1
00:01:14,114 --> 00:01:17,242
<i>The life of a playwright is tough.</i>

2
00:01:17,351 --> 00:01:20,252
<i>It's not easy,</i>
<i>as some people seem to think.</i>

3
00:01:20,354 --> 00:01:23,915
<i>You work hard writing plays,</i>
<i>and nobody puts them on.</i>

4
00:01:24,024 --> 00:01:26,925
<i>You take up other lines of work</i>
<i>to try to make a living-</i>

5
00:01:27,027 --> 00:01:28,927
<i>I became an actor-</i>

6
00:01:29,029 --> 00:01:31,259
<i>and people don't hire you.</i>

7
00:01:31,365 --> 00:01:35,324
<i>So you just spend your days</i>
<i>doing the errands of your trade.</i>

8
00:01:36,370 --> 00:01:38,668
<i>Today I'd had to be up</i>
<i>by 10:00 in the morning...</i>

9
00:01:38,772 --> 00:01:40,865
<i>to make some</i>
<i>important phone calls.</i>

10
00:01:40,974 --> 00:01:45,172
<i>Then I'd gone to the stationery store</i>
<i>to buy envelopes. Then to the Xerox shop.</i>

11
00:01:45,279 --> 00:01:47,247
<i>There were dozens of things to do.</i>

12
00:01:52,986 --> 00:01:55,648
<i>By 5:00 I'd finally made it</i>
<i>to the post office...</i>

13
00:01:55,756 --> 00:01:58,156
<i>and mailed off</i>
<i>several copies of my plays...</i>

14
00:01:58,258 --> 00:02:00,556
<i>meanwhile checking constantly</i>
<i>with my answering service...</i>

15
00:02:00,661 --> 00:02:03,892
<i>to see if my agent</i>
<i>had called with any acting work.</i>

16
00:02:03,997 --> 00:02:07,489
<i>In the morning, the mailbox</i>
<i>had just been stuffed with bills.</i>

17
00:02:07,601 --> 00:02:10,229
<i>What was I supposed to do?</i>
<i>How was I supposed to pay them?</i>

18
00:02:10,337 --> 00:02:13,306
<i>After all, I was already doing my best.</i>

19
00:02:15,042 --> 00:02:17,408
<i>I've lived in this city all my life.</i>

20
00:02:17,511 --> 00:02:20,002
<i>I grew up on the Upper East Side...</i>

21
00:02:20,114 --> 00:02:24,016
<i>and when I was 10 years old</i>
<i>I was rich, I was an aristocrat...</i>

22
00:02:24,118 --> 00:02:27,645
<i>riding around in taxis,</i>
<i>surrounded by comfort...</i>

23
00:02:27,755 --> 00:02:30,747
<i>and all I thought about</i>
<i>was art and music.</i>

24
00:02:30,858 --> 00:02:36,194
<i>Now I'm 36,</i>
<i>and all I think about is money.</i>

25
00:03:05,926 --> 00:03:07,826
<i>It was now 7:00...</i>

26
00:03:07,928 --> 00:03:11,523
<i>and I would have liked nothing better than</i>
<i>to go home and have my girlfriend Debby...</i>

27
00:03:11,632 --> 00:03:14,396
<i>cook me a nice, delicious dinner.</i>

28
00:03:14,501 --> 00:03:17,026
<i>But for the last several years</i>
<i>our financial circumstances...</i>

29
00:03:17,137 --> 00:03:20,368
<i>have forced Debby to work</i>
<i>three nights a week as a waitress.</i>

30
00:03:20,474 --> 00:03:23,568
<i>After all, somebody had to</i>
<i>bring in a little money.</i>

31
00:03:23,677 --> 00:03:26,407
<i>So I was on my own.</i>

32
00:03:26,513 --> 00:03:30,347
<i>But the worst thing of all was that I'd been</i>
<i>trapped by an odd series of circumstances...</i>

33
00:03:30,451 --> 00:03:35,081
<i>into agreeing to have dinner</i>
<i>with a man I'd been avoiding literally for years.</i>

34
00:03:35,189 --> 00:03:37,089
<i>His name was André Gregory.</i>

35
00:03:37,191 --> 00:03:40,388
<i>At one time he'd been</i>
<i>a very close friend of mine...</i>

36
00:03:40,494 --> 00:03:43,292
<i>as well as my most valued colleague</i>
<i>in the theater.</i>

37
00:03:43,397 --> 00:03:45,695
<i>In fact, he was the man</i>
<i>who had first discovered me...</i>

38
00:03:45,799 --> 00:03:49,166
<i>and put one of my plays</i>
<i>on the professional stage.</i>

39
00:03:49,269 --> 00:03:53,000
<i>When I'd known André, he'd been at the height</i>
<i>ofhis career as a theater director.</i>

40
00:03:53,106 --> 00:03:56,007
<i>The amazing work he did with his company,</i>
<i>the Manhattan Project...</i>

41
00:03:56,109 --> 00:03:59,237
<i>had just stunned audiences</i>
<i>throughout the world.</i>

42
00:04:00,647 --> 00:04:03,480
<i>But then something</i>
<i>had happened to André.</i>

43
00:04:03,584 --> 00:04:06,644
<i>He dropped out of the theater.</i>
<i>He sort of disappeared.</i>

44
00:04:06,753 --> 00:04:09,745
<i>For months at a time, his family seemed</i>
<i>only to know that he was traveling...</i>

45
00:04:09,857 --> 00:04:12,291
<i>in some odd place like Tibet...</i>

46
00:04:12,392 --> 00:04:15,156
<i>which was really weird</i>
<i>because he loved his wife and children.</i>

47
00:04:15,262 --> 00:04:17,822
<i>He never used to like</i>
<i>to leave home at all.</i>

48
00:04:17,931 --> 00:04:21,367
<i>Or else you'd hear that someone had met him</i>
<i>at a party and he'd been telling people...</i>

49
00:04:21,468 --> 00:04:24,869
<i>that he talked with trees</i>
<i>or something like that.</i>

50
00:04:24,972 --> 00:04:28,408
<i>Obviously, something terrible</i>
<i>had happened to André.</i>

51
00:04:28,509 --> 00:04:31,876
<i>♪♪</i>

52
00:04:34,948 --> 00:04:37,348
<i>The whole idea of meeting him</i>
<i>made me very nervous.</i>

53
00:04:37,451 --> 00:04:39,646
<i>I mean, I really wasn't up</i>
<i>for that sort of thing.</i>

54
00:04:39,753 --> 00:04:43,553
<i>I had problems of my own.</i>
<i>I mean, I couldn't help André.</i>

55
00:04:43,657 --> 00:04:45,716
<i>Was I supposed to be a doctor, or what?</i>

56
00:04:46,760 --> 00:04:48,990
<i>♪♪</i>

57
00:04:49,096 --> 00:04:50,996
- Hello.
- Hello.

58
00:04:52,499 --> 00:04:54,467
- Here you go.
- Thank you.

59
00:04:58,705 --> 00:05:02,835
- Yes, sir.
- Ah, sir, my name is Wallace Shawn.

60
00:05:02,943 --> 00:05:05,468
I'm expected at the table
of André Gregory.

61
00:05:07,948 --> 00:05:09,916
That table will be a moment, sir.

62
00:05:10,017 --> 00:05:12,485
If you like,
you may have a drink at the bar.

63
00:05:31,471 --> 00:05:34,440
- Good evening, sir.
- Uh, could I have a club soda, please?

64
00:05:34,541 --> 00:05:37,476
I'm sorry, sir.
We only serve Source de Pavilion.

65
00:05:37,578 --> 00:05:39,808
Oh, that'd be fine, thank you.

66
00:05:54,695 --> 00:05:58,062
<i>When I'd called André, and he'd suggested</i>
<i>that we meet in this particular restaurant...</i>

67
00:05:58,165 --> 00:06:02,465
<i>I'd been rather surprised, because</i>
<i>André's taste used to be very ascetic...</i>

68
00:06:02,569 --> 00:06:05,697
<i>even though people have always known</i>
<i>that he had some money somewhere.</i>

69
00:06:05,806 --> 00:06:09,333
<i>I mean, how the hell else could he have</i>
<i>been flying off to Asia and so on...</i>

70
00:06:09,443 --> 00:06:12,241
<i>and still have been supporting his family?</i>

71
00:06:13,981 --> 00:06:17,508
<i>The reason I was meeting André was that</i>
<i>an acquaintance of mine, George Grassfield...</i>

72
00:06:17,618 --> 00:06:21,418
<i>had called me</i>
<i>and just insisted that I had to see him.</i>

73
00:06:21,521 --> 00:06:25,651
<i>Apparently, George had been walking his dog</i>
<i>in an odd section of town the night before...</i>

74
00:06:25,759 --> 00:06:27,750
<i>and he'd suddenly come upon André...</i>

75
00:06:27,861 --> 00:06:31,353
<i>leaning against a crumbling old building</i>
<i>and sobbing.</i>

76
00:06:31,465 --> 00:06:33,899
<i>André had explained to George</i>
<i>that he'd just been watching...</i>

77
00:06:34,001 --> 00:06:36,401
<i>the Ingmar Bergman movie</i>
Autumn Sonata...

