Feb. 7, 2025

Episode 621 - NICHOLAS MEYER Talks Star Trek and Beyond

Episode 621 - NICHOLAS MEYER Talks Star Trek and Beyond

In this engaging conversation, Nicholas Meyer, the director of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, shares insights into the film's development, including its original title, the musical score, and the artistic choices made during production. He discusses...

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Special GuestsStar Trek Movies

In this engaging conversation, Nicholas Meyer, the director of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, shares insights into the film's development, including its original title, the musical score, and the artistic choices made during production. He discusses the challenges of working with iconic actors like Ricardo Montalban and Christopher Plummer, and reflects on the themes of the film, including its nautical influences and the importance of artistic interpretation. He also touches on his other works, including Time After Time and his views on Sherlock Holmes adaptations. In this engaging conversation he reflects on his journey from aspiring actor to acclaimed director and writer, sharing insights on the importance of storytelling, the nuances of directing, and the collaborative nature of filmmaking. He discusses his experiences in the film industry, particularly with Star Trek, and emphasizes the significance of language and character development in creating impactful narratives. In this engaging conversation, shares insights from his illustrious career in filmmaking, discussing the importance of collaboration on set, the creative intersections of Sherlock Holmes and Star Trek, and the inspiration behind his novel 'The 7% Solution'. He reflects on the profound impact of his television film 'The Day After', which sparked national conversations about nuclear war, and concludes with thoughts on legacy and the meaning of storytelling in his life.

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All right, good evening, Trekies and trek Is around the globe.

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Welcome to Trek Talk and episode six hundred and twenty one.

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We're here with Nicholas Myers. Welcome to the show.

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Nicholas, thank you.

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It's my pleasure.

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Okay, we finally got this going down right.

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Uh.

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Sorry for the delay, guys. We had a lot of

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technical difficulties for some unknown reason, but I think we

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got them worked out and I appreciate your patience. So

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I didn't get a chance to finish your entire book unfortunately,

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so I only have a couple of questions that I

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wanted to ask from as far as I got into

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the book.

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And one of the things.

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I wanted to talk about was what was the original

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title for Star Trek two. The Wrath of Con wasn't

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the Wrath of Con.

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It was the Undiscovered Country.

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Yeah, so how come, how come you where did you

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come from? Wrath of Con? And why did you have

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to change it?

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I was informed in the middle of shooting by my assistant.

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She came onto the set and said, I think they're

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changing the name of the movie, and I said, no,

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they're not. I'm very busy, and she came back a

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day or so later, and she said, yes, it's now

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going to be called the Vengeance of Cohn. And I said,

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where the fuck did that come from? And she said, well,

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there's some gentleman in New York named Mancuso. And I said,

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get him on the phone. So I said, mister Mancuso,

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this is mister Meyer. I am the writer director of

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Star Trek two. How do you do mister Meyer? I said, well,

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I'm a little troubled. Do I understand that you intend

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changing the name of the film and he said yes,

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I do. I said have you read the script? He

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said no, I have not. I said have you seen

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any of the dailies? He said no I have not.

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I said, don't you think it just displays a certain

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lack of savoir faire. Let us say that you haven't

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read the script, you haven't seen the dailies, and you

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haven't had the courtesy to contact me, as the creator

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of the film, to tell me what you intend. The

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little pause. He said, mister Meyer, I'm only trying to

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do what's best for your movie. I said, uh huh.

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Are you aware that Paramount Pictures does a lot of

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business via the Indiana Jones franchise with George Lucas. Yes,

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of course I know that. I said, are you aware

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that George Lucas's new movie is called The Revenge of

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the Jedi. Do you think he's going to take very

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kindly to your calling this film the Vengeance of con

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He said, I assure you, mister Meyer, that will not

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be a problem. Ah. And so three days later or

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whatever it was, I've got Barry Dillery yelling at me,

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who the fuck knows what wrath is? Who knows what wrath?

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Where do they get the fuck wrath from? Take that off? Please?

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And take that off? Please, um get rid of that, please,

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thank you. And so we wound up being called the

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Wrath of Khn. And that's the way it was until

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we got to Star Trek six, when mister Mancuso wasn't

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there and I was briefly the eight hundred pound Gorilla,

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and I said, the name of this movie is going

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to be Star Trek six, The Undiscovered Country. And they said, oh,

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that title seems a little soft, and I said, you

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think it's soft, but you've already had the last, the Final,

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the ultimate. To that, I said, nobody's paying attention to

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these superlatives. Anymore. Why don't you throw them a curveball

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once in a while. I'll make a deal with you. You

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come up with a better title and we'll go with it.

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So then this is on Star Trek six. We had

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a meeting there about thirty people in this room, and

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they all had computer sheets, you know, the ones that

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have the little punch holes in them, and they're pulling

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out Yeah, and so the computer is generating names. This

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is early AI, and so it would take a word

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like tomorrow or escape or bridge, and it would make

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up titles saying bridge to tomorrow, escape from yesterday. And

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they were like sheets of these, and I would I said, okay, well,

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let's let's start with a bridge to tomorrow. Anybody anybody

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like bridge? No, okay, what about a bridge from yesterday?

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Any anybody? Guy says, all right, you win. And that's

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how it became The Undiscovered.

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That's an excellent story, you know. I was also interested

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in the music for Star Trek to the Wrath of

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con I think that the soundtrack is is really one

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of the high points of the movie. How did you

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settle on, James Horner?

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Well, remember Star Trek two was being made for Peanuts

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and you know the first movie Star Trek. The motion

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picture was I think forty five million dollars in nineteen

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seventy nine. That was insane. So we were given I

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think eleven point two to do this movie, and so

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we definitely could not afford Jerry Goldsmith or anybody of

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that ILK, assuming there was anybody of that ILK. So

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we were auditioning and people would send in cassette tapes

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and I would listen, and I think Joe Silver, Joe Silver,

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I think that was his name. I may be getting

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it wrong, which embarrasses me because I shouldn't. But he

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was head of music at Paramount, and one of the

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tapes he sent me was James Horner and said listen

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to this, and I thought this was very interesting. And

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then I met James and we got along quite well,

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and I said, this is a movie about the Navy,

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and I want it to look like the Navy. I

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want it to sound like the Navy, and if I

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had my way, we would use w C LA maire

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was I'm on ocean, and he said, okay, I hear you.

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And then he came back to my house a couple

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of days later and we sat down at my piano

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and he started playing, and I said, okay, you're it.

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Some great stuff for sure. I also I learned something.

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Would you talk a little bit about the SETI eels

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that Ricardo Maltalbon has crawling around in the dirt there,

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and about his glove.

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You know, it's my opinion that the artist, in this

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case me should not be approached as if he were

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the answer. At a book of math equations at the back,

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somebody said to Margot Fontaine. They said, oh, Dame Margo,

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I so enjoyed you're dancing. Tell me what were you

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doing up there? And she had the presence of mind

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to say, I'm very sorry, but I explained what I

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was doing while I was doing it. If you didn't understand,

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then I failed. And so I think perhaps understandably reluctant

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to offer a sort of explanations and take people behind

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the scene. When people say to me why does Cohn

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wear only one glove? I always turn the question around

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and say, why do you think he wears only one glove?

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So I have to sort of decline those kind of explanations.

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They're always a little reductive, don't you find Like when

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a magician explains the magic trick once you learn how

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Houdini walked through a brick wall. And when Holmes explains

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to Watson how he did X Y, and Watson is

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always disappointed. He says, Oh, for a moment, I thought

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you had done something really clever, and I want you

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to keep thinking that I've done something really clever. And

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I worry that if I explain how I did it

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or why I did it, it loses some of its magic.

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It's mystery, so I have to tread carefully in answering

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your questions. I guess you have to make up your

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own mind about why he wears one glove. I think

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that art that asks questions is much more interesting than

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art that answers that. And I think artists lose all

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proprietary authority or control over their work when it's finished.

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We're like people who put messages in bottles, and you

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throw the bottle out there and hope that somebody's going

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to find it, pop the quirk and go oh wow,

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this is interesting or not. But for sure you're not

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going to be there when they're doing that, looking over

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their shoulder and helping to decipher some water logged handwriting

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and say no, that's not gum, that's gun, and so forth.

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People will have to make of movies and works of

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art and books and pieces of music what it means

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to them and how they view it. It's the difference

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in a way between also a reviewer and a critic.

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A reviewer tells you whether you should spend your time

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and your money to go see the movie, and a critic,

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as Anatole Franz said, narrates the adventures of his soul

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among masterpieces. Take out the word masterpiece, if you get

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the idea. So it's more me wanting to hear what

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you guys have to say, and I'll take you know.

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I'll answer some questions, but I can't answer the white glove.

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And as you may have noticed, I'm very long winded.

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I thought he was a fan of Michael Jackson, but

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that was just, that was just.

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I have to tell you that I barely know who

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Michael Jackson is.

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Okay, fair enough, I uh.

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Now, you had the pleasure of working with the late

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Ricardo Mantlebon and also Christopher Plumber. I wanted to ask

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you what is the difference between both of their two styles,

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their acting styles, and and how he directed them differently.

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Well, that's a very interesting that. That's a very interesting question.

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I'll sort of take them in order. Montlbond and and

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Plumber has had a lot in common. They were both

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extremely gifted performers, gifted actors, and very very both of

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them very very professional. The major difference, I think is

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that Ricardo, as he said to me very early on

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in he was the only actor I didn't get to

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rehearse with. I rehearsed with everybody, but he was busy

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doing his television series so he could never come to rehearsals.

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I met him for lunch. I gave him a copy

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of Moby Dick. I said, read this, this is it.

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And then I didn't see him till opening shooting day,

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when he showed up in full drag, ready to go,

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and we were doing the scene in the Botany Bay

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Cargo Bays where Con explains who he is and why

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he's so pissed off. I think it was a six

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page scene. And with my theater background, and I only

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directed one other movie, I thought, movies they're always telling

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actors to start and stop and pick it up and cut,

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and there's quite as interruptist. I said, why not let

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the guy work up a full head of steam and

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I'll dance the camera around him while he's doing his soliloquy,

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his grievance speech. So there were like twenty one marks

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for him to hit, and he came. He had memorized everything,

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total pro and he hit every single mark first time out.

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But he screamed the whole thing at the top of

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his lungs. It was just we were all standing there

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from the sound guy clutching his headphones, and nobody sort

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of knew what to do, including Missus Meyer's oldest who

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just thought, Wow, this guy has more credits than anybody

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in the world. What happens if I try to tell

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him something? Does he punched me out because that's his

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real chest. And so I said, so let's let's now

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they're going to do the lighting that they know the scene,

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and let's let's talk a little bit about interpretation in

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your in your dressing room. And he's very he's very courteous.

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He was very almost courtly, And I think actors always

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want to know the same thing about the director. Is

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he crazy? Am I going to live? Do I have

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to pull the boat over the mountain. So we didn't

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know each other. We just had that one lunch and

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he was courtly and it's hard to get past that.

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So we're sitting down in his dressing room and I said,

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you know, taking my life in my hands. Laurence Olivier

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once said that an actor should never show an audience

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as top, because once you show an audience your top,

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they know you've got no place else to go. And

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he leaned back and he looked at me and he said, oh,

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so you're gonna direct me. He said, that's good. I

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need direction. He says, I don't know what I'm doing

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up there. And he then proceeded to tell me all

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these stories about directors who would say things like Ricardo, Lana,

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make it a good scene, or give it balls Ricardo.

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You know, it's these things are not typically helpful. So

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the other thing I said to him, I said, okay,

227
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you know, I said, always let them. I think you've

228
00:16:07.600 --> 00:16:15.519
got something in reserve. You've got secrets and crazy people.

229
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They don't have to shout because you just never know

230
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what they're going to do next. And everybody he jumped

231
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and he said okay. And so this was the beginning

232
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of our collaboration, which was intense, and it was the

233
00:16:36.720 --> 00:16:40.159
only time I've ever known what it felt like to

234
00:16:40.360 --> 00:16:45.159
drive a Maserati because you didn't have to press the

235
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pedal very hard. And he was very smart, so he

236
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could finish your sentences and he would check on every

237
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little thing. Nick, what if I raise the eyebrow here?

238
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And I'd say, yeah, not not too high. And so

239
00:17:02.720 --> 00:17:09.039
that was our collaboration, and he was really eager for

240
00:17:09.160 --> 00:17:09.640
all of that.

241
00:17:11.400 --> 00:17:20.319
Plumber was way more sophisticated in many ways as a

242
00:17:20.359 --> 00:17:22.200
theater actor because he had done a lot.

243
00:17:22.519 --> 00:17:25.559
Ricardo had been on stage. He'd done Man and Superman

244
00:17:25.720 --> 00:17:28.720
or Don Juan in Hell on Broadway. He'd done Jamaica

245
00:17:28.799 --> 00:17:35.359
with Lena Horran, Lena Horne the musical. But but Christopher

246
00:17:35.799 --> 00:17:43.599
was really a stage actor and he movies were hard

247
00:17:43.640 --> 00:17:47.160
put to contain him, so he really always had to

248
00:17:47.240 --> 00:17:48.680
muzzle down, down, down.

249
00:17:49.079 --> 00:17:49.960
He was also.

250
00:17:49.880 --> 00:17:54.519
Extremely smart and very knowledgeable, and if you didn't know

251
00:17:54.559 --> 00:18:02.160
your stuff, he could sniff it out real fast. But

252
00:18:02.359 --> 00:18:06.039
we did have some time together to get to know

253
00:18:06.119 --> 00:18:09.880
one another, and he was very musical. We had music

254
00:18:10.480 --> 00:18:17.319
in common. We were both orchestra holics, so we kind

255
00:18:17.319 --> 00:18:22.519
of bonded over the music stuff and also of my

256
00:18:24.079 --> 00:18:30.160
love of Shakespeare. Unlike Kahan. I wrote the part of

257
00:18:30.440 --> 00:18:37.880
Chang specifically for Christopher Plummer because there was a Chandos

258
00:18:37.920 --> 00:18:44.240
CD which I own, of Plumber doing speeches from Henry

259
00:18:44.240 --> 00:18:49.640
the Fifth to the score written by William Walton for

260
00:18:49.720 --> 00:18:54.000
the Olivier movie. And I would just love to lie

261
00:18:54.000 --> 00:18:57.160
in the dark and listen to once more onto the

262
00:18:57.160 --> 00:19:00.960
Breach or close up the wall with our English while

263
00:19:01.000 --> 00:19:04.559
this music was played. So when I wrote Chang, I

264
00:19:04.640 --> 00:19:08.160
wrote it so that he was a Shakespeare spouting Klingon,

265
00:19:08.880 --> 00:19:12.079
so I could just turn him on every day we

266
00:19:12.079 --> 00:19:15.480
were in the studio and say do that thing about

267
00:19:15.519 --> 00:19:20.720
cry Havoc and let's slip the dogs of war. And

268
00:19:21.680 --> 00:19:27.920
so he, I think, was amused by this whole idea,

269
00:19:28.480 --> 00:19:33.359
and particularly my favorite line in the movie, you have

270
00:19:33.519 --> 00:19:37.960
never experienced Shakespeare until you've heard him in the original Klingon.

271
00:19:39.759 --> 00:19:45.240
This was a steal. Everything I do is a steal,

272
00:19:45.519 --> 00:19:49.160
because all art is a history of cut and paste,

273
00:19:50.079 --> 00:19:53.839
and in this case, it was the Nazis who used

274
00:19:53.880 --> 00:19:57.839
to say you've never heard Shakespeare until you've heard him

275
00:19:57.880 --> 00:20:02.039
its original German. So I just changed it to cling on.

276
00:20:04.880 --> 00:20:08.200
I love that, I love that one more question and

277
00:20:08.200 --> 00:20:11.000
then I'll I'll let Paul jump in here. I wanted

278
00:20:11.039 --> 00:20:12.599
to know how involved were you in the.

279
00:20:12.599 --> 00:20:15.279
Director's cut A Star Trek to the Wrath of kN.

280
00:20:16.559 --> 00:20:18.119
What do you mean how involved?

281
00:20:19.319 --> 00:20:22.559
Well, there's a there's a couple of scenes that were

282
00:20:22.599 --> 00:20:25.519
added that weren't in the original theatrical cut.

283
00:20:25.599 --> 00:20:28.720
But it's all the director's cut for a reason, isn't it.

284
00:20:29.799 --> 00:20:32.279
Yeah, that's what I wanted. That's was my question. Why

285
00:20:32.279 --> 00:20:35.200
were those Why were those things not in the original movie?

286
00:20:35.279 --> 00:20:42.160
Versus question that's a different question. I lost some battles

287
00:20:42.200 --> 00:20:46.680
before the feature version of the film was released, and

288
00:20:48.279 --> 00:20:51.440
you know stupid, I mean the studio. It's like a

289
00:20:51.599 --> 00:20:56.640
dog peeing to markets territory. Somebody has to. You know,

290
00:20:56.720 --> 00:20:58.680
I'm sort of stepping on my own joke. But you

291
00:20:58.720 --> 00:21:02.079
know that the the director and the producer or in

292
00:21:02.160 --> 00:21:06.640
the commissary and they're having soup and the writer says,

293
00:21:07.319 --> 00:21:10.839
this soup is perfect, and the director says, you know what,

294
00:21:10.880 --> 00:21:13.519
you're right, it is perfect. Maybe you could use a

295
00:21:13.559 --> 00:21:18.119
little salt, but otherwise perfect. And the producer says, boys,

296
00:21:18.599 --> 00:21:20.759
you're both right, but I know how to make it

297
00:21:20.799 --> 00:21:23.359
even better. And that's why I'm going to piss in it.

