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Mr. Chayefsky, when
I think over all your works,

it seems to me
that there's one basic theme,

one predominant theme to which
you're committed emotionally.

This is the theme of loneliness, isolation.

Would you accept this?

Yes, I think that's
probably true of all writers

'cause something rather severe
is happening recently.

It's the assumption that,

having achieved
a great deal of prosperity,

life seems to have achieved
no more particular meaning.

And because of that, they've
begun to stand on the brink

and look down into the abyss
and say,

"What is life all about?"
You see?

Nevertheless, we are all
more or less alone

- in one point or another.
- Yeah.

And just what it is
that constitutes a value to life

or a meaning to life

is, I think, well worth
the writer's consideration.

The winner in New York,
"Marty," Paddy Chayefsky.

The winner is Paddy Chayefsky.

The winner...

is Paddy Chayefsky
for "Network."

How long has
it been going on?

A month.

I thought it was
a transient thing

and blow over in a week.

I still pray to God it's just
a menopausal infatuation.

But it is an infatuation,
Louise.

There's no sense in my saying
I won't see her again

because I will.

You want me to leave?

Check into a hotel?

Do you love her?

I don't know how I feel.

I'm grateful
I can feel anything.

I know I'm obsessed with her.

Then say it.

Don't keep telling me
that you're obsessed,

that you're infatuated.

Say that you're in love
with her.

I'm in love with her.

There are good, solid,
professional screenwriters

who their job
and what they're good at

is getting you from explosion
to explosion to explosion, okay?

And it's really the director

who is creating the moments that
you're remembering in the film.

And on the other end of
the spectrum, Paddy Chayefsky.

I'm damned
if I'm going to stand here

and have you tell me you're
in love with somebody else.

Because this isn't
a convention weekend

with your secretary, is it?

Or-- Or or some broad

that you picked up
after three belts of booze.

This is your
great winter romance, isn't it?

Beatrice Straight--
You know, people always go,

"Beatrice Straight won an
Academy Award with one scene."

I say, "I will argue
she won it with one line."

What am I supposed to do?

Am I supposed to sit
home knitting and purling

while you slink back
like some penitent drunk?

I'm your wife, damn it!

And if you can't work up
a winter passion for me,

the least I require
is respect and allegiance!

There's a standout line
in that scene--

"I'm your wife, goddamn it,

and if you can't work up
a winter passion for me,

then the least I deserve
is respect and allegiance."

Come on!

You know the line?

Oh, I know "Net--" I know
"Network" backwards, man.

...and Beatrice Straight

in "Network."

And the winner is...

The winner is
Beatrice Straight in "Network."

Thank you so much,
all of you.

It's a great, great thrill
for me and very unexpected.

Though I should have known
that when I had someone

like Paddy Chayefsky writing

and saying things that we all
feel but can't express,

then how can I miss?

I have his face
right in front of me.

You know, glasses
and reddish hair and smoking,

all the time, smoking.

I mean, everyone smoked,

but he was never
without a cigarette.

I remember The New York Times
wrote an article

about Paddy Chayefsky,
and his drawer in his office,

there were individual
pieces of paper.

And they asked him,
"What are these tiny little

pieces of paper?
He said, "I collect words."

And he also put them
together beautifully.

The language

that these actors
got to play with,

I mean, monologues that
you would only see on stage,

and the balls
to do that on film

and to trust
that it would be riveting.

The simple fact is, Max,

that you're a family man.

You like a home and kids,
and that's beautiful.

But I am incapable
of any such commitment.

All you'll get from me
is another couple of months

of intermittent sex and
recriminate and ugly

little scenes like the one
we had last night.

I'm sorry for all those things
I said to you last night.

You're not the worst
fuck I've ever had.

Believe me, I've had worse.

You don't--

You don't puff or snorkel
and make death-like rattles.

As a matter of fact you're
rather serene in the sack.

Why is it that a woman
always thinks

that the most savage thing
she can say to a man

is to impugn his cocksmanship?

To see something like "Network"
that was written

so strongly...

When William Holden
and Faye Dunaway

were in a scene going
back and forth at each other

at 100 miles an hour...

...there were three people
in that scene.

There was Holden,
there was Dunaway,

and there was Chayefsky.

You didn't see him,
but you knew it was written.

You want Holden and Dunaway
to be out of control,

and yet someone in there
with them is in control,

and that's Chayefsky,
writing them toward this--

this climax of the scene...

I'm more concerned about you.

And you're not the boozer type.

So I figure a year, maybe two,
before you crack up

or jump out of your
14th-floor office window.

Stop selling, Max.
I don't need you.

...which then leads
to the next one,

which then leads
to the next one.

You don't improv your way
through stuff like that.

I don't want your pain.

I don't want your
menopausal decay and death!

I don't need you, Max!

- Get out of here!
- You need me!

You need me badly

because I'm your last contact
with human reality.

I love you!

And that painful, decaying love
is the only thing

between you
and the shrieking nothingness

you live the rest of the day.

Then don't leave me.

I mean,
that's just the beginning.

He's just getting warmed up.

That's just the opening
to the overture--

"the shrieking nothingness."

And you have that
handy, just like that?

Oh, yeah. It's right here.
Oh, yeah.

No, I-- I-- I-- I--

I look at it
a few times a month for sure.

You're television incarnate,
Diana.

Indifferent to suffering.

Insensitive to joy.

All of life is reduced to
the common rubble of banality.

That scene--
"You're television incarnate"--

is my favorite scene
for a number of reasons,

not the least of which

is it's the greatest description
of television.

War, murder, death...

all the same to you
as bottles of beer.

And the daily business
of life is a corrupt comedy.

I mean, I think "Network" is

always in my top three movies
of-- of all time.

You know, it's
behind the scenes of television.

And now, the distinguished

television news commentator,
Mr. Howard Beale.

Ladies and gentlemen,
I would like at this moment

to announce
that I will be retiring

from this program
in two weeks' time

because of poor ratings.

Since this show was
the only thing

I had going for me in my life,

I have decided to kill myself.

I'm gonna blow my brains out
right on this program

a week from today.

What the hell's going on?

Prepare yourself

for a perfectly outrageous
motion picture.

Did you see Paddy
as an unassuming writer?

Or was he someone
who you knew was a force?

I knew.

I mean,
Paddy always talked about

the struggle
in the soul of-- of people,

but he never preached.

It always came out of character.

We know things are bad,
worse than bad.

They're crazy.

It's like everything everywhere
is going crazy,

so we don't go out anymore.

We sit in the house,
and slowly the world

we're living in is getting
smaller, and all we say is,

"Please, at least leave us alone
in our living rooms.

"Let me have my toaster and my
TV and my steel-belted radials

and I won't say anything.
Just leave us alone."

Well, I'm not going to leave
you alone.

And it showed the
complex personalities of people

who create entertainment
and create the news

and what all the politics are
behind the scenes

and all the personal
relationships

and how ego gets in the way
of people doing the right thing.

Greed.

Howard Beale went out there
last night

and said what every American
feels,

that he's tired
of all the bullshit.

He's articulating
the popular rage.

I want that show, Frank.

I can turn that show into
the biggest smash on television.

Okay, we're going live
in 10, Howard.

Good evening.

What Paddy was able to do,

as a brilliant playwright,

screenwriter,

was to be able to articulate
the anger,

to put it into

an expressive, honest,

relatable manner

so that the audience
doesn't put up a wall to it

but allows that kind of energy
to come into them,

feel it themselves.

Dr. Bock:
We manufacture genes.

We can produce birth
ectogenetically.

We can practically clone people
like carrots.

And half the kids in this ghetto

haven't even been inoculated
for polio.

We have established
the most enormous

medical entity ever conceived,

and people are sicker than ever.

We cure nothing!

We heal nothing!

I mean, he was arguably
the best we had then.

When I met him,
I remember vividly,

as he made me feel like an idiot

because he said,
"Why do you want to do it?"

I said,
"Well, what do you mean?"

He got to what he meant,
which was,

"How many films you got in you?