78
00:06:36,503 --> 00:06:38,471
<i>about 25 blocks away...</i>

79
00:06:38,572 --> 00:06:41,973
<i>and he'd been seized</i>
<i>by a fit of ungovernable crying...</i>

80
00:06:42,075 --> 00:06:45,067
<i>when the character played</i>
<i>by Ingrid Bergman had said...</i>

81
00:06:45,178 --> 00:06:49,842
<i>"I could always live in my art,</i>
<i>but never in my life."</i>

82
00:06:55,122 --> 00:06:57,716
<i>WallyI</i>

83
00:06:57,824 --> 00:07:00,349
- Wow.
- My God.

84
00:07:03,930 --> 00:07:06,455
<i>I remember, when I first</i>
<i>started working with André's company...</i>

85
00:07:06,566 --> 00:07:10,366
<i>I couldn't get over the way the actors</i>
<i>would hug when they greeted each other.</i>

86
00:07:10,470 --> 00:07:13,496
<i>"Wow. Now I'm really in the theater,"</i>
<i>I thought.</i>

87
00:07:13,607 --> 00:07:15,768
Well, you look terrific.

88
00:07:15,876 --> 00:07:18,674
<i>Well, I feel terrible.</i>

89
00:07:20,781 --> 00:07:22,840
Good evening, sir.
Nice to see you again.

90
00:07:22,949 --> 00:07:26,214
Thank you. Good evening.
Ah, I think I'll have a spritzer, if I could.

91
00:07:26,319 --> 00:07:28,219
- Yes, sir.
- Thank you.

92
00:07:29,923 --> 00:07:32,016
<i>I was feeling incredibly nervous.</i>

93
00:07:32,125 --> 00:07:34,525
<i>I wasn't sure I could stick through</i>
<i>an entire meal with him.</i>

94
00:07:34,628 --> 00:07:36,255
Great.

95
00:07:36,363 --> 00:07:38,263
<i>So we talked about this and that.</i>

96
00:07:38,365 --> 00:07:40,595
<i>He told me a few things</i>
<i>aboutJerzy Grotowski...</i>

97
00:07:40,701 --> 00:07:42,601
<i>the great Polish theater director...</i>

98
00:07:42,703 --> 00:07:45,831
<i>who was a friend and almost like</i>
<i>a kind of a guru of André's.</i>

99
00:07:45,939 --> 00:07:48,339
<i>He'd also dropped out of the theater.</i>

100
00:07:48,442 --> 00:07:51,502
<i>Grotowski was a pretty</i>
<i>unusual character himself.</i>

101
00:07:51,611 --> 00:07:55,411
<i>At one time, he'd been quite fat, then he'd</i>
<i>lost an incredible amount of weight...</i>

102
00:07:55,515 --> 00:07:57,813
<i>and become very thin</i>
<i>and grown a beard.</i>

103
00:07:57,918 --> 00:08:00,751
- Your table is ready, if you feel like sitting down.
- Oh.

104
00:08:00,854 --> 00:08:02,754
- Oh.
- Yes. Thank you.

105
00:08:10,464 --> 00:08:13,661
<i>I was beginning to realize</i>
<i>that the only way to make this evening bearable...</i>

106
00:08:13,767 --> 00:08:16,565
<i>would be to ask André</i>
<i>a few questions.</i>

107
00:08:16,670 --> 00:08:19,468
<i>Asking questions always relaxes me.</i>

108
00:08:19,573 --> 00:08:21,837
<i>In fact, I sometimes think</i>
<i>that my secret profession...</i>

109
00:08:21,942 --> 00:08:25,036
<i>is that I'm a private investigator,</i>
<i>a detective.</i>

110
00:08:25,145 --> 00:08:27,875
<i>I always enjoy finding out about people.</i>

111
00:08:27,981 --> 00:08:33,112
<i>Even if they're in absolute agony,</i>
<i>I always find it very... interesting.</i>

112
00:08:34,654 --> 00:08:38,488
- By the way, is he still thin?
- What?

113
00:08:38,592 --> 00:08:42,255
Grotowski. Is he still thin?

114
00:08:42,362 --> 00:08:44,387
Oh. Absolutely.

115
00:08:48,101 --> 00:08:51,161
Oh, waiter?
Uh, I think we can do without this.

116
00:08:51,271 --> 00:08:53,569
- Yes, sir.
- Thank you.

117
00:08:53,673 --> 00:08:55,573
What about this one?

118
00:08:55,675 --> 00:08:58,872
Seven swimming shrimp.

119
00:09:01,248 --> 00:09:03,182
- Ready for your order?
- Ah, yes.

120
00:09:03,283 --> 00:09:06,081
Uh, the Galuska -
How - How do you prepare that?

121
00:09:06,186 --> 00:09:08,586
<i>André seemed</i>
<i>to know an awful lot about the menu.</i>

122
00:09:08,688 --> 00:09:11,088
- Dumpling with raisins, blanched almonds.
- <i>I didn't understand a word of it.</i>

123
00:09:11,191 --> 00:09:13,318
- Very good, I think.
- Hmm.

124
00:09:13,426 --> 00:09:16,020
No, I - I think I'll have
the Cailles aux Raisin, the quail.

125
00:09:16,129 --> 00:09:18,529
- Very good.
- Oh, quails! I'll have that as well.

126
00:09:18,632 --> 00:09:20,532
- Two.
- Great.
- Great!

127
00:09:20,634 --> 00:09:23,296
And then I think, to begin with,
the Terrine de Poissons.

128
00:09:23,403 --> 00:09:25,371
- Yes.
- What is that?

129
00:09:25,472 --> 00:09:28,635
Uh, it's a sort of pâte -
light, made of fish.

130
00:09:28,742 --> 00:09:31,609
- Does it have bones in it?
- No bones.

131
00:09:31,711 --> 00:09:33,872
<i>Perfectly safe.</i>

132
00:09:33,980 --> 00:09:38,610
Well, um -What is
the, um, Bramborová Polévka?

133
00:09:38,718 --> 00:09:42,586
It's a potato soup.
It's quite delicious.

134
00:09:42,689 --> 00:09:44,782
<i>Oh, well, that's great.</i>
<i>I'll have that.</i>

135
00:09:44,991 --> 00:09:47,289
- Thank you very kindly.
- <i>Thank you very much.</i>

136
00:09:50,263 --> 00:09:52,163
Well.

137
00:09:53,200 --> 00:09:55,191
When was the last time
that we saw each other?

138
00:09:55,302 --> 00:09:57,998
<i>So we talked for a while</i>
<i>about my writing and my acting...</i>

139
00:09:58,104 --> 00:10:00,004
<i>and about my girlfriend, Debby.</i>

140
00:10:00,106 --> 00:10:03,906
<i>And we talked about his wife, Chiquita,</i>
<i>and his two children, Nicolas and Marina.</i>

141
00:10:04,010 --> 00:10:06,274
<i>And I'd stayed back in New York.</i>

142
00:10:06,379 --> 00:10:09,746
<i>Finally, I got around to asking him</i>
<i>what he'd been up to in the last few years.</i>

143
00:10:09,850 --> 00:10:11,750
Oh, God. I'm just dying to hear it.

144
00:10:11,852 --> 00:10:13,479
- <i>Really?</i>
- Really.

145
00:10:13,587 --> 00:10:16,385
<i>At first, he seemed</i>
<i>a little reluctant to go into it...</i>

146
00:10:16,489 --> 00:10:20,084
<i>so I just kept asking,</i>
<i>and finally he started to answer.</i>

147
00:10:20,193 --> 00:10:22,855
...conference
on paratheatrical work then.

148
00:10:22,963 --> 00:10:26,763
And, uh, this must have been
about five years ago...

149
00:10:26,867 --> 00:10:31,361
and, uh, Grotowski and I were walking
along Fifth Avenue and we were talking.

150
00:10:31,471 --> 00:10:34,929
You see, he'd invited me to come
to teach that summer in Poland.

151
00:10:35,041 --> 00:10:38,533
You know, to teach a workshop
to actors and directors and whatever.

152
00:10:38,645 --> 00:10:42,979
And I had told him that I didn't want to come,
because, really, I had nothing left to teach.

153
00:10:43,083 --> 00:10:45,483
I had nothing left to say.
I didn't know anything.

154
00:10:45,585 --> 00:10:47,576
I couldn't teach anything.

155
00:10:47,687 --> 00:10:49,951
Exercises meant nothing to me anymore.

156
00:10:50,056 --> 00:10:52,354
Working on scenes from plays
seemed ridiculous.

157
00:10:52,459 --> 00:10:56,054
I - I didn't know what to do.
I mean, I just couldn't do it.

158
00:10:56,162 --> 00:11:00,189
So he said, "Why don't you tell me anything
you'd like to have if you did a workshop for me.

159
00:11:00,300 --> 00:11:03,599
No matter how outrageous.
And maybe I can give it to you."

160
00:11:03,703 --> 00:11:06,934
So I said,
"Well, if you could give me...

161
00:11:07,040 --> 00:11:09,907
"40 Jewish women who speak
neither English nor French -

162
00:11:10,010 --> 00:11:13,241
either women who've been in the theater
for a long time and want to leave it...

163
00:11:13,346 --> 00:11:15,246
but don't know why...

164
00:11:15,348 --> 00:11:18,545
or young women who love the theater,
but have never seen a theater they could love.

165
00:11:18,652 --> 00:11:20,984
And if these women could play
the trumpet or the harp...

166
00:11:21,087 --> 00:11:23,055
and if I could work in a forest, I'd come."

167
00:11:24,658 --> 00:11:27,286
A week later, or two weeks later,
he called me from Poland.

168
00:11:27,394 --> 00:11:30,727
And he said, "Well, 40 Jewish women -
that's a little hard to find."