298
00:21:26.240 --> 00:21:29.119
So that's what the studio felt its need to do.

299
00:21:29.839 --> 00:21:36.440
So they didn't want Midshipman Peter Preston to be identified

300
00:21:36.839 --> 00:21:41.240
as Scotti's nephew, and a couple of other really stupid,

301
00:21:41.440 --> 00:21:46.000
ridiculous things that I lost in the feature version of

302
00:21:46.039 --> 00:21:48.960
the movie. But once it was time to do the

303
00:21:49.960 --> 00:21:53.359
VHS tape or whatever we were doing back then, then

304
00:21:53.400 --> 00:21:55.519
they didn't give a shit, and so I got to

305
00:21:55.559 --> 00:21:57.480
put back in the things that I lost.

306
00:22:01.000 --> 00:22:01.519
Excellent.

307
00:22:01.920 --> 00:22:03.799
All right, Well, thank you so much. I'm going to

308
00:22:04.119 --> 00:22:07.759
unmute Paul and I'm gonna let Paul in here.

309
00:22:09.200 --> 00:22:11.359
Thank you, Uncle Jim, Thank you, mister Meyer.

310
00:22:11.480 --> 00:22:11.759
Wow.

311
00:22:11.920 --> 00:22:15.440
I cannot believe I am actually having the great pleasure

312
00:22:15.599 --> 00:22:17.880
of getting a chance to ask you some questions here

313
00:22:17.880 --> 00:22:21.000
at tonight. I've already learned two really important things tonight.

314
00:22:21.039 --> 00:22:23.400
One is that you have the patience of a saint

315
00:22:24.000 --> 00:22:27.480
when it comes to technology, apparently, and you're funny as hell.

316
00:22:27.720 --> 00:22:30.720
So we're learning so much tonight.

317
00:22:31.599 --> 00:22:38.000
Funny is held from Star Trek four you guys like Italian.

318
00:22:38.880 --> 00:22:42.759
Who does it?

319
00:22:42.759 --> 00:22:43.240
It's great.

320
00:22:43.440 --> 00:22:46.160
What a crowd pleasing gift you have, my friend, I'm

321
00:22:46.160 --> 00:22:49.640
telling you, I want to ask a Wrath of con question,

322
00:22:49.799 --> 00:22:51.680
just to build on some of Jim's stuff here a

323
00:22:51.720 --> 00:22:55.200
little bit. And you'd mentioned Moby Dick and that this

324
00:22:55.359 --> 00:22:58.400
was a movie about the navy, right, and I mean

325
00:22:59.319 --> 00:23:01.799
coming on the heat of the motion picture, right, which

326
00:23:01.839 --> 00:23:06.720
is kind of stately and slower and a little you know, ponderous, right,

327
00:23:07.119 --> 00:23:09.920
Wrath of Khan is just so it's such an energetic

328
00:23:10.000 --> 00:23:13.720
departure after that, right, it's so nautical. It's uh, it's

329
00:23:13.759 --> 00:23:15.480
Horatio Hornblower.

330
00:23:15.240 --> 00:23:18.079
Nautical and nautical but nice as my late.

331
00:23:18.160 --> 00:23:22.359
Yeah, and I'm just I'm just that whole seafaring motif.

332
00:23:23.079 --> 00:23:24.839
It just rocks so hard. And can you tell us

333
00:23:24.880 --> 00:23:27.119
just a little bit how that how you got that

334
00:23:27.240 --> 00:23:29.799
involved in there, and how you were able to bring

335
00:23:29.839 --> 00:23:32.440
that vitality and that that nautical vibe to it.

336
00:23:33.119 --> 00:23:36.640
Well, the fact that it works is a is its

337
00:23:36.680 --> 00:23:41.079
own miracle. I say, movies are like souflets. They either

338
00:23:41.200 --> 00:23:43.440
rise or they don't, and you never know by what

339
00:23:43.519 --> 00:23:48.359
alchemical miracle these things happened. I had never seen Star Trek.

340
00:23:49.359 --> 00:23:52.920
And by the way, for this and other you know answers,

341
00:23:53.319 --> 00:23:57.880
I refer your listeners, uh to my Star Trek memoir,

342
00:23:58.160 --> 00:24:00.880
which is called The View from the Bridge, Memories of

343
00:24:00.920 --> 00:24:05.200
Star Trek and a Life in Hollywood. It's available, as

344
00:24:05.240 --> 00:24:08.160
they say, and may tell you a lot more than

345
00:24:08.200 --> 00:24:12.559
we're going to get to in this conversation. I had

346
00:24:12.559 --> 00:24:14.400
never seen Star Trek when.

347
00:24:14.279 --> 00:24:14.680
It was on.

348
00:24:15.519 --> 00:24:18.680
Originally it didn't make any sense to me. I just

349
00:24:18.839 --> 00:24:21.559
zipped by it. The guy with pointy years and everybody

350
00:24:22.000 --> 00:24:25.640
running around in doctor Denton's or whatever they were. I

351
00:24:25.680 --> 00:24:29.920
think it's fair to say that I missed everything worthwhile

352
00:24:30.079 --> 00:24:36.039
and important and meaningful about that series. I missed the

353
00:24:36.160 --> 00:24:40.960
fact that it was an international interracial cast. I missed

354
00:24:40.960 --> 00:24:44.000
the fact that women were in positions of power. I

355
00:24:44.160 --> 00:24:46.720
missed what it was trying to do, that there was

356
00:24:46.759 --> 00:24:50.880
a rush. I just missed everything because because it looked

357
00:24:50.960 --> 00:24:53.559
cheesy to me, and so I didn't stay with it.

358
00:24:55.599 --> 00:25:01.400
So when I met Harve Bennett, who was the producer

359
00:25:02.039 --> 00:25:06.599
of the movie, who'd been hired to make a second

360
00:25:06.640 --> 00:25:12.119
Star Trek movie for Peanuts compared to the first Star

361
00:25:12.200 --> 00:25:15.319
Trek movie. And Harve had done a lot of television.

362
00:25:16.000 --> 00:25:18.319
He had done the Mod Squad, he'd done Six Million

363
00:25:18.319 --> 00:25:20.640
Dollar Man, and I think he did the first mini series.

364
00:25:20.839 --> 00:25:22.440
I mean, I know he did it. I don't know

365
00:25:22.480 --> 00:25:26.519
if it was the first rich Man, poor Man and

366
00:25:26.799 --> 00:25:32.440
Harve had. He was really, really smart. He had been

367
00:25:32.440 --> 00:25:36.440
a quiz kid, if you remember the old radio program,

368
00:25:36.880 --> 00:25:42.079
and so neither of us knew anything about Star Trek.

369
00:25:42.480 --> 00:25:43.000
But he.

370
00:25:45.079 --> 00:25:48.880
Watched all seventy nine episodes or however many episodes. He

371
00:25:49.000 --> 00:25:52.319
watched every one of them, and he showed me a

372
00:25:52.359 --> 00:25:56.359
few of them, and he showed me the movie. And

373
00:25:56.599 --> 00:25:59.880
I don't knock the movie because somebody had to go

374
00:26:01.279 --> 00:26:06.759
boldly where nobody had gone before. And by the way,

375
00:26:06.799 --> 00:26:09.680
it should be go boldly. You don't put the modifier

376
00:26:09.759 --> 00:26:18.599
before the because I am a pedant anyway, So I

377
00:26:18.720 --> 00:26:22.559
kept thinking, well, there's something that I like about this,

378
00:26:22.720 --> 00:26:26.279
but I knowing me, it took me forever to figure

379
00:26:26.359 --> 00:26:30.240
it out because I think slow, I read slow. If

380
00:26:30.279 --> 00:26:34.119
I talk fast, you can be sure I'm playing a tape. Anyway,

381
00:26:35.240 --> 00:26:37.960
I thought about it for a while and I thought, oh, yeah,

382
00:26:38.000 --> 00:26:40.880
this is like those books that I read when I

383
00:26:40.960 --> 00:26:46.920
was thirteen years old about Captain Horatio Hornblower. Is this

384
00:26:47.000 --> 00:26:49.119
is the Navy in outer space. I know how to

385
00:26:49.160 --> 00:26:53.440
do that. And so that was my way in, and

386
00:26:54.519 --> 00:26:59.519
it was enough to enable me to make the movie.

387
00:26:59.759 --> 00:27:05.920
It was not enough ultimately for me to ultimately understand

388
00:27:05.960 --> 00:27:10.799
and come to terms with what Star Trek is. I

389
00:27:10.880 --> 00:27:13.640
was still a little dense in that department, So it

390
00:27:13.680 --> 00:27:18.960
took me another thirty years sort of figure out why

391
00:27:19.839 --> 00:27:24.880
what this was trying to do. But you know, there

392
00:27:24.920 --> 00:27:28.240
are some things that you can you can do without

393
00:27:28.400 --> 00:27:32.240
knowing how you do them or what makes it right.

394
00:27:32.920 --> 00:27:38.359
So Hornblower was enough to sort of get me through it.

395
00:27:38.519 --> 00:27:40.640
And then I just when I was writing it, I

396
00:27:40.759 --> 00:27:44.039
just had to make the people real. So I just

397
00:27:44.079 --> 00:27:47.359
had to think, you're on deck, you're in the hole,

398
00:27:47.480 --> 00:27:51.319
you're in the galley, you're behind the guns. Who are

399
00:27:51.359 --> 00:27:54.519
these people? And the fact that as I was writing it,

400
00:27:56.000 --> 00:28:01.559
I realized certain themes began to emerge. And the themes

401
00:28:01.640 --> 00:28:08.519
were old age because they were all getting old friendship,

402
00:28:13.480 --> 00:28:26.880
implacable hatred and death. Old age friendship, implacable hatred and death, death.

403
00:28:27.079 --> 00:28:30.920
And then I was kind of writing into those notions

404
00:28:31.000 --> 00:28:34.480
and building on those. It's like a brass rubbing. You know,

405
00:28:34.559 --> 00:28:39.279
there's things starts to get clear as you're working.

406
00:28:42.559 --> 00:28:45.039
Well. I have had the pleasure a couple of times

407
00:28:45.079 --> 00:28:47.599
in the last like five years of seeing Wrath of

408
00:28:47.680 --> 00:28:50.559
Khan in the theater again, and I just have to

409
00:28:50.599 --> 00:28:55.200
say that it's a picture that the audiences still just

410
00:28:55.200 --> 00:28:58.960
go nuts for it. I mean, admittedly, probably we'll see it.

411
00:28:58.960 --> 00:29:01.839
It's it's pactful of fans because people are so excited that, oh,

412
00:29:01.839 --> 00:29:03.279
it's back in the theater again. I gotta go, I

413
00:29:03.319 --> 00:29:05.559
gotta see it. And so there's a you know, a

414
00:29:05.720 --> 00:29:10.119
very dedicated, loyal audience. But regardless, they just love it

415
00:29:10.160 --> 00:29:12.640
and eat it up. And it is such a treat

416
00:29:12.759 --> 00:29:15.480
just to watch the audience. You know, they're rising up

417
00:29:15.480 --> 00:29:17.759
out of their seats through most of Act three. It's

418
00:29:17.839 --> 00:29:21.160
just incredible. I mean, they're really entertained. That picture delivers

419
00:29:21.200 --> 00:29:23.599
like nuts. And it blows my mind to hear that

420
00:29:23.640 --> 00:29:25.960
you made it for eleven million dollars back then. That's

421
00:29:26.039 --> 00:29:28.960
just that's crazy. That is crazy.

422
00:29:29.559 --> 00:29:32.839
Well, I have a theory, and my theory is that

423
00:29:33.039 --> 00:29:36.920
art thrives on restrictions. Not only is all art a

424
00:29:37.039 --> 00:29:39.799
history of cut and paste. Let's face it, the Odyssey

425
00:29:40.440 --> 00:29:45.759
is a fanboy sequel to The Ill, right, do I lie?

426
00:29:47.079 --> 00:29:51.839
I think you might have a good point the fanboy

427
00:29:51.960 --> 00:29:58.799
sequel to the Odyssey, and didn't Mozart reorchestrate Messiah handle,

428
00:30:00.839 --> 00:30:03.920
you add, you cut, you paste, you make it different,

429
00:30:03.920 --> 00:30:08.000
and you build on what goes before. The words of

430
00:30:08.039 --> 00:30:13.519
the Catholic Mass are pretty standard. There's the Annua's Day,

431
00:30:13.720 --> 00:30:17.759
there's the resurrect there's the Hosanna it but people write

432
00:30:17.759 --> 00:30:21.079
different music to it. And you would never confuse the

433
00:30:21.160 --> 00:30:24.440
heightened Mass in time of war with the Verity Requiem

434
00:30:25.240 --> 00:30:28.880
or the Mozart Carnation Mass. But saw the same words.

435
00:30:30.279 --> 00:30:33.119
Or to put it another way, the shape of the

436
00:30:33.160 --> 00:30:36.920
bottle is the same. But those of us who toil

437
00:30:37.000 --> 00:30:40.200
in star trek get to pour our own vintage into that.

438
00:30:41.200 --> 00:30:43.680
The bottle's got to have Kirk, it's got to have McCoy,

439
00:30:43.720 --> 00:30:46.400
it's got to have the other one, you know, and

440
00:30:46.440 --> 00:30:49.359
so on and you But the but the shape is

441
00:30:49.400 --> 00:30:53.359
sort of Gene Roddenberry's shape, what he came up with,

442
00:30:55.079 --> 00:30:58.400
and within that you cut and paste and fool around.

443
00:31:00.039 --> 00:31:01.359
M hm so.

444
00:31:02.240 --> 00:31:05.079
And the the other thing, I will say, Apropos. We've

445
00:31:05.119 --> 00:31:07.880
we've talked about it as a soufla. There's a soufle

446
00:31:08.079 --> 00:31:12.799
that that rose rose big who knew, not me, not

447
00:31:12.880 --> 00:31:15.200
anybody else, by the way, until it was sort of

448
00:31:15.200 --> 00:31:19.599
in the finishing stages, and then people started, We're getting

449
00:31:19.759 --> 00:31:23.759
all excited, and you know, do we really want Spock

450
00:31:23.880 --> 00:31:29.279
to die? Even Leonard was having second thoughts about well,

451
00:31:29.359 --> 00:31:35.119
when you I sort of strayed from my my point,

452
00:31:35.160 --> 00:31:36.440
whatever that point was.

453
00:31:36.400 --> 00:31:36.799
Going to be.

454
00:31:38.640 --> 00:31:41.079
You just, oh, I know it's I was thinking that

455
00:31:41.359 --> 00:31:46.319
somebody recommended a general to Napoleon and said this guy

456
00:31:46.440 --> 00:31:50.200
is a very good general, and Napoleon said, I know

457
00:31:50.279 --> 00:31:57.759
he's good, but is he lucky?

458
00:31:58.440 --> 00:32:00.000
Perfect? Perfect? Perfect?

459
00:32:00.799 --> 00:32:03.400
I want to go back just a little bit because

460
00:32:04.160 --> 00:32:08.160
this is a picture that I just frankly adore, and

461
00:32:08.240 --> 00:32:10.519
the first time I saw it, I felt like I

462
00:32:10.559 --> 00:32:13.079
was coming out of the theater just with with wings

463
00:32:13.160 --> 00:32:18.599
on my eels. Is is? I just love time after time.

464
00:32:19.039 --> 00:32:23.000
I just think it is a remarkable entertainment and h

465
00:32:23.640 --> 00:32:28.640
thank you. It is just delightful. There's something about the

466
00:32:28.680 --> 00:32:32.319
idea of taking a real person from history and turning

467
00:32:32.359 --> 00:32:35.440
them into a fictional character was just enchanting to me.

468
00:32:36.039 --> 00:32:41.279
And you have this man who's propelled by reason and

469
00:32:42.000 --> 00:32:46.440
science and hope, and you contrast him with this dark

470
00:32:46.559 --> 00:32:51.200
agent of chaos John Leslie Stevenson. It's just magic. And

471
00:32:51.240 --> 00:32:53.599
somehow there's a there's a love story in the middle

472
00:32:53.640 --> 00:32:56.640
of all that. It was just I was just enchanted

473
00:32:56.680 --> 00:32:58.279
for the entire time. I just thought it was one

474
00:32:58.279 --> 00:33:01.599
of the best written movies I've ever scene. I I

475
00:33:01.640 --> 00:33:04.200
try to get back and watch it at least once

476
00:33:04.240 --> 00:33:06.440
a year. I just think it's absolutely wonderful. And I'm

477
00:33:06.440 --> 00:33:08.400
always amazed when people say, oh, I've never seen time

478
00:33:08.440 --> 00:33:10.960
after time and I just want to throttle them, like,

479
00:33:10.960 --> 00:33:11.960
what are you talking about?

480
00:33:12.599 --> 00:33:14.119
Use it somewhere in time?

481
00:33:16.720 --> 00:33:20.400
Christopher confirm for me, Is it true that that I've

482
00:33:20.440 --> 00:33:23.640
heard this this story that at one point Mick Jagger

483
00:33:23.920 --> 00:33:28.680
was considered to be John Leslie Stevenson. Is that is

484
00:33:28.720 --> 00:33:30.200
that really the case?

485
00:33:32.920 --> 00:33:38.839
Warner Brothers wanted me to use him.