You know? You got 10?
You got 15?

I know you're
somewhat selective."

He says, "Me?
I got what, a few, handful?

That's it."

He says, "So, which ones
should we make?"

He says,
"If we don't make the films

that cut to our very marrow,

then we shouldn't be doing it."

I met Paddy Chayefsky
at Catch a Rising Star,

and it was one of those,
like, amazing nights

where you go home and you go,
"Look who I just met."

The writing style
he chose, the--

just the anger he came from--

did you sense
that when you met him?

He was a-- You could tell--

I remember it was a summer,
so it was hot.

So everybody's a little angry.

You know,
he was a regular kind of guy

who wrote masterpieces.

My impression of him
was a genius,

but something was boiling.

Everybody's looking for
their true selves.

We're all trying
to fulfill ourselves,

understand ourselves,
get in touch with ourselves,

face the reality of ourselves,

explore ourselves,
expand ourselves.

Ever since we dispensed
with God,

we've got nothing but ourselves

to explain
this meaningless horror of life.

You're a wacko.

Well, I think that
that true self,

that original self,
that first self is,

a real, mensurate,
quantifiable thing,

tangible and incarnate.

And I'm going to find
the fucker.

There's a fear
in the commercial industry

of provoking, and that's all--

It runs through television,
and it runs through film.

It's just--

It's cowardly,
but it's protective.

And there's this fear that,
"I'm going too far."

What did I do?
Will you tell me that, please?

- What did I do?
- I didn't expect

I'd stay more than
two or three weeks.

I did everything I could
to make you happy.

Been out here
more than two months now.

I gave a $10,000 tithe to the
furthering of missionary work.

Honey, your Uncle George--

he's more in bed than out,
he's that sick.

And Alice Marie tends the store.

They can hardly make
do without me.

Nothing I do pleases you,
does it?

Nothing I ever did pleases you!

All you know
is to just run off on me.

I hate you so much,
I don't know how to tell you

how much I hate you.

You just get out of my house!
Just get out!

You never cared whether I lived
or died, so just get out!

I never want to see you again,
not even in your grave.

And I hope you do die.
I hope you do.

I hope your heart just explodes!

I just want you to know that!

You want to capture a moment.

You want to get the attention
of the audience.

And I love that in film.

And that's why
I was attracted to him.

There ain't no God!

Do you hear me?!

There ain't no God!

Did you hear what I said?!

There ain't no God!

There ain't no God!

There ain't!

There ain't no God!

There's a lot
of shouting going on.

There's a lot of...

There is a-- There's a lot
of angry creativity.

But finally, what Chayefsky's
about is a massive talent.

He's amazingly underappreciated.

That isn't why he consumes me.

Because I'm consumed with him,

I know that he's
amazingly underappreciated.

The golden ring is somehow
the stuff that you're doing

has something
to do with self-expression,

rather than serving what's hot.

You know,
that's the golden ring.

You're lucky-- You're lucky
if you can even try for that.

And when you try for that,

I find it a tremendously
humbling experience.

I believe that all the shit
that goes down and, you know--

and the kind of stuff
that people go through,

if you go through it for--
for writing, it's righteous.

You know, some of the stuff,
some of the glad-handing,

some of the, you know,
"I want to impress this person,"

you know, it's humiliating,
it's shameful,

it's necessary,
it's whatever it is.

When you when you go through
all that stuff for writing,

it's a--
it's a righteous struggle.

And I think that dignifies it.

He's just as good a writer
as there ever was,

so far as I was concerned.

The name, when you go around

and you say "Paddy Chayefsky,"
no one really registers.

Uh, they're not as smart
as they should be.

Uh, thank you.

It's impossible
to describe what it feels like

to be handed the same award

that was given
to Paddy Chayefsky

35 years ago for another movie

with "Network" in the title.

You see a guy
like Aaron Sorkin.

Yes.

Would you say that--

Are these new screenwriters,

are they heir apparents
to what Chayefsky was about?

Yeah. To-- To the Chayefskys, absolutely.

Aaron Sorkin especially.

Bold, courageous,
but good writing.

You know,
you have to be a writer.

You have to start
with something.

You're not just there to rebel.

It was Paddy Chayefsky
and Jim Brooks,

the combination of "Network"
and "Broadcast News"

that really woke me up

to a, "I think
I want to do that."

It felt to me--
Their writing just felt to me--

Like, he had that energy, and he
just burst into those speeches

and he did not stop for dinner.

I want you to get up right now
and go to the window,

open it, and stick your head out
and yell,

"I'm as mad as hell, and I'm
not going to take this anymore!"

In the take
that Lumet uses in the film,

Peter Finch got the line wrong.

Um, he says--

What we see him say is,
"I'm as mad as hell,

and I'm not gonna take
it anymore,"

when what Paddy wrote is,

"I'm mad as hell and I'm not
gonna take it anymore."

There's no "as."
And you can see proof of that.

When the people start opening
their windows and shouting,

they're shouting the line
that Paddy wrote.

I'm mad as hell!
I'm not gonna take it anymore!

I'm mad as hell and I'm not
gonna take it anymore!

- I'm not gonna take it anymore!
- Gave Peter Finch one take,

got the line wrong, and Lumet--

they used the take where the
line was wrong.

I can tell you that would
not happen on a Sorkin set.

So, how in control is he?

Oh, that-- The entire speech
is written around,

"I'm mad as hell."

The notion of me getting up
there or anybody else and going,

"I'm as mad as hell"--

It would be like,
"Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa!"

It would have been a nuclear

moment of shut down.

On one word?

- Oh, yeah.
- On "Network,"

I don't know
if you've seen the poster,

but it says
"by Paddy Chayefsky."

- That's right.
- Not "written by."

- It's "by."
- Oh, that's interesting.

- I didn't notice that.
- Yeah.

And Aaron's obsessed, he says,

with the fact that he got "by"
and not "written by."

- And it's funny because...
- Wow.

...there are not
many powerful writers

like Aaron is where he's the
marketable name up top.

- That's right.
- There's probably

- only one, and he's the one.
- That's right.

Chayefsky was the one then.

Are we using Squeaky Fromme?

Let's do that in two.
Squeaky, Ford at the airport.

Bump.

Now, we using a map
going into San Francisco?

My favorite thing
about "Network"

is the "by Paddy Chayefsky,"
the "by" credit.

There's a strange thing
in movies

that the director is the one

who gets the possessory
credit-- "A film by."

I don't know
why the credit "directed by"

isn't good enough
for the director,

but "Network" is
by Paddy Chayefsky

and directed perfectly
by Sidney Lumet.

And did you do a deep dive

when you were exposed
to "Network"

- and then you kind of looked...
- Oh, yeah.

Then I had to see everything
else this guy had done.

I mean, I think anybody would.
You're--

You're watching "Network,"
and you want to know--

You just want to spend more time
with the guy who wrote that.

I've read two biographies
about the guy.

They're both
called "Mad as Hell."

Um... that's pretty good,
that you've--

that you've written something
that's so in the zeitgeist

that two authors can't think
of a better title.

He had a voice.

The voice came from who he was,

what his upbringing was.

There's a component of it

that comes from his Jewishness,
for sure.

If you are raised Jewish
in an urban setting in America,

social justice is just
sort of baked into

the education that you get.

It-- It's just talked about
constantly.

Paddy Chayefsky was obviously
fed a lot of that as a kid,

and so much of his work

is about that quest
for social justice.

If you are a Russian Jew,

you got chased to this country.

Listen, there's
a whole generation,

a whole species of us who,

because our grandparents
did not have it easy,

what they instilled
in my parents generation

was the importance
of an education

and work with your mind.

And then our parents
handed that down to us.

Paddy Chayefsky went to
DeWitt Clinton High School,

which I attended.

James Baldwin, Neil Simon,

Burt Lancaster,
tons of wonderful people.

He was born Sidney Chayefsky,

and he's a Bronx-born Jew.

Nobody in that family
was ever named Paddy or Patrick

or called that as a nickname.

