All language subtitles for Perry Mason s09ex1 Charlie Rose Interviews Raymond Burr

In 1985, and again in 1987, Raymond
spoke about Perry Mason with

Charlie Rose, who was then hosting CBS
Nightwatch.

These interviews were to promote the
return of Perry Mason in the two -hour

movie format.

That music signaled the beginning of an
hour of unfailing justice.

Wright was done every night, just in the
nick of time.

Perry Mason never rested. The show went
on the air in 1957, and after a nine

-year run, it went into syndication.

Now, Raymond Burr is recreating the role
of Perry Mason for a new two -hour

movie, The Return of Perry Mason. It
airs in December.

And we are pleased to have Raymond Burr
join us now. What a pleasure it is to

have you here. Thank you. It's my
pleasure. I'm a great fan of this show.

Thank you very much on behalf of all
those people who watch it.

Why is it coming back?

Well, we never had the opportunity of
doing a two -hour show, and I always

wanted to.

All of Mr. Gardner's books had to be
oversimplified to get the whole story

into an hour's time.

And I always wanted to do a two -hour
show for that reason.

And so Perry Mason comes back because
Della is in trouble.

That's right. That's right. Can I give
it away? I mean, she's on trial for...

She's on trial for murder. And he has
been... She has become an executive

assistant to a big industrialist whom
she's accused of murdering.

Perry Mason has become a judge, an
appellate court judge.

And he has to resign that in order to
defend her.

So we don't dwell on those two things
very much. We dwell on the case.

And, however, we do have two hours that
tells you a little bit more about Mason

and tells you certainly a good deal more
about Dulles Street.

And what's happened to him in the
interim or more about the nature of the

and his character?

The nature of the people involved in the
show.

What was the magic of it? Why did it
work so well?

I think because the audiences wanted to
believe in...

our form of justice, our court system.

It's imperfect, but it's still the best
in the world.

And then in the end, justice will help.
Yes.

It was even an important show in foreign
countries where they had the Napoleonic

criminal code as opposed to the Anglo
-Saxon code.

And some of the shows that were done in
the United States...

Perry Mason and the Defenders and shows
like that helped change the law in some

of those countries. It was good without
having car chases and shootings and

violence. It was the drama, the human
drama of characters you liked in

You saw the results of violence mostly
on the show, very little violence, if

any.

We will have mostly that in the two
-hour show.

There is no gratuitous violence of any
kind in the show. There is

some excitement.

It must be more than just justice.

I mean, the character itself. People
must have liked Perry Mason.

I mean, you've got to have an anchor
there that people like.

Well, we worked.

Those days were the beginnings of
television's hours, hour dramas.

And when we started the show, there were
very few hour dramas. We had come from

live television, Playhouse 90 and Climax
and those shows, mostly introduced by

CBS.

And then the new shows started, Lux
Radio and Hallmark Playhouse and all

of those.

And then the hour dramas. So no one
really knew where they would go or

they would be successful.

And that came just at the right time, I
guess. You had a reputation for being a

prodigious worker. You lived on the set.

Well, unfortunately, there were those
many words in each show to learn,

and you couldn't do it by living apart
from the studio.

It's probably... It was a great success,
the show. We went on for nine years.

I thought it was two years too many.

You really, you wanted to quit two years
earlier?

Oh, I wanted to quit at the end of five
years.

It went nine, you wanted to quit at
five. You thought it should have been

after seven.

Absolutely. Because?

You start losing qualities on the show.
You start losing your best writers after

five years.

It's very rare that a show can continue
on unless it has an...

integrated part of the cast who also
works on the show, like writing, like

done in MASH, for instance.

MASH continued on for all those years
because of the dedication and, you know,

with a great degree of excellence.

The shows that are on today that are the
best shows have that dedication from

all departments in the shows. Commitment
to excellence. That's right. And you

don't get it. You have it on your show.
That's why I watch it all the time.

Well, thanks very much. Back in a
moment, Raymond Burr. Stay with us.