486
00:33:36.960 --> 00:33:39.119
So it was a studio again, kind of adding to

487
00:33:39.160 --> 00:33:39.519
the suit.

488
00:33:39.599 --> 00:33:43.359
Well, they were trying to, you know, make it commercial,

489
00:33:43.599 --> 00:33:46.279
you know, uh, they were trying to We didn't have

490
00:33:46.319 --> 00:33:51.839
a star Malcolm Malcolm was popular, but he's not really

491
00:33:52.279 --> 00:33:55.839
or he wasn't really a star. And David Warner, who's

492
00:33:55.839 --> 00:33:59.000
a terrific actor. He was the great First War Hamlet,

493
00:33:59.200 --> 00:34:02.200
he was the Carnival Street Hamlet. But he's not a star.

494
00:34:02.680 --> 00:34:08.360
And I originally wanted Derek Jacoby from I Claudius to

495
00:34:08.440 --> 00:34:12.039
be Wells and they went who so they were they

496
00:34:12.039 --> 00:34:15.360
were really you know, front loaded with with somebody, And

497
00:34:15.440 --> 00:34:17.800
maybe the movie would have been a bigger hit than

498
00:34:17.840 --> 00:34:21.360
it was if Mick Jagger had played the Ripper. I

499
00:34:21.440 --> 00:34:23.760
just didn't think I could believe him as the Ripper.

500
00:34:23.800 --> 00:34:26.480
I think we'd only see Mick Jagger and it would

501
00:34:26.480 --> 00:34:28.679
sort of disbalance the movie.

502
00:34:31.840 --> 00:34:34.519
Wow, I'm so glad you you went with the cast

503
00:34:34.559 --> 00:34:36.400
you have, because to me, it's just a magical cast.

504
00:34:36.440 --> 00:34:39.400
I mean, I'm a big David Warner fan like forever

505
00:34:39.599 --> 00:34:43.400
and but but that movie, I mean that's just like me.

506
00:34:43.559 --> 00:34:46.840
Is this a David Warner that's like him at his best?

507
00:34:46.920 --> 00:34:50.079
He's just when he sits down and mikes mikes uh

508
00:34:50.400 --> 00:34:54.159
HG watched the TV. It's just like, look at where

509
00:34:54.239 --> 00:35:00.360
we are, Herbert, It's just.

510
00:34:59.079 --> 00:35:00.000
Look at where we are?

511
00:35:01.039 --> 00:35:06.199
Yeah, terrifying. So it's I think that's why a lot

512
00:35:06.239 --> 00:35:07.960
of us keep going back to Star Trek though. It

513
00:35:08.000 --> 00:35:10.199
is just because it like says, you know, things can

514
00:35:10.320 --> 00:35:12.519
be dark and crazy, but there's hope and we might

515
00:35:13.440 --> 00:35:18.199
somehow finally grow up. So I think I need extra

516
00:35:18.280 --> 00:35:20.320
doses of that message from time to time.

517
00:35:20.360 --> 00:35:23.199
I think, just just I'd be happy to od on it.

518
00:35:25.039 --> 00:35:27.960
But I just wow, I mean, that's just I just

519
00:35:28.000 --> 00:35:30.079
have to tell you one of the greatest movies I've

520
00:35:30.079 --> 00:35:33.440
ever seen. I'm such a It's just an enchanting piece

521
00:35:33.480 --> 00:35:35.840
of work. I just absolutely love it. I want to

522
00:35:35.880 --> 00:35:37.719
ask you a question because I know that some of

523
00:35:37.719 --> 00:35:40.960
the other Truk experts are really going to probably go

524
00:35:41.000 --> 00:35:43.760
to town with you on you know, we have, like

525
00:35:43.960 --> 00:35:46.960
to me, I think one of the great Sherlock Holmes

526
00:35:46.960 --> 00:35:49.880
experts of our all time with us here tonight. It's like,

527
00:35:49.920 --> 00:35:52.800
so there's gonna be some Sherlock Holmes questioning. But I

528
00:35:52.800 --> 00:35:55.920
would like to ask you, sir, my friend, who is

529
00:35:55.920 --> 00:36:00.400
your favorite actor's depiction of Sherlock Holmes. Are you more

530
00:36:00.440 --> 00:36:03.840
of a Basil Rathbone guy or a Jeremy Brett guy

531
00:36:04.159 --> 00:36:09.119
who rocks your world? On two twenty on Baker Street.

532
00:36:11.480 --> 00:36:14.800
I rather liked Peter Cushing in The Hound of the

533
00:36:14.840 --> 00:36:23.320
Baskerville IM movies. I have a lot of problems with

534
00:36:23.599 --> 00:36:29.440
Basil Wrathbone, one of which is that he looks like

535
00:36:29.599 --> 00:36:33.639
he's Sherlock Holmes. He sounds like he's Sherlock Holmes, but

536
00:36:33.679 --> 00:36:39.599
I can never quite sense the wheels going round. I don't.

537
00:36:39.639 --> 00:36:42.840
There are actors, you know. You look at Gary Cooper

538
00:36:42.880 --> 00:36:45.800
and every feeling, every emotion is there. You can just

539
00:36:46.320 --> 00:36:51.599
you can see him, you know. And and when when

540
00:36:51.639 --> 00:36:54.760
you saw Mel Gibson his Hamlet, it's all there, you

541
00:36:54.800 --> 00:36:58.679
can see the wheels. And then there's people that they

542
00:36:58.760 --> 00:37:02.199
sort of do everything right, but you can't see inside.

543
00:37:02.840 --> 00:37:06.639
And that's one of my problems with Basil Rathbone. The

544
00:37:06.679 --> 00:37:14.079
other is that he's shackled with Nigel Bruce. You know.

545
00:37:15.719 --> 00:37:19.039
When we talk about Sherlock Holmes, which I'm happy to

546
00:37:19.119 --> 00:37:23.639
talk about, and everybody should read my new Sherlock Holmes novel,

547
00:37:24.039 --> 00:37:30.000
Sherlock Holmes and the Telegram from Hell, which is really good.

548
00:37:30.079 --> 00:37:32.079
And if my mother were here, she'd say.

549
00:37:31.880 --> 00:37:34.760
So, that's a great title. By the way, that's a

550
00:37:34.800 --> 00:37:37.320
pretty badass title. That's great.

551
00:37:37.360 --> 00:37:40.599
It was a real telegram. It's a real telegram. I've

552
00:37:40.599 --> 00:37:43.880
got it around here someplace, but you have to decode it,

553
00:37:44.719 --> 00:37:52.519
which they finally did. And it's a rather hair raising story,

554
00:37:52.599 --> 00:37:56.440
Sherlock Holmes and the Telegram from Hell. But I'm a purist.

555
00:37:56.840 --> 00:37:59.800
I read the home stories when I was about eleven

556
00:38:00.119 --> 00:38:03.360
or sixty of them. My dad gave me the complete book,

557
00:38:04.360 --> 00:38:08.239
and that's the homes I like. I don't really like

558
00:38:08.320 --> 00:38:13.239
Holmes in the movies, apecially didn't like Rathbone and Nigel

559
00:38:13.239 --> 00:38:16.920
Bruce because I could never understand why a genius hangs

560
00:38:16.920 --> 00:38:20.400
out with a jerk. It didn't make any sense to me.

561
00:38:22.159 --> 00:38:30.119
And if you read, if you read the Holmes stories

562
00:38:31.400 --> 00:38:35.800
that you can't imagine that Nigel Bruce is the Watson

563
00:38:35.920 --> 00:38:37.119
who's writing them down.

564
00:38:37.920 --> 00:38:41.760
It doesn't track at all. And when I wrote my

565
00:38:41.840 --> 00:38:45.480
first Holmes book, The Seven Percent Solution, I was trying

566
00:38:45.519 --> 00:38:50.880
to write a corrective to all the Sherlock Holmes movies

567
00:38:51.559 --> 00:38:57.840
can't stand and I don't like many of them. I

568
00:38:57.880 --> 00:39:00.960
thought The Hound of the Baskerville's with Peter Kokishing was

569
00:39:01.079 --> 00:39:06.800
pretty straightforward, no nonsense Holmes. It's got you know, maybe

570
00:39:06.840 --> 00:39:13.440
the Hound could be better, but whatever, but it was.

571
00:39:13.480 --> 00:39:16.719
It wasn't playing games with it. It was just this

572
00:39:16.800 --> 00:39:20.440
is how This is as close to what Doyle was writing.

573
00:39:20.840 --> 00:39:27.559
And I think Andre Morrell is Watson in it, and

574
00:39:27.599 --> 00:39:32.480
he's a very good Watson, very you could imagine him.

575
00:39:32.960 --> 00:39:36.639
And we were talking a little bit before about mixing

576
00:39:36.760 --> 00:39:41.679
fictional and non fictional characters. When I wrote The seven

577
00:39:41.760 --> 00:39:47.239
Percent Solution, which is Sherlock Holmes meets Sigmund Freud, I

578
00:39:47.400 --> 00:39:52.000
was combining. I wasn't the first person to combine fiction

579
00:39:52.119 --> 00:39:55.400
and nonfiction around the same time that The Seven Percent

580
00:39:55.519 --> 00:39:59.679
Solution came out. That's when E. L. Doctor Roh wrote

581
00:39:59.760 --> 00:40:04.280
Rag Time, Houdini and a lot of other well known

582
00:40:04.400 --> 00:40:11.559
but even Walter Scott and to some degree, Shakespeare. It's

583
00:40:11.599 --> 00:40:18.960
not a new thing combining fictional and nonfictional people. We

584
00:40:19.039 --> 00:40:20.920
call out the historical novel.

585
00:40:24.039 --> 00:40:26.519
Well, the way you do it's pretty amazing, would be

586
00:40:26.559 --> 00:40:30.079
what I have to say, and have a unique take

587
00:40:30.119 --> 00:40:32.199
on it. The other te experts are going to kill me,

588
00:40:32.239 --> 00:40:34.159
but I got to ask you one last question, just quick,

589
00:40:34.360 --> 00:40:38.280
quick two parter right, favorite movie of yours as a

590
00:40:38.360 --> 00:40:41.960
kid growing up and then over to say the last

591
00:40:42.239 --> 00:40:45.239
ten years, what has been the movie that you're like,

592
00:40:45.599 --> 00:40:48.239
that's a freaking movie. That's a good one.

593
00:40:48.440 --> 00:40:52.639
My favorite movie when I was a kid was probably

594
00:40:52.639 --> 00:40:55.920
the Walt Disney twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, which

595
00:40:55.960 --> 00:40:58.679
is still I think the best Walt Disney.

596
00:40:59.760 --> 00:41:02.039
I couldn't agree more. That is my favorite movie. As

597
00:41:02.079 --> 00:41:03.639
a child, I love that picture.

598
00:41:04.119 --> 00:41:05.360
Have you seen it as an adult?

599
00:41:06.159 --> 00:41:06.440
I have.

600
00:41:06.639 --> 00:41:09.519
I'm like it's like time after time like for me.

601
00:41:09.679 --> 00:41:12.960
It's a very interesting movie. It you know, there's no

602
00:41:13.159 --> 00:41:19.239
girls in it. It's great Jules Verne. It's very depressing

603
00:41:19.679 --> 00:41:22.320
if you listen to what they're talking about. It ends

604
00:41:22.360 --> 00:41:26.000
with the goddamn Adam Baum going off at the end.

605
00:41:27.320 --> 00:41:31.880
It is not anything like a Walt Disney movie. It

606
00:41:31.960 --> 00:41:37.840
is about moral struggles between good and evil and how

607
00:41:37.880 --> 00:41:43.199
to if they can be reconciled. Can you do bad

608
00:41:43.400 --> 00:41:48.039
in order to do good? There are big questions that

609
00:41:48.119 --> 00:41:52.440
when Nemo and Aronnax are having their conversations, if you

610
00:41:52.599 --> 00:41:57.840
just listen to what they're talking about, it's not It

611
00:41:57.960 --> 00:42:03.039
manages to be a young kid adventure movie, and it's

612
00:42:03.400 --> 00:42:05.760
wonderful to look at. The guy never got a proper

613
00:42:05.760 --> 00:42:14.639
credit Harper Goff, who designed the Nautilus. But besides all

614
00:42:14.679 --> 00:42:18.920
the bells and whistles, and it has a great score

615
00:42:19.000 --> 00:42:25.559
by the in house Disney composer Paul Smith. It's an

616
00:42:25.599 --> 00:42:30.039
exceptional joy and it lasts. It plays very well. There's

617
00:42:30.119 --> 00:42:36.320
one stupid line in the movie. Nemo and Aaron Ax

618
00:42:36.400 --> 00:42:41.400
are talking and and Nemo says, my my base is

619
00:42:41.400 --> 00:42:45.599
a place known only to me as Volcania, and Aaron

620
00:42:45.679 --> 00:42:57.840
Ax says, sounds remote anyway, that's that's my my my

621
00:42:58.119 --> 00:43:02.159
growing up movie. The I think one of my favorite

622
00:43:02.199 --> 00:43:06.639
movies of modern times, and it's not a new movie

623
00:43:06.679 --> 00:43:11.760
by any means, is a movie called The Organizer. It's

624
00:43:11.800 --> 00:43:15.800
an Italian movie from nineteen sixty five. It was directed

625
00:43:15.840 --> 00:43:20.639
by Mario Monicelli and stars Marcella Mostraani in a role

626
00:43:20.719 --> 00:43:24.440
you would never recognize him in in a gazillion years.

627
00:43:24.719 --> 00:43:30.239
And it was shot by Giuseppe Ruttuno in CinemaScope black

628
00:43:30.280 --> 00:43:34.199
and white, and it is about a strike in a

629
00:43:34.239 --> 00:43:39.360
textile mill in northern Italy. And it's one of the

630
00:43:39.360 --> 00:43:42.239
greatest movies I've ever seen in my life. It is

631
00:43:43.760 --> 00:43:50.119
like inhabiting a novel and it breaks my heart every

632
00:43:50.119 --> 00:43:52.480
time I watch it.

633
00:43:52.480 --> 00:43:55.800
It's now on my list. Thank you, thank you, my friend. Wow.

634
00:43:55.880 --> 00:43:58.480
I actually embarrassingly never heard of it.

635
00:43:59.440 --> 00:44:01.119
I don't think a lot of people have. I went

636
00:44:01.119 --> 00:44:03.440
to school at the University of Iowa and we had

637
00:44:03.480 --> 00:44:07.199
movie theaters and I saw it when it came out

638
00:44:07.199 --> 00:44:10.320
in a movie theater, and I was just so knocked out.

639
00:44:10.360 --> 00:44:13.280
I just never forgot it. And then when I was

640
00:44:13.760 --> 00:44:16.960
on the lot at Paramount, which I was for fifteen years,

641
00:44:17.239 --> 00:44:20.519
you could order up any movie that you wanted. So

642
00:44:20.599 --> 00:44:25.039
I said, I want to watch an Organizer. And all

643
00:44:25.159 --> 00:44:30.360
that existed at the time was a sixteen millimeter print

644
00:44:30.719 --> 00:44:33.000
and they had to stop and switch the reels, and

645
00:44:33.760 --> 00:44:37.360
so you can imagine about I don't know, four or

646
00:44:37.440 --> 00:44:41.199
five years ago, maybe it's longer, when they put it

647
00:44:41.239 --> 00:44:45.920
out on DVD and they had restored it and it's gorgeous,

648
00:44:45.960 --> 00:44:52.199
and I immediately bought like five copies that five copies

649
00:44:52.199 --> 00:44:54.840
for it. I just wanted to hang on to my

650
00:44:54.960 --> 00:44:56.199
copy of the Organizer.

651
00:44:58.559 --> 00:44:58.840
Wow.

652
00:44:59.039 --> 00:45:01.719
Well, I I just have to say, and I'm I'm

653
00:45:02.239 --> 00:45:05.079
I have some Nicholas Meyer books to go purchase, so

654
00:45:05.119 --> 00:45:06.719
I need to be on my way to do that.

655
00:45:07.199 --> 00:45:08.960
Our review on Amazon would.

656
00:45:08.800 --> 00:45:13.760
Be done, brother, done, because I'll tell you it's gonna take,

657
00:45:14.639 --> 00:45:18.920
you know, me being emperor of some other solar system

658
00:45:18.960 --> 00:45:21.119
to top this experience for me this week, this has

659
00:45:21.199 --> 00:45:26.039
been an incredible treat. You are a gem, Nicholas Meyer,

660
00:45:26.119 --> 00:45:30.679
would be what I would say, And oh, well, very lucky,

661
00:45:30.760 --> 00:45:33.159
and I just love your work. I love your work.

662
00:45:33.440 --> 00:45:35.800
I hope you're directing something again soon because I'm a

663
00:45:35.840 --> 00:45:38.960
big fan, so we'll see what we can see. But

664
00:45:39.360 --> 00:45:42.400
I got to stop talking and pass this to my

665
00:45:42.519 --> 00:45:48.039
good pal trexpert Eric, who is ready to explode with questions. Eric,

666
00:45:48.840 --> 00:45:50.199
unleash yourself, my friend.

667
00:45:50.599 --> 00:45:53.239
So many questions, so many questions. Nicholas, thank you so much.

668
00:45:53.280 --> 00:45:55.280
It's really fun to listen to you and Paul riff

669
00:45:55.320 --> 00:45:58.079
off each other. I just Paul's fanboying harder than I've

670
00:45:58.079 --> 00:46:00.199
ever seen him fanboy in his life. It's really fun.