But it wasn't until he went off
to fight in World War II,

where he was a kind of indolent,
lazy soldier,

at least by his own account,

and often trying
to get out of, you know,

his own kind of
training and routines.

And so the officer,
seeing right through it,

says, "Oh, sure you do, Paddy,"

as if he were, you know,
an Irish Catholic,

knowing that he's talking
to a Jew.

His friends, he started--
they started teasing him,

calling him "Paddy,"
like, you know, Saint Patrick.

So it was given to him as a--

as a-- as a joke, almost.

Chayefsky himself
sort of took it to heart

and redubbed himself "Paddy."

But certainly by the time
he comes out of the Army

at the end of World War II,
he's calling himself Paddy,

and that's the name that stuck.

He did like
the sound of it, though,

and he very much liked how it
upended people's expectations

about who he might be.

When you grow up as a kid
with a name like "Norbert Butz,"

I always felt sort of
very much on the outside,

and I started to see
Chayefsky as someone

who was on the outside, as well.

And the moment that really,
really clicked for me

is when I found out about
his injury during World War II.

That was an event that I

really, really, really
thought a lot about.

He was injured.

He basically sat on a land mine

in the middle of a battle.

And the eyewitness account

was that there was terrible,
terrible scarring.

When I started thinking
about sort of the complexity

of balancing those two sides
of himself,

this outward persona
of a brilliant,

articulate bulldog of a man,

and then on the other side,

this man who was plagued
with a secret.

When he was in the army,
he wrote something

called "The Fugue
of the Manic Depressive,"

which immediately
got my interest.

I would give anything to hear it
if anyone has a copy of it.

It's apparently guys in the army

trying to get release by touting
their emotional disorders,

which is so up my alley.

I need to hear that.

You would think,
"Well, it rolls."

It doesn't roll.

You would think,
"Well, they just knock them off.

You know? It comes."
It doesn't.

Paddy worked harder, draft--

You talked about it.

Draft after draft after draft.

Screenwriting-- it's
the same as playing the violin.

Practice is gonna
make you better.

However good you think you are
right out of the gate--

and maybe you're a prodigy--

you are gonna get better
in time.

There's a part of screenwriting
that can be taught and learned,

but there's a part
of screenwriting that can't.

And the part that can't
is usually what we mean

when we use the word "talent."

I'm so old that I remember
the Golden Age of Television.

Or I guess we now should call it

the First Golden Age
of Television.

So, I remember watching
television shows

that were written by Chayefsky

and that whole incredible
group of writers.

I haven't seen
enough of the "Playhouse,"

but that seems to be
like a stepping stone,

where the playwrights got to put
words in front of the camera.

Because you're in a TV studio
in New York City,

so you don't have effects

and all the stuff that we
have now, not even close.

I mean, you basically
were shooting a play.

And it was still
about the words.

Well, what do you feel
like doing tonight?

I don't know.
What do you feel like doing?

I miss that.

Uh, prior to Paddy Chayefsky,

most of us were considered
to be two-headed hacks

who worked around the clock
and used boy/girl situations

and any one of 5,000
different routine matters.

But Paddy gave us a stature.

Hey, Marty, I'm in a hurry.

You're next right now,
Miss Canduso.

When you gonna get married,
Marty?

Should be ashamed of yourself.

All your brothers and sisters
younger than you,

they get married
and got the children.

I meet your mother
in the fruit store.

She said to me, "Hey, you know
a nice girl for my boy, Marty?"

What's the matter with you?
That's a no way.

- What's the matter with you?
- Uh, Miss Fus--

Paddy wrote
absolutely brilliantly

of himself and his family,
his background.

I think I did
about eight or nine

television shows with Paddy
and three feature films.

His stories at that time
were all about the Bronx,

the Jewish Bronx lingo

and patois and attitudes.

However, when we did "Marty,"

I do remember distinctively
that the response

from people everywhere,

both by phone and by mail,

and people of obvious, great
variety of ethnic backgrounds,

all essentially saying
the same thing--

"This is the story of my life."

He touched people
across a wide scope.

I remember
the first exposure I had to him

was the movie "Marty."

And you had this overweight,
homely man, Marty,

played by Ernest Borgnine.

He's a butcher, right?

And he had a group of friends
who sat around--

"What are you gonna--
What are we gonna do tonight?

- What are we gonna do tonight?"
- See ya, Joe.

What do you feel like
doing tonight?

I don't know, Ang.

What do you feel like doing?

Well, we ought to do something.
It's Saturday night.

I don't want to go bowling
like last Saturday.

Right on the corner,

we're at South 3rd Street
and Hooper in Brooklyn.

So many nights
when I was 16, 17.

"Where do you want to go?"

"I don't know.
Where do you want to go?"

I mean, it was--
He had an amazing ear.

Hey. how about calling up
that big girl

we picked up in the movies
about a month ago

up in the RKO Chester?

Which one was that?

You know, that big girl
that was sitting in front of us

with the skinny friend.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Remember?
Her name was Mary Feeney.

We took them home
all the way out in Brooklyn?

- Yeah.
- Paddy, like Arthur Miller...

They had this quality.

They took ordinary dialogue,

ordinary speech,

and they sharpened it,

they heightened it,
and they featured it.

But it was just ordinary talk.

There was never
any polysyllabics.

There was never any
big-shot bullshit.

Well, I'm kind of a stocky guy.

The last time we met
was in the RKO Chester.

You was with a friend of yours,

and I was with a friend of mine
named Angie.

This was about a month ago.

That's how I felt
as a young man.

I didn't f-- I felt ugly.
I was rejected.

I was--
a lot of pain inside me.

So I connected.

I'm the fellow who works
in the butcher shop.

Oh. Come on.
Y-You know who I am.

That's right.

And then we went
to Howard Johnson's.

We had hamburgers.
You had a milkshake.

Yeah, that's right.

"Marty" changed everything.

It set it on a different--

Because he,
in that one little moment,

connected with
anyone with a soul,

anyone with a heart.

Yeah, well, what about--

Well, how about
next Saturday night?

A-Are you free
next Saturday night?

Well, what about
the Saturday after that?

Ernest Borgnine
was a movie star.

- Yeah.
- But he was not

a glamorous movie star.

And Paddy Chayefsky--

he was--
he knew who he was.

And, sure,
didn't he want to be, uh,

Bill Holden or all these people
that he wrote for?

- But he wasn't.
- I got hurt enough.

I don't want to get hurt
no more.

I just called up a girl
this afternoon.

I got a real brushoff, boy.

I figured I was past the point
of being hurt, but that hurt.

Some stupid woman who I didn't
even want to call up.

She gave me the brush.

No, Ma, I don't want to go
to the Stardust Ballroom

because all that ever happened
to me there was

girls made me feel
like I was a bug.

I got feelings, you know?
I had enough pain.

- No, thanks. Ma.
- It's such a deep character.

about somebody who,
on the surface, is not deep.

"Marty" speaks to,
we can all be an actor.

We can all--

There are things to say

that this face, this body
could embody.

I'm just a fat little man,
a fat, ugly man.

- You not ugly.
- I'm ugly, I'm ugly, I'm ugly!

- Marty--
- Ma, leave me alone!

You know, I am--
I'm gonna cry.

I'm who I am, and this is--
this is what I want to do.

Ma, what do you want from me?
What do you want from me?

I'm miserable enough as it is.

All right, so I'll go to
the Stardust Ballroom.

I'll put on a blue suit,
and I'll go.

And you know what
I'm gonna get for my trouble?

Heartache.
A big night of heartache.

Why does it
bring you emotion

to talk about "Marty" like that?

Oh.

Look at me.

I mean, you know
we're the ordinary guy.

He was writing himself,
really, as Marty,

a guy who didn't really
score that well with women

and apparently had some sort of
a nightmarish experience

at a junior high school dance,

which I had in common with him.

When I was looking for things
we had in common,

I had a nightmarish experience

at a junior high school dance, too.

Girls just walking up to him

and looking at him
and walking away.

You go there and you're all
dolled up and you're like,

"Hey, this is me at the dance."

