WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 1175 - Glenn Close

Episode Date: November 16, 2020

It took Glenn Close a long time to open up about some aspects of her past. Shame was stubbornly in the way. But Glenn tells Marc she was able to discover her inner rebel and push past that shame, many years after she already became famous for finding the buried emotions of complicated characters. They talk about Glenn's personal evolution, as well as the mark she left with her performances in The Big Chill, Fatal Attraction, Sunset Boulevard, 101 Dalmatians, and her latest film Hillbilly Elegy.  Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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T's and C's apply. Lock the gates! All right, let's do this. How are you, what the fuckers? What the fucknicks? What the fucksters? What the fuckadelics? That could go on for a while.

Sometimes I don't know if I should keep doing it at all. But we're 10 years in, and it was sort of a carryover from something I did back in the day on morning sedition a community builder now it's a habit now it's a it's a signature thing and i do it i used to have lists of different wtf things and uh i i like doing it so i don't know who i'm talking to it's as if somebody just told me not to do it and that person just lives in my head that there was a moment there in the middle of doing it where i'm like i'm doing this again and then there was another voice that said why and then uh the out loud one said because it's what i do how's it going with you guys are you doing what you do are you holding on the bottom line is the last several months four years been hard for everybody.

You know, I was shattered with some personal experiences that I'm getting through, but it's in all this vulnerability and then all this isolation, you know, that, you know, you start to see, and I've talked about this a bit before that you kind of really get a sense of who you really are. And, you know, lately I've, I've really been wondering if I've changed at all, you know, cause I have this compulsion, my, you know, some of my old kind of desires to like, I want to smoke cigars. You know what I mean? I want to be out in the world. I just like, I can feel the discomfort and, you know, my sense of self is kind of fragmented. I find I'm insecure again. I'm obsessing about my weight and this and that. All the things that I used to do to try to somehow feel like I had control over my life by creating more aggravation for myself, more drama for myself, more reasons to beat myself up.

That was somehow grounding to me through most of my life. And I've identified that. But now with Lynn gone and the fact that I was starting to believe her, I was starting to believe her idea of me. I think a lot of it was true. I was trying to live in that. But now it's like it's a struggle. So the last few weeks have been sort of fraught with this idea that like, you in that but now it's like it's a struggle so the last few

weeks have been sort of fraught with this idea that like you know like well fuck it man look at me maybe and then maybe she was the best thing about me even though it had nothing to do with me you know maybe you know I felt better when I was with her and now look at me I'm just the same old fuck I always was. And then I just beat myself up for one reason or another. And by the way, I have Glenn Close on today. Glenn Close. It's one of the only things that saves me is like I get to talk to amazingly talented people and enjoy that and wonder in the face of it,

do I have any talent? Who am I? What am I? But you know Glenn Close from The Big Chill, Fatal Attraction, The Natural. Maybe some of you grew up watching her in 101 Dalmatians. She's currently in the new Netflix movie Hillbilly Elegy, which was quite a stunning performance on her part. And Amy Adams, right?

I get some of the Amy's mixed up. Yes. Amy Adams. So that was great to talk to her. But this meditation thing keeps popping up, you know. I've been doing therapy. I've been doing EMDR to try to process, you know, some of the trauma. Of late and of early.

I got to sit quietly. My therapist pointed out to me that negative thinking is sort of the animal thing. That we have to choose against it. I never thought about this way. A couple of things that happened in the last week. I talked to John Densmore from The Doors. Who in his book brought up something that I said to Gary Shanley or Gary Shanley said to me. And I'm paraphrasing. It was like people that can't sit in silence or with

silence are addicts. And when you strip it down to that degree, like, you know, to get to a place of silence, meditative silence, to not be able to do that is in and of itself addiction to where you like i have to i have to distract i have to distract i have to distract i have to get away from me but the interesting thing that my therapist brought up was that on an animal level we think negative and i'm like how is that even possible because we're conscious i mean negative is a is a value judgment and she said well as well, as an animal, all you're thinking is fight or flight. Really, that's your reaction to the world. You wake up and you're like, all right, here we go.

So that translated into human is like fear and assumptions and negative thoughts. And then the beating yourself up, that's a different choice. That comes from parenting or lack of parenting but like when does this stop when do i stop making mistakes when do i fully fucking learn from my experience i guess not until i live on a goddamn mountain by myself but that's where the possibility comes in why can i just sit with myself until i like myself but this meditation thing keeps coming up it kind of landed with me

when densmore took that section of my conversation with gary shanling which i don't remember and then the knowledge that lynn used to meditate twice a day and then my therapist saying that one of the things that it would enable you to do if you sit with yourself just learn how to do it to meditate is to accept yourself and maybe love yourself see that's the fucked up thing i don't want to get into complaining. We have bigger problems in the world. Everyone's got their own burden to carry and to bear. You know, try not to dump it on other people. But why can't I just sit fucking quietly and figure that out?

God damn it. I crave the peace of abandon. And it seems attainable. If I just sit. I know what's up intellectually. I know who I am in my heart. I know my liabilities. I know my shortcomings.

I know my sadness. My anger my shortcomings i know my sadness my anger i know all this stuff and i live with it and some days i accept it but i need to get to the next place Where I continue to honor myself through decisions. And also to maybe, and I don't even like to say it. To like myself, for fuck's sake. To love myself. See, I'm uncomfortable with even saying that. I'd rather just, you know, parade around on stage or on Instagram. With you folks doing the emotional wrestling, doing the back and forth, doing the song and dance, doing the jokes, doing the anger, doing the guitar, doing this, doing that, doing the eating, doing the cooking, stripping stripping the pans starting things not finishing things loose ends drama terrified eating god damn i gotta get straight with myself in terms of

God damn, I got to get straight with myself in terms of acceptance, self-love, moving through feelings. Like there is such a fucking strong part of me that is so fucking young inside, childish even, and so afraid of being hurt and that's and i've talked about this before in my act the monster i created to protect the child inside is hard to manage that's i mean i can't get any truther than that that's as truther as i can be and it exists got Got to bring it. I got to get that kid out. I got to get that kid. Okay. I got to show that kid some love and I got to fucking, you know, integrate and meditate.

Yeah. This is what I'm left with after phase one of the grieving process. I'm left with me again. God damn, I'm going to make a cake. So look, Glenn Close was surprising. Talk about things that I couldn't have imagined. It always is that way when I talk to people. I was happy to talk to her. I was thrilled to talk to her. I watched the movie Hillbilly Elegy. Obviously, I've seen many of her movies, but it was a very engaged conversation, and she looks great, and I love her, and I love talking to her. She's in this new movie, as I mentioned, Hillbilly Elegy. It's got her, Glenn Close, Amy Adams, directed by Ron Howard, streaming on Netflix now. And this is me talking to Glenn Clegg. stolen equipment, or an unhappy customer suing you. That's why you need insurance. Don't let the, I'm too small for this mindset,

hold you back from protecting yourself. Zensurance provides customized business insurance policies starting at just $19 per month. Visit Zensurance today to get a free quote. Zensurance, mind your business. Death is in our air. This year's most anticipated series, FX's Shogun, only onney plus we live and we die we control

nothing beyond that an epic saga based on the global best-selling novel by james clavelle to show your true heart just to risk your life will i die here you'll never leave japan alive fx's shogun a new original series streaming february 27th exclusively on Disney+. 18 plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. Hi, Glenn. Hi. How are you?