671
00:46:00.280 --> 00:46:04.719
Can do the answers without the questions? I could do yes, yeah,

672
00:46:04.719 --> 00:46:12.800
you know, sure, uh, maybe maybe, maybe not.

673
00:46:14.400 --> 00:46:16.000
I don't think you need to change your tactic. I

674
00:46:16.039 --> 00:46:18.079
think you're doing just fine the way you are, so yeah,

675
00:46:18.159 --> 00:46:22.639
carry on, carry on. What I am really glad occurred

676
00:46:22.800 --> 00:46:24.800
was that, as we were able to book you for

677
00:46:24.840 --> 00:46:28.599
this show, you recommended reading The View from the Bridge,

678
00:46:28.800 --> 00:46:31.880
This this wonderful memoir that you have, and uh, and

679
00:46:31.920 --> 00:46:33.599
I've been reading through it. I'm almost done with that.

680
00:46:33.639 --> 00:46:35.400
I'm not quite there, but I'm almost done with it.

681
00:46:36.000 --> 00:46:37.480
But I wanted to ask you a questions.

682
00:46:38.280 --> 00:46:41.280
Finish well, I'll be right back.

683
00:46:41.840 --> 00:46:45.639
No, but I I have picked a couple that are

684
00:46:45.679 --> 00:46:47.760
from the first two thirds or so of the book

685
00:46:47.800 --> 00:46:49.480
that I wanted to ask you about because they were,

686
00:46:50.199 --> 00:46:52.559
I don't know, just sort of made me think about

687
00:46:52.599 --> 00:46:55.079
things in a different way way. Early on in the book,

688
00:46:55.119 --> 00:46:57.360
you're talking about kind of the beginning of your career,

689
00:46:58.039 --> 00:47:02.360
and you're talking about how it was your original conscious

690
00:47:02.400 --> 00:47:07.039
goal to want to be an actor, and you juxtapose

691
00:47:07.119 --> 00:47:12.480
that against what you call your unconscious goal, which became

692
00:47:13.119 --> 00:47:17.199
being a writer director, and that sort of was something

693
00:47:17.199 --> 00:47:21.519
that you developed into. And having this idea of a

694
00:47:21.559 --> 00:47:24.119
conscious goal and an unconscious goal at the same time,

695
00:47:24.159 --> 00:47:25.800
I thought was kind of interesting.

696
00:47:25.840 --> 00:47:29.000
And saying about having a conscious goal. I'm not a

697
00:47:29.079 --> 00:47:32.360
very analytic person. I'm getting I'm maybe a little better

698
00:47:32.360 --> 00:47:35.239
at it than I used to be. But when the

699
00:47:35.280 --> 00:47:37.920
whole point about having anything that could be called an

700
00:47:38.000 --> 00:47:41.000
unconscious goal is that you're not aware.

701
00:47:40.679 --> 00:47:42.119
Of it, right.

702
00:47:42.320 --> 00:47:47.880
I was a kid who had a lot of learning difficulties.

703
00:47:48.559 --> 00:47:53.320
Nobody knew what add was or anything like that, so

704
00:47:53.360 --> 00:47:59.159
they just said undisciplined, aloof can't focus. I never understood

705
00:47:59.199 --> 00:48:02.679
much that they were saying in class, and then wouldn't

706
00:48:02.679 --> 00:48:07.039
you know, I became a relentlessly self educated person. I'm

707
00:48:07.079 --> 00:48:10.679
a very good memory, and if something interests me, then

708
00:48:10.719 --> 00:48:15.199
I can pay attention to it for a long time years.

709
00:48:17.400 --> 00:48:20.920
But at the time nobody knew what that was. So

710
00:48:21.039 --> 00:48:23.079
I wasn't a very good student. I would sit in

711
00:48:23.159 --> 00:48:25.920
class and I didn't know. The one thing that I

712
00:48:26.039 --> 00:48:31.519
understood was stories. If it starts off with once upon

713
00:48:31.559 --> 00:48:34.920
a time, I'm there. But I can't really read a

714
00:48:34.960 --> 00:48:38.119
business contract. I can't do my taxes. I have to

715
00:48:38.159 --> 00:48:42.599
have help with all those things because I'm disnumerate, which

716
00:48:42.639 --> 00:48:47.559
is like being illiterate with numbers. I can remember dates.

717
00:48:47.800 --> 00:48:51.199
I can remember that the Queen Mary weighs eighty one

718
00:48:51.599 --> 00:48:55.039
two hundred and thirty seven times. She's ony eighteen feet long.

719
00:48:55.119 --> 00:48:57.800
I can give you the all that stuff, but it's

720
00:48:58.199 --> 00:49:03.960
it's not really it's it's stories. I like to hear stories.

721
00:49:04.000 --> 00:49:06.920
If it starts with once upon a time or some

722
00:49:07.159 --> 00:49:13.559
variant of that, then I'm in. I'm hooked. And so

723
00:49:16.360 --> 00:49:19.239
stories was what I was interested in. And I think

724
00:49:19.360 --> 00:49:25.159
because I didn't have much self definitions as a young person,

725
00:49:25.639 --> 00:49:29.199
not quite knowing who or what I was, being an

726
00:49:29.239 --> 00:49:35.079
actor was seemed like a cool thing to be if

727
00:49:35.119 --> 00:49:39.599
you're uncertain about your own identity, you could assume someone else's.

728
00:49:39.840 --> 00:49:42.960
The problem is I had no talent. It was not

729
00:49:43.079 --> 00:49:47.000
a good actor. You hear about them, but you don't

730
00:49:47.000 --> 00:49:49.960
often meet them face to face. So here it is.

731
00:49:51.559 --> 00:49:59.039
So I was. I was terminally self conscious as an actor,

732
00:50:00.280 --> 00:50:03.559
and I didn't even know what a director was when

733
00:50:03.599 --> 00:50:05.960
I thought I wanted to be an actor. Now everybody

734
00:50:06.000 --> 00:50:08.800
knows what a director. I didn't know until one of

735
00:50:08.800 --> 00:50:11.239
them started yelling at me while we're putting on a

736
00:50:11.280 --> 00:50:14.039
play and I just was doing it wrong. And I

737
00:50:14.119 --> 00:50:16.280
just got yelled at by the guy sitting in the

738
00:50:17.079 --> 00:50:20.239
seat with the coffee, and I thought, well, I wish

739
00:50:20.320 --> 00:50:22.239
I were the guy sitting in the seat with the

740
00:50:22.280 --> 00:50:27.239
coffee and doing the yelling. And I think he may

741
00:50:27.280 --> 00:50:31.360
have been yelling at me because I thought what they

742
00:50:31.360 --> 00:50:34.599
were telling me to do maybe was wrong, and I

743
00:50:34.639 --> 00:50:39.920
had my own idea. And that doesn't that doesn't really work.

744
00:50:40.599 --> 00:50:43.440
It gets you into trouble. I'm particularly in film. So

745
00:50:45.000 --> 00:50:49.880
that's how I segued into wanting to be a director,

746
00:50:50.920 --> 00:50:55.719
and that became at that point a conscious goal. Let's

747
00:50:55.760 --> 00:50:59.199
full call it. Not that I had it in my mind.

748
00:50:59.239 --> 00:51:01.719
The whole time, I didn't because I didn't know what

749
00:51:01.840 --> 00:51:05.760
director was. This was back in college. The thing about

750
00:51:05.800 --> 00:51:10.679
the writing, I never decided I wanted to be a writer.

751
00:51:10.920 --> 00:51:15.400
I never thought about it. It was just something that

752
00:51:15.519 --> 00:51:19.719
I always did. I would tell stories. I would tell

753
00:51:19.760 --> 00:51:22.880
stories at the dinner table, and my parents always had

754
00:51:22.920 --> 00:51:27.760
to shut me up. No plot, nicky, no plot or

755
00:51:27.840 --> 00:51:33.039
you know, two minutes or whatever. And when I was

756
00:51:34.000 --> 00:51:36.960
before I knew how to write, I would tell my

757
00:51:37.079 --> 00:51:41.000
dad little stories about how our dog carried the newspaper

758
00:51:41.039 --> 00:51:43.800
home in her mouth from the grocery store, and he

759
00:51:43.800 --> 00:51:47.559
would write them down and then he said, you know

760
00:51:48.880 --> 00:51:52.360
enough already. You got to write your own stuff. And

761
00:51:52.400 --> 00:51:56.519
that's when I just did it. And words are sort

762
00:51:56.559 --> 00:52:03.000
of my safe place, and so I it wasn't even

763
00:52:03.039 --> 00:52:06.719
a decision. It was just there from the get go.

764
00:52:08.559 --> 00:52:12.800
My parents read aloud to me at bedtime, they read Kipling,

765
00:52:12.840 --> 00:52:17.360
they read the Justeau stories, and I fell in love

766
00:52:18.960 --> 00:52:25.920
with language and the and the and how beautiful it was,

767
00:52:26.800 --> 00:52:29.760
how beautiful it is. No one speaks English anymore, but

768
00:52:30.760 --> 00:52:34.519
I still love it. And I think one of the

769
00:52:34.599 --> 00:52:38.280
nice things about writing Sherlock Holmes stories, which is not

770
00:52:38.440 --> 00:52:41.840
my own language. Obviously, it's it's a foreign language, but

771
00:52:41.920 --> 00:52:44.800
it's it's an English that I that I really love,

772
00:52:45.440 --> 00:52:50.079
that still has you know, rules of grammar and stuff

773
00:52:50.119 --> 00:52:53.599
that make it poetic and evocative.

774
00:52:56.519 --> 00:52:59.599
Well yeah, and it's meaning becomes much deeper as a

775
00:52:59.639 --> 00:53:05.480
result of its language. Yeah, yeah, which I guess the

776
00:53:05.519 --> 00:53:08.480
corollary to that is that language these days has less

777
00:53:08.480 --> 00:53:11.599
and less meaning because people simply don't know how to

778
00:53:11.639 --> 00:53:12.719
speak or write anymore.

779
00:53:12.760 --> 00:53:18.039
And we also use fewer words. Shakespeare his vocabulary is

780
00:53:18.119 --> 00:53:23.039
fifty thousand words. We don't use anything like fifty thousand words.

781
00:53:23.360 --> 00:53:27.519
We use one word that's pressed into service to mean

782
00:53:27.599 --> 00:53:33.960
many things. We say fabulous, wow, terrific, but we don't

783
00:53:34.559 --> 00:53:37.920
go in any more specific than that. These are sort

784
00:53:37.920 --> 00:53:42.880
of umbrella terms. And people use adjectives and adverbs a lot,

785
00:53:43.119 --> 00:53:47.320
which nobody pays much attention to those. It's like a

786
00:53:47.360 --> 00:53:50.719
fly buzzing around if you find the right verb, somebody

787
00:53:50.760 --> 00:53:52.960
explained to me, Get the right verb, and you sound

788
00:53:53.000 --> 00:53:56.719
like a good writer. No, he came into the room.

789
00:53:57.239 --> 00:54:01.239
That was a fucking boring verb came as boring. He

790
00:54:01.400 --> 00:54:05.639
exploded into the room, He insinuated himself into the room.

791
00:54:05.880 --> 00:54:11.039
He crept into the room, he stole into the room,

792
00:54:11.239 --> 00:54:15.000
he found himself in the room. That gets interesting. Just

793
00:54:16.559 --> 00:54:18.719
you know, I just saved you guys a lot of time.

794
00:54:19.000 --> 00:54:21.760
Find the right verb, and you're in, like Flynn.

795
00:54:23.239 --> 00:54:26.840
There it is. And presumably you know metaphors are part

796
00:54:26.840 --> 00:54:27.280
of that too.

797
00:54:29.920 --> 00:54:30.239
Yeah.

798
00:54:30.599 --> 00:54:39.280
Yeah, do you like I'm gonna use that one? Great? Well?

799
00:54:39.480 --> 00:54:41.760
Uh so, I guess moving on to a little bit

800
00:54:41.800 --> 00:54:44.360
of the directing stuff. There was also something that you

801
00:54:44.480 --> 00:54:48.039
said about one of your first directing experiences there in

802
00:54:48.079 --> 00:54:52.639
the book. You were talking about how you felt like

803
00:54:53.480 --> 00:54:58.599
directing or directors had kind of devolved into being technicians,

804
00:54:58.599 --> 00:55:00.760
and you just sort of left it there in the book,

805
00:55:01.039 --> 00:55:04.239
and I wondered, I mean I can insinuate what you

806
00:55:04.360 --> 00:55:04.960
meant by that?

807
00:55:05.000 --> 00:55:07.639
I mean you mean infer.

808
00:55:08.800 --> 00:55:08.880
Or?

809
00:55:09.000 --> 00:55:12.039
Yes, I can infer what you That is what I

810
00:55:12.079 --> 00:55:14.360
meant what you meant by that?

811
00:55:14.440 --> 00:55:17.039
So I wondered, you know, what did I mean by that?

812
00:55:17.480 --> 00:55:19.920
What did you mean by that? Yeah?

813
00:55:19.960 --> 00:55:26.199
Well, what I experienced in that conversation with Ricardo Montlebond

814
00:55:27.760 --> 00:55:33.760
was his frustration as an actor that the director wasn't

815
00:55:33.800 --> 00:55:38.840
helping a talented guy who needed help with the performance.

816
00:55:39.599 --> 00:55:44.159
And what's happened over many years is actors have become

817
00:55:44.280 --> 00:55:49.480
used to having to direct themselves because as we become

818
00:55:49.559 --> 00:55:55.960
more technically and technologically sophisticated, and we know about drones

819
00:55:56.039 --> 00:56:01.960
and steady cams and green screens and siege and AI

820
00:56:02.079 --> 00:56:04.880
and all this stuff, but how to get a performance

821
00:56:05.199 --> 00:56:10.079
out of somebody? And when I taught directing, which I

822
00:56:10.159 --> 00:56:15.320
did at Chapman University for a couple of years, I said,

823
00:56:16.239 --> 00:56:19.880
if you want to in addition to learning about all

824
00:56:19.920 --> 00:56:22.960
the bells and whistles, you have to learn how to

825
00:56:23.000 --> 00:56:26.199
talk to actors, you have to learn how to help

826
00:56:26.199 --> 00:56:29.960
them shape a performance. And the way to learn this

827
00:56:31.119 --> 00:56:34.119
is you got to go to acting class and you

828
00:56:34.239 --> 00:56:37.440
got to act and that and that means you can't

829
00:56:37.480 --> 00:56:40.119
sit at the back and just watch other people make

830
00:56:40.119 --> 00:56:43.000
a fool of themselves. You got to get up and

831
00:56:43.119 --> 00:56:45.239
you got to make a fool of yourself, and you've

832
00:56:45.280 --> 00:56:47.840
got to go out there and learn the language that

833
00:56:47.960 --> 00:56:56.079
these people speak. There is a marvelous movie. I can't

834
00:56:56.119 --> 00:56:59.320
quite call it a movie, but it is a photographed

835
00:57:00.119 --> 00:57:04.000
version of a play that was done by the National

836
00:57:04.679 --> 00:57:09.840
Theater of Great Britain New It's brand new and they've

837
00:57:09.880 --> 00:57:13.119
shown it. You can root around, you'll find it. It's

838
00:57:13.159 --> 00:57:17.039
called The Motive in the Queue by Jack Thorne, playwright,

839
00:57:17.960 --> 00:57:22.880
and it's directed by Sam Mendes. And it's a play

840
00:57:24.079 --> 00:57:28.119
that is based on the real experience of putting on

841
00:57:28.199 --> 00:57:32.119
a production of Hamlet on Broadway in nineteen sixty five,

842
00:57:32.880 --> 00:57:39.000
starring Richard Burton and directed by John Gilgood. And you

843
00:57:39.159 --> 00:57:44.559
watch as these people try to put on a play

844
00:57:44.559 --> 00:57:50.800
of Hamlet and what goes through the creation of a role,

845
00:57:50.920 --> 00:57:55.480
how things work out, And it was a real struggle

846
00:57:56.320 --> 00:58:01.119
because John Gilgood is an elderly gay guy. Richard Burton

847
00:58:01.440 --> 00:58:05.360
is a young, drunk guy, and he wants to do

848
00:58:05.440 --> 00:58:07.800
Hamlet to show that he's not just a movie star.

849
00:58:08.320 --> 00:58:11.559
Gilgood thought he was washed up and took the job

850
00:58:11.920 --> 00:58:15.920
because it was there. And you watch as this play

851
00:58:16.039 --> 00:58:22.239
comes together, and you watch as an actor's performance is shaped,

852
00:58:23.400 --> 00:58:27.119
and you watch as Gilgod and Burton, who have spent

853
00:58:27.280 --> 00:58:32.360
weeks tearing each other apart, finally find themselves sitting alone

854
00:58:32.639 --> 00:58:38.320
in a rehearsal room and Gilgood says to Richard Burton,

855
00:58:39.760 --> 00:58:43.880
tell me about your father, and Burton says, well, my

856
00:58:43.920 --> 00:58:47.199
father was a drunk. He was either in the mine

857
00:58:47.719 --> 00:58:54.760
or in the pub and he abandoned us. And Gilgood says,

858
00:58:56.559 --> 00:59:00.239
what do you think Hamlet thinks about his father? Not

859
00:59:00.440 --> 00:59:03.760
just he's told me I got to murder my uncle

860
00:59:03.840 --> 00:59:06.639
who poisons him, blah blah, but what does he think

861
00:59:06.679 --> 00:59:12.360
about his father? And this long pause, one of the

862
00:59:12.400 --> 00:59:16.480
longest pauses I've ever seen in theater. And then the

863
00:59:16.480 --> 00:59:20.039
guy playing Richard Burtons like Johnny Flynn who stars in

864
00:59:20.079 --> 00:59:25.400
the Talent of mister Ripley, long pause, and he goes

865
00:59:27.880 --> 00:59:32.960
to be or not to be? That is the question,

866
00:59:34.079 --> 00:59:40.440
and the whole speech is now infused with all the

867
00:59:40.599 --> 00:59:46.320
gifts that were prompted by Gilgod's question. This is about

868
00:59:46.360 --> 00:59:50.199
helping shape an actor, shape or performance and get to

869
00:59:50.760 --> 00:59:54.760
a new place. And a lot of directors now they

870
00:59:54.800 --> 01:00:00.639
have not the time or the training, the patience inclination

871
01:00:01.119 --> 01:00:08.320
to get into that. And it's not that great performances

872
01:00:08.360 --> 01:00:11.679
don't happen without it. But that's not the place I

873
01:00:11.840 --> 01:00:16.199
was coming from.