169
00:11:30,830 --> 00:11:34,789
But he said, "I do have 40 women.
They all pretty much fit the definition."

170
00:11:34,901 --> 00:11:37,335
And he said, "I also have
some very interesting men...

171
00:11:37,437 --> 00:11:39,405
"but you don't have to work with them.

172
00:11:39,506 --> 00:11:42,441
"These are all people who have in common
the fact that they're questioning the theater.

173
00:11:42,542 --> 00:11:45,534
"They don't all play the trumpet or the harp,
but they all play a musical instrument.

174
00:11:45,645 --> 00:11:47,738
And none of them speak English."

175
00:11:47,847 --> 00:11:49,781
And he'd found me a forest, Wally.

176
00:11:49,883 --> 00:11:54,183
And the only inhabitants of this forest
were some wild boar and a hermit.

177
00:11:54,287 --> 00:11:56,255
So that was an offer I couldn't refuse.

178
00:11:56,356 --> 00:11:58,256
I had to go.

179
00:11:58,358 --> 00:12:02,260
So, I went to Poland, and it was this
wonderful group of young men and women.

180
00:12:02,362 --> 00:12:05,331
And the forest he had found us
was absolutely magical.

181
00:12:05,432 --> 00:12:07,332
You know, it was a huge forest.

182
00:12:07,434 --> 00:12:09,334
I mean, the trees were so large...

183
00:12:09,436 --> 00:12:13,839
that four or five people linking their arms
couldn't get their arms around the trees.

184
00:12:13,940 --> 00:12:17,432
So we were camped out beside
the ruins of this tiny little castle...

185
00:12:17,544 --> 00:12:21,878
and we would eat around this great stone slab
that served as a sort of a table.

186
00:12:21,982 --> 00:12:25,145
And our schedule was that usually
we'd start work around sunset...

187
00:12:25,251 --> 00:12:28,118
and then generally we'd work
until about 6:00 or 7:00 in the morning.

188
00:12:28,221 --> 00:12:30,587
And then, because the Poles
love to sing and dance...

189
00:12:30,690 --> 00:12:33,955
we'd sing and dance until about
10:00 or 11 :00 in the morning.

190
00:12:34,060 --> 00:12:38,622
And then we'd have our food, which
was generally bread, jam, cheese and tea.

191
00:12:38,732 --> 00:12:42,065
And then we'd sleep
from around noon to sunset.

192
00:12:43,436 --> 00:12:45,404
Now, technically, of course -

193
00:12:45,505 --> 00:12:47,905
Technically, the situation
is a very interesting one...

194
00:12:48,008 --> 00:12:50,806
because if you find yourself in a forest
with a group of 40 people...

195
00:12:50,910 --> 00:12:54,573
who don't speak your language,
then all your moorings are gone.

196
00:12:54,681 --> 00:12:56,581
What do you mean exactly?

197
00:12:56,683 --> 00:12:59,413
Well, what we'd do
is just sit there and wait...

198
00:12:59,519 --> 00:13:02,682
for someone to have
an impulse to do something.

199
00:13:02,789 --> 00:13:06,020
Now, in a way that's - that's something
like a theatrical improvisation.

200
00:13:06,126 --> 00:13:09,118
I mean, you know, if you were a director
working on a play by Chekhov...

201
00:13:09,229 --> 00:13:12,460
you might have the actors playing
the mother, the son and the uncle...

202
00:13:12,565 --> 00:13:16,001
all sit around in a room and do
a made-up scene that isn't in the play.

203
00:13:16,102 --> 00:13:18,070
For instance, you might say to them...

204
00:13:18,171 --> 00:13:21,436
"All right. Let's say that it's a rainy
Sunday afternoon on Sorin's estate...

205
00:13:21,541 --> 00:13:23,702
and you're all trapped
in the drawing room together."

206
00:13:23,810 --> 00:13:25,778
And then everyone would improvise -

207
00:13:25,879 --> 00:13:30,248
saying and doing what their character
might say and do in that circumstance.

208
00:13:30,350 --> 00:13:34,286
Except that in this type of improvisation -
the kind we did in Poland -

209
00:13:34,387 --> 00:13:37,220
the theme is oneself.

210
00:13:37,323 --> 00:13:39,791
So, you follow
the same law of improvisation...

211
00:13:39,893 --> 00:13:43,260
which is that you do whatever your impulse,
as the character, tells you to do...

212
00:13:43,363 --> 00:13:46,093
but in this case,
you are the character.

213
00:13:46,199 --> 00:13:49,635
So there's no imaginary situation
to hide behind...

214
00:13:49,736 --> 00:13:52,762
and there's no other person
to hide behind.

215
00:13:52,872 --> 00:13:55,773
What you're doing, in fact,
is you're asking those same questions...

216
00:13:55,875 --> 00:14:00,835
that Stanislavsky said the actor should
constantly ask himself as a character:

217
00:14:00,947 --> 00:14:04,439
Who am I? Why am I here?

218
00:14:04,551 --> 00:14:08,146
Where do I come from,
and where am I going?

219
00:14:08,254 --> 00:14:12,520
But instead of applying them to a role,
you apply them to yourself.

220
00:14:12,625 --> 00:14:14,855
- Hmm.
- Or, to look at it a little differently...

221
00:14:14,961 --> 00:14:16,952
in a way, it's like going
right back to childhood...

222
00:14:17,063 --> 00:14:20,032
where a group of children simply come
into a room or are brought into a room -

223
00:14:20,133 --> 00:14:22,363
without toys - and begin to play.

224
00:14:22,469 --> 00:14:26,166
Grown-ups were learning
how to play again.

225
00:14:26,272 --> 00:14:30,038
So, you would, uh,
all sit together somewhere...

226
00:14:30,143 --> 00:14:32,805
and, uh, you would play in some way.

227
00:14:32,912 --> 00:14:35,972
- But what would you actually do?
- Well, I could give you a good example.

228
00:14:36,082 --> 00:14:39,483
You see, we worked, uh, together
for a week in the city...

229
00:14:39,586 --> 00:14:41,611
before we went off to our forest.

230
00:14:41,721 --> 00:14:44,053
And of course,
Grotowski was there in the city too.

231
00:14:44,157 --> 00:14:46,887
I heard that every night,
he conducted something called a beehive.

232
00:14:46,993 --> 00:14:48,893
I loved the sound of this beehive...

233
00:14:48,995 --> 00:14:51,987
so a night or two before we were
supposed to go off to the country...

234
00:14:52,098 --> 00:14:55,192
I grabbed him by the collar, and I said,
"Listen, about this beehive.

235
00:14:55,301 --> 00:14:57,292
"You know, I'd kind of like
to participate in one.

236
00:14:57,403 --> 00:15:00,201
Just instinctively I feel it would
be something interesting."

237
00:15:00,306 --> 00:15:03,275
And he said, "Well, certainly.
In fact, why don't you, with your group...

238
00:15:03,376 --> 00:15:06,038
lead the beehive
instead of participating in one?"

239
00:15:06,146 --> 00:15:09,980
You know, I - I got very nervous,
you know, and I said, "Well, what is a beehive?"

240
00:15:10,083 --> 00:15:12,745
He said, "Well, a beehive is...

241
00:15:12,852 --> 00:15:15,685
at 8:00 a hundred strangers
come into a room."

242
00:15:16,723 --> 00:15:19,157
I said, "Yes?" He said,
"Yes, and whatever happens is a beehive."

243
00:15:19,259 --> 00:15:22,456
I said, "Yes, but what am I supposed to do?"
He said, "That's up to you."

244
00:15:22,562 --> 00:15:26,293
I said, "No, no. I really don't want to do this.
I'll just participate."

245
00:15:26,399 --> 00:15:30,096
And he said,
"No, no. You lead the beehive."

246
00:15:30,203 --> 00:15:32,228
Well, I was terrified, Wally.

247
00:15:32,338 --> 00:15:35,637
I mean, in a way, I felt on stage.

248
00:15:36,743 --> 00:15:39,075
I did it anyway.

249
00:15:39,179 --> 00:15:41,545
God. Well, tell me about it.

250
00:15:41,648 --> 00:15:45,675
You see, there was this song-
I have a tape of it. I can play it for you one day.

251
00:15:45,785 --> 00:15:49,016
And it's just unbelievably beautiful.

252
00:15:49,122 --> 00:15:53,855
You see, one of the women in our group knew
a few fragments of this song of Saint Francis...

253
00:15:53,960 --> 00:15:57,054
and it's a song in which you
thank God for your eyes...

254
00:15:57,163 --> 00:16:00,360
and you thank God for your heart,
and you thank God for your friends...

255
00:16:00,466 --> 00:16:02,400
and you thank God for your life.

256
00:16:02,502 --> 00:16:05,494
And it, uh - It repeats itself
over and over again.

257
00:16:05,605 --> 00:16:07,539
And this became our theme song.

258
00:16:07,640 --> 00:16:09,631
I really must play this thing
for you one day...

259
00:16:09,742 --> 00:16:14,145
because you just can't believe that a group
of people who don't know how to sing...

260
00:16:14,247 --> 00:16:17,910
could create something so beautiful.

261
00:16:18,017 --> 00:16:22,647
So, I decided that when the people
arrived for the beehive...

262
00:16:22,755 --> 00:16:25,519
that our group would already be there
singing this very beautiful song...

263
00:16:25,625 --> 00:16:29,425
and that we would simply sing it
over and over again.

264
00:16:29,529 --> 00:16:34,364
One of the people decided to bring
her very large teddy bear, you know.