I'm fine. Are you still in Northern California? I am in, no, I'm in Southern California. Hi. How are you? I'm fine. Are you still in Northern California? I am in, no, I'm in Southern California. Ah. Where are you? I'm in Bozeman, Montana. Really? It's snowing right now.

Can you see? Oh, that's exciting. I know. It's great. Yeah, we don't have real winter down here. It's just crisp. We just, it's like this. Yeah, crisp for you is like 62 degrees.

Exactly, yeah. Crisp for us is minus nine. People are complaining about how cold it is, and it's, yeah, 63. You're a bunch of wusses down here. Look, I lived in New York for long enough. I'm from New Mexico. I know what snow is. Yeah.

I know what wind chill is. Boy, can New York get cold. Oh, my God. With the windchill? It's crazy. But it's such damp cold. Yeah, it's the worst. Here, it's different.

It's dry. It's not as bad. It's nice. It's pretty. You can still enjoy the cold in Montana? Yeah. How long have you been up there? Well, two members of my family, my two siblings have been here for 30 over 30 years

my parents used to live they're both gone now but they they were in wyoming so i was the only eastern holdout for my entire working life until last christmas where i when i moved here across the yard from my younger sister so So you live on the same compound? Oh, I wouldn't call it a compound. I'd call it two houses next to each other in the nice, fabulous, normal neighborhood. Oh, that's nice. Yeah, compound's a little menacing. Well, compound sounds a little she-she.

Yeah, or a little scary. Either way, she-she, scary. Oh, yeah, there are compounds out here that are scary i would think so yeah but wait so you're do you come from wyoming no we all come from connecticut so originally your parents just ended up in wyoming my parents were black sheep of if there were ever black sheep they we all i mean they both grew up basically in greenwich connecticut fancy greenwich connecticut like fancy green well now it's really different from when i was growing up but anyway what's going on there now i don't even know what's going on in greenwich well i

don't know either i have but you know all these huge huge, huge mansions all over the place with big, big walls and locked gates. And when I was little, we would, you know, get on our little feisty Shetland pony and ride all over the place. And, you know, it was a totally different place. It felt like the rolling hills of Connecticut or something. Yeah. I mean, it was like the back country. But your parents were black sheep? Like, wait, what was the situation there when you were growing up? I mean, we were lucky enough to

my grandfather had like 180 acres. Oh my God, that's like half the state. He was, yeah, so we could have been in iowa as far as we were concerned so that was was that a compound were you guys well i couldn't call a farm a compound it was a farm yeah it was like a farm legit farm so your grandfather was yeah chickens and oh he wasn't in the farming business but yes i call it a gentleman's farm. Yeah. So we ran wild.

And what was he a big landowner? What was he like a corporate wizard? Your grandfather? Was he from the Mayflower or something? Well, other ancestors weren't on the Mayflower, but close behind. No kidding. So old, old school America. Way old. True old school America. Way old. True Yankees.

I mean, around the world, like Yankees, Yankee is not necessarily, it can be pejorative. Right. No, no, I get it. But, you know, real, yeah, New Englanders. Blue Bloods? Yeah. All right. So that's, well, that's kind of deep, right?

I mean, to grow up in that. Well, it's fascinating. I want to know everything about my family. I know my grandmother on my dad's side was in the Galveston Flood. Oh, really? She was three years old. Yeah. Tell me about that.

What is the Galveston Flood? The Galveston Flood was still 8000 people died. It's still the biggest natural disaster to befall this country. Oh, my God. It was a storm surge that basically wiped out a huge section of Galveston. So you have so you have family from Texas. Yes. Texas, Virginia.

And that was your mom's side. My dad's side. Who's the one that goes back to in the Connecticut? Well, the closest do. There's a Thomas Close house on Lake Avenue in Greenwich. And that goes, you know, back to way back. Way back. Yeah.

Yeah. So would you say that they were like, you know, old school kind of waspy? You know, was it a. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You kind of lived in that world that's exciting that's what well that's where my that's why i say my parents are black sheep because we did not live in that world

they they quit like when they quit the country clubs you know we didn't have coming out parties none of that stuff they really went into that rebels what did they do? What was your dad's gig? My dad was a surgeon. Oh, mine too. He went into the war, and he flew with the Army Air Corps in France. Yeah. And when he came back, he went to Columbia, became a surgeon. What kind of surgeon?

General? General surgeon, yeah. Is your dad a general surgeon? Orthopedic. Hammers and saws. Yeah. Nothing like a good orthopedic surgeon. Yeah, my dad did everything.

I mean, it's a long story, and it could be the entire interview, It could be the entire interview. But they ended up going. He went to the Congo in 1960. Really? With a kind of a quasi-missionary type group. And he spoke fluent French. So when the mutiny broke out, he stayed, walked into the big hospital there and said, put me to work.

I'm a surgeon. All the Belgian surgeons were leaving. And he worked all through the mutiny and stayed for 16 years in the Congo. And then when they came back, they went to the least populated county in the least populated state, which was Sublet County, Wyoming. And he became the town doc for the last 25, 30 years of his life. Wow, that really is black sheep business there. So you lived in the Congo as a kid? I visited the Congo. Oh.

Yeah. Like, were you already, like, too old? No. I mean, why'd you have to? That's a story. They got into a kind of a cult group, so. Christian cult? This is why we don't want to go there too

far well it's supposed to be for everybody you know if you were a good muslim be a good muslim good christian be a good christian but basically it was like any other cult um you know well we're gonna remake the world and no kidding so so you were you were old enough to say i'm not fucking doing that no i wasn't sorry i didn't get out of it till i was 22 and i went to college of william and mary as a freshman when i was 22 years old did you was it a revelation that you realized it was a cult or were you like this is bullshit i got to get out thank on him I'm in college. Yeah, it was that. That, oh. I mean, a revelation? I mean, it was always incredibly controlling. So I didn't know what I didn't know.

I just knew I was ignorant. Oh, okay. So you didn't know you were in a cult, per se. It was just the life. Well, I felt very separate and different from people. What was the name of the thing? Moral Rearmament. Wow. Or MRA. Yeah. Wow. I used to not be able to talk about it at all because I felt like there was a stamp on my forehead. Right. And I felt a sense of terrible shame. It wasn't my fault.