874
01:00:16.360 --> 01:00:20.960
Do you think that's a result of Hollywood and there

875
01:00:21.039 --> 01:00:24.480
being so many pictures made, so many movies made, that

876
01:00:24.599 --> 01:00:27.480
is just kind of the art of making a good

877
01:00:27.559 --> 01:00:31.079
movie has been lost? Or do you think there have

878
01:00:31.280 --> 01:00:33.880
always been just some directors that could make that happen

879
01:00:33.880 --> 01:00:37.159
and some directors that couldn't make that happen. I see

880
01:00:37.320 --> 01:00:38.000
very few.

881
01:00:37.760 --> 01:00:38.239
Of the latter.

882
01:00:38.360 --> 01:00:43.519
There are some directors who are inclined, you know. John

883
01:00:43.599 --> 01:00:49.239
Houston felt that casting was the most important thing. If

884
01:00:49.239 --> 01:00:53.599
you find the right person, you'll get the performance that

885
01:00:53.679 --> 01:00:57.320
you want. He didn't talk a lot to actors. And

886
01:00:57.400 --> 01:01:00.280
by the way, he always printed, take one is the

887
01:01:00.280 --> 01:01:04.559
goal were going on? And when they were doing the

888
01:01:04.599 --> 01:01:10.360
African Queen and he was having difficulties with Catherine Hepburn,

889
01:01:10.360 --> 01:01:13.800
who was sort of floundering a little bit as Rosie,

890
01:01:15.079 --> 01:01:21.519
he said, I think Eleanor Roosevelt, and that's all he needed,

891
01:01:21.840 --> 01:01:24.239
he said, was in this direction she ever got and

892
01:01:24.280 --> 01:01:27.519
she suddenly thought, okay, I'm playing Eleanor Roosevelt, and she

893
01:01:27.639 --> 01:01:30.360
knew where to go. So it doesn't necessarily have to

894
01:01:30.360 --> 01:01:34.320
be a lot. Doesn't have to be what you see

895
01:01:34.360 --> 01:01:36.519
in the motive in the queue, which, by the way,

896
01:01:36.559 --> 01:01:42.920
you must see this. It's fine to see it. But

897
01:01:43.800 --> 01:01:47.000
casting is very, very important. The other thing that I

898
01:01:47.039 --> 01:01:50.920
think is very important and saves a lot of time

899
01:01:50.960 --> 01:01:54.800
and ultimately a lot of money, is to rehearse before

900
01:01:54.840 --> 01:01:58.119
you are on the set before you are on rolling,

901
01:01:58.400 --> 01:02:02.480
before everybody's looking at their watch. Studios don't want to

902
01:02:02.480 --> 01:02:04.719
do it. Agents don't want to do it because nobody's

903
01:02:04.920 --> 01:02:07.800
no money is changing hands. Actors want to do it

904
01:02:08.519 --> 01:02:11.519
because they want to be good. When we did Star

905
01:02:11.599 --> 01:02:15.320
Trek The Wrath of Khn, we all met at my

906
01:02:15.480 --> 01:02:21.079
house except for Ricardo wasn't there. And actors, if they

907
01:02:21.079 --> 01:02:23.559
didn't know, get to know each other now they do.

908
01:02:23.920 --> 01:02:26.639
If they didn't know the script before, now we do.

909
01:02:26.840 --> 01:02:29.480
And we can make cuts easier to do cuts when

910
01:02:29.519 --> 01:02:31.679
you're rehearsing and say well, I could do this with

911
01:02:31.719 --> 01:02:35.400
a look yes, okay, good do that and so forth,

912
01:02:35.400 --> 01:02:39.679
and actors learn what to expect from the director, and

913
01:02:39.800 --> 01:02:43.679
the director learns what to expect from the actors, so

914
01:02:43.719 --> 01:02:46.920
that when you get on the set and the meter

915
01:02:47.119 --> 01:02:51.760
is running, everybody has a better idea of what this

916
01:02:51.840 --> 01:02:57.079
thing is supposed to be. Mike Nickluck liked to rehearse.

917
01:02:57.679 --> 01:03:02.800
You know, I don't know if Stanley Kubrick did. Some

918
01:03:02.840 --> 01:03:08.360
people do sixty takes. Willie Wyler and Kubrick many many takes,

919
01:03:09.559 --> 01:03:12.000
and I was thinking, maybe it's because they didn't rehearse

920
01:03:12.400 --> 01:03:16.719
and figure it out and at one point, you know,

921
01:03:17.440 --> 01:03:21.239
I think it was Charlton Heston saying to Willie Wyler, Willie,

922
01:03:21.280 --> 01:03:26.360
for Christ's sake, how do you want it after takes?

923
01:03:28.119 --> 01:03:35.679
If they'd only rehearse, Wyler says better. Oh, and then

924
01:03:35.719 --> 01:03:37.599
you know they didn't know how to, They didn't know

925
01:03:37.599 --> 01:03:40.440
how to what they were They just would know it

926
01:03:40.480 --> 01:03:41.360
when they see.

927
01:03:41.159 --> 01:03:47.239
It, right, Yeah, sort of like just throwing enough darts

928
01:03:47.280 --> 01:03:49.039
at the board that eventually you're going to hit the board,

929
01:03:49.519 --> 01:03:51.039
but you go through an awful lot of darts doing

930
01:03:51.079 --> 01:03:51.519
it that way.

931
01:03:52.760 --> 01:03:56.440
No amount of monkeys could have written Hamlet. I'm just explaining.

932
01:03:57.000 --> 01:04:00.000
Yeah, no, that's absolutely true. I did love that imagery

933
01:04:00.079 --> 01:04:02.800
in the book of when you're talking about that early

934
01:04:02.840 --> 01:04:05.559
rehearsal of Wrath of Khan and going through the script

935
01:04:06.599 --> 01:04:09.000
of all of the actors sitting around your table, eating

936
01:04:10.159 --> 01:04:14.559
you know, meats and cheeses and bouncing ideas back and forth.

937
01:04:14.599 --> 01:04:19.440
It just such a such a cool thing to think about,

938
01:04:19.480 --> 01:04:22.360
that is, in some ways outside of film, And yet

939
01:04:22.519 --> 01:04:25.880
couldn't you know that was one of the reasons likely

940
01:04:25.920 --> 01:04:28.440
that that movie was so good. And I also loved

941
01:04:28.480 --> 01:04:30.599
that concept that you say you talk about in the

942
01:04:30.599 --> 01:04:35.559
book of hutting, hutting, cutting, getting down. You know, fifty

943
01:04:35.599 --> 01:04:40.360
percent of the lines go away, and it is that

944
01:04:40.440 --> 01:04:45.000
look or the sinkness of being able to say something

945
01:04:45.039 --> 01:04:47.519
in fewer words that really brings the matter.

946
01:04:47.599 --> 01:04:50.039
It's hard for me because I started out as in

947
01:04:50.119 --> 01:04:56.159
the theater, and the theaters words and movies is pictures

948
01:04:56.199 --> 01:05:02.320
with words, but you know just how you use them

949
01:05:02.920 --> 01:05:09.760
when you use them. And I became a much better

950
01:05:09.800 --> 01:05:13.519
screenwriter after I directed time after time, and I just

951
01:05:13.719 --> 01:05:19.320
learned how words take up time and space and audience

952
01:05:19.519 --> 01:05:25.400
energy unless they're very carefully used.

953
01:05:26.960 --> 01:05:27.320
And you.

954
01:05:28.920 --> 01:05:31.960
I think The Seven Percent Solution is a very good movie.

955
01:05:32.079 --> 01:05:36.079
It's a very smart movie, but it's a very wordy movie.

956
01:05:36.320 --> 01:05:40.360
And I was always trying to get herb Bross, the director,

957
01:05:40.599 --> 01:05:45.400
to slice out more of the speeches because I thought,

958
01:05:45.400 --> 01:05:46.920
you don't need it, you don't need it, you don't

959
01:05:46.960 --> 01:05:50.119
need it. And the one part of making that movie,

960
01:05:50.159 --> 01:05:52.559
he was very good, herb Ross. He let me out

961
01:05:52.599 --> 01:05:55.119
be on the set the whole time, but I was

962
01:05:55.119 --> 01:05:58.840
not in the cutting room.

963
01:05:58.920 --> 01:06:00.320
Well would you have liked to have been?

964
01:06:00.360 --> 01:06:00.400
Is?

965
01:06:02.000 --> 01:06:05.320
Yeah, Well that's that's where you really hone it in

966
01:06:05.360 --> 01:06:10.400
and take it from ninety percent to one hundred percent. Well,

967
01:06:10.440 --> 01:06:13.679
I probably need to let others have a shot at you,

968
01:06:13.760 --> 01:06:15.360
but I do want to ask you just a couple

969
01:06:15.559 --> 01:06:19.639
of Star Trek questions. So you also talked a little

970
01:06:19.679 --> 01:06:21.880
bit in the book about the Star Trek six blankets,

971
01:06:22.159 --> 01:06:24.440
and I will say that Star Trek six is my

972
01:06:24.840 --> 01:06:26.719
favorite of all of the movie. I mean, I love

973
01:06:26.760 --> 01:06:29.599
them all for different reasons, but I love the motion picture,

974
01:06:29.599 --> 01:06:31.480
I love Star Trek two, but Star Trek six is

975
01:06:31.480 --> 01:06:34.519
the one that I find to be just has a

976
01:06:34.519 --> 01:06:37.599
lot of complexity to it. It had parody with what

977
01:06:37.760 --> 01:06:41.280
was going on in the world at the time, so

978
01:06:41.679 --> 01:06:43.880
I think it just resonated for me when I first

979
01:06:43.920 --> 01:06:47.679
saw it. But the blankets, I didn't know about those

980
01:06:47.800 --> 01:06:53.480
until I read your book, And so I'm curious, do

981
01:06:53.559 --> 01:06:56.639
you still have your own Star Trek six blanket? And

982
01:06:57.199 --> 01:07:01.360
if you do, did you sign your own stificate of authenticity?

983
01:07:01.559 --> 01:07:03.800
Well I had to sign that. That was a condition

984
01:07:04.000 --> 01:07:08.119
under which they agree, you know. So I have a

985
01:07:08.159 --> 01:07:11.760
couple of them, and one of them I sleep under.

986
01:07:13.480 --> 01:07:14.000
Excellent.

987
01:07:14.280 --> 01:07:16.679
So from from all those years ago, I love that.

988
01:07:16.800 --> 01:07:18.239
Is it Is it a fairly comfy blanket?

989
01:07:18.320 --> 01:07:21.320
No, it's very uncomfortable. And one of the things that

990
01:07:21.960 --> 01:07:26.360
they explained to me when I was kind of pressuring

991
01:07:26.400 --> 01:07:30.519
them to make a Star Trek blanket, they said, well,

992
01:07:31.199 --> 01:07:33.440
you know, in order to make it, you know, at

993
01:07:33.480 --> 01:07:35.440
a price that everybody going to board, it's going to

994
01:07:35.440 --> 01:07:39.000
be a rather coarse thing. I said, well, that's fine.

995
01:07:39.000 --> 01:07:41.880
It's the goddamn Maybe it's not a pleasure cruiser in

996
01:07:41.960 --> 01:07:44.159
the love boat. Let it be court. So I don't

997
01:07:44.159 --> 01:07:46.880
put it on me directly. I put it on over

998
01:07:46.960 --> 01:07:48.840
a sheet so I don't have to feel.

999
01:07:48.599 --> 01:07:54.159
It makes sense, okay. And then my last question is

1000
01:07:54.280 --> 01:07:56.800
just that obviously you were involved with Star Trek Discovery,

1001
01:07:56.920 --> 01:08:00.880
so presumably did you did you keep up with that show?

1002
01:08:00.920 --> 01:08:04.159
Did you watch the entire series along the way or

1003
01:08:05.360 --> 01:08:06.519
or not necessarily?

1004
01:08:07.320 --> 01:08:07.639
Okay?

1005
01:08:07.960 --> 01:08:09.599
Have you kept up with any of the other Star

1006
01:08:09.639 --> 01:08:12.360
Trek shows that have come out in more recent years?

1007
01:08:13.159 --> 01:08:17.960
Not really, okay, Well that was my That was kind

1008
01:08:17.960 --> 01:08:20.000
of the question. I was just wondering what you if

1009
01:08:20.000 --> 01:08:22.439
you had any opinions about them, but without having seen them,

1010
01:08:22.439 --> 01:08:23.159
you wouldn't be able to.

1011
01:08:23.279 --> 01:08:27.199
No my opinions. It would be very easy, probably preferable,

1012
01:08:27.399 --> 01:08:32.479
for me to have an opinion without seeing it, which,

1013
01:08:32.640 --> 01:08:35.359
like my objectivity, would not be compromised.

1014
01:08:36.239 --> 01:08:40.720
There we go. All right, thank you so much for

1015
01:08:40.760 --> 01:08:42.920
allowing me to chat with you here for a little bit.

1016
01:08:43.279 --> 01:08:47.239
I am going to pass this microphone over to David here.

1017
01:08:49.760 --> 01:08:53.600
Hey, welcome to our show. Talking about all the technical

1018
01:08:53.640 --> 01:08:59.640
differ that we've had. But yeah, so I've got a

1019
01:08:59.720 --> 01:09:02.199
quick question about Star Trek, and I'm going to move

1020
01:09:02.239 --> 01:09:04.399
on to a little bit more of your work that

1021
01:09:04.439 --> 01:09:06.800
you had done in the past. But my first question

1022
01:09:06.920 --> 01:09:10.079
to you is how did you come about creating the

1023
01:09:10.119 --> 01:09:13.479
Shavic character for Therapkan.

1024
01:09:14.880 --> 01:09:17.960
The short answer is that I didn't create the Sabbath character.

1025
01:09:18.199 --> 01:09:27.680
What I was given were five screenplays, all called Star

1026
01:09:27.760 --> 01:09:36.800
Trek two. None of them bore any relation. Sorry, four, four,

1027
01:09:38.199 --> 01:09:42.920
Maybe it was five five screenplays that bore no relation

1028
01:09:43.840 --> 01:09:49.960
to each other. It was just five separate attempts to

1029
01:09:50.079 --> 01:09:57.239
get a second Star Trek movie. And nobody was happy

1030
01:09:57.279 --> 01:10:04.279
with any of these. And I was promised a new

1031
01:10:04.399 --> 01:10:07.039
draft was coming. I guess it was four, and then

1032
01:10:07.159 --> 01:10:10.000
draft five was coming in. Draft five was coming in,

1033
01:10:11.199 --> 01:10:14.000
and I got along great with Harf Bennett and I

1034
01:10:14.119 --> 01:10:18.359
was gotten interested in this whole Horatio Hornblower and outer

1035
01:10:18.479 --> 01:10:22.000
Space thing, and I kept waiting for the script to

1036
01:10:22.039 --> 01:10:27.000
come in, and finally I woke up three weeks later

1037
01:10:27.039 --> 01:10:30.159
and said, well, whatever happened to that project? That outer

1038
01:10:30.319 --> 01:10:34.239
space movie that I liked? And I called Harve Bennett

1039
01:10:34.239 --> 01:10:36.239
and he said, oh, I can't send it to you.

1040
01:10:36.279 --> 01:10:39.600
It's not good. And I said, well, what about draft

1041
01:10:39.640 --> 01:10:42.079
four or draft two or something? He said no, no, no,

1042
01:10:42.119 --> 01:10:42.960
they're all different.

1043
01:10:44.800 --> 01:10:44.960
Hm.

1044
01:10:46.119 --> 01:10:48.520
And so at this point, I'm now jonesing to make

1045
01:10:48.640 --> 01:10:51.920
my Space opera. So I said, well, why don't you

1046
01:10:51.920 --> 01:10:55.239
send them all up so I can read them? And

1047
01:10:55.279 --> 01:10:59.880
he said, really, it's your funeral. So in those days

1048
01:11:00.439 --> 01:11:06.000
you didn't hit send right. A mini van drives up

1049
01:11:08.000 --> 01:11:12.079
and it wasn't just five scripts. There was drafts that

1050
01:11:12.119 --> 01:11:15.279
had been revised and this and that. And I'm a

1051
01:11:15.319 --> 01:11:15.960
slow reader.

1052
01:11:16.079 --> 01:11:16.479
Wow.