265
00:16:34,467 --> 00:16:36,435
Well, she's a little afraid of this event.

266
00:16:36,536 --> 00:16:38,800
And somebody wanted
to bring a - a sheet.

267
00:16:38,905 --> 00:16:41,601
And somebody else wanted
to bring a large bowl of water...

268
00:16:41,708 --> 00:16:43,903
in case people got hot or thirsty.

269
00:16:44,010 --> 00:16:46,308
And somebody suggested
that we have candles -

270
00:16:46,412 --> 00:16:50,508
that there be no artificial light,
but candlelight.

271
00:16:50,617 --> 00:16:53,142
And I remember watching people
preparing for this evening.

272
00:16:53,253 --> 00:16:55,448
Of course, there was no makeup,
and there were no costumes...

273
00:16:55,555 --> 00:16:58,149
but it was exactly the way that people
prepare for a performance.

274
00:16:58,258 --> 00:17:01,386
You know, people sort of taking off
their jewelry and their watches...

275
00:17:01,494 --> 00:17:04,622
and stowing it away
and making sure it's all secure.

276
00:17:04,731 --> 00:17:07,632
And then slowly people arrived,
the way they would arrive at the theater-

277
00:17:07,734 --> 00:17:10,498
in ones and twos and 10s and 15s
and what have you.

278
00:17:10,603 --> 00:17:13,595
And we were just sitting there,
and we were singing this very beautiful song.

279
00:17:13,706 --> 00:17:17,039
And people started to sit with us
and started to learn the song.

280
00:17:17,143 --> 00:17:22,274
Now, there is, of course,
as in any performance or improvisation...

281
00:17:22,382 --> 00:17:24,816
instinct for when things
are gonna get boring.

282
00:17:24,917 --> 00:17:28,853
So, at a certain point - It may have taken
an hour to get there, an hour and a half-

283
00:17:28,955 --> 00:17:32,948
I suddenly grabbed this teddy bear
and threw it in the air...

284
00:17:33,059 --> 00:17:36,586
at which 140 or 130 people
suddenly exploded.

285
00:17:36,696 --> 00:17:39,688
You know, it was like
a - a Jackson Pollack painting, you know.

286
00:17:39,799 --> 00:17:44,202
Human beings exploded out of this tight
little circle that was singing the song.

287
00:17:44,304 --> 00:17:47,273
And before I knew it,
there were two circles, dancing, you know -

288
00:17:47,373 --> 00:17:50,672
one dancing clockwise,
the other dancing counterclockwise...

289
00:17:50,777 --> 00:17:52,972
with this rhythm
mostly from the waist down.

290
00:17:53,079 --> 00:17:57,379
In other words, like an American Indian dance,
with this thumping, persistent rhythm.

291
00:18:02,055 --> 00:18:05,286
Now, you could easily see,
'cause we're talking about group trance...

292
00:18:05,391 --> 00:18:09,828
where the line between something like this
and something like Hitler's Nuremberg rallies...

293
00:18:09,929 --> 00:18:12,090
is, in a way, a very thin line.

294
00:18:14,434 --> 00:18:18,495
Anyway, after about an hour
of this wild, hypnotic dancing...

295
00:18:18,604 --> 00:18:21,801
Grotowski and I found ourselves sitting opposite
each other in the middle of this whole thing.

296
00:18:21,908 --> 00:18:24,342
And we threw the teddy bear
back and forth.

297
00:18:24,444 --> 00:18:26,969
You know, on one level,
you could say this is childish.

298
00:18:27,080 --> 00:18:29,310
And I gave the teddy bear suck,
suddenly, at my breast.

299
00:18:29,415 --> 00:18:32,543
And then I threw the teddy bear to him,
and he gave it suck at his breast.

300
00:18:32,652 --> 00:18:35,052
And then the teddy bear
was thrown up into the air again...

301
00:18:35,154 --> 00:18:38,453
at which there was another explosion
of form into... something.

302
00:18:38,558 --> 00:18:41,356
And these -What was it like?
You know, this is the -

303
00:18:41,461 --> 00:18:44,988
There's something like a kaleidoscope,
like a human kaleidoscope.

304
00:18:45,098 --> 00:18:49,364
The evening was made up
of shiftings of the kaleidoscope.

305
00:18:49,469 --> 00:18:51,460
Now, the only other things
that I remember...

306
00:18:51,571 --> 00:18:53,471
other than constantly trying
to guide this thing...

307
00:18:53,573 --> 00:18:58,067
which was always involved with either
movement, rhythm, repetition or song -

308
00:18:58,177 --> 00:19:00,304
Or chanting, because,
uh, two people in my group...

309
00:19:00,413 --> 00:19:02,404
had brought musical instruments,
a flute and a drum...

310
00:19:02,515 --> 00:19:04,483
which, of course,
are sacred instruments -

311
00:19:04,584 --> 00:19:07,109
was that sometimes the room
would break up...

312
00:19:07,220 --> 00:19:10,485
into six or seven different things
going on at once.

313
00:19:10,590 --> 00:19:13,491
You know, six or seven
different improvisations...

314
00:19:13,593 --> 00:19:17,393
all of which seemed, in some way,
related to each other.

315
00:19:17,497 --> 00:19:20,864
It was - It was like
a magnificent cobweb.

316
00:19:22,201 --> 00:19:26,365
And at one point, I noticed that Grotowski
was at the center of one group...

317
00:19:26,472 --> 00:19:29,270
huddled around a bunch of candles
that they'd gathered together.

318
00:19:29,375 --> 00:19:32,503
And like a little child
fascinated by fire...

319
00:19:32,612 --> 00:19:36,708
I saw that he had his hand right in the flame
and was holding it there.

320
00:19:36,816 --> 00:19:39,683
And as I approached his group,
I wondered if I could do it.

321
00:19:39,786 --> 00:19:44,655
I put my left hand in the flame and I found
I could hold it there for as long as I liked...

322
00:19:44,757 --> 00:19:47,123
and there was no burn
and no pain.

323
00:19:47,226 --> 00:19:51,356
But when I tried to put my right hand in the
flame, I couldn't hold it there for a second.

324
00:19:51,464 --> 00:19:56,367
So Grotowski said, "If it burns,
try to change some little thing in yourself."

325
00:19:56,469 --> 00:19:59,927
And I tried to do that.
Didn't work.

326
00:20:00,039 --> 00:20:04,567
Then I remember a very, very beautiful
procession with the sheet...

327
00:20:04,677 --> 00:20:07,145
and there was somebody
being carried below the sheet.

328
00:20:07,246 --> 00:20:10,340
You know, the sheet was like
some great biblical canopy.

329
00:20:10,450 --> 00:20:14,580
And the entire group was weaving
around the room and chanting.

330
00:20:15,988 --> 00:20:18,718
And then at one point,
people were dancing...

331
00:20:18,825 --> 00:20:21,123
and I was dancing with a girl...

332
00:20:21,227 --> 00:20:23,752
and suddenly our hands began
vibrating near each other-

333
00:20:23,863 --> 00:20:25,763
like this -vibrating, vibrating.

334
00:20:25,865 --> 00:20:29,301
And we went down to our knees,
and suddenly I was sobbing in her arms...

335
00:20:29,402 --> 00:20:33,668
and she was sort of cradling me in her arms,
and then she started to cry too.

336
00:20:33,773 --> 00:20:36,173
And then we - then we just
hugged each other for a moment.

337
00:20:36,275 --> 00:20:39,574
And, uh, then we joined the dance again.

338
00:20:39,679 --> 00:20:43,137
And then at a certain point,
hours later...

339
00:20:43,249 --> 00:20:46,218
we returned to the singing
of the song of Saint Francis...

340
00:20:46,319 --> 00:20:48,651
and that was the end of the beehive.

341
00:20:50,056 --> 00:20:54,220
And then, again, when it was over, it was
just like the theater after a performance.

342
00:20:54,327 --> 00:20:57,490
You know, people sort of put on
their earrings and their wristwatches...

343
00:20:57,597 --> 00:20:59,565
and we went off
to the railroad station...

344
00:20:59,665 --> 00:21:03,726
to drink a lot of beer
and have a good dinner.

345
00:21:03,836 --> 00:21:06,600
Oh, and there was one girl,
who wasn't in our group...

346
00:21:06,706 --> 00:21:10,142
but who just wouldn't leave,
so we took her along with us.

347
00:21:12,044 --> 00:21:13,944
Huh.

348
00:21:19,085 --> 00:21:22,612
God. Well, tell me some of the other things
you did with your group.

349
00:21:22,722 --> 00:21:26,419
Well- Oh, I remember once
when we were in the city...

350
00:21:26,526 --> 00:21:29,962
we tried doing an improvisation -you know,
the kind that I used to do in New York.

351
00:21:30,062 --> 00:21:32,462
Uh, everybody was supposed to be
on an airplane...

352
00:21:32,565 --> 00:21:35,329
and they've all learned from the pilot
there's something wrong with the motor.

353
00:21:35,434 --> 00:21:38,369
But what was unusual
about this improvisation...

354
00:21:38,471 --> 00:21:42,134
was that two people who
participated in it... fell in love.

355
00:21:42,241 --> 00:21:44,141
They've, in fact, married.

356
00:21:44,243 --> 00:21:46,939
And when we were -
Yeah, out of fear...

357
00:21:47,046 --> 00:21:50,243
of being on this plane,
they fell in love...

358
00:21:50,349 --> 00:21:52,442
thinking they were going to die
at any moment.