Right. But I felt terrible shame. And it really wrecked havoc with me and my siblings. But that's why it's a long story. But it's devastating to go through something like that when you're that young. It's a mind fuck. And it's real psychological abuse, basically. Oh, for sure. You don't know who you are. Oh, that was the whole thing huh oh the leader yes it was on on your birthday you got ushered into this room and

you were given a little this is when we we stayed in switzerland for tuesday getting this little embroidered swiss hanky it was like you were being given you know gold gold. It was just, when you think about it, it was so ridiculous. And, you know, I remember as a little girl, we would all have to have work shifts. And if you got lucky enough to work in Uncle Frank's dining room, and you could set the table. And, of course, it had all the best crystal and silverware. But you felt like you were the anointed.

I mean, it's the same kind of thing that is such, so powerful. Yeah. But it's interesting, isn't it, that your parents, like being, you know, sophisticated, educated people, kind of like got involved with that. Isn't that kind of? Well, you know, know i mean this is everything come you know the thing was my mom didn't finish high school they got married when they were 18 dad yeah dad had a very very good uh he went to saint paul's then he went to uh harvard but left to go to into the war and then he yeah he had he had a great education and he also had as a child had been

sent as at seven years old which i think had huge repercussions uh on how he looked at the world but went um to uh english schools uh-huh oh okay from seven on you know so he was like he was away from his parents and just left to the institution yes yes his dad was the director of the american hospital in paris so that's why he spoke french i mean so it's fascinating it's really fascinating and i've been able to come to terms with it but it's still uh i have trigger points yeah i that i've become aware of and i just know what kind of people to stay away from it's not healthy healthy for me. Well, I mean, you got to be like, there's, there's an element of that now that I think everybody tries to reckon with, like, you know, how do these people allow themselves to be brain fucked by bullshit and, and commit to it wholeheartedly? It's hard to understand.

Yeah. I mean, I, I, it comes down to, I think my parents, when they got sucked into it, were at a very, very fragile point in their marriage. Oh. You know, and I think they, and they, this group fills in where you are the weakest. It tells you, come in, come in, come in and believe what we believe and we're going to change the world. Higher purpose. we're going to change the world is i i i higher purpose i mean it's we i think as humans we're very susceptible to that because we're born into this world we you know we don't know where we come from we don't know where we're going we don't know who we are yeah and uh depending on what kind of

what kind of strength you get from your parents upbringing yeah yeah yeah that um it's what it's how you can deal with it yeah that's the vulnerability keep your individuality and i and i do think because i i i i was born i you know i'm very much an introvert i've been into my head since i was little so i had a very active imaginative life so i don't think they ever got me there but but they got me in a lot of other ways they I mean the group not my my parents but your parents obviously needed some parental like they're they're they had a gap in their parent their how they were parented because that you need that yes yes my dad was I mean basically he was abandoned when he sent a seven-year-old. Right.

You know, it's crazy. So you were able to hide your inner life and you knew that instinctively that that was sort of yours. Well, I, you know, you become a little soldier. Yes, I do. My other of my siblings, one, my younger sister was too young, but my other siblings had their own ways of rebelling. But I don't have the DNA of a rebel. No? Well, I guess I've learned it in a way.

You more retreat inward? I'm more of a pleaser. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. How can I help? How can I help you with your tumbling? Who do you want me to be? Who do you want me to be? I can be that. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. How can I help? How can I help you with your... Yeah, yeah. With your... Who do you want me to be?

Who do you want me to be? I can be that. Yeah, yeah. I can be that. Oh, I'm not that. Oh, I better get out of here. But every single relationship I've ever had. And that's your love life.

Who do you want me to be? Oh, I can be that. Oh, I'm not that. Help! Yeah. And hopefully as you get older, it takes less time to realize you're not that. Shall I say

I had a very empty toolbox? And I haven't always known the right tools to put in it, but you know, I think I'm at a pretty good place in my life now. You seem good. You're exuding goodness.

I feel great. Yeah. I mean, it's like, because I was thinking, well, that explains a lot about, because one thing that I was thinking about before I talked to you is the range of women that you have been in acting. It's kind of crazy that if you really think about all the all the different real extreme types of emotional monsters that you've brought monsters some of them only one monster that's cruella okay otherwise but you have to bring humanity to people that are that

are are troubled and and mentally you know fragile and and fragile and have real shortcomings that can be dangerous. But also, you know, you're really good with the maternal force as well somehow. So I don't know where you tap into all that, but I guess this needing to be somebody for somebody must have informed the early acting intent you know i really don't know because uh i think that love of pretending yeah which it is when you're a child right in the early days you know before i was seven we had this wonderful landscape to run on and imagine on and uh we did we and i was you know i was a cowboy uh i was but i had and we played with puppets and we it was you know it was of course you you lived you you you made up things you made up your games and who you were and where your hideout was and who are the good guys, who are the bad guys.

You know, it was all, and it's all so healthy for a child to do that. And I loved fairy tales. Yeah. I loved even the scary ones. I'd pretend I was a little match girl, you know. Oh, yeah. The more kind of forlorn, the better.

Yeah. more the more kind of forlorn the better yeah and uh and then so i loved uh the great classic disney animated features um especially especially snow white especially snow white because the the um the wicked witch was so incredibly scary and then i got to play a wicked witch later as Cruella a Disney witch right yeah a Disney witch it was it was so so wonderful so I think uh I think long it was in my this is I'm doing what I should be doing well I mean it in in that moment that you were able to go to uh to college to to sort of escape from you know get out from under this weird shameful life that you had to hide like i imagine that at that moment like that that must have just been mind-blowing because i mean what we that was in the 70s too right so a lot of shit was happening

1970 so like the world was blowing up expressively you know you know the youth uh of the country was kind of like music art you know taking but i'd been i had been caught in a very uh conservative group right so it must have been just explosive when you got what college did you go to yeah william and mary virginia it was incredible what was the campus like there were people were the were the young people really were they pushing the envelope at williams it wasn't like berkeley or anything like that. But that kind of spread around a bit. Yeah, yeah, it did.

But I wasn't kind of, you know, I just lived in the theater department. I have to say, I wish now I'd been more of a rebel. But you have to remember, that kind of rebellion was not built into me. Right, right. You know, so I had to find it. It took me a long time long long long time but what i had was uh the theater and so that was what you studied there the whole time you were there i oh i studied it's my i studied theater i well i majored in theater and anthropology

anthropology of course it was like literally it was like water in the desert. I had a brilliant bio 101 professor. I thought, oh, God. You know, he'd talk about mitochondria, and that's all we know. I'd say, no, no, I want to know more. But I never could have gotten through chemistry. I couldn't either. It was like everything, philosophy, French drama, English literature, poetry, which still kind of intimidates me in a way. There's always the girl who got the meaning, kind of.

Yeah, but they're liars. No, it was fantastic. And I had a little dog, Penny, with me. And she trot behind me. In college? Yeah. You brought a dog to college? Yeah.