1053
01:11:17.800 --> 01:11:24.319
So I plowed through all these scripts and I then

1054
01:11:24.439 --> 01:11:27.520
asked to meet with Harve Bennett and his producing partner

1055
01:11:27.840 --> 01:11:32.640
Robert Salem in my living room and I said, okay,

1056
01:11:32.720 --> 01:11:38.319
I have an idea. I said, why don't we? And

1057
01:11:38.399 --> 01:11:42.039
I brought out a legal pad. I said, why don't

1058
01:11:42.039 --> 01:11:46.319
we make a list of everything we like in these

1059
01:11:46.560 --> 01:11:52.199
five screenplays? Could be a major plot, could be a subplot,

1060
01:11:53.319 --> 01:11:58.800
could be a sequence, could be a scene, could be

1061
01:11:58.800 --> 01:12:02.359
a character, could be a line of dialogue. I don't

1062
01:12:02.359 --> 01:12:06.039
care which to make this list. And then I'll try

1063
01:12:06.039 --> 01:12:09.560
to write a new script that combines as many of

1064
01:12:09.600 --> 01:12:16.840
the things that we list. And this is the short

1065
01:12:16.920 --> 01:12:20.479
version of this story. You'll be glad to hear. And

1066
01:12:20.520 --> 01:12:22.680
that's sort of what we did, because I didn't know

1067
01:12:22.680 --> 01:12:28.560
anything about Star Trek. So what was our list? Well, Khan,

1068
01:12:29.399 --> 01:12:34.560
the Genesis Project, Kirk meets his son and the wife,

1069
01:12:35.119 --> 01:12:43.359
Lieutenant Savak, the simulator, sequence of all that stuff, and

1070
01:12:43.399 --> 01:12:49.359
then I put it through a meat grinder and pick

1071
01:12:49.479 --> 01:12:53.520
these things that just I remember when we were having

1072
01:12:53.600 --> 01:12:57.279
this conversation, I was walking around my living room saying,

1073
01:12:57.279 --> 01:12:59.319
how come nobody ever reads a book in the twenty

1074
01:12:59.359 --> 01:13:03.439
third century? And I just pulled down the nearest book,

1075
01:13:03.760 --> 01:13:06.199
which happened to be a Tale of Two Cities. Is

1076
01:13:06.600 --> 01:13:09.119
the one novel that everybody knows the first and last

1077
01:13:09.159 --> 01:13:17.079
lines of. And so Savoc was in that mix. Is

1078
01:13:17.119 --> 01:13:19.760
where she came from. I didn't dream her up. I

1079
01:13:19.800 --> 01:13:23.239
didn't dream up con, I didn't dream up the Genesis Project.

1080
01:13:23.520 --> 01:13:26.520
I didn't I don't know any of that stuff. I

1081
01:13:26.680 --> 01:13:31.119
just poured my own dialogue all over it and fiddled

1082
01:13:31.119 --> 01:13:36.960
with it like a Rubik's cube. That was really I

1083
01:13:37.000 --> 01:13:38.520
can't take credit.

1084
01:13:39.039 --> 01:13:39.600
But I did.

1085
01:13:39.880 --> 01:13:40.319
Okay.

1086
01:13:42.159 --> 01:13:46.640
Interesting, So when you were directing that movie, did you

1087
01:13:46.760 --> 01:13:51.479
have a shay and like what plot took place in

1088
01:13:51.680 --> 01:13:52.399
what sequence?

1089
01:13:53.159 --> 01:13:56.720
Yeah? It was a totally my movie. I totally controlled

1090
01:13:56.720 --> 01:13:59.199
it my script.

1091
01:14:00.840 --> 01:14:03.600
Yeah, I was just trying to understand some dialogue.

1092
01:14:03.920 --> 01:14:07.479
It would you like a tranquilizer? That was Harve Captain

1093
01:14:07.560 --> 01:14:10.680
this is the garden Spot of CD Alpha six or

1094
01:14:10.680 --> 01:14:16.439
whatever it was, and Uh, I poured myself a drink,

1095
01:14:16.479 --> 01:14:20.359
would you like one? I remember all Harve's signs. I

1096
01:14:20.479 --> 01:14:21.840
remember them better than my own.

1097
01:14:23.560 --> 01:14:25.960
Oh cool, awesome.

1098
01:14:26.119 --> 01:14:26.359
Cool.

1099
01:14:26.640 --> 01:14:29.000
Well I'm gonna go ahead and switch two from Star

1100
01:14:29.079 --> 01:14:33.920
Trek to one of your previous uh works that you've

1101
01:14:33.960 --> 01:14:36.760
done in the past. And you mentioned before that you

1102
01:14:37.760 --> 01:14:43.159
liked the whole Once upon a Time Story and got

1103
01:14:45.239 --> 01:14:50.680
so you used to work with a particular company called

1104
01:14:50.720 --> 01:14:55.520
the Fairytale Theaters and you directed a particular episode called

1105
01:14:55.520 --> 01:14:58.960
The Pied Piper, And I was just wondering, what was

1106
01:14:58.960 --> 01:15:03.119
it like to an episode of a Lunch upon a

1107
01:15:03.159 --> 01:15:03.840
Time Story?

1108
01:15:04.680 --> 01:15:07.000
Well, we had two hundred and fifty rats.

1109
01:15:08.720 --> 01:15:14.239
Oh real rat? Oh wow.

1110
01:15:15.239 --> 01:15:22.199
It was originally supposed to star David Bowie, but he

1111
01:15:22.199 --> 01:15:26.159
he couldn't do it because he wasn't finished recording a

1112
01:15:26.239 --> 01:15:28.960
record that he was doing. And so that's how I

1113
01:15:29.000 --> 01:15:33.800
met and became friends with Eric Idol, who played the piper.

1114
01:15:34.399 --> 01:15:38.279
And when it was offered me to do it by

1115
01:15:38.359 --> 01:15:43.960
Shelley Duval because it was her television series, I said, well,

1116
01:15:44.000 --> 01:15:46.720
I'll only do it if we can do it in

1117
01:15:46.880 --> 01:15:53.479
rhyme like the Robert Browning poem. She said, oh, sure, sure, whatever,

1118
01:15:54.960 --> 01:15:57.520
And then I read the poem and I saw it

1119
01:15:57.560 --> 01:16:00.600
was only like two and a half pages, and I

1120
01:16:00.680 --> 01:16:02.800
told her, I said how long does the thing have

1121
01:16:02.920 --> 01:16:05.600
to be and she said, well, it's about forty four minutes.

1122
01:16:08.239 --> 01:16:12.199
And I thought, oh, we're gonna need more rhymes. So

1123
01:16:12.319 --> 01:16:16.199
I had to have more rhymes, and then we needed

1124
01:16:16.239 --> 01:16:17.279
more rats, and.

1125
01:16:19.439 --> 01:16:23.199
Wow, yeah, I'm a really big chucker for rhymes. I

1126
01:16:24.000 --> 01:16:28.119
when I show that particular episode, I said, you're.

1127
01:16:28.000 --> 01:16:31.039
A sucker for rhymes. I'm a sucker for rats.

1128
01:16:31.680 --> 01:16:37.640
Okay, yeah. I when I saw that particular episode, I

1129
01:16:37.720 --> 01:16:42.239
was like, wow, that the writing is pretty well done.

1130
01:16:42.319 --> 01:16:44.720
I mean, did you also do the writing portion of

1131
01:16:44.760 --> 01:16:46.159
it or that done by somebody else?

1132
01:16:47.279 --> 01:16:50.800
Well, do you count the poet Robert Browning as somebody else?

1133
01:16:53.880 --> 01:17:04.479
I just couldn't remember. I don't know, but okay, so okay, cool.

1134
01:17:05.359 --> 01:17:07.439
So you mentioned Chilly Devall. This was going to be

1135
01:17:07.520 --> 01:17:11.399
drawing off to My next question was that what did it?

1136
01:17:12.039 --> 01:17:12.079
What?

1137
01:17:12.359 --> 01:17:20.319
Uh? What did you say? Uh? How was it like

1138
01:17:20.439 --> 01:17:22.439
to work alongside Chilley Devall?

1139
01:17:23.199 --> 01:17:25.560
Well, it didn't really work alongside her. Once she put

1140
01:17:25.560 --> 01:17:29.600
the whole thing together like a really good producer, she vanished.

1141
01:17:32.359 --> 01:17:34.479
Okay and in the suit.

1142
01:17:40.359 --> 01:17:40.720
Okay.

1143
01:17:41.359 --> 01:17:47.640
So here's another question that I had. Was it better?

1144
01:17:48.279 --> 01:17:51.000
Was it fun to do writing or was it fun

1145
01:17:51.079 --> 01:17:52.039
to do directing?

1146
01:17:52.680 --> 01:17:52.880
Fun?

1147
01:17:53.520 --> 01:17:57.279
There are two very very different things, and they're fun

1148
01:17:57.479 --> 01:18:01.560
or not fun in very different ways. When you are writing,

1149
01:18:03.079 --> 01:18:08.399
you are fundamentally limited only by your own abilities. This

1150
01:18:08.560 --> 01:18:12.159
is particularly true if you're writing a book, no one

1151
01:18:12.199 --> 01:18:16.479
can tell you. When you're writing a movie, somebody's writing

1152
01:18:16.600 --> 01:18:19.159
checks and you're going to have to please the person

1153
01:18:19.199 --> 01:18:22.279
who's writing checks unless you're writing on spec and then yes,

1154
01:18:22.560 --> 01:18:27.680
you are only limited by your own ability, and writing

1155
01:18:28.920 --> 01:18:32.079
is lonely unless you're in a writer's room, which I've

1156
01:18:32.119 --> 01:18:35.640
seldom been in. But you know, at the end of

1157
01:18:36.159 --> 01:18:40.720
Henry the Fifth, the narrator the chorus says, thus far,

1158
01:18:41.600 --> 01:18:46.720
with rough and all unable pen our, bending author has

1159
01:18:46.840 --> 01:18:53.560
pursued the story in little room, confining mighty men. Mangling

1160
01:18:53.680 --> 01:18:57.079
by starts the full course of their glory. It's a

1161
01:18:57.239 --> 01:19:01.960
lonely business in that little room, confining mighty men. You're

1162
01:19:02.000 --> 01:19:08.199
by yourself when you're making a movie, which Orson Welles

1163
01:19:08.279 --> 01:19:11.000
said was the biggest set of electric trains any kid

1164
01:19:11.079 --> 01:19:17.600
was ever given to play with. You are answerable to everybody.

1165
01:19:18.880 --> 01:19:22.520
You are answerable to the studio. You're answerable to the producer.

1166
01:19:22.600 --> 01:19:26.319
You're answerable to the budget, to the ad to the weather,

1167
01:19:26.600 --> 01:19:30.319
to the egos of the stars. There's a million moving parts,

1168
01:19:32.000 --> 01:19:37.239
and it's a very different experience. So when I'm finished

1169
01:19:37.279 --> 01:19:42.840
writing the screenplay, whatever I've got cabin fever, I want

1170
01:19:42.880 --> 01:19:48.680
out of that little room. When I'm finished making the movie,

1171
01:19:48.960 --> 01:19:51.800
I've oded on party time. I just want to go

1172
01:19:51.920 --> 01:19:56.199
back into my hovel wherever it is. So they're very,

1173
01:19:56.319 --> 01:20:01.119
very different. Making a movie is a collaborative experience. You're

1174
01:20:01.119 --> 01:20:03.880
going to have to work and play well with others

1175
01:20:05.159 --> 01:20:11.279
and to get the best from them, and you'll have

1176
01:20:11.319 --> 01:20:15.119
to experience give and take. I'm not very good at

1177
01:20:15.119 --> 01:20:18.000
the give and take part. A lot of times it's,

1178
01:20:18.399 --> 01:20:19.920
you know, I want it to be my way or

1179
01:20:19.960 --> 01:20:25.239
the highway. But I have learned that people can contribute.

1180
01:20:25.880 --> 01:20:29.960
And the moment when I learned this was when I was,

1181
01:20:30.039 --> 01:20:32.840
this is my last thing, and I'll shut up. We

1182
01:20:32.840 --> 01:20:36.520
were doing Time after Time, and we shot a close

1183
01:20:36.600 --> 01:20:39.079
up of Malcolm McDowell and he set his line and

1184
01:20:39.119 --> 01:20:43.439
we broke for lunch and a guy came down from

1185
01:20:43.479 --> 01:20:46.119
way high up in the sound stage and he comes

1186
01:20:46.159 --> 01:20:50.960
up to me and he goes, you're the uh, you're

1187
01:20:51.000 --> 01:20:52.960
the writer of this thing, aren't you, as well as

1188
01:20:52.960 --> 01:20:57.880
the director? And I said yes. And he said, well,

1189
01:20:57.920 --> 01:20:59.960
if you're asking me, he's saying the wrong thing there.

1190
01:21:01.359 --> 01:21:01.640
And I.

1191
01:21:03.159 --> 01:21:08.560
Said, what should he say? And he gave me his line,

1192
01:21:08.880 --> 01:21:11.520
which was actually a repeat of a line from earlier

1193
01:21:11.520 --> 01:21:14.720
in the movie that he thought should be repeated at

1194
01:21:14.720 --> 01:21:19.279
that moment. And it was so much better than my

1195
01:21:19.760 --> 01:21:22.960
mediocre line that my mediocre line was now terrible piece

1196
01:21:22.960 --> 01:21:27.760
of shit, terrible line, and I was embarrassed and this

1197
01:21:27.960 --> 01:21:31.439
was so brilliant. And then I thought, hang on, you're

1198
01:21:31.479 --> 01:21:34.920
the director, bring him everybody back after lunch and shoot

1199
01:21:34.960 --> 01:21:39.119
the other line. And that's exactly what I did. And

1200
01:21:39.159 --> 01:21:43.000
once the rest of the crew began to understand that

1201
01:21:43.079 --> 01:21:46.920
I was interested in what they had to offer, not

1202
01:21:47.079 --> 01:21:50.800
just what they did in their part of it. This

1203
01:21:50.920 --> 01:21:54.520
wasn't his part of it. He was handling lights. But

1204
01:21:54.960 --> 01:21:58.319
I loved it because he was interested enough in what

1205
01:21:58.479 --> 01:22:03.840
we were doing to make a suggestion, and b that

1206
01:22:03.920 --> 01:22:07.479
he felt comfortable enough on my set that I wasn't

1207
01:22:07.520 --> 01:22:10.960
going to jump down his throat and fire him. And

1208
01:22:11.039 --> 01:22:12.880
I said, and I said, well, you get the credit

1209
01:22:13.000 --> 01:22:18.239
no matter what says directed by Nicholas Meyer. So I

1210
01:22:18.359 --> 01:22:21.319
wasn't you know, I said, you can't come up to

1211
01:22:21.359 --> 01:22:24.560
me in the middle of while I'm doing it when

1212
01:22:24.560 --> 01:22:26.720
I got a million things on my mind, but you

1213
01:22:26.760 --> 01:22:29.560
can come up to me and say things if you've

1214
01:22:29.560 --> 01:22:32.000
got ideas. And that's when they all started to pitch

1215
01:22:32.079 --> 01:22:34.880
in and the movie started getting better and better.

1216
01:22:36.239 --> 01:22:40.800
Hmm, cool, Wow, it's interesting.

1217
01:22:42.000 --> 01:22:42.199
Cool.

1218
01:22:42.319 --> 01:22:45.720
Well, I want to say thank you for being on

1219
01:22:45.760 --> 01:22:48.840
a show. And I'm going to pass this microphone.

1220
01:22:48.279 --> 01:22:54.279
Off to Charles Charles Parker, but are you the Charlie Parker.

1221
01:22:56.119 --> 01:23:01.239
I wish I was. I wish I was. Start off

1222
01:23:01.279 --> 01:23:07.039
with a one of our guests when our friends asked

1223
01:23:07.079 --> 01:23:09.800
a question, Edwin, I was going to ask you if

1224
01:23:09.840 --> 01:23:13.960
you ever considered writing a Sherlock Holmes Star Trek crossover

1225
01:23:14.800 --> 01:23:18.760
involving both genres, either in TLS or TNNG.

1226
01:23:20.279 --> 01:23:24.760
You'll have to remind me what those initials are, the

1227
01:23:24.800 --> 01:23:28.680
original series or the next generation. Well, I did the

1228
01:23:28.720 --> 01:23:31.760
best I could. Spock does claim that he's descended from

1229
01:23:32.239 --> 01:23:40.720
Holmes in Star Trek six The Undiscovered Country. As I say,

1230
01:23:40.800 --> 01:23:45.960
when we talk about Holmes, I'm a purists. I want

1231
01:23:46.000 --> 01:23:51.039
Holmes kind of the way Doyle wrote it. And while

1232
01:23:51.039 --> 01:23:56.479
it's true that Doyle did write science fiction, he did

1233
01:23:56.560 --> 01:24:01.359
write The Lost World, he did invent Professor Joe Edward Challenger,

1234
01:24:03.840 --> 01:24:10.840
and maybe I could, but I don't feel comfortable past

1235
01:24:10.920 --> 01:24:15.560
what I did putting Track and Homes together.

1236
01:24:16.399 --> 01:24:26.039
I'm too square, Okay, Now, speaking about Holmes, I was

1237
01:24:26.079 --> 01:24:29.560
looking through our show notes and a little bit of

1238
01:24:29.560 --> 01:24:35.239
your bio and looked and said the six percent solution.

1239
01:24:37.159 --> 01:24:39.239
So I decide I'm going to pick it up and

1240
01:24:39.279 --> 01:24:44.039
read it. And I'm about forty four into it right now.