359
00:21:52,552 --> 00:21:56,181
And when we went to the forest,
these two disappeared...

360
00:21:56,289 --> 00:21:58,723
because they understood
the - the experiment so well...

361
00:21:58,824 --> 00:22:02,555
that they realized that to go off together
in the forest was much more important...

362
00:22:02,662 --> 00:22:06,098
than any kind of experiment
the group could do as a whole.

363
00:22:06,198 --> 00:22:09,497
So, uh, about halfway
through the week...

364
00:22:09,602 --> 00:22:11,797
we stumbled into
a clearing in the forest...

365
00:22:11,904 --> 00:22:15,305
and the two of them
were fast asleep in each other's arms.

366
00:22:15,408 --> 00:22:18,104
It was around dawn,
and we put flowers on them...

367
00:22:18,210 --> 00:22:21,338
to let them know we'd been there,
and then we crept away.

368
00:22:21,447 --> 00:22:24,712
And then on the last day of our stay
in the forest, these two showed up...

369
00:22:24,817 --> 00:22:27,684
and they shook me by my hands,
and they thanked me very much...

370
00:22:27,787 --> 00:22:30,449
for the wonderful work
they'd been able to do, you see.

371
00:22:30,556 --> 00:22:33,650
They understood what it was about.

372
00:22:33,759 --> 00:22:37,160
I mean, that, of course, poses
the question of what was it about.

373
00:22:38,531 --> 00:22:41,967
But it has -has something
to do with living.

374
00:22:44,704 --> 00:22:47,434
And then on the final day
of our stay in the forest...

375
00:22:47,540 --> 00:22:50,065
the whole group did something
so wonderful for me, Wally.

376
00:22:50,176 --> 00:22:52,406
They arranged a christening -
a baptism - for me.

377
00:22:52,511 --> 00:22:54,809
And they filled the castle with flowers.

378
00:22:54,914 --> 00:22:57,314
And it was just a miracle of light...

379
00:22:57,416 --> 00:23:01,284
because they had literally set up
hundreds of candles and torches.

380
00:23:01,387 --> 00:23:04,220
I mean, no church
could have looked more beautiful.

381
00:23:04,323 --> 00:23:07,417
There was a simple ceremony, and one
of them played the role of my godmother...

382
00:23:07,526 --> 00:23:09,494
and another played the role
of my godfather.

383
00:23:09,595 --> 00:23:13,258
And I was given a new name.
They called me Yendrush.

384
00:23:13,366 --> 00:23:16,767
And some of the people
took it completely seriously...

385
00:23:16,869 --> 00:23:18,996
and some of them found it funny.

386
00:23:19,105 --> 00:23:22,336
But, uh, I really felt
that I had a new name.

387
00:23:23,609 --> 00:23:27,375
And then we had an enormous feast,
with blueberries picked from the field...

388
00:23:27,480 --> 00:23:30,074
and chocolate someone
had gone a great distance to buy...

389
00:23:30,182 --> 00:23:32,173
and raspberry soup and rabbit stew.

390
00:23:32,284 --> 00:23:35,310
And we sang Polish songs
and Greek songs...

391
00:23:35,421 --> 00:23:38,322
and everybody danced
for the rest of the night.

392
00:23:38,424 --> 00:23:40,517
- Hmm.
- Oh, I have a picture.

393
00:23:43,162 --> 00:23:46,097
See, this was - Let's see.

394
00:23:47,133 --> 00:23:50,068
Oh, yeah.
This was me in the forest. See?

395
00:23:50,169 --> 00:23:52,763
- God!
- That's what I felt like.

396
00:23:55,875 --> 00:23:58,139
- That's the state I was in.
- God.

397
00:23:59,178 --> 00:24:03,012
Yeah. I remember George, uh, told me
he'd seen you around that time.

398
00:24:03,115 --> 00:24:05,379
He said you looked like
you'd come back from a war.

399
00:24:05,484 --> 00:24:08,920
Yeah, I remember meeting him. He, uh -
He asked me a lot of friendly questions.

400
00:24:09,021 --> 00:24:11,251
I think I called you up, too,
that summer, didn't I?

401
00:24:11,357 --> 00:24:13,257
Huh.

402
00:24:13,359 --> 00:24:16,328
I think I was out of town.

403
00:24:16,429 --> 00:24:20,092
Yeah, well, most people I met thought
there was something wrong with me.

404
00:24:20,199 --> 00:24:23,464
They didn't say that, but I could tell that
that was what they thought.

405
00:24:23,569 --> 00:24:25,662
But...

406
00:24:25,771 --> 00:24:30,470
you see, what I think
I experienced... was...

407
00:24:30,576 --> 00:24:33,306
for the first time in my life...

408
00:24:33,412 --> 00:24:35,880
to know what it means
to be truly alive.

409
00:24:35,981 --> 00:24:37,949
Now, that's very frightening...

410
00:24:38,050 --> 00:24:40,518
because with that comes
an immediate awareness of death...

411
00:24:40,619 --> 00:24:42,519
'cause they go hand in hand.

412
00:24:42,621 --> 00:24:46,057
You know, the kind of impulse that led to
Walt Whitman, that led to <i>Leaves of Grass.</i>

413
00:24:46,158 --> 00:24:48,626
That feeling of being connected
to everything...

414
00:24:48,728 --> 00:24:51,026
means to also be connected to death.

415
00:24:51,130 --> 00:24:53,291
And that's pretty scary.

416
00:24:53,399 --> 00:24:57,893
But I really felt as if I were floating
above the ground, not walking.

417
00:24:58,003 --> 00:25:00,597
You know, and I could do things
like go out to the highway...

418
00:25:00,706 --> 00:25:04,608
and watch the lights go from red to green
and think, "How wonderful."

419
00:25:04,710 --> 00:25:08,009
And then one day, in the early fall...

420
00:25:08,114 --> 00:25:10,582
I was out in the country,
walking in a field...

421
00:25:10,683 --> 00:25:14,119
and I suddenly heard a voice
say, <i>"Little Prince."</i>

422
00:25:14,220 --> 00:25:17,018
Of course, <i>The Little Prince</i>
was a book that I always thought of...

423
00:25:17,123 --> 00:25:19,023
as disgusting, childish treacle.

424
00:25:19,125 --> 00:25:22,356
But still, I thought, "Well, you know,
if a voice comes to me in a field" -

425
00:25:22,461 --> 00:25:24,759
This was the first voice I had ever heard.

426
00:25:24,864 --> 00:25:26,832
Maybe I should go and read the book.

427
00:25:26,932 --> 00:25:29,230
Now, that same morning
I'd got a letter...

428
00:25:29,335 --> 00:25:31,633
from a young woman
who'd been in my group in Poland.

429
00:25:31,737 --> 00:25:33,967
And in her letter she'd written,
"You have dominated me."

430
00:25:34,073 --> 00:25:36,064
You know,
she spoke very awkward English.

431
00:25:36,175 --> 00:25:39,167
So she'd gone to the dictionary,
and she'd crossed out the word "dominated"...

432
00:25:39,278 --> 00:25:42,145
and she'd said,
"No. The correct word is 'tamed.'"

433
00:25:42,248 --> 00:25:45,445
And then when I went to town
and bought the book and started to read it...

434
00:25:45,551 --> 00:25:49,578
I saw that "taming" was the most
important word in the whole book.

435
00:25:49,688 --> 00:25:53,556
By the end of the book, I was in tears,
I was so moved by the story.

436
00:25:53,659 --> 00:25:56,253
And then I went and tried to write
an answer to her letter...

437
00:25:56,362 --> 00:25:58,330
'cause she'd written me a very long letter.

438
00:25:58,430 --> 00:26:01,866
But I just couldn't find the right words,
so finally I took my hand...

439
00:26:01,967 --> 00:26:04,765
I put it on a piece of paper,
I outlined it with a pen...

440
00:26:04,870 --> 00:26:07,668
and I wrote in the center something
like, "Your heart is in my hand."

441
00:26:07,773 --> 00:26:09,400
Something like that.

442
00:26:09,508 --> 00:26:11,499
Then I went over
to my brother's house to swim...

443
00:26:11,610 --> 00:26:14,044
'cause he lives nearby in the country
and he has a pool.

444
00:26:14,146 --> 00:26:16,114
And he wasn't home.
I went into his library...

445
00:26:16,215 --> 00:26:19,275
and he had bought at an auction
the collected issues of <i>Minotaure.</i>

446
00:26:19,385 --> 00:26:23,788
You know, the surrealist magazine?
Oh, it's a great, great surrealist
magazine of the '20s and '30s.

447
00:26:23,889 --> 00:26:26,915
And I never-You know,
I consider myself a bit of a surrealist.

448
00:26:27,026 --> 00:26:29,586
I had never, ever seen
a copy of <i>Minotaure.</i>

449
00:26:29,695 --> 00:26:31,959
And here they all were,
bound, year after year.

450
00:26:32,064 --> 00:26:35,431
So, at random,
I picked one out, I opened it up...

451
00:26:35,534 --> 00:26:38,833
and there was a full-page reproduction
of the letter "A"...

452
00:26:38,938 --> 00:26:40,997
from Tenniel's <i>Alice In Wonderland.</i>

453
00:26:41,106 --> 00:26:44,371
And I thought, that -Well, you know,
it's been a day of coincidences...

454
00:26:44,476 --> 00:26:47,240
but that's not unusual that the surrealists
would have been interested in <i>Alice...</i>

455
00:26:47,346 --> 00:26:49,314
and I did a play of <i>Alice.</i>

456
00:26:49,415 --> 00:26:53,647
So at random,
I opened to another page...