That's nice. I did. I've never heard that before. Yeah. In fact, my senior year at Phi Beta Kappa Hall, Phi Beta Kappa started at William & Mary. And so their theater was a beautiful, beautiful, I think they're now redoing it, I hope they, but anyway, their theater was where I lived

and Penny was very much a part there. And I heard my senior year, or after I graduated, that the faculty had gotten together and realized that there were too many dogs in the building and they'd better lay down the law and not allow dogs. And then there was this pause and then somebody said, but what about Penny? The important dog. Yeah, so they didn't, I don't think they changed the realtor after we were gone.

That's wild. I never saw any dogs in college. I guess it was a different time. There should be more dogs in college. I think so. People would not be in their high anxiety and stress. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, my little soulmate's just lying right over there. You got one? Yes, I have Pip. Sir Pippin of Beanfield, yes. Ah, yes. What kind of dog is Pip? Pip is a Havanesevanese oh i don't even know what that looks like oh he's well they're like havanese can come in all different colors but he happens he was born gray and black and now he's white old no he's five oh that's not bad no he just turned white i don. I don't know. It just happened? Yeah.

So when you get there, like when you start doing the theater work, you had had no real experience with it before? Well, in the group, they had theater, but they used to spread the message and they'd go on these with their theater things but the um like what like a like a singing group yeah well no it was an actual they had plays in the cult yeah huh and there was a children's play called bungle in the jungle and i played a tiger once and i loved it probably too much you weren't supposed to like it too much for the wrong reasons you just like the acting yeah because oh i feel this is cool i'm a tiger it's not cool it's not about you and what these were morality things these there were i can't believe i'm laughing at it what it's good to laugh at message they had a message the plays oh everything had a message recruitment tool yeah wow you were in i'm so surprised i never heard of the cult so that was your that was your

early theater experience and other than that you didn't do any acting in high school or anything uh let's see well i went to rosemary hall from 10th grade on because we came back to this country. And I was in the drama club. And they had an outdoor amphitheater. It was fabulous. It was all girls school. But every spring semester, we'd put on a Shakespeare play in the amphitheater. And my senior year, I was Romeo. And I was in Emergence of Venice and blah, blah, blah. Yes. Did you get Shakespeare early on? I mean, did it resonate with of Venice and blah, blah, blah. Yes. Did you get Shakespeare early on? I mean, did it resonate with you? No.

Yeah, I've had a very hard time with it, and I'm getting better, but I don't practice or anything. Well, if the actor understands it, the audience will understand it, I think. It's just a matter of staying in the saddle. I mean, it's hard to listen to. It goes on a while.

You know what I mean? It's like, oh,. It goes on a while. You know what I mean? It's like, oh, my God, are they still talking about, what are they talking about now? I checked out for three seconds. I don't know what's happening. That's my problem. So in terms of training, was there someone that changed your life down there in college? Dr. Howard Scammon. He was the head of the theater department.

He was an absolute drunk. scamming he was the head of the theater department he was an absolute drunk uh and yeah i i did my first audition you know literally when i it was for 12th night and uh i was in chemistry class or i was in bio but we were in the lab and Scammer had this kind of wild white hair, and he wore flip-flops and kind of Sherbert-colored Bermuda shorts. And he peeked around the corner of the door of the lab and asked if I was there. And I went up to him, and he said, I just want to make sure you know you have a call back. So I got the role of Olivia in Twelfth Night. And the great thing about going to a liberal arts school is that kids from all over the campus would participate in the theater project. So you couldn't really be a snob about what you were doing.

You just tried to do it. Right. I really like that. Yeah. There were kids who were there just because of the love of it, not because they wanted to make it their career. And yet there was a triumvirate at that time that were they could have been in any acting school at you know and howard scammon boy he was a what a character he was but he sensed my the seriousness of my intent and he he was, I remember he said to me, as I became kind of, you know, a star at that time of maybe the William & Mary Theater,

though you would have a starring role, then you'd have a very, very secondary role. And then you would do, you do costumes and then you do, you know, sets. Yeah, real theater community stuff. do you know sets uh yeah real theater community stuff but i remember him saying to me at one point just remember you're a big fish in a very little pond so he was a real champion of yours he was he he helped me we did out they did at that time at williamsburg this outdoor called the Common Glory, this outdoor drama about the revolution. But it was a true amphitheater.

It didn't have any sound system. And he helped me really with my vocal range, my speaking vocal range. With my vocal range, my speaking vocal range. And then my senior year, I've always loved Katharine Hepburn because she's from Connecticut. Her father was a doctor. And I've always felt, unlike me, that she knew who she was. You know, I've always had great respect for her. She was kind of one of a kind, you know. Right, right. And original and didn't apologize for it.

And I was doing sets, painting sets, you know, it was my senior year. And for some reason, there was a television on and it was that Dick Cavett, the only time that Hepburn was on television, being interviewed by Dick Cavett and something in me, I mean, I always knew what I wanted, but at that moment it says, okay, if that's what you want to do, do it. And the next day I went to Dr. Skammon's offices and I had heard about the URTA, TCG, national auditions. And I said, would you, you know, nominate me, write this letter, it was the last day the letter could be postmarked for that year. And I, I went to those series of auditions, and I got my first job in New York. Well, the finals for the, I the the college theaters okay and then the urta was all the non-profit theaters okay it was that must so it must have been theater communications

i know that's a non-profit the tcg and i got my job with a phoenix theater that had three shows on broadway and so my my first job was understudying on Broadway. Really? That's amazing. I like how the voice that told you to do it was actually Katharine Hepburn's voice, I think. Yes, but also before Nike, or was it Just Do It?

It was that. He used to stand in the wings and just say, just do it? It was that. He used to stand in the wings and just say, just do it. That was, what's his name? The teacher? Howard Scammon. Yeah.

And after I graduated, I think the year after I graduated, and oh my God, I was going into the old Helen Hayes Theater for my first job. Was it like 46th Street or something? Where was it? I think it was 46th Street. It was right across from the Lunt Fontaine.

And I saw somebody hovering in the shadows. And I looked over and I said, Dr. Scammon? And I went up to him, what are you doing here? And he said, I just wanted to see you walk into the stage door. Oh, that's sweet. Yeah, and then he sent me a little Jefferson cup, you know, with the name of the play, and sent me very, very, he'd come to see everything I did, and then he would send me really, really notes oh really yeah so this is throughout your early career so you're

doing broadway yeah he's still and he's coming to see everything and really so he really was like invested and and seemed to love you he did and i loved him and was that was that really the foundation of your the training that sort of built you still oh absolutely i never went to acting school that was all of it huh what about singing where'd you learn how to sing so beautifully um i don't want to go into that. Really? That's the... No, it's just... Well... Well, I've always sung.