1241
01:24:44.880 --> 01:24:49.000
And what got you into writing a Sherlock Holmes book

1242
01:24:49.399 --> 01:24:52.479
and in the in the format that feels like it's

1243
01:24:53.119 --> 01:24:59.479
author Conan Doyle's writing, well a few things.

1244
01:24:59.520 --> 01:25:01.479
This is a lo long story. We got time for

1245
01:25:01.520 --> 01:25:05.119
a slightly long Yeah, we do, all right. I don't

1246
01:25:05.119 --> 01:25:07.640
know if you had any listeners left, but here goes.

1247
01:25:10.560 --> 01:25:14.279
I fell in love with these sixty stories when I

1248
01:25:14.399 --> 01:25:16.479
was eleven, and my dad gave me the book to

1249
01:25:16.520 --> 01:25:23.119
read in high school. When I was being teased about

1250
01:25:23.119 --> 01:25:26.479
a lot of things, people said to me, oh, your

1251
01:25:26.520 --> 01:25:31.760
old man's a shrink. Is he a Freudian? And I

1252
01:25:31.800 --> 01:25:36.319
didn't know, so I said, pop, are you a Freudian?

1253
01:25:37.720 --> 01:25:41.159
And he said, well, that's a kind of silly question.

1254
01:25:42.960 --> 01:25:46.159
And I said why is that? And he said, because

1255
01:25:46.199 --> 01:25:49.760
it's no more possible to discuss psychoanalysis and not at

1256
01:25:49.840 --> 01:25:53.279
least begin with Sigmund Freud than it is to discuss

1257
01:25:53.319 --> 01:25:57.159
the history of the discovery of America by Europeans and

1258
01:25:57.199 --> 01:25:59.880
not start with Columbus or the Vikings, take your pick.

1259
01:26:00.159 --> 01:26:05.159
But to imagine that nothing has happened since the Vikings,

1260
01:26:05.880 --> 01:26:11.000
just to be pretty rigid, pretty doctrinaire. When a patient

1261
01:26:11.000 --> 01:26:14.479
comes to see me, I listen to what they say,

1262
01:26:15.760 --> 01:26:20.119
I listen to how they say it. I'm especially curious

1263
01:26:20.199 --> 01:26:23.920
as to what they do not say. I am, in short,

1264
01:26:24.680 --> 01:26:28.960
searching for clues, are they on time, what's their body language,

1265
01:26:28.960 --> 01:26:31.399
what kind of clothes are they wearing, searching for clues

1266
01:26:31.439 --> 01:26:36.760
from them as to why they are not happy? And

1267
01:26:36.880 --> 01:26:42.000
I said, whatever, I'm twelve or maybe thirteen with it.

1268
01:26:42.880 --> 01:26:48.800
That sounds like detective work. And he said, well, it

1269
01:26:48.920 --> 01:26:53.520
is rather like detective work. And at that moment something

1270
01:26:53.680 --> 01:26:57.199
clicked because I realized that listening to my dad talk

1271
01:26:57.319 --> 01:26:59.760
about his patients, when he would say, what do you

1272
01:26:59.760 --> 01:27:02.239
think about a guy? Who? He would never identify them,

1273
01:27:03.119 --> 01:27:07.399
but I realized who Sherlock Holmes had always reminded me

1274
01:27:07.520 --> 01:27:12.159
of was my dad. And so then I started to

1275
01:27:12.359 --> 01:27:18.640
wonder how much did Arthur Conan Doyle know about the

1276
01:27:18.680 --> 01:27:23.600
life and writing of Sigmund Freud. And the first thing

1277
01:27:23.640 --> 01:27:28.960
you realize is, oh, they're both doctors, and they both

1278
01:27:29.000 --> 01:27:33.520
died in the same town within nine years of each other.

1279
01:27:35.960 --> 01:27:37.920
And then I said, wait a minute, wait a minute,

1280
01:27:37.920 --> 01:27:43.600
and Sherlock Holmes is addicted to cocaine, and so for

1281
01:27:43.680 --> 01:27:50.159
a time was Sigmund Freud, who used it to combat depression,

1282
01:27:52.119 --> 01:27:56.560
and so bit by bit these dots over many years, because,

1283
01:27:56.600 --> 01:27:59.920
as I say, I'm a slow thinker. But I kept

1284
01:28:00.039 --> 01:28:04.319
thinking about Holmes and and Doyle and Freud and Holmes,

1285
01:28:04.319 --> 01:28:07.239
and there was some combination in there. I did not

1286
01:28:07.479 --> 01:28:10.399
then know. I didn't learn until years and years later

1287
01:28:11.319 --> 01:28:17.159
that Freud's favorite bedtime reading, his you know, bedside table,

1288
01:28:17.520 --> 01:28:21.720
were the home stories he loved, Sherlock Holmes. And when

1289
01:28:21.800 --> 01:28:24.640
you read I don't know if anybody here has read

1290
01:28:24.680 --> 01:28:28.239
some of the Freud case histories, tell me those case

1291
01:28:28.319 --> 01:28:32.600
histories don't sometimes read like they were written by Watson,

1292
01:28:33.560 --> 01:28:36.479
do I lie?

1293
01:28:36.800 --> 01:28:42.920
Yes, No, don't know, but that would be fascinating.

1294
01:28:43.720 --> 01:28:48.039
Read about Anna Oh or the rat Man you never

1295
01:28:48.119 --> 01:28:52.520
heard the Those histories are very interesting, and I swear

1296
01:28:52.560 --> 01:28:57.960
to God there must be influenced by Watson's writing style

1297
01:28:58.119 --> 01:29:04.800
or Doyle writing as Watson. At one point, Freud says quote,

1298
01:29:05.119 --> 01:29:09.479
I followed the Labyrinth of her mind Sherlock Holmes like

1299
01:29:09.920 --> 01:29:12.640
until it led me to I can't remember the rest

1300
01:29:12.640 --> 01:29:14.199
of it, but I was like, oh my god, this

1301
01:29:14.319 --> 01:29:20.479
is really And the sort of impetus, as far as

1302
01:29:20.520 --> 01:29:23.720
I was concerned, was how much I hated all the

1303
01:29:23.720 --> 01:29:27.520
Sherlock Holmes movies and felt that none of them were

1304
01:29:27.600 --> 01:29:34.720
really capturing my eleven year old experience of the stories.

1305
01:29:34.840 --> 01:29:38.279
That's what I wanted. I wanted to write a corrective

1306
01:29:39.239 --> 01:29:43.319
Watson was not a jerky and so forth, and those

1307
01:29:43.359 --> 01:29:46.880
were the elements that brought me to it, and I

1308
01:29:47.000 --> 01:29:50.119
probably wouldn't have done anything. By this time, I was

1309
01:29:50.159 --> 01:29:54.039
living in LA I was trying to get into the movies,

1310
01:29:54.680 --> 01:29:57.720
and wouldn't you know, the writer's guild went on strike,

1311
01:29:58.399 --> 01:30:02.640
which we do every chance we get. And at that

1312
01:30:02.760 --> 01:30:06.279
point the woman with whom I was living said, because

1313
01:30:06.479 --> 01:30:08.479
all you did was pick it every day for three

1314
01:30:08.520 --> 01:30:12.039
hours in the hot sun. And she said, because you're

1315
01:30:12.079 --> 01:30:15.119
not allowed to write screenplays. He said, well, now you

1316
01:30:15.119 --> 01:30:20.039
can write that Sherlock meets Sigmund story that you're always

1317
01:30:20.079 --> 01:30:23.640
talking about. She was right. I had nothing else to do,

1318
01:30:24.600 --> 01:30:25.560
so that's when I did it.

1319
01:30:30.479 --> 01:30:34.279
I'm so happy you did. I was also looking at

1320
01:30:34.920 --> 01:30:38.319
I was also looking through all your credits, and Uncle

1321
01:30:38.399 --> 01:30:43.159
Jim kind of mentioned this at one point and things

1322
01:30:43.159 --> 01:30:48.680
were discussing. I found this TV movie that you that

1323
01:30:48.800 --> 01:30:55.119
you directed, called The Day After, and I'm curious what

1324
01:30:55.159 --> 01:30:59.399
it was like to sit there and do a movie

1325
01:30:59.600 --> 01:31:02.520
where most of your actors are not actors.

1326
01:31:04.359 --> 01:31:08.479
Well, in the first place, they were actors. All the

1327
01:31:08.520 --> 01:31:13.239
speaking roles were filled by actors, whether you're talking about

1328
01:31:13.319 --> 01:31:18.439
Joe Beth Williams or Jason Robards or John Cullum or

1329
01:31:18.560 --> 01:31:25.680
Steve Gutenberg, and even the actors from Lawrence, Kansas were

1330
01:31:25.720 --> 01:31:30.720
acting students the day after, which is maybe the most

1331
01:31:30.760 --> 01:31:36.600
worthwhile thing that I ever got to do with my life,

1332
01:31:37.279 --> 01:31:45.640
was maybe to help start dismantling at the time, nuclear weapons.

1333
01:31:48.119 --> 01:31:52.600
The movie is the most watched movie ever made for television,

1334
01:31:53.760 --> 01:31:56.840
and it's a record that will never be broken because

1335
01:31:56.840 --> 01:32:00.279
there's so many channels now. But to have a over

1336
01:32:00.319 --> 01:32:02.640
one hundred, one hundred and fifty million people watching your

1337
01:32:02.640 --> 01:32:05.680
movie in one night, that's not going to happen again.

1338
01:32:06.479 --> 01:32:11.680
And it changed the conversation, and it freaked out the

1339
01:32:11.720 --> 01:32:15.239
President of the United States, who had come to power

1340
01:32:16.159 --> 01:32:22.119
believing in a winnable nuclear war, and the movie shook

1341
01:32:22.199 --> 01:32:26.359
him to its core. He was Ronald Reagan. He was

1342
01:32:26.399 --> 01:32:31.920
a Hollywood movie actor, and in Hollywood we have happy endings.

1343
01:32:32.159 --> 01:32:35.920
Were all been raised on one hundred years of happy endings,

1344
01:32:36.199 --> 01:32:42.279
and he had never been confronted by anything like that,

1345
01:32:42.760 --> 01:32:46.720
and if you read his memoir, he says how shaken

1346
01:32:46.840 --> 01:32:51.960
he was. And I also got to know his official biographer,

1347
01:32:52.680 --> 01:32:56.920
Edmund Morris, who wrote the book Dutch It's about him,

1348
01:32:57.520 --> 01:33:02.000
and he wrote another book called The Theodore Roosevelt that

1349
01:33:02.119 --> 01:33:05.359
I wrote as a script from Martin Scorsese. So that's

1350
01:33:05.399 --> 01:33:07.960
how I got to know ed Marris, and ed lived

1351
01:33:08.000 --> 01:33:12.079
in the White House for three years as Reagan's official biographer,

1352
01:33:13.000 --> 01:33:14.880
and he said the only time he ever saw the

1353
01:33:14.920 --> 01:33:19.960
guy flip out was after he saw the Day after

1354
01:33:20.159 --> 01:33:24.359
Camp David, and ultimately he was so flipped out that

1355
01:33:24.439 --> 01:33:28.199
he flew to Regyaevik, met with Prime Minister Soviet Prime

1356
01:33:28.239 --> 01:33:35.920
Minister Premier Gorbachev and signed the Intermediate Missile Range Treaty,

1357
01:33:36.520 --> 01:33:42.000
which is the only treaty that ever resulted in the

1358
01:33:42.079 --> 01:33:48.319
dismantling of nuclear weapons. As you may know, the pussy

1359
01:33:48.359 --> 01:33:54.479
grabber in chief has walked out of that treaty.

1360
01:33:54.680 --> 01:33:59.800
YEP. It was interesting because I thought about the movie

1361
01:34:00.039 --> 01:34:03.399
and went looking for it and found it and actually

1362
01:34:03.479 --> 01:34:06.479
watch it on Monday, and it's still had the same

1363
01:34:06.560 --> 01:34:09.720
impact on me as I saw it back in its

1364
01:34:09.760 --> 01:34:13.039
original and there's still pieces of it that I looked

1365
01:34:13.079 --> 01:34:15.920
at it like I ustill remember parts of that movie

1366
01:34:17.680 --> 01:34:19.520
because it made just such an impression.

1367
01:34:20.079 --> 01:34:23.720
If you go on YouTube, you can find a documentary

1368
01:34:23.960 --> 01:34:28.079
about the making of the movie. It's called Television Event,

1369
01:34:31.399 --> 01:34:34.600
and you'll see a lot of me, maybe too much

1370
01:34:34.600 --> 01:34:37.800
of me, but I'm in the documentary. And you can

1371
01:34:37.800 --> 01:34:42.199
also read a book about it called Apocalypse Television by

1372
01:34:42.239 --> 01:34:45.000
a man named David Craig. So a lot has been

1373
01:34:45.039 --> 01:34:51.479
written and filmed and discussed about the Day After, which

1374
01:34:51.680 --> 01:34:54.399
I say is maybe the most worthwhile thing I ever

1375
01:34:55.359 --> 01:34:58.560
so far have gotten to do with my life.

1376
01:35:00.560 --> 01:35:00.800
Yep.

1377
01:35:00.880 --> 01:35:05.920
I think there's a new twenty twenty two, twenty three

1378
01:35:06.159 --> 01:35:10.199
discussion on the making of it, the educational video which

1379
01:35:10.239 --> 01:35:14.840
I'm still trying to obtain, but such an impact, and

1380
01:35:15.319 --> 01:35:18.239
I almost recommend people to go back and watch it again.

1381
01:35:18.520 --> 01:35:21.560
Oh that everybody, just remind it. Everybody should watch it.

1382
01:35:21.840 --> 01:35:27.600
Donald Trump should watch Yes, anyway you can, you can.

1383
01:35:27.680 --> 01:35:30.359
You can see the documentary. It's I think it's available

1384
01:35:30.399 --> 01:35:33.000
on YouTube. It's called Television Event.

1385
01:35:36.079 --> 01:35:39.239
Definitely look forward. I think I've done some documentars already

1386
01:35:39.279 --> 01:35:42.159
and they were fascinating. I think I did see that

1387
01:35:42.199 --> 01:35:47.479
one and just incredible that one movie made such an

1388
01:35:47.520 --> 01:35:49.720
impact on history a.

1389
01:35:49.760 --> 01:35:55.840
Unique set of circumstances. You know, there were only three channels,

1390
01:35:55.880 --> 01:35:56.800
not three hundred.

1391
01:35:59.279 --> 01:36:02.560
But you made a movie that impacted the nation at

1392
01:36:02.600 --> 01:36:03.840
a time it needed to be impact.

1393
01:36:04.119 --> 01:36:07.600
Just as long as I'm taking credit. It was also

1394
01:36:07.760 --> 01:36:11.479
shown in the Soviet Union. It was shown around the

1395
01:36:11.479 --> 01:36:18.520
world in France, it was called ajieur d'apray in Jappodorno

1396
01:36:18.800 --> 01:36:23.199
in Italy, and it broke a lot of because there.

1397
01:36:23.239 --> 01:36:25.800
It was shown theatrically. It was shown in movie theaters,

1398
01:36:26.800 --> 01:36:29.800
broke a lot of records. It was shown in Cuba,

1399
01:36:31.000 --> 01:36:36.720
and there was a general on Castro's staff, not unlike

1400
01:36:36.800 --> 01:36:41.239
Ronald Reagan, who said that until he saw the movie,

1401
01:36:41.880 --> 01:36:45.399
the Cuban missile crisis had not been real to him.

1402
01:36:46.520 --> 01:36:50.880
That we came to blowing ourselves to Kingdom come, and

1403
01:36:51.000 --> 01:36:55.600
this guy had to see a movie before he understood

1404
01:36:55.800 --> 01:36:58.199
what we're talking about. When those missiles come out of

1405
01:36:58.199 --> 01:37:05.199
the ground, Reagan, Wow. Meagan incidentally thought you could recall

1406
01:37:05.239 --> 01:37:09.960
the missiles, and Helen called Tocott had a meeting with

1407
01:37:10.039 --> 01:37:13.239
him at the White House, and she said, no, mister President,

1408
01:37:13.279 --> 01:37:15.720
the missiles cannot be recalled. He didn't know that.

1409
01:37:22.359 --> 01:37:25.039
Well, with that, I'm going to pass it over back

1410
01:37:25.079 --> 01:37:29.000
to Uncle Jim and thank you very much. And you've

1411
01:37:29.039 --> 01:37:32.439
just added a lot more to my reading list coming

1412
01:37:32.520 --> 01:37:33.479
up on my kindle.

1413
01:37:33.720 --> 01:37:36.560
Thank you. I hope doesn't disappoint.

1414
01:37:38.319 --> 01:37:44.199
Oh well, Nicklas, I just wanted to say that I

1415
01:37:44.279 --> 01:37:47.079
just watched The Day After myself, and the one thing

1416
01:37:47.119 --> 01:37:50.960
that struck me about it was all the death.

1417
01:37:50.920 --> 01:37:52.359
All the carnage.

1418
01:37:53.159 --> 01:37:58.520
The movie ended with humanity remaining intact when the starving

1419
01:37:58.720 --> 01:38:04.439
family offers the doctor an apple and embraces him at

1420
01:38:04.439 --> 01:38:08.000
the end. And I thought through all of that, humanity

1421
01:38:08.439 --> 01:38:10.520
was still there. And that was one of the things

1422
01:38:10.560 --> 01:38:13.560
I really really stuck with me about that.