And then it turns out, "Oh, no,
no, it's not you at the dance.

It's-- You're nothing
at the dance.

The dance is out there."

Excuse me, Miss,
would you care to dance?

Miss?

It wasn't
terribly sentimental.

It was truthful and painful

to see these two people.

And there is a touch in "Marty"

that is unique.

So when I get out of

the army, Clara, I was lost.

I didn't know
what I wanted to do.

I was 25 years old.

What was I gonna do,
go back to my old job

40 cents an hour?

I thought maybe
I'd go to college

under the G.I. Bill of Rights,
you know?

But my brother, Freddie,
he wanted to get married,

and I had three
unmarried sisters.

In an Italian house,
that's a terrible thing.

So I just went to pieces.

I just started weeping.

I'm getting weepy now,
thinking about it.

Yeah, it has-- It was some--

It was a performance worthy
of Paddy Chayefsky's writing.

But he writes humanity,

you know, as the everyman.

It's probably the guy he looked
in the mirror and saw and said,

"All right, so,
who am I in this story?"

I used to walk the streets
till 3:00, 4:00 in the morning.

My poor mother used to be
so worried about me.

God forgive me
what I'm gonna say now, but...

...I used to think of doing away
with myself.

I used to stand on the subway
sometimes--

and God forgive me
what I'm gonna say--

I used to feel the tracks

sucking me down
under the wheels.

Yes, I know.

Ernest Borgnine, "Marty."

Marty, I've known you
for three hours, but...

I know you're a good butcher.

You're an intelligent, decent,
sensitive man, and...

Well, I have a feeling
about you, like...

Well, like, sometimes
one of my kids

comes in to see me
about something or other,

and-- and some of these kids,
Marty, in my classes,

they-- they have so much warmth

and-- and so much capacity.

Well, that's the feeling
I have about you.

This is a special movie.

"Marty" is special

by not being special.

You know?
It's-- It's the everyman.

It's everybody, and that--

And it's everybody
raised to high art

because it's
so beautifully written.

The winner in New York,
"Marty," Paddy Chayefsky.

I'm just very proud
right now.

Thank you very much.

The winner is...

"Marty," Harold Hecht.

That "Marty" won
the Academy Award is a fluke.

Back then,
there was a studio system.

Think of the next
independent movie that won,

that was even nominated.

It was groundbreaking that
attention was paid to "Marty."

- Groundbreaking.
- I studied him.

You know, I studied
where he came from.

I studied--
I think it's fascinating

that he kind of invented

this new form of realism

and dialogue
in his television work.

I look at Paddy Chayefsky's
career

because, again, in TV,
he's cutting his teeth

and he is writing
at a very fast clip

and he's doing
a lot of stuff that--

some of it doesn't work,
some of it does.

He's getting into
a lot of fights,

particularly over casts

and people
trying to change his words.

But when he emerges from that
with "Marty,"

I think he realized, like,
"Okay.

I now have like
sort of found a foundation.

Like, there's a level
that I can't really sink below,

and I'm just gonna try
and stay here."

And I think
That's everyone's goal.

If you're--
If you're a guy who...

watches the film "Marty"

and so deeply Identifies with
the soul of that butcher, right,

of the soul of that man
who's really good at heart,

really wants to do
the right thing,

but is-- but is plagued
by insecurities,

Insecurities based
on his ethnicity,

insecurities based
on his-- his name,

big insecurities based
on his looks--

You know, if you grow up
with a funny name,

and you--
and you don't look like,

you know, you're not a great
athlete, and you're not--

and you're more interested
in books and movies and museums

than you are sports fields
or fraternity houses,

for guys like me,

Paddy Chayefsky sort of becomes
our-- our Gandhi.

He becomes somebody who
legitimizes the basic goodness

and even the--

helps to reframe
what masculinity can be.

I know
I have been conscious

of considerable restraint
in my writing,

the restraint of self-discipline

as to say, the restraint
that a pianist does

when he practices scales
instead of concert pieces.

And about now, I'd like
to get into the concert pieces.

And then
this same writer just,

you know,
became our Shakespeare.

Chayefsky got out
of television.

Yeah, he did. And I don't--
I can't match that.

I think this takes
a relative degree of guts

to leave a medium
that's made you,

that's made you a sociable,
as a kind of a household name.

Maybe I don't want to, you know,
get stuck up on the board

and get shot at with darts
in a Broadway play

when I'm not sure
I'm prepared for it.

But Paddy was willing
to take the chance.

Paddy wrote very theatrically.

Nice, big speeches.

I think in some cases, he was
more adept at the stage,

which has much more focus
and energy

on-- on the actual construct
of a sentence

and the verbiage used, than
the cinematic nature of a movie

where they say,
"Show me, don't tell me."

And he would rather tell you
than show you.

And so I think it works
really well,

I think-- I think that was--

"Tenth Man" was
a really good play.

No, life is merely dreary

if you're sane and unbearable,
if you're sensitive.

I can't think
of a more meaningless sham

than my own life.

My radical youth was cut short
when I left the Communist Party,

because I discovered there were
easier ways to seduce girls.

So I turned from reproaching
society for my loneliness

to reproaching my mother.

And one day I stormed
out of the house

and got myself a nice room
on the west side.

And then I fell in love.

That is to say, I found
living alone so unbearable

I was willing to marry.

She married me because all her
friends were marrying somebody.

Needless to say,

we told each other
how deeply in love we were.

We wanted very much to be happy.

Americans, you know,
are frantic about being happy.

The American nirvana
is a man and his wife

watching television amiably

and then turning off the lights

and effortlessly making
the most ardent love.

Television, unfortunately,
is a bore,

and making ardent love is an
enormous drain on my energies.

Everybody else that
we knew were getting married.

So we got married.

I guess we just got tired of
necking in the back of the car.

We used to eat in restaurants
all the time.

Then we'd come home.
We'd watch television.

Around 11:00, we'd...

both march into the bedroom
like it was a gas chamber.

I used to wonder
if everyone was like this.

I must have been unbearable
the last years of our marriage.

I mean, I'd go into silences
that lasted for days.

Poor Georgie,
he'd plead with me,

"What did I do?"

What he's got
in his best work,

from my point of view,

is a real understanding
of how a human being

and a personality
is organized and created.

This is the
typewriter of Paddy Chayefsky.

And this is the face
of Kim Stanley.

I think the best version
of it that he had

was "The Goddess."

I want to die!

This is the story of
a woman who became a movie star.

Which is such an homage
to repetition compulsion

that I was thrilled with it.

It thrilled me
that he got it so right.

Repetition compulsion,

well, in "The Goddess,"
you see it.

It's more or less
the story of Marilyn Monroe...

"The Goddess" explores

the desperate
demeaning of love...

Don't you love me?

...and how it becomes
the business of fame.

Why don't you
come to my house tonight,

and we'll discuss
the whole matter.

...and the way
that she was created and the way

that her life played out because
of the way she was created.

And she came from a mother
who was bored and restless

and didn't really want to
have a kid

and created a kid
with a bottomless need,

who then goes on to,
at the same age as her mother,

bored and restless and had a kid

and didn't want the kid
and gives the kid up.

That's repetition compulsion.

It's just this idea

that you are just playing
through the disabilities

and the problems
that your upbringing gave you.

"The Goddess,"
through the story of one woman,

is the public disrobing
of a generation

born in the Depression,

nurtured by war,
obsessed by prosperity.

She's a
Marilyn Monroe character

and she wants to get into
show business

because she thinks that's
where the love is,

because she grew up
in a loveless household.

So she finds a drunk
passed out on the ground,

and he turns out
to be the really screwed-up

son of a Hollywood movie star.

So she starts coddling him
back to health.

And he says to her...

I destroy everything
that means anything to me.

That's not true.

Well, I've never been so happy
in my life

from what you just told me.

I'm too damaged for you, Emmy.

I want to hold you
in my arms, John.

Emmy, why
are we kidding ourselves?

I love you now,
in a half-hour,

I'll wonder
how I ever got into this.

You have a passion
for respectability.