I've always sung. But I went into a group that was an offshoot of MRA. It was in that group for five years. And it was from that... Up With People. You see? You're a real trooper. I feel, I'm feeling a little bolus of shame, even as I say that, because I have fucking

no control. So I find myself on the girl's bus, you know, for five years with up with people. I didn't know that was involved. Everyone knew up with people, but not everyone knew that cult. Yeah, it came out of MRA. No kidding. Yeah. How do we get you past this shame you have to let go of the shame glenn well i've just talked about it so but that up with people oh my god uh yeah i just had a dream the other day and this is really cool i just had a dream and uh i was in a, I had been doing a show, but it was really radical.

And it was supposed to be up with people. And then I was exhausted. I was in kind of a room. It's almost like a hospital room. And the leader came in with a little henchman and said, said oh we're gonna go to europe i said i'm not going this isn't what i do in my dream and i've gone through a whole series of of dreams and it was so much fun because in my dream i just was are you kidding

i'm not gonna go there it's not what i do you actually understand i'm in my dream and then and then the guy had all these buttons his little henchman had all these buttons on his suit i said what are those buttons he said they're from a bergermeister and the thing was in switzerland they get these people to come like these vips and they'd be bergermeisters of you know some town in germany or holland or something and they'd suck up to them and everything and and so the fact that in my dream all these years later the word bergermeister would come up was hilarious yeah it's hilarious and in your dream you're standing up for yourself yeah i'm just saying i and it wasn't even i wasn't even angry i've had i've had raging dreams where you wake up

gasping for air but this was just are you kidding me yeah i'm over it go away you know go it was it was found it was it was based in switzerland that's where the the big one of the bases was switzerland they had they had a fancy place in was Switzerland. They had a fancy place in London. They had a fancy place in LA. But it's gone now. They had a big house in Tucson. You know what? I don't even want to look it up.

I don't know where it is, what it is. Okay. I don't want to know about either of those organizations. I think you've freed yourself and you've done very well. And you are an authentic, uh voice and person yes okay so we can move on yes well you know it's it's interesting because i do i've always felt that that art comes out of somewhere a sense of outrage art that really touches people and i certainly have had my bolus of outrage and i and i think it's it's pretty much a a bottomless ocean sure yeah i

know you i can always tell i used to do a bit about that there's a a river of rage it runs through me always but it's your choice to put the kayak in the water yeah yeah but it's always there yeah it's always there for a resource you know well luckily mine's a more maybe a little bit of a calmer thing than a than a river on a kayak but yeah maybe just a gently paddling down the uh the rage creek maybe a lake because the ocean is a little bit scary just a it's a new england lake with you know an angry lake. So I guess like going to New York at that point must have been sort of jarring and exciting. Oh, it was thrilling. I still was living at my grandmother's house in Greenwich.

I'd take the train in and get lost. I was absolutely, I said, I do not, I'm going to take, you know, I want to be a New Yorker. I'm going to take buses or subways and i'd end out on queens you know and we were rehearsing down on west 18th street and and i you know it's like if you can make it here you can make it anywhere well that's fucking true just getting someplace just getting someplace what was the first show that was the first play con greaves love for love a restoration comedy. That was 70, 1974. So you were really a theater actress for a decade before you did movies, almost.

I think it's about six years. Huh. Because my first movie was Garp. Well, who were the people that were like, you must have showed up in New York and there must have been the whole community was like, who's this kid? What is, who's this woman anyway well I mean that's a whole other story because uh Hal Prince was the director of that love for love and um I understudied a beautiful English actor Mary and my best friend still Mary Beth Hurt thank God I never had to go on for her. But the Saturday before our opening, Hal was at the theater at the stage door when I came in and he took me out on the stage and

he said, I'm thinking of letting Miss Yor go. I'll make up my decision during this matinee. So stay in your dressing room after the show. Everybody always disperses immediately. Go get dinner between the shows. Stay in your dressing room. And if you hear of the intercom that you're wanted down in costumes, I've made my decision and I want you to go on tonight. What? Yeah.

And did it happen? It did. And I'd never had an understudy rehearsal. But the thing was, I was so green and hungry that I went to every single rehearsal. And for some ungodly reason, I knew the lines because usually you start understudy rehearsals after the show is opened. So I went on that night. They tried to find everybody and bring them back so we could at least walk through it.

Yeah. And I got through it and I finished the run for that show. And then it was not true repertory in that we did one play after another. But then I went up to the fourth floor dressing room again and became an understudy. So it was tragedy for Mary Yor, who died the following spring. And in a profession that can be so cruel and so demanding, it was a profound lesson at the very beginning of my career. She wrote me a note. She had the grace to write me a note before I went on that night.

And in that note, she said, be brave and strong. She didn't say break a leg or, you know, she said, be brave and strong. That's heavy. Yeah. What a gift she gave me. Yeah. To be that giving in that moment, Jesus. Unbelievable. And that was the beginning of it. That was my first step onto a professional stage.

And then you went on to do so much. I mean, like, who were the, like, who was the, like, I don't know theater as well as I know movies, but I have to assume at that time in the 70s, you were seeing that world of those actors who were around. Yeah. The people you worked with. All of us. John Lithgow.

Yeah. Oh, God. Practically everybody in the Big Chill. Kevin Kline. Yeah. All of us started. Meryl, Mary Beth, Mandy Patinkin. Yeah.

Who else? Everybody. That's such an amazing bunch of talented people. Yeah. Pretty fierce. Really? I mean, like, it's sort of, I don't, I think there's plenty of talented people, you know, now, obviously. But I think it was, it seems, everything seems different. you know, now, obviously, but I think it was, it seems, everything seems different.

There seems to be a crew of people that happened in the 70s that have some sort of integrity that kind of lasts and they're very defining, but that just might be because of my age. Maybe there's plenty of 20 year olds that are along the same trajectory. I think starting out in theater gives you a depth of craft that you do not get if you start out in television or film. Yeah. I think there are great film actors. They're great, you know. But stage, it's you and the audience and your craft. And there's nobody to edit you.

There's nobody, you know. You got one shot. Yeah. Every show. Every line. Eight times a week. You know, you're. You got one shot. Yeah. Every show. Every line. Eight times a week. A different audience every night. And you go out and deliver.

And there's a discipline about it. You get there on time. You do your own makeup unless it's complicated. And, you know, if you don't, you get docked. You know, it's a discipline that has followed me these 46 years into how I approach everything still. And when you say craft, because like when I watched, like I watched Hillbilly Elegy the other night, and it's a tricky movie. You know, it's heavy and it's, you know, kind of gut wrenching. It's a tricky movie.