1423
01:38:13.520 --> 01:38:17.239
Movie, the perfect example of the way you interpret the

1424
01:38:17.279 --> 01:38:21.119
movie and the way other people, including me might interpret

1425
01:38:21.199 --> 01:38:27.479
the movie. You saw a ray of sunshine or array

1426
01:38:27.520 --> 01:38:34.479
of hope. I'm not sure that everybody takes that away

1427
01:38:34.640 --> 01:38:35.520
from that moment.

1428
01:38:38.119 --> 01:38:40.279
Well, that was just my interpretation.

1429
01:38:41.000 --> 01:38:43.399
That's my whole point. You opened the bottle, you pulled

1430
01:38:43.399 --> 01:38:45.119
out the message, and this is what you read.

1431
01:38:46.600 --> 01:38:46.800
Yep.

1432
01:38:47.880 --> 01:38:51.039
And you've told us a lot of stories tonight, and

1433
01:38:51.079 --> 01:38:53.640
I really appreciate it, and I want to in the

1434
01:38:53.680 --> 01:38:58.359
podcast by telling you one so way back in nineteen

1435
01:38:58.439 --> 01:39:04.439
ninety two, you were appearing at a Sherlock Holmes reading

1436
01:39:05.000 --> 01:39:09.680
at the Bennington State College in Bennington, Vermont. Me knowing

1437
01:39:09.720 --> 01:39:12.640
nothing about Sherlock Holmes at all, Me and my friends

1438
01:39:12.640 --> 01:39:14.920
piled in the car. I dressed up as a klingon,

1439
01:39:15.359 --> 01:39:18.159
we had our Starfleet uniforms on, and we made the

1440
01:39:18.159 --> 01:39:21.720
two hour trek to Bennington just to meet you. We

1441
01:39:21.760 --> 01:39:25.640
got there and we were the only people dressed up

1442
01:39:25.680 --> 01:39:29.760
in Star Trek costumes. We made our way through the

1443
01:39:29.800 --> 01:39:33.039
ballroom and we found you. Had you signed my Star

1444
01:39:33.079 --> 01:39:35.399
Trek six poster, which is hanging on my wall right

1445
01:39:35.439 --> 01:39:38.960
over here, and we chatted for a few minutes. I

1446
01:39:39.000 --> 01:39:41.239
don't remember everything that you said, but the one thing

1447
01:39:41.239 --> 01:39:45.399
you did say that sticks in my crawta today is

1448
01:39:45.439 --> 01:39:48.199
you said to me that no matter where you go,

1449
01:39:48.800 --> 01:39:54.199
Star Trek always finds you. Do you find that true today?

1450
01:39:54.239 --> 01:39:57.159
And does it? Are you proud of your involvement in

1451
01:39:57.199 --> 01:39:59.920
Star Trek and through everything you've done in your career,

1452
01:40:00.439 --> 01:40:03.920
all the books you've written that people come back to

1453
01:40:03.960 --> 01:40:04.560
Star Trek.

1454
01:40:06.000 --> 01:40:10.079
I feel very lucky to have I've had a lucky career.

1455
01:40:11.520 --> 01:40:17.039
But is he lucky, Napoleon asked, is he lucky? The

1456
01:40:17.199 --> 01:40:21.079
idea that I ever crossed paths with Star Trek, which,

1457
01:40:21.119 --> 01:40:24.920
as I said, I knew nothing about and didn't understand,

1458
01:40:26.119 --> 01:40:29.560
and the fact that I've been so fortunate, on at

1459
01:40:29.600 --> 01:40:34.680
least three occasions to have made these movies or I

1460
01:40:34.680 --> 01:40:40.600
didn't direct for but I wrote most of it. I

1461
01:40:40.760 --> 01:40:44.560
just count myself extremely lucky to have been involved with something.

1462
01:40:45.319 --> 01:40:49.079
And I'm fascinated that it took me so long to

1463
01:40:49.199 --> 01:40:52.840
figure out what was special about it. That it's belief

1464
01:40:54.319 --> 01:40:59.760
that people of goodwill could come together to achieve things,

1465
01:41:01.079 --> 01:41:08.840
whether that's real or ideal, is still to me meaningful

1466
01:41:10.000 --> 01:41:15.039
and important and valuable and something that I'm always proud

1467
01:41:15.119 --> 01:41:20.760
to have been part of, especially when people tell you

1468
01:41:20.880 --> 01:41:25.640
that something that you did, whether it's Star Trek or

1469
01:41:25.800 --> 01:41:30.239
Time after Time or my Sherlock Holmes novels or the

1470
01:41:30.319 --> 01:41:35.079
Day after that, it meant something that you got through

1471
01:41:36.359 --> 01:41:39.520
that they saw. The message in the bottle may not

1472
01:41:39.560 --> 01:41:41.319
be the message you thought you put in there, but

1473
01:41:41.479 --> 01:41:48.079
still and they're thanking you. You can't ask for more

1474
01:41:48.159 --> 01:41:51.960
than that. I can't, I don't. I don't ask for

1475
01:41:52.000 --> 01:41:52.479
more than that.

1476
01:41:54.920 --> 01:41:57.760
Well, and I think I think that's a great jumping

1477
01:41:57.800 --> 01:42:00.239
off point here, and I just want to tell you

1478
01:42:00.239 --> 01:42:02.439
an opportunity to say thank you so much for spending

1479
01:42:02.479 --> 01:42:05.039
some time with us and Trek talking with us. We

1480
01:42:05.079 --> 01:42:07.600
really appreciate it. It meant so much to us to

1481
01:42:08.119 --> 01:42:12.119
talk to someone of your caliber. And uh, Paul, would

1482
01:42:12.159 --> 01:42:15.359
you like to say good night to Nicholas Meyers and

1483
01:42:15.479 --> 01:42:19.199
I unmuted your at least my shackles.

1484
01:42:19.279 --> 01:42:23.600
Let me be free, please again, this has just been

1485
01:42:24.399 --> 01:42:27.840
We have a whole spectrum, a mosaic of different guests

1486
01:42:28.319 --> 01:42:30.920
from all different corners of Star Trek on this show

1487
01:42:30.920 --> 01:42:33.479
from time to time. But it's just if someone had

1488
01:42:33.520 --> 01:42:35.039
told me at some point that we were going to

1489
01:42:35.079 --> 01:42:36.600
get you on this show and that we were able

1490
01:42:36.640 --> 01:42:39.079
to have such an incredible conversation and that you would

1491
01:42:39.119 --> 01:42:43.680
be so generous with your stories and so patient with

1492
01:42:43.720 --> 01:42:48.479
the crazy machinations behind the scenes here, that I was

1493
01:42:48.520 --> 01:42:50.399
just like, I was so grateful that we were able

1494
01:42:50.399 --> 01:42:51.960
to hang in there and that were you were kind

1495
01:42:52.079 --> 01:42:55.399
enough to spend some time with us. I'm just a

1496
01:42:56.920 --> 01:42:57.960
You're a treasure brother.

1497
01:43:00.520 --> 01:43:06.399
Everybody should buy Sherlock Holmes and the Telegram from Hell.

1498
01:43:08.399 --> 01:43:11.600
I confess I've been. I've been buying them during our

1499
01:43:11.640 --> 01:43:17.840
podcast right now, Nicholas, we're moving it.

1500
01:43:18.560 --> 01:43:22.760
You can read them during the podcast. Just just go

1501
01:43:22.840 --> 01:43:25.760
on Amazon and write a nice reader's review because they

1502
01:43:25.800 --> 01:43:26.720
pay attention to that.

1503
01:43:27.319 --> 01:43:31.359
Absolutely, absolutely, thank you for sharing all of your wonderfulness

1504
01:43:31.359 --> 01:43:34.159
with us. It's just the worst word I've ever invented, wonderfulness.

1505
01:43:34.159 --> 01:43:36.600
I don't know, but it's just I'm very self conscious

1506
01:43:36.600 --> 01:43:38.279
about the words coming out of my mouth now, which

1507
01:43:38.319 --> 01:43:39.319
is probably a good thing, but.

1508
01:43:41.960 --> 01:43:44.079
You should probably be careful when we speak.

1509
01:43:45.119 --> 01:43:47.880
Well, it's been a pleasure, sir. Thank you so much

1510
01:43:47.960 --> 01:43:48.960
for spending time with us.

1511
01:43:49.119 --> 01:43:51.920
Take care of fellows. Thank you, thank you.

1512
01:43:52.319 --> 01:43:55.640
Good night, thank you, thank you, good night.

1513
01:43:56.720 --> 01:44:00.439
All right, guys, I wow, I got to a pologize.

1514
01:44:00.520 --> 01:44:02.520
I don't know what happened at the top of the show.

1515
01:44:03.000 --> 01:44:04.319
I honestly don't know.

1516
01:44:04.600 --> 01:44:06.800
I'm just so grateful that we fixed it. Though whatever

1517
01:44:06.880 --> 01:44:09.560
happened to fix it, there was for like a few

1518
01:44:09.600 --> 01:44:11.840
minutes there, I was just like, he's gonna bail. I

1519
01:44:11.880 --> 01:44:15.000
was just really concerned, right, and the fact that he

1520
01:44:15.079 --> 01:44:17.720
hung in there and that it worked out somehow or

1521
01:44:17.800 --> 01:44:22.359
whatever means. I have no idea. Wow, that was amazing.

1522
01:44:22.479 --> 01:44:23.680
He was so great.

1523
01:44:24.199 --> 01:44:27.840
Yes, yep, and I'm gonna have a lot of editing

1524
01:44:27.880 --> 01:44:30.760
to do tomorrow, just place this whole thing together and

1525
01:44:30.840 --> 01:44:31.920
make it sound all right.

1526
01:44:32.039 --> 01:44:33.359
But but I'll make it happen.

1527
01:44:33.399 --> 01:44:35.800
He's such a storyteller, Oh my god.

1528
01:44:36.319 --> 01:44:38.840
Oh the storytellers are the best.

1529
01:44:39.000 --> 01:44:39.159
Yeah.

1530
01:44:39.199 --> 01:44:39.760
A lot of fun.

1531
01:44:39.800 --> 01:44:42.319
And he's just very He's very open. I mean, once

1532
01:44:42.319 --> 01:44:44.640
he started swearing, I was just like, Yeah, he's just

1533
01:44:44.640 --> 01:44:47.239
gonna let it go, right, He's just gonna open his

1534
01:44:47.800 --> 01:44:51.479
open his story bank and just start talking. And I

1535
01:44:51.600 --> 01:44:55.520
just think everybody, uh, you should all be commended. Everybody

1536
01:44:55.640 --> 01:44:58.119
just really put in a lot of thought in advance

1537
01:44:58.159 --> 01:45:01.239
and asked great questions to him. I think we all

1538
01:45:01.239 --> 01:45:04.640
had different points of view and different areas of interest,

1539
01:45:04.640 --> 01:45:06.560
but I thought they were all just really great questions,

1540
01:45:06.600 --> 01:45:10.640
and he seemed to find a lot of enjoyment in

1541
01:45:10.680 --> 01:45:13.720
the diversity of them. I thought everyone did a great job.

1542
01:45:13.960 --> 01:45:16.560
It was just lovely, lovely to hear.

1543
01:45:17.319 --> 01:45:17.560
Well.

1544
01:45:17.600 --> 01:45:19.560
I think I think we're able to come up with

1545
01:45:19.640 --> 01:45:23.399
so many different different places, different thing to talk about,

1546
01:45:23.880 --> 01:45:27.159
so we really weren't talking of each other hardly.

1547
01:45:27.439 --> 01:45:29.880
Yeah, I think writing down the questions in advance like

1548
01:45:29.960 --> 01:45:34.000
this is great. I think it's really super super super helpful.

1549
01:45:34.479 --> 01:45:35.319
I want to do it.

1550
01:45:35.560 --> 01:45:38.399
Yeah, it just focuses us and stuff. But man, he

1551
01:45:38.640 --> 01:45:41.680
is what is the eighties something now, Nicholas Meyer. I

1552
01:45:41.680 --> 01:45:43.840
think it's just like but man, he is just like

1553
01:45:44.960 --> 01:45:46.880
he's like a young guy. I mean he's just so

1554
01:45:47.680 --> 01:45:51.079
you know, uh, you know, quick and uh and smart

1555
01:45:51.119 --> 01:45:54.560
and funny and just like he's just great classicist.

1556
01:45:55.079 --> 01:45:55.279
You know.

1557
01:45:56.520 --> 01:45:57.439
Do you have a good time Eric?

1558
01:45:57.680 --> 01:45:58.560
A lot of fun.

1559
01:46:00.119 --> 01:46:00.199
Now?

1560
01:46:00.319 --> 01:46:02.840
I mean it was amazing, of course. Yeah. Yeah, I

1561
01:46:02.840 --> 01:46:06.279
had a fantastic time. He was really something a.

1562
01:46:06.199 --> 01:46:06.800
Lot of fun.

1563
01:46:06.880 --> 01:46:07.119
Cool.

1564
01:46:07.199 --> 01:46:10.600
But I I we've never had that type of technical

1565
01:46:10.680 --> 01:46:13.399
problem before, and I hope that that was a one

1566
01:46:13.439 --> 01:46:15.680
time deal. And I apologize to all of our listeners

1567
01:46:15.760 --> 01:46:19.199
for that. I don't know what caused it, and I

1568
01:46:19.199 --> 01:46:21.359
don't know why it stopped. I'm just glat that it did.

1569
01:46:22.039 --> 01:46:22.239
Well.

1570
01:46:22.239 --> 01:46:26.199
We know that the holographic cat did something over that.

1571
01:46:25.840 --> 01:46:27.760
Yeah, Charles holographic.

1572
01:46:29.520 --> 01:46:31.920
Yeah, I think the back door of the artist just

1573
01:46:31.960 --> 01:46:37.760
flew off. I think yeah, but I think it was

1574
01:46:37.840 --> 01:46:39.520
probably it was.

1575
01:46:41.760 --> 01:46:46.800
When we reloaded. I didn't get my background on, so

1576
01:46:46.840 --> 01:46:51.279
it's not a hologram right now. Yeah, something just scared

1577
01:46:51.319 --> 01:46:53.319
the cat and she just went right across the bed

1578
01:46:53.399 --> 01:46:55.479
and just turned the lot off.

1579
01:46:55.560 --> 01:46:58.119
It's like, thank you crazy.

1580
01:46:58.239 --> 01:47:01.399
So, uh, next week, next week we have another guest.

1581
01:47:01.439 --> 01:47:04.479
We're going to be talking to Jonathan Simpson and he's

1582
01:47:04.520 --> 01:47:07.039
the guy that played Sarah in My favorite movie, Star

1583
01:47:07.119 --> 01:47:10.159
Trek five to the Final Frontier in the flashback scene

1584
01:47:10.560 --> 01:47:13.600
with Cybach and Spock. He'll be joining us next week

1585
01:47:13.720 --> 01:47:17.119
as well, and the following after that we're going to

1586
01:47:17.159 --> 01:47:21.159
be talking about they called us Enemy George da Kaye's book,

1587
01:47:21.279 --> 01:47:24.199
and we have a lot to talk about. I think

1588
01:47:24.199 --> 01:47:28.039
we're going to do an entire show on fascism and

1589
01:47:28.399 --> 01:47:30.640
the rise of it in America and what is going

1590
01:47:30.680 --> 01:47:33.960
on today. I think that's going to be a very telling,

1591
01:47:34.920 --> 01:47:40.560
very important show for everybody, because I think there's a

1592
01:47:40.600 --> 01:47:42.479
lot that needs to be talked about, a lot that

1593
01:47:42.520 --> 01:47:45.119
needs to be addressed, and I think that we, as

1594
01:47:45.119 --> 01:47:49.279
Star Trek fans and Trek Spurts, you know, are going

1595
01:47:49.359 --> 01:47:51.800
to get a lot out of talking about that. So

1596
01:47:51.880 --> 01:47:55.159
that'll be And then I've also reached out to David

1597
01:47:55.319 --> 01:47:58.880
Ornant Orange who played the Klingon in Star Trek six,

1598
01:47:58.880 --> 01:48:03.279
who has the conversation with Ahura when she's trying to

1599
01:48:03.319 --> 01:48:07.640
sneak through to Kronos or to Roora Pente, and he's

1600
01:48:07.680 --> 01:48:12.479
the Klingon that's talking to her and about the bugs

1601
01:48:12.520 --> 01:48:16.880
and whatnot. So that's that's coming up as well. And uh,

1602
01:48:16.960 --> 01:48:19.000
I guess that's it. Guys, we went a little bit over.

1603
01:48:19.199 --> 01:48:22.880
I apologize for that as well. I'm your most excellent host,

1604
01:48:22.960 --> 01:48:26.720
Uncle Jim saying everybody, please, Star Trek fans are the

1605
01:48:26.760 --> 01:48:32.520
best fans, and you better believe that hailing frequencies are closed.

1606
01:48:32.600 --> 01:48:33.560
Good night, everybody.

1607
01:48:37.239 --> 01:48:40.239
All right, let's I'm ready for departure, sir.

1608
01:48:43.920 --> 01:48:47.000
Some problem righter, just hoping this isn't the usual way

1609
01:48:47.039 --> 01:48:47.840
our missions will go.

1610
01:48:47.880 --> 01:48:52.039
Set Oh, no, number one, iuel most will be much

1611
01:48:52.039 --> 01:48:52.680
more interesting.

1612
01:48:56.720 --> 01:49:04.159
Let's see what's out there. You really like the personal
Nicholas Meyer