457
00:26:53,752 --> 00:26:57,244
and there were four handprints.

458
00:26:57,356 --> 00:27:00,223
One was André Breton,
another was André Derain...

459
00:27:00,326 --> 00:27:02,920
the third was André -
I've got it written down somewhere.

460
00:27:03,028 --> 00:27:06,896
It's not Malraux. It's, like, someone -
Another of the surrealists.

461
00:27:06,999 --> 00:27:11,868
All A's, and the fourth
was Antoine de Saint-Exupéry...

462
00:27:11,971 --> 00:27:13,996
who wrote <i>The Little Prince.</i>

463
00:27:14,106 --> 00:27:16,597
And they'd shown these handprints
to some kind of expert...

464
00:27:16,709 --> 00:27:19,507
without saying
whose hands they belonged to.

465
00:27:19,612 --> 00:27:23,412
And under Exupéry's,
it said that he was an artist...

466
00:27:23,515 --> 00:27:25,813
with very powerful eyes...

467
00:27:25,918 --> 00:27:29,718
who was a tamer of wild animals.

468
00:27:29,822 --> 00:27:32,017
I thought,
"This is incredible, you know."

469
00:27:32,124 --> 00:27:35,855
And I looked back to see
when the issue came out.

470
00:27:35,961 --> 00:27:39,795
It came out on the newsstands
May 12, 1934...

471
00:27:39,899 --> 00:27:44,097
and I was born during the day
of May 11, 1934.

472
00:27:45,237 --> 00:27:50,368
So, well, that's what started me on, uh,
Saint-Exupéry and <i>The Little Prince.</i>

473
00:27:58,050 --> 00:28:00,518
Now, of course today-

474
00:28:00,619 --> 00:28:04,055
today I think there's a very fascistic thing
under <i>The Little Prince.</i>

475
00:28:04,156 --> 00:28:06,386
You know, I -
Well, no, I think there's a kind of-

476
00:28:06,492 --> 00:28:11,896
I think a kind of S.S. totalitarian
sentimentality in there somewhere.

477
00:28:11,997 --> 00:28:14,727
You know, there's something, you know -
that -

478
00:28:14,833 --> 00:28:16,994
that love of, um -

479
00:28:17,102 --> 00:28:21,471
Well, that masculine love
of a certain kind of oily muscle.

480
00:28:21,573 --> 00:28:24,804
You know what I mean?
I mean, I can't quite put my finger on it.

481
00:28:24,910 --> 00:28:28,539
But I can just imagine
some beautiful S.S. man...

482
00:28:28,647 --> 00:28:30,615
loving <i>The Little Prince.</i>

483
00:28:30,716 --> 00:28:33,344
Now, I don't know why, but there's
something wrong with it. It stinks.

484
00:28:39,258 --> 00:28:43,627
Well, didn't George tell me that you were gonna
do a play that was based on <i>The Little Prince?</i>

485
00:28:43,729 --> 00:28:46,926
Hmm. Well, what happened, Wally...

486
00:28:48,100 --> 00:28:49,590
was that fall I was in New York...

487
00:28:49,702 --> 00:28:53,138
and I met this young Japanese
Buddhist priest named Kozan...

488
00:28:53,238 --> 00:28:55,729
and I thought he was Puck
from the <i>Midsummer Night's Dream.</i>

489
00:28:55,841 --> 00:28:58,071
You know,
he had this beautiful, delicate smile.

490
00:28:58,177 --> 00:29:00,111
I thought <i>he</i> was the Little Prince.

491
00:29:00,212 --> 00:29:03,613
So, naturally, I decided
to go off to the Sahara desert...

492
00:29:03,716 --> 00:29:07,174
to work on <i>The Little Prince</i>
with two actors and this Japanese monk.

493
00:29:07,286 --> 00:29:09,186
You did?

494
00:29:09,288 --> 00:29:14,248
Well, I mean, I was still in a very
peculiar state at that time, Wally.

495
00:29:14,360 --> 00:29:17,727
You know, I would - I would look
in the rearview mirror of my car...

496
00:29:17,830 --> 00:29:20,628
and see little birds
flying out of my mouth.

497
00:29:21,700 --> 00:29:25,966
And I remember always being
exhausted in that period.

498
00:29:26,071 --> 00:29:30,132
I always felt weak. You know, I really
didn't know what was going on with me.

499
00:29:30,242 --> 00:29:34,144
I would just sit out there all alone
in the country for days...

500
00:29:34,246 --> 00:29:37,409
and do nothing but write in my diary.

501
00:29:37,516 --> 00:29:40,314
- And I was always thinking about death.
- <i>Huh.</i>

502
00:29:40,419 --> 00:29:42,387
<i>But you went to the Sahara.</i>

503
00:29:42,488 --> 00:29:44,581
Oh, yes, we went off into the desert...

504
00:29:44,690 --> 00:29:46,783
and we rode through the desert
on camels.

505
00:29:46,892 --> 00:29:48,792
And we rode and we rode.

506
00:29:48,894 --> 00:29:51,294
And then at night we would walk out
under that enormous sky...

507
00:29:51,397 --> 00:29:53,456
and look at the stars.

508
00:29:53,565 --> 00:29:57,092
I just kept thinking about the same things
that I was always thinking about at home -

509
00:29:57,202 --> 00:29:59,227
particularly about Chiquita.

510
00:29:59,338 --> 00:30:02,705
In fact, I thought about
just about nothing but my marriage.

511
00:30:04,676 --> 00:30:07,008
And then I remember
one incredibly dark night...

512
00:30:07,112 --> 00:30:10,343
being at an oasis, and there were
palm trees moving in the wind...

513
00:30:10,449 --> 00:30:14,146
and I could hear Kozan singing
far away in that beautiful bass voice.

514
00:30:14,253 --> 00:30:16,949
And I tried to follow his voice
along the sand.

515
00:30:19,058 --> 00:30:22,027
You see, I thought he had
something to teach me, Wally.

516
00:30:23,629 --> 00:30:25,620
And sometimes
I would meditate with him.

517
00:30:25,731 --> 00:30:28,666
Sometimes I'd go off
and meditate by myself.

518
00:30:30,035 --> 00:30:32,936
You know,
I would see images of Chiquita.

519
00:30:33,038 --> 00:30:35,302
Once I actually saw her growing old...

520
00:30:35,407 --> 00:30:38,001
and her hair turning gray
in front of my eyes.

521
00:30:38,110 --> 00:30:43,070
And I would just wail and yell my lungs out
out there on the dunes.

522
00:30:46,151 --> 00:30:50,053
Anyway,
the desert was pretty horrible.

523
00:30:50,155 --> 00:30:52,055
It was pretty cold.

524
00:30:52,157 --> 00:30:55,593
We were searching for something, but we
couldn't tell if we were finding anything.

525
00:30:55,694 --> 00:30:57,719
You know that once Kozan and I -

526
00:30:57,830 --> 00:31:00,298
we were sitting on a dune,
and we just ate sand.

527
00:31:00,399 --> 00:31:02,799
No, we weren't trying to be funny.
I started, then he started.

528
00:31:02,901 --> 00:31:06,735
We just ate sand and threw up.
That's how desperate we were.

529
00:31:06,839 --> 00:31:10,468
In other words,
we didn't know why we were there.
We didn't know what we were looking for.

530
00:31:10,576 --> 00:31:13,670
The entire thing seemed
completely absurd, arid and empty.

531
00:31:13,779 --> 00:31:17,215
It was like, uh -
like a last chance or something.

532
00:31:17,316 --> 00:31:19,648
Huh.

533
00:31:19,751 --> 00:31:22,015
So what happened then?

534
00:31:22,121 --> 00:31:24,885
Well, in those days...

535
00:31:24,990 --> 00:31:27,254
I went completely on impulse.

536
00:31:27,359 --> 00:31:30,487
So on impulse I brought Kozan back
to stay with us in New York...

537
00:31:30,596 --> 00:31:34,157
after we got back from the Sahara,
and he stayed for six months.

538
00:31:34,266 --> 00:31:38,202
And he really sort of took over
the whole family, in a way.
- What do you mean?

539
00:31:38,303 --> 00:31:42,501
Well, there was certainly a center
missing in the house at the time.

540
00:31:42,608 --> 00:31:45,099
There certainly wasn't a father,
'cause I was always thinking...

541
00:31:45,210 --> 00:31:48,646
about going off to Tibet
or doing God knows what.

542
00:31:48,747 --> 00:31:51,079
And so he taught the whole family
to meditate...

543
00:31:51,183 --> 00:31:55,381
and he told them all about Asia and the East
and his monastery and everything.

544
00:31:55,487 --> 00:31:59,947
He really captivated everybody
with an incredible bag of tricks.

545
00:32:00,058 --> 00:32:02,822
He had literally
developed himself, Wally...

546
00:32:02,928 --> 00:32:07,661
so that he could push on his fingers
and rise off out of his chair.

547
00:32:07,766 --> 00:32:09,734
I mean, he could literally go like this -

548
00:32:09,835 --> 00:32:12,030
You know, push on his fingers
and go into like a headstand...

549
00:32:12,137 --> 00:32:14,264
and just hold himself there
with two fingers.

550
00:32:14,373 --> 00:32:16,739
Or if Chiquita would suddenly get
a little tension in her neck...

551
00:32:16,842 --> 00:32:20,039
well, he'd immediately have her
down on the floor, he'd be walking
up and down on her back...