It's heavy and it's kind of gut-wrenching. The characters, the character you played and Amy Adams played, unapologetic and broken, but human. Did you assess that material and say, if we don't embody these characters as humans, you're on the edge of something that could be kind of farcical yes because i mean you think of hillbilly which i now i say mountain you know the mountain people we just most of us know them as a cliche right right and uh Right, right. And which is tragic. It is tragic. Ron's whole purpose in wanting to tell this story, and he will say that he had, you know, his people come from Oklahoma. So it was, he called his grandmother mamaw. You know, it was this whole mindset that a lot of us have just said oh that's a cliche or and then we read about the opioid crisis and the poverty and the violence so yes i think the intent was

always to take that family and make them human and you know all great drama comes from family. And I think in creating something very specific, people then can make broader. They can relate it to themselves. You know, and that's rare that you see those type of people on screen that whether or not played as rubes or or or villains of some bad people. Yeah. Yeah. So, well, that well, that definitely worked good. Yeah. I mean, it was an amazing process. He also, you know, we're we were very grateful, first of all, for Ron and all his prep, which is always just astounding. But also Netflix gave us the money to have at least three weeks of preparation. So we had time to go to Middleton, Ohio and meet the family, see the neighborhood, you know, long before we went there to shoot. And we met whatever members of the family that were there. shoot. And we met whatever members of the family that were there. Each of us had individual time with them to ask whatever questions we thought were pertinent to the characters we were playing.

And it was, it just was invaluable, invaluable. And we all felt it was incredibly brave for that family, especially Bev, and, you know amy speaks to this to agree to be to let strangers come in and uh play you i mean um and to play you as honestly as they could especially what she went through i mean that's what she went through um yeah so and I think because of the humanity of the story that you will find empathy in places that you might not have had it before. Well, I think that was that that was the amazing thing about how everybody played it and how it was put together. You know, like your character, you know, from the outset, you know, you go through this arc with her, where you're like, oh, what a nice old lady. And then you're like, well, what? Maybe not, you know? And then, you know, you get into that familial darkness that drives, I think,

what you said before, drama, you know, that there are these, there's a history there, that, you know, becomes revealed as the story unfolds. But yet, no one, you do not, you know, the empathy stays. They're no real villains, people. It's just the gray of human life, you know? I mean, Mamaw had made terrible mistakes with her children. Right. And she didn't want her children, she didn't want to see it with her children. Right. And she didn't want her children,

she didn't want to see it happen to JD. Right. And there's that, you know, there's that one scene, I don't want to spoil anything, where, you know, there's a flashback of, you know, what your character went through as a young. And it was like, oh my God. It's like one of those moments where like,

I could see how, I didn't read the book, but that was, you know, you're like that, that was the window into the darkness, right? Yeah. Deeply traumatizing for children. But also, I mean, the truth is that she and Papaw lived, you know. Separately. They lived separately because he played around and she never dated or saw anyone else.

But he would come and spend most of his days at her house and then walk home. In real life. In real life, yeah. Well, it must be amazing that the process of actually having to spend time. I don't know how many times you did that. You didn't have the same opportunity with Von Bulow. But to actually get involved with the family that you're portraying.

That was the opposite with that woman I played, Sunny Von Bulow, and it was tragic for me. Understandably, everybody around her who knew her, and she was still alive up at Presbyterian, New York Presbyterian, wouldn't talk to me. And I understand that, but I do feel that if they had, I would have played her. It would have helped me. It would have only made my performance better. Sure.

But yeah. better. Sure. But to have this opportunity to sort of integrate and engage and spend time with and understand the emotional history of the characters you're playing, that must be more pressure in a way. I mean, it must be relieving in some way, but more pressure. Yeah. My questions were, how did she sit? How did kind of she change the atmosphere and she walked into a room? You know, how did she hold a cigarette? She always used her hands a lot. If anything, I kind of tamped it down a bit because she was truly larger than life. And she was a much bigger woman than I am, taller. But it was incredibly helpful to just to try to, to in my imagination put all those elements together

and those are decisions you have to make and you know based on your own imagination without this resource like if you're creating if you're playing a fictional person those are the questions you still ask yourself well that's the fun of it yeah yeah yeah yeah the fun of it is all these you know kind of like minute to minute choices around behavior and and engagement and a lot of times i mean i remember when when i worked with mike nichols he said it's really really good to have secrets and so a lot of times you can have something in your head that's a secret that might be uh in your in your either imagination or for example something like house of the Spirits,

where I had an entire book as a Bible in a supporting role. You can have things that might trigger a certain behavior or reaction that the audience might not totally understand, but it will make it intriguing. Interesting. Yeah. So I think secrets are good so that's and that's sort of different than backstory really like because that's a character choice like you know somebody can hand you a backstory for a character like you know or have a couple of pages of where they come from but to actually choose something that defines them emotionally that

is unspoken. Yeah. From that backstory, there might be certain events. You do a lot of backstory work when you do the stuff? Usually, usually, if I feel a need. When I did Damages, it was the first time I couldn't, they wouldn't allow me to do a back sword because they didn't know where they were going to go. That was very disconcerting, you know, because I'd done beginning, middle and end. And this was, you know, you sign up for six

years, we did five years. But it was a great exercise. And in those writers, they were so brilliant. And I just, they were so brilliant. And I just said, just promise me that you don't compromise me in a way that I'm not aware of. That you don't have me say something and then turn it around three episodes from now. And they never did. Oh, that's good. Yeah. You're able to trust them.

But over time, it just struck me because i remember seeing like when i was younger i remember seeing garp and i remember like in when you when you mentioned that you had a sort of uh when you were a kid you were you you were sort of an inner kid and you entertained yourself with your imagination robin was a lot like that we got to be got to be real friends in that movie that lasted our whole lives. Not friends that called each other every week, but friends that, you know, time fell away whenever I saw him. It was that kind of experience. Well, it feels like he had sort of a similar, you know, a little bit similar background in that.

He was the only child, though. Yeah. You know, but he did come from a big world. Yeah, but he was very much an introvert yeah for sure yeah yeah i i knew him from comedy and i interviewed him years ago and he was a very shy guy really yeah in a strange way i remember early on the i think when we were shooting up in millbrook the school stuff and some a whole bunch of press had come up and uh robin was doing press and uh he they you know they asked me to go with him just for kind of moral support i guess right and he was before

he was really uh quiet and it was one of the most amazing demonstrations of brilliance as he, when he spoke in front of the press, he brought in, you know, what was happening in the world. I mean, all this stuff. And I'd never seen him read a newspaper. And it was just, it was just astoundingly brilliant.

And he came off and he looked at me and said, was that okay? Yeah. astoundingly brilliant and he came off and he and he looked at me said was that okay yeah that's sweet and then like and then like i remember like the the big the big chill had a profound effect on me somehow i'm you know i'm younger but like that movie seemed to you're younger are you saying you're younger than me? I'm not. I'm the tail end of the boomer thing. Oh, okay. I'm getting to where everyone is younger than me. I'm 57.

I wasn't... Wow! Yeah. I want to be 57. But that movie was like, for better or for worse, it kind of set the ball rolling of what a boomer was. Yeah. It defined the spectrum. spectrum yeah and somehow or another

i don't know what it's like working with kasdan oh great but he really kind of he's you like you that was to me there was i guess it was really the second film where you played a maternal force yes yes absolutely idea of that character right yeah i wanted to play mary k's part right yeah you know uh but i i remember he had a reading in new york he brought some of us in it was really kind of oh my god my my dear brilliant friend mary beth had been married to bill hurt and he had she had just broken up with kevin klein and she read the mary she i mean it Oh, my God. My dear, brilliant friend Mary Beth had been married to Bill Hurd, and she had just broken up with Kevin Kline. And she read the Mary – I mean, it was just fraught.

