Once I reached lunchtime and realized how long I’d been going on, I realized that it was just going to make good sense to split the first day of PBS into two parts (I’ll do the same for Day 2 as well), so we now rejoin PBS Day 1 immediately post-lunch, as we loosen our belts and are introduced to…
“American Masters: You Must Remember This – The Warner Brothers Story”: This is one of those panels that started out with a ho-hum line-up, and then – BAM! – it suddenly became awesome. I was always interested in seeing it, since I’m a film buff, but two days before it took place, we suddenly got an E-mail from PBS saying, “Oh, by the way, that Warner Brothers panel? We just added Frank Darabont (director of ‘The Shawshank Redemption,’ ‘The Green Mile,’ and ‘The Mist’), Richard Donner (director of ‘Superman,’ ‘Lethal Weapon,’ and ‘The Goonies’) and Jon Voight (star of ‘Midnight Cowboy,’ ‘Deliverance,’ and ‘Coming Home’) to it.”
WHAT? Oh, HELL, yes, I’m gonna be there!
And in addition to those names, also in attendance were actress Joan Leslie (‘Yankee Doodle Dandy,’ ‘Sergeant York,’ and ‘High Sierra’), Lauren Shuler Donner (producer of ‘Dave,’ ‘You’ve Got Mail,’ and ‘Free Willy’), Greg Orr (grandson of Jack Warner), and Richard Schickel, the film critic of Time Magazine since 1972 and the creative mind behind this historical retrospective.
Oh, yeah, I was excited.
Ultimately, precious little about the program itself ended up being revealed, aside from Schickel’s confirmation that the animation of Warner Brothers will be covered in a four or five minute segment. Most of it was the various actors and directors recollecting about their experiences for the company, plus a bit of reminscining from Orr about his grandfather and his reputation. Not that I’m complaining, mind you. It was still pretty damned awesome.
Here are some highlights…
* Frank Darabont revealed that, whenever he makes a film, he’s always checking to see what other films have been made on that lot. “When we were shooting The Green Mile, for example, we were shooting on the Formosa lot, which was Warner Hollywood at the time, and it was the same sound stages where they shot ‘The Black Swan,’ going back to the silent days,” said Darabont. “If you love movies, you go in, and it’s not just a place where you are showing up. You start looking around the nooks and crannies of these places and asking questions, and I actually had some of my staff sneak into their offices and talk to their people and pull their files out, and we would start getting lists together of what had been shot on that sound stage. We started lobbying for them to start, you know, putting up plaques in the sound stages with the titles with some of the great movies. That’s now true at Warner Brothers. I like to think that me bitching about it had a little something to do with it. Maybe they were planning it anyway and I’m just humoring myself.”
* Joan Leslie spoke of how different the studio system was in her day than it is now. “I was signed in 1939 when I was 15 years old,” she revealed, “and they said, ‘We’ll groom you.’ In two weeks I was testing for ‘High Sierra,’ and I got the part, and I did five more pictures that year while I was 15. And I was going to school and doing publicity. Quiet wonder was like how I felt about the studio. These enormous stages, and glamorous people. The makeup department in the morning was busy and fun and talking, charming. And on the set, great feeling of teamwork. I think everybody on the set felt good when we made a good take. It wasn’t just it’s a take. We all felt like, ‘Gee, we did good.’ But I think that some of that has changed. And that doesn’t mean they’re not making great pictures, but it’s changed a lot. And I’m glad I was there then. I’m glad they did that purposely for me. I’m grateful to Warner’s for what they did. They took care of me. They gave me my identity.”
* There was mass praising of what a great studio Warner Brothers used to be, with discussions about how you’d meet after a film had done well and have the studio head throw you the keys to a brand new car. Once, according to Richard Donner, Christopher Reeve had rented a car on the studio’s dime, and when he asked if he could keep it a few extra days so that he could see the sights, studio head John Calley asked, “What’s his favorite color?” And the next thing you knew, Reeve had his own car to see the sights with. This trick backfired on them at least once, though, according to Richard Donner. ” When ‘Lethal Weapon’ hit, I don’t know, whatever mark, a lot of money, Bob Daley and Terry Semel asked us to have a little lunch in their office to celebrate,” said Donner. “And he said, ‘Would you come, and (Joel Silver) and Mel?’ I said, ‘Of course. And you’ve got to have Danny (Glover).’ He said, ‘Oh, yeah, sure, Danny.’ And then I said, ‘You’ve got to have Jeff Boam.’ And Bob Daley said, ‘You know, this is just a little lunch.” I said, ‘Well, you’ve got to have them.’ He said, ‘Okay.’ By the time we were done, we had Rene Russo, Joey Pesci…every time I called Bob to add a name, he was very curt about it. So lunch was going on, and I said, ‘You know, in the old days, before you, after lunch they would have thrown some keys on the table, and everyone would have gone outside and got a Ferrari or a…’ Bob Daley looked at me and threw some keys on the table, and they were all brand-new Range Rovers…but he only started with three. Every time (I added a name)…well, the last two had to come down from San Francisco in a truck!”
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