552
00:32:20,145 --> 00:32:23,171
doing these unbelievable massages,
you know.

553
00:32:24,349 --> 00:32:26,317
And the children found him amazing.

554
00:32:26,418 --> 00:32:29,649
I mean, you know, we'd visit friends
who had children...

555
00:32:29,755 --> 00:32:31,814
and immediately
he'd be playing with these children...

556
00:32:31,924 --> 00:32:33,915
in a way that, you know, we just can't do.

557
00:32:34,026 --> 00:32:36,722
I mean, those children -
just giggles, giggles, giggles...

558
00:32:36,828 --> 00:32:40,264
about what this Japanese monk
was doing in these holy robes.

559
00:32:40,365 --> 00:32:43,300
I mean, he was an acrobat,
a ventriloquist...

560
00:32:43,402 --> 00:32:45,893
a magician, everything.

561
00:32:46,004 --> 00:32:47,972
You know,
the amazing thing was that...

562
00:32:48,073 --> 00:32:50,405
I don't think he had any interest
in children whatsoever.

563
00:32:50,509 --> 00:32:52,739
None at all.
I don't think he liked them.

564
00:32:52,844 --> 00:32:54,937
I mean, you know,
when he stayed with us...

565
00:32:55,047 --> 00:32:57,743
in the first week, really, the kids
were just googly-eyed over him.

566
00:32:57,849 --> 00:33:00,750
But then a couple of weeks later,
Chiquita and I could be out...

567
00:33:00,852 --> 00:33:03,821
and Marina could have flu
or a temperature of 104...

568
00:33:03,922 --> 00:33:06,482
and he wouldn't even go in
and say hello to her.

569
00:33:06,592 --> 00:33:10,050
But he was taking over more and more.

570
00:33:10,162 --> 00:33:12,756
I mean, his own habits
had completely changed.

571
00:33:12,864 --> 00:33:17,631
You know, he started wearing these elegant
Gucci shoes under his white monk's robes.

572
00:33:17,736 --> 00:33:19,727
He was eating huge amounts of food.

573
00:33:19,838 --> 00:33:23,296
I mean, he ate twice as much
as Nicolas ate, you know?

574
00:33:23,408 --> 00:33:25,899
This tiny little Buddhist
when I first met him, you know...

575
00:33:26,011 --> 00:33:28,946
was eating a little bowl of milk-
hot milk with rice -

576
00:33:29,047 --> 00:33:31,641
was now eating huge beef.

577
00:33:33,652 --> 00:33:36,348
It was just very strange.

578
00:33:36,455 --> 00:33:39,913
You know, and we had tried working together,
but really our work consisted mostly...

579
00:33:40,025 --> 00:33:44,826
of my trying to do these incredibly painful
prostrations that they do in the monastery.

580
00:33:44,930 --> 00:33:47,956
You know, so really we hadn't
been working very much.

581
00:33:48,066 --> 00:33:53,402
Anyway, we were out in the country, and
we all went to Christmas mass together.

582
00:33:53,505 --> 00:33:55,769
You know, he was all dressed up
in his Buddhist finery.

583
00:33:55,874 --> 00:33:59,833
And it was one of those - one of those awful,
dreary Catholic churches on Long Island...

584
00:33:59,945 --> 00:34:03,904
where the priest talks about
communism and birth control.

585
00:34:04,016 --> 00:34:07,952
And as I was sitting there in mass, I was
wondering, "What in the world is going on?"

586
00:34:08,053 --> 00:34:10,021
I mean, here I am. I'm a grown man...

587
00:34:10,122 --> 00:34:12,716
and there's this strange person living
in the house, and I'm not working -

588
00:34:12,824 --> 00:34:16,351
You know, I was doing nothing
but scribbling a little poetry in my diary.

589
00:34:16,461 --> 00:34:20,898
And I can't get a job teaching anymore,
and I don't know what I want to do.

590
00:34:20,999 --> 00:34:26,494
When all of a sudden a huge creature
appeared, looking at the congregation.

591
00:34:26,605 --> 00:34:31,042
It was about, I'd say, 6'8" -
something like that, you know...

592
00:34:31,143 --> 00:34:34,078
and it was -
it was half bull, half man...

593
00:34:34,179 --> 00:34:36,272
and its skin was blue.

594
00:34:36,381 --> 00:34:40,010
It had violets growing out of its eyelids
and poppies growing out of its toenails.

595
00:34:40,118 --> 00:34:43,849
And it just stood there
for the whole mass.

596
00:34:43,955 --> 00:34:46,355
I mean, I could not make
that creature disappear.

597
00:34:46,458 --> 00:34:49,450
You know, I thought, "Oh, well. You know,
I'm just seeing this 'cause I'm bored."

598
00:34:49,561 --> 00:34:54,692
You know, close my-
I could not make that creature go away.

599
00:34:54,800 --> 00:34:58,702
Okay. Now, I didn't talk with people about it,
because they'd think I was weird...

600
00:34:58,804 --> 00:35:04,299
but I felt that this creature
was somehow coming to comfort me...

601
00:35:04,409 --> 00:35:07,674
that somehow
he was appearing to say...

602
00:35:07,779 --> 00:35:12,341
"Well, you may feel low and you might
not be able to create a play right now...

603
00:35:12,451 --> 00:35:16,410
"but look at what can come to you
on Christmas Eve. Hang on, old friend.

604
00:35:16,521 --> 00:35:19,354
"I may seem weird to you,
but on these weird voyages...

605
00:35:19,458 --> 00:35:21,426
"weird creatures appear.

606
00:35:21,526 --> 00:35:25,394
It's part of the journey.
You're okay. Hang in there."

607
00:35:30,769 --> 00:35:33,101
By the way, uh, did you ever see...

608
00:35:33,205 --> 00:35:36,800
that play, uh, <i>The Violets are Blue?</i>

609
00:35:38,677 --> 00:35:40,577
No.

610
00:35:40,679 --> 00:35:43,876
Oh, when you mentioned the violets,
it-it reminded me of that.

611
00:35:43,982 --> 00:35:46,917
It-It was about, um, people...

612
00:35:47,018 --> 00:35:50,112
being, uh, strangled
on a - on a submarine.

613
00:35:50,222 --> 00:35:52,417
Hmm.

614
00:35:56,428 --> 00:36:01,365
Well, so that was -
that was Christmas.

615
00:36:01,466 --> 00:36:04,094
What happened after that?

616
00:36:04,202 --> 00:36:07,171
- Do you really want to hear about all this?
- Yeah.

617
00:36:07,272 --> 00:36:10,901
Well, around that time...

618
00:36:14,079 --> 00:36:17,845
I was beginning to think about going to India.
And Kozan suddenly left one day.

619
00:36:17,949 --> 00:36:21,282
I was beginning to get into a lot
of very strange ideas around that time.

620
00:36:21,386 --> 00:36:25,447
Now, for example, I'd developed this -
Well, I got this idea which I -

621
00:36:25,557 --> 00:36:28,720
Now, it was very appealing to me
at the time, you know -

622
00:36:28,827 --> 00:36:32,126
which was that I would have a flag,
a large flag...

623
00:36:32,230 --> 00:36:34,596
and that wherever I worked,
this flag would fly.

624
00:36:34,699 --> 00:36:38,965
Or if we were outside, say, with a group, that
the flag could be the thing we lay on at night...

625
00:36:39,070 --> 00:36:42,801
and that somehow, between
working on this flag and lying on this flag...

626
00:36:42,908 --> 00:36:44,808
this flag flying over us...

627
00:36:44,910 --> 00:36:48,869
that the flag would pick up
vibrations of a kind...

628
00:36:48,980 --> 00:36:51,710
that would still be in the flag
when I brought it home.

629
00:36:51,817 --> 00:36:54,911
So I went down to meet this flag maker
that I'd heard about.

630
00:36:55,020 --> 00:36:57,045
And you know, there was
this very straightforward-looking guy.

631
00:36:57,155 --> 00:37:01,922
You know, very sweet, really healthy-looking
and everything. Nice big, blond.

632
00:37:02,027 --> 00:37:05,019
And he had a beautiful, clean loft
down in the village with lovely, happy flags.

633
00:37:05,130 --> 00:37:08,566
And I was all into <i>The Little Prince,</i>
and I talked to him about <i>The Little Prince...</i>

634
00:37:08,667 --> 00:37:12,501
these adventures and everything, how I
needed the flag and what the flag should be.

635
00:37:12,604 --> 00:37:14,936
He seemed to really connect with it.

636
00:37:15,040 --> 00:37:17,508
So, two weeks later, I came back.

637
00:37:17,609 --> 00:37:21,306
He showed me a flag that I thought
was very odd, you know...

638
00:37:21,413 --> 00:37:23,404
'cause I had, you know -
well, you know...

639
00:37:23,515 --> 00:37:26,882
I had expected something
gentle and lyrical.

640
00:37:26,985 --> 00:37:29,317
There was something about this
that was so powerful...

641
00:37:29,421 --> 00:37:31,355
it was almost overwhelming.

642
00:37:31,456 --> 00:37:33,424
And it did include the Tibetan swastika.

643
00:37:34,993 --> 00:37:37,188
He put a swastika in your flag?

644
00:37:37,295 --> 00:37:39,991
No, it was the Tibetan swastika,
not the Nazi swastika.

645
00:37:40,098 --> 00:37:42,464
It's one of the most ancient
Tibetan symbols.

646
00:37:42,567 --> 00:37:45,559
And it was just strange, you know?