She read the part that Mary Kay Place got. So it was all – but after that reading, I went up to Larry and said, I bet you want me to play, you know. And he said, yeah. I said, okay. you want me to play. You know, and he said, yeah. I said, okay. But you held it down. You were the angel. And I dated Kevin.

We all dated Kevin. Yeah. But it was great because we stayed friends. And so it was no big deal. You know, it was great. But Hurt, so are you friends with Hurt still, William? I am when I see him. That kind of friendship.

But I don't have the kind of friendship that you know you you uh call yeah regularly i am my best friend is mary beth still right so you can't yeah oh no i can i mean you know everything's water under the bridge at this point for me i mean i she didn't do anything to me no but i mean but they don't get along like mary beth and william oh i think they'd probably be civil but no oh i just can't like i that whole crew where he just seems everybody seems so defined and he seems so intense i was kind of obsessed he was intense i mean he was incredibly intense he and larry had big fights because I mean, he was incredibly intense.

He and Larry had big fights because he wanted to stay looking like that drug dealer the whole movie. Because everybody said how beautiful he was. And he was beautiful. And he didn't want, I guess, he didn't want to clean up. He thought it would be, you know. So, but of course, Larry won the fight. But no, it was so. Larry made all of us be there all the time even if we weren't working so we really and we had an a month of rehearsal at the columbia uh uh lot

before we did the movie wow so you guys really knew each other that mean that was the intent yeah other than those of us who had dated each other we uh and there was a there was an epilogue which we actually shot first down in atlanta where we were all in the seedy old house that we shared on the campus of that of the university of michigan right but it was hard with the costumes right didn't no well i mean you could say jeff you know, Jeff Goldblum all of a sudden had a huge beard and because it was time when everybody was demonstrating. And wasn't Costner in it at that time? Was Kevin Costner in it? Kevin Costner was alive. Right. You saw him alive.

He played the dead guy. He's the dead guy. He's the body in the beginning of the movie. But I think it was because it opened up such a can of worms. It was actually the part that made me weep when I read the script because it was a bunch of young friends who did not know what life was going to do to them, didn't know that one of them was going to die by suicide. I always find that dynamic incredibly moving but i think it just it just opened up too much um and no one's ever seen it the flashback the flashback yeah it's

interesting that that he's kept it under wraps i guess yeah he's got it i know he listens to this show i'm sure he does i know his kids oh he's the best He's just the best. He and Meg, his wife. Yeah. They're wonderful people. Yeah. So, well, obviously we can't go through every movie, but it seems like I love The Natural. That's one of my, I watch it whenever I can.

I don't know what it is about that movie, but I just love it. I love it. And apparently I didn't realize that in the end, he doesn't, in the book, he doesn't in the book he he doesn't it's not the way he strikes out yeah the difference between movies and and how you can't have robert redford strike out but also like he wouldn't have been a hit if he striked out right but i think levinson was, like he was very like, you know, whatever that book was meant to imply that this was a hero story from the beginning,

you know, all the way. It's a Homeric tale. Yeah. So he's, he's got to hit the home run. I mean, and what a moment,

isn't it fabulous? Yeah. And the music, it's just, it's a beautiful score. Oh, it's amazing. But,

but like fatal attraction was this huge cultural phenomenon where you defined the worst fear of every man alive. And it holds, I think. Yeah, it does hold. Yeah. You set the standard. Yeah, I'm proud of that. Yeah, you are proud, right? It's hard to get dates, but I'm proud of that yeah you are hard to get dates but i'm proud of fatal attraction it was a hell of a role i mean how do you like how do you make that person a

human what was what was oh my god that probably is the the movie that i did most research on really because i wanted to know if her behavior was possible. So I took that script to two different psychiatrists. And it's amazing to me now that they didn't come up with any kind of mental illness or disorder. But who I was playing from that research is somebody who had been incested at a very early age by her father right there's all that weirdness about her father um and when that happens many people like that I mean a disturbing percentage will will do themselves in. This is a woman who was made into a sex object before she even knew what sex was. Right.

And then made to feel it was secret and shameful. So you have, she was incapable of having a healthy relationship. And it triggered um i mean that character was used by dr gooderson who has since passed but he was kind of the the guru of of um borderline personality just for research he said that that was he used that as an extreme case a A borderline. Which could be triggered by what she had gone through in the past. So I was playing a woman who was damaged and in need of help and acting out. For her, the last thing Alex Forrest was to me was a villain. Right. Because it's interesting. you don't get her backstory

at all you don't you know you don't really understand uh there was also a scene that was cut out where you where she discovered she was actually pregnant um she's not just so um it uh in that scene where i'm turning the light on and off, that was we put that in to remind people that I was a human being in pain that should have been at the end of the movie. Anyway, I could talk about it forever. culturally it gets framed as like you know what a monster where you know because and i i didn't feel that because it was played you know so uh emotionally um truthfully that you know she clearly had problems but you know she was not uh at fault in in in her emotional reaction to being used she originally she she killed herself which how should how that the original ending was that she's she cut her throat to to madame butterfly and uh god which

is the opera that that they didn't shoot the scene where she's at the opera and you see madame butterfly doing the same thing but anyway um it would not have been a hit if they hadn't changed the ending for changing the ending for me was was a profound i mean it was profoundly difficult i learned from that the importance the what the audience you know was crying for was catharsis was closure and they wanted me like like dangerous liaisons they wanted me, like Dangerous Liaisons, they wanted her punished more than, you know, it's like women who overkill because if he's alive, they'll kill her. You know, it's just, people needed the assurance that order would be restored. And that's what the new ending gave that movie. And I think that's why it was a big hit.

Yeah. So you're not thrilled with that decision but you understand it. I understand it. I fought against it for like three weeks. I said I won't do that to my character. And then finally I was told

as one would it won't be released if we don't do another ending. They had done a lot of testing. It's kind of a famous incident, the testing and all that. Well, so when you dig in with like, you know, with Maumau,

how do you say it? Mammaw. Mammaw Vance. Or somebody like, you know, Alex Forrest and stuff. Then, like, you know, you played Norma Desmond a lot. Yeah. Now, I guess there's a a wealth of of weird narcissistic sadness there that you have to play honestly as well right yeah oh my god is she i hope to do her

on film and then i can put her to rest um but yes there i've always been attracted to people who believe in something that we know as an audience is unattainable. Right. But that belief, even if it's, I don't want to use crazy, there's something noble about it. There's something noble about it. There's something noble about it. And also people, what's really, really important is that those characters don't have any self-pity. There is nothing I hate more than self-pity. Yeah.