I have a horror of loneliness.
That's love.

The worst thing
that could happen to us is

if we got married.

I'd hate you
before the blush of the ceremony

had gone from your cheeks.

I'd make you a good wife, John.

I'll make you a good home.

It's just-- It's the one thing
that you want to tell all women.

No, no! He just told you
he's going to destroy you.

It's that "He'll be
different with me" stuff.

That's repetition compulsion,
is just moving past anything

that makes any sense to a deep,
dark wound inside you

that came from the way
you were raised.

What are you living for?
What-- Be honest. Tell me.

One of these days,
you'll be necking

in the back of the car
with one of the boys from town,

and because all your friends
are getting married,

you'll get married.

You'll put on weight.

Your husband will take
up with a waitress

in a hotel in Chattanooga.

And you'll have babies,

you'll fret about the rent,
and your hair will gray.

Suddenly, you'll look back
and say, "What happened?

It's all over."

Your friends will die,

and you'll sink in
the melancholic hours,

sitting by a window,
peering with unseeing eyes

through white chintz curtains.

And finally, they'll drop
your long wooden box

into the moldering grave.

And what was it all about
except slings and arrows?

What do you know about it?
Bobby-soxer in a hick town.

You don't know
what loneliness is.

You think it's not having
a date on Saturday night.

You don't know the great,
ultimate ache of desolation.

He is somebody
that you aspire to be.

That that kind of writing,
that that kind of humanity

could come out of this guy.

Of course.

- Italian. Very lovely.
- Thank you, sir.

Cocktails at 5:30,
and heavy on the gin.

Tom, dinner at 6:00 promptly.

Once you've cleared away,
I'll manage from there.

Very good, sir.

You're not limping,
Commander.

It's "The Arabian Nights."

Do you have chests of rubies
in the bathroom?

Just perfumes and liquor.

I've heard about this room,
Commander.

All the girls talk about it,
but I just couldn't believe it.

Bergdorf Goodman,
Saks Fifth Avenue,

Lord & Taylor.

Sheila's right. It is the
swankiest shop in town.

My first exposure
to Mr. Chayefsky

was in
"Americanization of Emily."

James Garner was one
of my favorites,

and Julie Andrews was one
of my favorites.

And to see those two as lovers
in the film was interesting.

How did you manage Arpège
with the Germans in Paris?

There are Germans in Paris,
aren't there?

There is a war on, I think.

You Americans must have heard
something about it, I'm sure.

Just pick out a dress, honey,
and be back at 5:30.

You American haters bore me
to tears, Miss Barham.

I've dealt with Europeans
all my life.

I know all about us

parvenus from the States
who come over here

and race around your
old cathedral towns

with our cameras and Coca-Cola
bottles.

Brawl in your pubs,

paw your women,
and act like we own the world.

We overtip.
We talk too loud.

We think we can buy
anything with a Hershey bar.

I've had Germans and Italians

tell me how
politically ingenuous we are,

and perhaps so,
but we haven't managed

to Hitler or Mussolini yet.

I mean,
"The Americanization of Emily"

is an incredible movie

because it was made not
that long after World War II,

and it's a real
indictment of war

and the people who wage wars
and all of the things

that they do which are corrupt.

It's almost a shocking movie for

how close it was made
to the end of the war.

It's amazing it got made.

We crass Americans
didn't introduce war

into your little island.

This war, Miss Barham, to which
we Americans are so insensitive,

is the result of 2,000 years
of European greed,

barbarism, superstition,
and stupidity.

Don't blame it
on our Coca-Cola bottles.

Europe was a going brothel long
before we came to town.

Dear me, what an outburst.

And it's not laden
with battle.

And, in fact, it's funny.

And being funny
and serious at the same time

is the toughest thing in comedy.

And to show the absurdity
of the war

and all the absurd things
that developed from it,

as well as about a man's
personal courage.

We shall never end wars,
Mrs. Barham,

by blaming it
on ministers and generals,

or warmongering imperialists,
or all the other banal bogeys.

It's the rest of us
who build statues to

those generals
and name boulevards

after those ministers.

The rest of us
who make heroes of our dead

and shrines of our battlefields.

We wear our widow's weeds
like nuns,

Mrs. Barham, and perpetuate
war by exalting its sacrifices.

James Garner plays
an American G.I. who is

told he's going to be
the first person

to land on Normandy Beach
at D-Day,

and they're going to cover it
with, you know,

newsreels and whatnot to show
the brave American soldiers.

He's a coward.
He says, "I'm not brave.

I want to turn around
and run away.

And don't use me
to sell bullshit to people.

This is how people get killed."

On the surface, it's
a very mainstream kind of movie.

It's a war movie,
and there's a love story--

- beautiful love story in it.
- I'm not gonna let you go.

All you have to say is,
"I don't love you."

I don't love you, Charlie.

Come on, Charlie.
It's time to go.

Well, you're a good woman.

You've done the
morally right thing.

God save us all from people
who do the morally right thing.

It's the rest of us
who get broken in half.

You're a bitch.

But under the surface,

I thought it was
really subversive.

You know, I-- And the idea of
making a movie against war

and against the lies
that get you into war,

in 1964 was-- As always,
he was way ahead of his time.

My God, the incompetence here
is absolutely radiant!

I mean, two separate nurses
walk into a room

and stick needles in a man,
and one of those is

a number-18 gel coat,

tourniquet
the poor son of a bitch,

anchor the
poor son of a bitch's arm

with adhesive tape,
and it's the wrong

poor son of a bitch.

My God.

I mean, where do you train
your nurses, Mrs. Christie?

Dachau?!

The poetry of
"The Hospital,"

where he's dressing down
the nurse and going, you know,

"Where were your nurses trained?

Dachau?!"

You know,
to say something like that,

such a funny line

and a condemnation
of an entire medical system.

Nobody spoke about that.

And we were all trained,
especially during those days,

to respect your doctors.

And he at that time--
What's that, 40, 50 years ago--

is questioning
the medical profession

and the medical industry.

He started becoming the first.

You ain't heard nothing yet.

We finally got Welbeck
around 4:00 in the morning.

He said, "Go ahead," so they
laid on the surgery for 8:00.

Welbeck turned up
half-stoned,

orders an IVP,
clears him for allergies.

- Without actually testing.
- Right.

And the patient
went into shock.

And tubular necrosis.

They lopped out
the bleeding kidney,

ran him back to the room.

We sat around waiting for urine.

Fever began spiking like hell.

Uremia, vomiting.
So he arranged hemodialysis.

Was putting out
good water now,

but some nurse goofed
on his last treatment.

A shunt separated something.

Blood pressure plunged.
They ran him up to ICU.

Gave him two units
of whole blood.

All vital signs are normal now,
except he's comatose.

That was two days ago.

There's a lot of scary stuff
happening at the hospital.

Like, the politics
and the mistakes

and the personality issues

and the power struggles of
a hospital could get you killed.

And it's much more complicated
than you think.

It's not some perfect place
that just helps you.

There's fallible people
running this place.

In short, a man comes into
this hospital in perfect health,

and in the space of one week,

we chop out one kidney,
damage another,

reduce him to coma,
and damn near kill him.

Yes, sir.

You know, Brubaker...

last night,
I sat in my hotel room,

reviewing the shambles of my
life and contemplating suicide.

By the time I saw it,
it had a reputation.

It was like,
"Oh, this is the guy who did

all these great live
television shows in the '50s,

was a master of
biting social satire

that worked both as
deadly serious stuff

and also as dark humor."

Well, what do you say
to that, Dr. Bock?

What the hell am I supposed
to say to that, Miss Drummond?

Oh!

I mean,
I'm sitting here boozing,

and you come in
and tell me some demented story

about your father's
religious conversion.

No, you missed the point,
Doctor.

Not my father's conversion.
Mine.

And, of course, people--

It's funny,
in the film business,

people are always saying, "No.

Cut the monologues.
You have to make it short."

Yeah, sometimes it makes sense,

but you speed up--
You speed it up,

but sometimes,
you miss the impact.