Raymond Burr is with us now in
Washington, and what a pleasure it is to

back, sir. It's a pleasure to be with
you, I'll tell you.

So we got another movie. The last one
was so successful, it was what? The most

watched television movie of the year? We
did five.

This is the... We just finished the
seventh one.

The Case of the Murdered Madam was the
sixth.

So we did five in the two -year period,
then we're doing four this year. And

they've all done... They've all beat
everything else on their time slots. You

prefer the longer form because... Oh,
yes.

You can... We found out that Della
Street lived in a house and could

garden and could cook. You never saw her
cook. In all the nine years we did a

show. Find out that Perry Mason...

possibly might have a sense of humor,
you know, and those kinds of things. You

never had time for that. Never had time
for it. And we find out also that maybe

there is more than hanky -panky going on
between Della and Perry. Between Della

and Perry? Yeah. So we never had time
for that either.

Time for just the one -hour show.

Is the audience reacting differently? Do
they say, my God, I love the... I mean,

what's the...

Charlie, the most important thing to me
was, everybody said, did you

expect the kind of reaction you got on
the first show? I expected us to be

moderately successful.

Not immeasurably successful, as we were.

because that demanded that at least a
third of the audience be young people

Not only tune in but stay tuned in and
they have since they're people who had

not really know.

Yeah What do you how do you explain the
success?

What is it that people still want to?

They are taking a measure of their form
of justice as sure as anything.

And they like the idea of, everybody
likes the idea of a white knight, you

running to the rescue.

Across this country and indeed in
foreign countries, it's the most

show of its kind ever. Yes, I was in
Cannes last year, my

first kind of trip to that milieu.

We are the number one show of any
dramatic show that goes from the United

this last year. But there's got to be
more to it than just the fact that it is

life and death. It is courtroom drama.

I mean, there is something special.

A, it's part of you, but it's also part
of the Perry Mason persona. I mean, what

is it that makes it uniquely successful
when there are other competing dramas

about lawyers?

Well, I think it was the first one.

Number one, when we went on the air in
57, none of the minorities were

represented really in the courts or
didn't know that they were.

And this was a great education for the
American people. Not only our show, but

all the shows came after.

But the Oriental people, the Hispanics,
the black people,

it all became their show.

Why? Because they could see that this
was a country that the justice system is

imperfect in our country because it's
dealt with by human beings who are

imperfect. But it's still the best damn
one that we have in the world.

Our justice system. Yes. Have you read
this book, Presumed Innocent?

Yes, I'm in the middle of it right now.
Because it's a fascinating look at

American justice and the notion of deals
being made and a sense of the

corruption of American justice.

Oh, there is that.

There is that because now that we get
ourselves, wait till we get into the

century, I think there's a lot more
going to be involved with the new

electronics than we've had in courtrooms
before.

Not just televising the courtroom, but
using... No, no, no. Using the whole

courtroom. I support a college of law in
Sacramento called McGeorge, and it's

one of the finest law schools in the
United States.

I did a commencement address of 27 years
there, and we graduated 14 lawyers that

day in an open field because they didn't
have any commencement hall.

Last year, they graduated almost 800
students.

And they had 7 ,000 in the audience.

800 students? Almost, 800.

800 lawyers. Yes.

But all marvelous lawyers. And what it
has is the biggest group

of students per capita in the law
schools passing the bar.

Now, the interest in

that... During that period of time,
during the 25 years, they started

what was called the courtroom of the
future. And we built the courtroom.

I was part of it. I did a whole film on
it. It was done circular, where

the jury sits with its back to the
spectator section.

There's absolute security for
everything.

There's a television set in front of
every one of the jurors and every one of

the principal people that shows them
evidence close -ups and certain aspects.

It's a marvelous system and is used as a
courtroom.

And all the new courtrooms in the United
States don't want to take a look at

that courtroom.

So by the time we get to the year 2000,

You're going to see a lot of changes
within the courtroom systems.

We need to because we are more populous
and we have more cases.

We're our litigious society.