That's what I loved about the story of Albert Nobbs, this woman who had this dream of finding love and having a little chocolate shop. And we knew it would never happen, but her belief makes her heartbreaking. And same with Norma Desmond. Her belief finally does her in for all many different reasons. But there's something incredibly moving about someone clinging to something that feeds them, but we know that it's going

to be a disaster. Yeah, we're seeing it on the presidential level right now. Oh my God. Whoa. Not as heartbreaking, that story. But also, I read that you played Blanche once. I did, in London. So that's another character.

What's it for you? What was at the core of that character? Oh, my God. PTSD. I really, I thought, again, I'm fascinated by the why of behavior. So why was she like that? She famously has that incredible speech about watching her lover or her fiancé,

who was obviously gay, kill himself in front of her, put a gun to his head and blow his head off. There's no trauma worse than that. was never ptsd if it's not treated becomes only worse and people relive it in their minds so she heard the music that was playing she hears here's the gunshot and she starts self-medicating to me that was blanche dubois wow that makes sense yeah it made sense to me and so then is it just fun to play cruella is that like do you oh my god or do you infuse her with some sort of psychology yeah well the

first of all i was so thrilled to be a disney witch after after my childhood. And knowing in fairy tales, kids have to know that there's darkness and that they can be rescued from it or that they can rescue themselves from it. So I think the great fairy tales have children who don't have a mother because a mother would not let it happen. And who get, there's a wicked witch or a wicked stepmother.

The fathers are usually not there or like very distant, like Bambi or oblivious, like the little mermaid. I mean, there's all these. So the father's not there. And and it's about rescuing the children and bringing them back into the light. And that was, again, you know, instead of children, it was the Dalmatian puppies. And I learned very early on that the meaner she was, the funnier she was. Yeah. Yeah. So you could really push it.

And the original movie has, I mean, there's the original movie that says, you know, poison them, drown them, poison them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Drown them, poison them. They didn't step back from doing the same stuff like that. So what happens now? We're all just waiting in COVID land. Do you have work coming up? I do.

And I've been here since February, so I'm kind of freaking out. Are you going to go, like, I just took a little part in a movie, and I'm scared about the COVID thing. I know, especially now. It's worse than ever. And now they're like, but they've got protocols and stuff. But I'm still like, oh, fuck. I don't know.

What does that mean? It's like, until they get a test that they can just we can just do at home every morning how do we you know i know i don't know well are you gonna go work uh i'm supposed to go down to la for 10 days to do a voice for an animated feature and that's doable yeah just go into the bunker i did i yeah you can that's good that can be pretty clean and then uh yeah but you have to stay somewhere um and anyway then on the new year i'm supposed to go well actually i have to i miss christmas because i've got to go quarantine in canada to do a movie uh two weeks in canada to quarantine weeks absolute absolute vanc Yeah. That's a great city.

Yeah, it is. It's pretty. It's like a toy city. It looks like it was all built from the same box. It's kind of human. I've done two movies there quite a while ago, but I really liked it. It'll be interesting to go back. I'm sure it's very different.

Yeah, I'd like to live there, I think. Yeah. Well. we'll see but anyway it's they're very very strict and they that's good i'm taking my pit my dog and this movie's gonna open up soon and and people are gonna be blown away great job thank you on uh the hillbilly elegy it was nice talkinggy. It was nice talking to you. It's nice talking to you. Did we cover things that you wanted to cover? We kind of got hung up in the beginning. No, no, I think so. Like, you know, usually like, you know, I like the beginning. I think it's, you know, it's interesting to when you have the time to do a long conversation that some you kind of get a sense of how somebody either was put together or put themselves together.

So, you know, it all kind of reveals something. And we covered a few movies, a few plays, your craft, your childhood, your shame, your sensitivity to psychological motivations, to behavior, your physical choices, Montana, the presidency, working during COVID. We've covered a lot. This is the first time I actually have come out

with a political opinion because I was very disillusioned by Clinton. And I really worked for the first Clinton campaign and then I thought you know but this you can't you I could not be silent

you know so I mean it's crazy it's toxic horrendous it's like embarrassing and it's sort it's, it's toxic, horrendous. It's like embarrassing. And it's sort of like, how is this fucking real? The thing is that they've, you know, the Republicans have laid for years this groundwork. Of course.

And they don't care about him. He's just like, he's like, it's all about power. Staying in power. And also he's running like they're like, let him do his dance, and we can chip away at the agenda we've been diligently working on for 30 years. And let the crown. Our founding fathers, and many people feel that the Constitution, I mean, it's amazing that we still are adhering to it,

but it's an old piece of writing. But our founding fathers never banked on professional politicians. That's true. You know, you're supposed to go serve and go home, and now there are these men that have to stay in power, and to stay in power they have to get money, and to get money they get corrupted. Well, they knew that there would be problems with people who were politicians.

Yeah, and they tried to think of, you know. I talked to uh heidi shrek have you seen that show yes and i listened to that i listened to that whole thing it was really great right great yeah did you watch this did you go what an interesting woman yeah have you watched the show i went to her show on broadway oh you did yeah like it was so funny because I was so like, you know, the title of it was sort of alienating to me. It was. I know when you said in the beginning, I don't want to go to school. Yeah, no, it's true. But it was really great. It was great. I think this is an opportunity, hopefully, for all of us to sort of somehow not be complacent and have a deeper engagement with the civic process. I really agree.

And what I really hope is that we should have some sort of truth and reconciliation. We have to, now that the scab has been pulled off of the racism in this country, we have to address it. And I think at that point, we will make our Constitution real for everyone. Right now, it's not. And it never has been because of the racism that has existed from the beginning.

That was my, you know, we're taught that. It didn't really sink in until the whole Black Lives Matter movement, which is to validate ourselves and to finally kind of grow up in a way. That sounds presumptuous to even say that, but I mean that. To really have our Constitution truthful and meaningful and strong and important for all of us, we have to deal with these issues.

And hopefully we'll have the enlightened leadership that will help us do that. Yeah, and we can hold back authoritarianism for a while. Yeah. You know, we're not a pretty species in huge groups. We're just not. That can go, yes.

It could be an audience or it could be a political movement. We can turn on a dime. That's for sure. Have a good rest of the day. You too. It's nice to meet you and congratulations on your podcast. It's fascinating.

Thank you for doing it know i really believe in in uh you're where you're coming from and i'm very honored to have talked to you thank you thank you so much and i feel the same way very honored to talk to you i've been a huge fan for a long time thanks a lot see you later glenn bye-bye Wasn't that surprising and good? Wow. Hillbilly Elegy with Glenn Close and Amy Adams is on Netflix now, directed by Ron Howard, who we talked to. Go listen to that.

That was an enlightening talk. All right, so let's... I'm playing clean, man. I'm playing clean Thank you. Boomer lives. Monkey lives. La Fonda lives. I miss you, Lynn Shelton. ¶¶ ¶¶ Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence.

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