So I've always fought for

keeping the speech,
if necessary.

You see, I'd been hitting
the acid pretty regularly

at that time.

I'd achieved a few
minor sensory deformities,

some suicidal despairs,
but nothing as wild as

fluency in an
obscure Apache dialect.

I mean, like, wow, man.

He was living afflatus
right before my eyes.

Within a week, my father had
closed his Beacon Hill practice

and set out to start a mission
in the Mexican mountains.

I turned in my SDS card and my
crash helmet and I followed him.

It was a disaster,
at least for me.

My father had received
the revelation, not I.

He stood gaunt
on a mountain slope

and preached the apocalypse
to solemnly amused Indians.

I masturbated a great deal.

We lived in a grass wickiup,
ate raw rabbit

and crushed piñon nuts.

It was hideous.

Within two months, I was back
in Boston, a hollow shell,

disenchanted with everything
and dizzy with dengue.

I turned to austerity,

combed my hair tight,
entered nursing school.

I became haggard, driven,

had shamelessly incestuous
dreams about my father.

I took up with some of the
senior staff at the hospital.

One of them,
a portly psychiatrist,

explained I was generated by an
unresolved lust for my father.

I cracked up.

One day, they found
me walking to work naked

and screaming obscenities.

There was talk
of institutionalizing me,

so I packed a bag

and went back to join my father
in the Sierra Madre mountains.

I've been there ever since.
That's three years.

My father is, of course,
as mad as a hatter.

I watch over him
and have been curiously content.

The winner is
Paddy Chayefsky.

It's a special privilege

and especially gratifying,
this particular award,

and I most respectfully
want to thank all of you very,

very much, indeed.

Thank you.

Paddy Chayefsky and
Bob Fosse and Herb Gardner

all shared offices together.

Really nothing little offices.

And then they would have lunch
every day.

The same group, every day.

It's interesting to me

that Paddy's friends
at the Carnegie Deli weren't,

you know,
Jewish revolutionaries.

They weren't communists.

They were Mel Brooks,
Bob Fosse, and Neil Simon.

What Paddy respected was brains.

That roundtable of writers

that you described
when we first started.

Yeah.
Whenever they wrote,

they didn't write
frivolously just to entertain

or just for money.

Not one of those writers.

So what were they after?

They were after
their venting

their hope and their despair,
their message.

They were all-- Those guys are
really fascinating to me.

And the more I write,
the more I understand them.

Even, you know, at my age,
you still-- you go,

"Oh, that's what that's about."

And guys like--

Geniuses like a Paddy Chayefsky
will see something

in a human piece of clay

that needs to be
shaped and molded.

And you just have to

polish it up and
get it out of your system.

These guys-- they talked it,
thought it all the time.

"How do we penetrate this?"

- Is that right?
- Yeah. Yeah.

They weren't--
They wouldn't bring it--

They wouldn't use my words
like that.

But it was always what
they were talking about.

When you did it in your comedy

and when they were talking about
"How do we penetrate this?",

what's "this"?

"This" is the establishment,
where people are right now.

"How do we
penetrate that to get

our viewpoint across to
get people knowledge

that they might not have,
to kind of rip open

the establishment to say,
'This is what's going on'"?

- That's a good start.
- And then what?

Then nothing happens.

Paddy, Herb, and Fosse
liked to call themselves

"Flash," "Whimsy,"
and "Boredom."

Flash was obviously Fosse,

Whimsy was Herb,
and Boredom was Paddy.

And they gave each other
these names

because that was their
lowest opinion of their work.

At worst, Paddy was boring,

at worst, Herb was whimsical,
and at worst, Bob was flashy.

That was their fear
about themselves.

So it was-- Oh, it was

a very fun joke to make
fun of Paddy for being boring,

you know, which, of course,
we know he wasn't.

Just physically as a person,

Chayefsky was kind of
diminutive,

but also very stocky.

And by this time, he also had
a really kind of thick beard

that he had grown out.

He was kind of a pugilistic,
I guess you'd say,

and also kind of dyspeptic,

that unless you were, like,
a really good friend of his,

he had a way of kind of
keeping people at a distance.

Usually, he was
very confident that he could

write any story
he set out to write,

but occasionally,
he'd be troubled

with just a touch of self-doubt.

I told him that in a business
that keeps cloning,

remaking, rehashing,
redoing its successes,

that he was a
world-class risk-taker.

He dared to write
literate scripts

and held an audience
through verbal rather than

visual fireworks.

I think there are-- Especially
in relationship to Hollywood,

there are two kinds of writers.

There are the
"I have to get up every day

and write no matter what,

or the day isn't
worth anything to me,"

and then there are
other people who say,

"When you pay me, I will write."

I don't condemn those people.

You know, that's the way
they look at it.

And I don't think I'm
a better writer than somebody

who does it for the paycheck.

I think that I'm as obsessed
with writing--

the joy and the pain of writing
that Chayefsky was.

You know, not a friend,
but we knew each other

and we had talked.

He always had a score
to settle with television.

He always wanted a series
that was-- You know, it, like,

gnarled at him
that he didn't have a series.

You know,
it just pissed him off,

because, you know, money was
a consideration to Paddy.

And as it is to most--
as it may--

whatever the hell it is,
but it was to Paddy,

and not a subtle way.

And I think that
sort of, you know,

just-- So, I know
we talked about that.

We talked about that,
and I used to--

You know, and I used to just
crack up, I mean, to him,

you know, because he was this
and he was--

You know, it's...

There's something about

financial insecurity that can
either make or break an artist.

And, I mean, you see it
in music all the time.

They're about
to get dropped from their label

and they come up with
a masterpiece.

Or you see it with athletes.

They're in a contract year and
they have an all-time season.

And I think that's what happened
with Paddy with "Network."

When the chips were down,
he delivered the masterpiece.

It was very avant-garde,

and we kept hearing
comments about,

"Have you seen this show
about the newscast?"

And it's like,
"No, what's that?"

It was the first time I ever
saw a movie that made me think,

"Oh, my God.

Everybody in the audience

thinks this is the smartest
movie they've ever seen."

You could just feel it.

I watched it very young,

but then I revisited it
several years ago

because someone asked me what my
favorite technology movie was.

And I realized that, actually,
"Network,"

which I think is thought of
as a medium movie

the American psyche,
or the American rage,

can also be read as a movie
about changing technology

and particularly the
changing technology of media.

"Network," I think,
is as far as you can go

with a personal vision.

He took it as far as anybody's
ever taken a personal vision.

We weren't sure about "Network,"
and so we split it up.

So, MGM took the lead on it,
and they put up

half the money,
we put up half.

And then we
went on to try to pull

it all together,
all the pieces together.

And I had a meeting
with Howard Gottfried,

who was producing the movie,
and Paddy at the MGM commissary.

Howard Gottfried,
who I got to know a little bit,

was a very dedicated producer.

Paddy was his man,
and he was just--

He was like a mother to a child.

He was a very good producer,

and I think he's kind of
been forgotten, unfortunately.

We start
talking about directors.

So I had a list,
and Paddy had a list.

But it was pretty clear that
Paddy had a list of one.

I said, "Paddy, I mean,

when was the last time
you saw a Sidney Lumet movie

that had humor in it?"

Paddy...

There was chicken soup,
I think, at the time.

He turned the plate over,

you know, and the soup went
all over the place.

And I looked at him and I said,
"You know what?

Sidney Lumet is a funny guy."

And I said, "Paddy, terrific."

Two years later,
a script arrived.

It was literally that simple.

And, you know,
how can you not fall in love?

Well, let's say fuck you,
Hackett.

You want me out of here,

you're gonna have to drag me
out kicking and screaming

and the whole news division
kicking and screaming with me.

You think they're gonna quit
their jobs for you?

Not in this recession, buddy.

When Ruddy gets back,
he'll have your ass.

I got a hit, Schumacher,
and Ruddy doesn't count anymore.

He was hoping I'd fall
on my face with this Beale show,

but I didn't.

It's a big, fat, big-titted hit,

and I don't have to waffle
around with Ruddy anymore.

If he wants to take me up
before the CCA board, let him.

But what-- what
was the one thing that you--

one thread that you pulled on

that unraveled the whole world
of television news

and turned it
into this nightmare

that it becomes
in the Howard Beale environment?

And the answer would be
making news

part of the entertainment
monolith.

The division producing
the lowest rate of return

has been the news division,

with its $98 million budget

and its average annual deficit
of $32 million.

I know that, historically,
news divisions are expected

to lose money,
but to our minds,

this philosophy is
a wanton fiscal affront

to be resolutely resisted.

Oh, I think that "Network" is--
Most famous monologue maybe is

when the executive
comes into the room

and tells him
how the facts of the world run.

Valhalla, Mr. Beale.

Please sit down.

That's "Now let me
get this straight

with you, you idiot."

And this is the way
the world works,

and nobody's going to
fuck it up, including you."

This network correspondent,
Peter Finch.

You have meddled with
the primal forces of nature,

Mr. Beale,
and I won't have it!

Is that clear?

And Ned Beatty-- Ned Beatty
did a great job on that.

You are an old man who thinks
in terms of nations and peoples.

There are no nations.
There are no peoples.

There are no Russians.
There are no Arabs.

There are no third worlds.

There is no West.

There is only one
holistic system of systems.

Those kinds of speeches,
a speech from an anti-hero,

is usually
the best kind of speech.

"You think I'm a bad guy,

but let me tell you either
why you're wrong

and I'm really a good guy
or why you're a hypocrite."

Those tend to be the speeches
with the most blood in them.

It is the international
system of currency

which determines the totality
of life on this planet.

That is the natural order
of things today.

That is the atomic and subatomic

and galactic structure
of things today.

It's very difficult to
get the monologue right.

Again, it is like
a musical number,

because it's so easy
for it to read false.

I mean,
lots of people monologue.

Lots of people just
ramble and talk.

But to give, like,
a concise

sort of speech
in the middle of everyday life

is not a thing
that really happens.

So to arrive there in a piece,

it takes a lot of work
just to get to that moment.

And then the monologue itself
has to deliver.

It has to be entertaining.

It has to take you
on a bit of a ride.

It has to tell a bit
of a story in and of itself.

He's writing erudite speeches.
That's the other thing.

These aren't
just great speeches, you know,

great monologues.

They are so informed
about the world.

And that's hard
to do for two reasons.

One, it's hard to be that smart.

Simply to know as much
as Paddy knows is hard.

And, two, to write that in a way

that it doesn't sound
dramatically false,

that's the dramatist's job.

And Paddy had that muscle.

Without that,
he'd just be a preacher.

But because he was
a great dramatist,

on top of that,
he could make those speeches

matter to an audience.

There is no America.

There is no democracy.

There is only IBM and ITT
and AT&T and DuPont,

Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon.

Those are the nations
of the world today.

But when he points out
that there are no nations,

that DuPont and Dow and
Union Carbide

and General Electric are the
nations of the world today,

and "What do you think
the Russians talk about

in their meetings of state,
Karl Marx?

No, they get out
their linear charts

and their financial planners

and they chart their profits
and losses the same that we do."

That, to me, was a revelation,
because

in the same way that
when the Supreme Court said,

"Corporations are people,"

I went,
"Paddy Chayefsky just went..."

The whole bloody world
is becoming inhuman.

All of modern life-- and not
just America, by any means--

has become a corporate entity
rather than a human entity.

What do you think
the Russians talk about

in their councils of state,
Karl Marx?

They get out their
linear programming charts,

statistical-decision theories,
minimax solutions,

and compute the price,
cost, probabilities

of their transactions
and investments just like we do.

And what is their means
of communication?

Media.
That's all they've got.

So the more
that they can pervert and color

and distort media,
that is their messaging.

And what he was clearly saying
is, "The news is not pristine."

I said,
"You know, that's--"

I said, "You'll get arrested."

I said, "You know, McCarthy.
You'll be arrested.

They know that you know
that money is the message.

You know?
You're in trouble, Paddy.

You're going to be in trouble."

"Network"--
when I saw it in the theater,

I wasn't a fan of it
the first time I saw it,

because I thought the heroine
was too farcical.

There was nobody like her.

And then, suddenly, there
she was all over the place,

that kind of woman.

I was married for four years
and pretended to be happy...

and had six years of analysis
and pretended to be sane.

My husband ran off
with his boyfriend,

and I had an affair
with my analyst,

who told me I was the worst lay
he'd ever had.

I can't tell you
how many men have told me what

a lousy lay I am.

I apparently have
a masculine temperament.

I arouse quickly,
consummate prematurely,

and can't wait
to get my clothes back on

and get out of that bedroom.

I seem to be inept
at everything except my work.

I'm good at my work,
so I confine myself to that.

All I want out of life
is a 30 share and a 20 rating.

And I always thought that's a

terrific ambition to catch
a type of character

before she becomes a type
of character.

Barbara, is Tommy
around anywhere?

I think so.

I'd like to see the two of you
for a moment.

I mean, that's one thing

that's really interesting about
the way that they style her

and she's portrayed--
she's the villain.

She's the craven,
hungry, manipulative person

who understands the mechanic
of the business,

has no fear, no sacred cows,
and they make her so alluring.

I mean, she's almost
like this kind of Faustian,

devilish character.

Look, I've got a bunch
of hobgoblin radicals

called the
Ecumenical Liberation Army

who go around taking home movies
of themselves robbing banks.

And maybe they'll take movies of
themselves kidnapping heiresses,

um, hijacking 747s,

bombing bridges,
assassinating ambassadors.

Well, we'd open
each week's segment

with that authentic footage,
hire a couple of writers

to write some story
behind that footage,

and we've got ourselves
a series.

And she's such
a smart villain.

She's not a craven villain.
She's not a stupid villain.

She's-- What's villainous
about her is that she's right.

And she's smart
about what the audience wants,

and the real villain
in the movie is all of us

who are so easily manipulated.

She's just a clever player
of the strings.

The American people
are turning sullen.

They've been clobbered
on all sides by Vietnam,

Watergate, the inflation,
the depression.

They've turned off, shot up,
and they fuck themselves limp,

and nothing helps.

So this concept analysis
report concludes

the American people want
somebody to articulate

their rage for them.

I've been telling you people

since I took this job six months
ago that I want angry shows.

It's easy to say, "Oh, well,
'Network' sort of saw the future

of television
and junk television

and, you know,
reality TV and nonsense."

I think that's the tip
of the iceberg.

Did you see the overnights
on the network news?

It has an 8 in New York,
a 9 in L.A.,

and a 27 share in both cities.

Last night,
Howard Beale went on the air

and yelled bullshit
for two minutes,

and I can tell you right now
that tonight's show

will get a 30 share at least.

I think we've lucked
into something.

That movie predicts
Donald Trump.

You know, "Network"--
Early on in "Network,"

somebody says,
"The American people

want someone who's
going to express their rage."

I see Howard Beale
as a latter-day prophet,

a magnificent messianic figure,

inveighing against
the hypocrisies of our times,

a strip Savonarola
Monday through Friday

that I tell you, Frank,
could just go through the roof.

And then, finally,
someone says, "Wait a second.

Are you talking about putting
a--" how do you describe it?--

"a manifestly inappropriate man
on national television?

And they go, "Yeah."

God sakes, Diana,
we're talking about putting

a manifestly irresponsible man
on national television.

It's Donald Trump.

And, you know, he goes on TV
and he says, you know,

"I want you to go to your
windows and yell,

'I'm mad as hell.'"

And his show becomes
like a Trump rally.

People aren't doing it
because of policy reasons.

They're doing it because
they want to express rage

and it's fun,
and it gets out of control.

I want you to get up
right now.

- Get up.
- Stay with him.

Go to your windows,
open them,

and stick your head out
and yell,

"I'm as mad as hell and I'm
not going to take this anymore!"

Things have got to change...

How many stations
does this go out to?

67. I know it goes to
Louisville and Atlanta--

We're not gonna
take this anymore.

Then we'll figure out
what to do about the depression

and the inflation
and the oil crisis.

But first,
get up out of your chairs,

open the window, stick
your head out, and yell and say,

"I'm as mad as hell and I'm not
gonna take this anymore!"

I just think it's stunning.

1976, he predicts Trump.

- I can see that.
- You can?

Yeah.
Peter Finch's character.

"Open up your window and scream,
'I'm mad as hell and

not going to take it anymore.'
You have a voice."

I can see Paddy kind of being
the first step towards that.

Last night, I got up here
and asked you people to stand up

and fight for your heritage,
and you did

and it was beautiful.

6 million telegrams were
received at the White House.

The Arab takeover of CCA
has been stopped.

The people spoke,
the people won.

It was a radiant eruption
of democracy.

But I think that was it, fellas.

That sort of thing
is not likely to happen again.

Because at the bottom
of all our terrified souls,

we know that democracy
is a dying giant,

a sick, sick, dying,

decaying political concept
writhing in its final pain.

Here's the risk
with monologues.

When you write a long speech
for a character,

the audience always begins to
wonder, "Wait a second.

Is this the author
talking to me right now?

Has the author just--
the character unzipped

themselves, and the author
has stepped out?

And are they telling me
how they feel

or are they trying
to convince me of something?"

I think people felt
that way with Paddy,

like they knew him
and what he thought.

I don't mean that
the United States is finished

as a world power.

The United States is
the richest, the most powerful,

the most advanced country
in the world,

light-years ahead
of any other country.

And I don't mean the communists
are going to take over

the world,
because the communists

are deader than we are.

What is finished...

is the idea that this
great country is dedicated to

the freedom and flourishing
of every individual in it.

It's the individual
that's finished.

I mean, I cannot tell you
how many times my words

have been
distorted or misunderstood.

That's the nature of my life--
to be misunderstood.

I am not a destroyer
of companies.

I am a liberator of them.

The point is,
ladies and gentlemen,

that greed, for lack
of a better word, is good.

Greed is right.
Greed works.

Greed clarifies,
cuts through, and captures

the essence of
the evolutionary spirit.

Greed in all of its forms--

greed for life, for money,
for love, knowledge--

has marked the
upward surge of mankind,

and greed, you mark my words,
will not only save Teldar Paper,

but that other malfunctioning
corporation called the U.S.A.

Thank you very much.

The greed speech
was misunderstood.

I mean, what I was-- I didn't
want it to make it simplistic,

black and white.

It was not, you know,

"Yeah, we all know
that greed is not a good thing."

The kids,
the people who see these movies

that were in college
or high school

and they loved the film
and they wanted to make money.

They didn't want to go to
some boring university

and study for what?

They wanted to
hit the jackpot on Wall Street.

So I guess I misjudged
the landscape.

I thought people had
more morality than they did.

I think it's the
most important art form we have.

Satire is the only form
where you can sit down,

be entertained,

have that sense of escapism
from your everyday life,

but also deeply involve
yourself with something

that's really important
about society

that, otherwise, you
wouldn't really want to see.

Well, the time has come to say,

is "dehumanization"
such a bad word?

Because good or bad,
that's what is so.

The whole world
is becoming humanoid--

creatures that look human,
but aren't.

The whole world,
not just us.

We're just the
most advanced country,

so we're getting there first.

The whole world's people
are becoming mass-produced,

programmed, numbered,
insensate things...

Can it be
dismantled? Can it be stopped?

Do you want the truth?
I don't think it can.

And somebody once said to me,

"Don't you have
any hope at all?"

And I said, "Yes.
I hope I'm wrong."

That's the only hope I have.

The winner is
Paddy Chayefsky for "Network."

You know, it's so easy

and I think very reductive
to just talk about the words

with Chayefsky,
because the words are so--

they're so arresting.

But it was not the words.
It was the characters.

It was the intentions.

No character can survive
being badly performed.

If you don't have great actors,
I don't care how good

the writing is,
it's going to be terrible.

So, yeah, Peter Finch,
Faye Dunaway, Bill Holden,

Robert Duvall,
George C. Scott, Diana Rigg,

yeah, they made a difference.

And they found what
was living between the words

in those brilliant screenplays.

But I don't know that we need to
rank which was more important,

because the truth is,
they served each other.

This was just everybody bringing
their best at the same time.

I approached him.

I was fledgling
and I approached him at--

They used to have these great
Writers Guild Award dinners.

And I saw him and Robert Towne,

for God's sake,
sitting at the same table.

I approached him.

And Paddy,
on "Altered States,"

I always wondered
whether it was possible

for a writer to write people
smarter than he was or she was.

And he did it.

I mean, you know,
he had to write geniuses in

"Altered States."

He had to write a flat-out
genius and make it convincing,

and he did.

Arthur says you're very shy.
He wants me to draw you out.

Draw me out?
That doesn't sound like Arthur.

Well, what he actually
said was you were

a high-handed, arrogant prick,
a little nuts, but brilliant,

and that if I ever got
you talking,

I would find you fascinating.

That sounds more like Arthur.

He says you're doing
some work with him and

- Alan Hobart at Payne Whitney.
- Yes.

Well, what sort of work?

Toxic-metabolite stuff
for more or less

replicating Heath's
and Friedhoff's strategies,

trying to find
maverick substances specific

to schizophrenia.

I think we're chasing our tails.
What do you do?

Well, "Altered States"
is so interesting

because, first of all,
Paddy Chayefsky was

the only screenwriter in history
who had the power

to fire the director,
but he could not fire two.

And I think--
And on "Altered States,"

he fired the first
and then got Ken Russell,

and that wasn't
the happiest arrangement ever.

Yeah, I mean, that's the thing.

Is it a Chayefsky movie?
Is it not a Chayefsky movie?

He took his name off of it.

I just remember,
you talk about a big swing,

I think that it's
underrated in that

it's not in the discussion
as much as it should be.

But even I knew it was
an imperfect movie

when I saw it as a kid,
but there's enough in it

that is unlike any other movie
that you've ever seen

that I think it's like--
it's the Chayefsky deep cut.

...know deep in our hearts
that he may be onto something

that is beyond our
own comprehension.

Now, because I believe him,
I want this thing stopped!

I read the novella
on my honeymoon,

and the nature of the story

requires him to solve
the meaning of life at the end.

There was no other way
to end it.

And he did it.

And it was like
2:00 in the morning,

and I was, I think, reading
in the bathroom of my honeymoon.

And I cried
for the second time in my life.

I believe it was
in the hospital.

Paddy and Bob,
sort of half-jokingly,

but not jokingly,
made a pact with each other.

If Bob died first,

Paddy would give a very long
and very boring eulogy.

And if Paddy died first, Bob
said he would do a tap dance.

Now, it was presented
with a tinge of disrespect,

obviously, because it was
a joke, like, you know,

I'll do something as stupid as
tap-dance at your memorial,

you know,
at Riverside Memorial Chapel."

It was a joke,
but it wasn't a joke.

At Paddy Chayefsky's
funeral in New York,

which I attended,
and it was solemn.

I mean,
it was very solemn for me.

And Bob Fosse, who, as close as
friends can be, got up and said

that he and Paddy
had made a deal.

And I asked
E.L. Doctorow about it.

Doctorow was there,
and he said it was just

a very sad and solemn soft-shoe,
very quiet, very internal.

And he started
to do a dance, tap dance,

and by the third step,
he was collapsing in tears.

I don't remember anything
but that

and being there in the place
and the kind of day it was.

Fosse said, "I can't
imagine my life without you."

And that's true.
That is true.

Fosse declined after Paddy died.

In the epitaph,
I think one word used is

"humanist."

Yes, humanist for sure.

Yeah.
Cared about the human condition,

wanted to make sure that
we were all rigorously honest

with ourselves about
what the human condition was,

what human frailty was,
what human potential was,

what human evil could be.

He was just X-raying all of us,

both in the micro
and in the macro...

and giving us a bill of health
that was not always flattering,

but was exceedingly necessary.