647
00:37:45,670 --> 00:37:49,265
But I brought it home,
because my idea with this flag...

648
00:37:49,374 --> 00:37:51,842
was that before I left -
you know, before I left for India...

649
00:37:51,943 --> 00:37:55,777
I wanted several people who were close to me
to have this flag in the room for the night...

650
00:37:55,881 --> 00:37:59,317
to sleep with it, you know, and then
in the morning to sew something into the flag.

651
00:37:59,417 --> 00:38:03,444
So I took the flag into Marina, and I said,
"Hey, look at this. What do you think of this?"

652
00:38:03,555 --> 00:38:06,285
And she said, "What is that? That's awful."
I said, "It's a flag."

653
00:38:06,391 --> 00:38:08,018
And she said, "I don't like it."

654
00:38:08,126 --> 00:38:11,357
I said, "I kind of thought you might like
to spend the night with it, you know."

655
00:38:11,463 --> 00:38:14,398
But she really thought
the flag was awful.

656
00:38:14,499 --> 00:38:18,833
So then Chiquita threw this party
for me before I left for India...

657
00:38:18,937 --> 00:38:20,996
and the apartment
was filled with guests.

658
00:38:21,106 --> 00:38:24,166
And at one point Chiquita said,
"The flag, the flag. Where's the flag?"

659
00:38:24,276 --> 00:38:28,269
And I said, "Oh, yeah. The flag."
And I go and get the flag, and I open it up.

660
00:38:28,380 --> 00:38:32,214
Chiquita goes absolutely white
and runs out of the room and vomits.

661
00:38:32,317 --> 00:38:35,582
So the party just comes to a halt
and breaks up.

662
00:38:35,687 --> 00:38:38,383
And then the next day
I gave it to this young woman...

663
00:38:38,490 --> 00:38:41,084
who'd been in my group in Poland,
who was now in New York.

664
00:38:41,192 --> 00:38:44,684
I didn't tell her anything
about any of this.

665
00:38:44,796 --> 00:38:47,196
At 5:00 in the morning,
she called me up and she said...

666
00:38:47,299 --> 00:38:49,767
"I gotta come and see you right away."
I thought, "Oh, God."

667
00:38:49,868 --> 00:38:53,599
She came up, and she said, "I saw things -
I saw things around this flag.

668
00:38:53,705 --> 00:38:56,697
"Now, I know you're stubborn, and I know
you want to take this thing with you...

669
00:38:56,808 --> 00:38:59,800
"but if you'd follow my advice,
you'd put it in a hole in the ground...

670
00:38:59,911 --> 00:39:02,744
and burn it and cover it with earth,
cause the devil's in it."

671
00:39:02,847 --> 00:39:04,747
I never took the flag with me.

672
00:39:04,849 --> 00:39:09,286
In fact, I gave it to her, and, uh,
she - she had a ceremony with it...

673
00:39:09,387 --> 00:39:11,855
six months later, in France,
with some friends...

674
00:39:11,957 --> 00:39:14,118
in which, uh, they did burn it.

675
00:39:15,260 --> 00:39:17,490
God.

676
00:39:17,596 --> 00:39:20,963
That's really, really amazing.

677
00:39:22,667 --> 00:39:25,192
So, did you ever go to India?

678
00:39:25,303 --> 00:39:28,636
Oh, yes, I - I went to India
in the spring, Wally...

679
00:39:28,740 --> 00:39:31,208
and I came back home
feeling all wrong.

680
00:39:31,309 --> 00:39:35,746
I mean, you know, I'd been to India,
and I'd just felt like a tourist.

681
00:39:35,847 --> 00:39:38,645
I'd found nothing.

682
00:39:38,750 --> 00:39:43,414
So I was - I was spending, uh, the summer
on Long Island with my family...

683
00:39:43,521 --> 00:39:46,490
and I heard about this community
in Scotland called Findhorn...

684
00:39:46,591 --> 00:39:50,152
where people sang and talked
and meditated with plants.

685
00:39:50,261 --> 00:39:55,756
And it was founded by several rather
middle-class English and Scottish eccentrics.

686
00:39:55,867 --> 00:39:58,199
Some of them intellectuals,
and some of them not.

687
00:39:58,303 --> 00:40:00,703
And I'd heard that they'd
grown things in soil...

688
00:40:00,805 --> 00:40:03,968
that supposedly nothing can grow in,
'cause it's almost beach soil...

689
00:40:04,075 --> 00:40:08,239
and that they'd built - not built - they'd
grown the largest cauliflowers in the world...

690
00:40:08,346 --> 00:40:10,280
and there are sort of cabbages.

691
00:40:10,382 --> 00:40:14,182
And they've grown trees
that can't grow in the British Isles.

692
00:40:14,285 --> 00:40:17,015
So I went there.
I mean, it is an amazing place, Wally.

693
00:40:17,122 --> 00:40:21,286
I mean, if there are insects
bothering the plants...

694
00:40:21,393 --> 00:40:24,885
they will talk with the insects
and, you know, make an agreement...

695
00:40:24,996 --> 00:40:29,092
by which they'll set aside a special patch
of vegetables just for the insects...

696
00:40:29,200 --> 00:40:31,293
and then the insects
will leave the main part alone.

697
00:40:31,403 --> 00:40:33,394
- Huh.
- Things like that.

698
00:40:33,505 --> 00:40:35,973
And everything they do
they do beautifully.

699
00:40:36,074 --> 00:40:38,838
I mean, the buildings just shine.

700
00:40:38,943 --> 00:40:42,879
And I mean, for instance, the icebox,
the stove, the car- they all have names.

701
00:40:42,981 --> 00:40:45,245
And since you wouldn't treat Helen,
the icebox...

702
00:40:45,350 --> 00:40:47,682
with any less respect
than you would Margaret, your wife...

703
00:40:47,786 --> 00:40:51,654
you know, you make sure that Helen is as clean
as Margaret, or treated with equal respect.

704
00:40:53,992 --> 00:40:58,486
And when I was there, Wally,
I remember being in the woods...

705
00:40:58,596 --> 00:41:03,260
and I would look at a leaf,
and I would actually see that thing...

706
00:41:03,368 --> 00:41:06,531
that is alive in that leaf.

707
00:41:06,638 --> 00:41:09,630
And then I remember just running
through the woods as fast as I could...

708
00:41:09,741 --> 00:41:12,209
with this incredible laugh
coming out of me...

709
00:41:12,310 --> 00:41:17,475
and really being in that state, you know,
where laughter and tears seem to merge.

710
00:41:17,582 --> 00:41:19,550
I mean, it absolutely blasted me open.

711
00:41:19,651 --> 00:41:22,711
When I came out of Findhorn,
I was hallucinating nonstop.

712
00:41:22,821 --> 00:41:25,449
I was seeing clouds as creatures.

713
00:41:25,557 --> 00:41:28,151
The people on the airplane
all had animals' faces.

714
00:41:28,259 --> 00:41:32,286
I mean, I was on a trip. It was like being
in a William Blake world suddenly.

715
00:41:32,397 --> 00:41:34,331
Things were exploding.

716
00:41:34,432 --> 00:41:38,732
So immediately I went to Belgrade,
'cause I wanted to talk to Grotowski.

717
00:41:38,837 --> 00:41:42,068
Grotowski and I got together
at midnight in my hotel room...

718
00:41:42,173 --> 00:41:45,609
and we drank instant coffee
out of the top of my shaving cream...

719
00:41:45,710 --> 00:41:49,771
and we talked from midnight
until 11 :00 the next morning.

720
00:41:49,881 --> 00:41:52,349
- God. What did he say?
- Nothing!

721
00:41:52,450 --> 00:41:54,475
I talked. He didn't say a word.

722
00:41:54,586 --> 00:41:58,317
And -And then I guess really...

723
00:41:59,290 --> 00:42:03,283
the last big experience of this kind
took place that fall.

724
00:42:03,394 --> 00:42:05,362
It was out at Montauk on Long Island...

725
00:42:05,463 --> 00:42:09,058
and there were only about nine
of us involved, mostly men.

726
00:42:09,167 --> 00:42:12,159
And we borrowed Dick Avedon's property
out at Montauk.

727
00:42:12,270 --> 00:42:15,398
And the country out there
is like Heathcliff country.

728
00:42:15,507 --> 00:42:18,067
It's absolutely wild.

729
00:42:18,176 --> 00:42:20,576
What we wanted to do was
we wanted to take, you know -

730
00:42:20,678 --> 00:42:22,976
We wanted to take All Souls' Eve,
Halloween...

731
00:42:23,081 --> 00:42:25,413
and use it as a point of departure
for something.

732
00:42:25,517 --> 00:42:28,975
So each one of us prepared
some sort of event for the others...

733
00:42:29,087 --> 00:42:31,885
somehow in the spirit
of All Souls' Eve.

734
00:42:31,990 --> 00:42:34,891
But the biggest event
was three of the people...

735
00:42:34,993 --> 00:42:37,393
kept disappearing
in the middle of the night each night...

736
00:42:37,495 --> 00:42:39,861
and we knew they were
preparing something big...

737
00:42:39,964 --> 00:42:41,932
but we didn't know what.

738
00:42:42,033 --> 00:42:46,231
And midnight on Halloween,
under a dark moon, above these cliffs...

739
00:42:46,337 --> 00:42:50,103
we were all told to gather at the topmost cliff
and that we would be taken somewhere.

740
00:42:50,208 --> 00:42:54,542
And we did.
And we waited, and it was very, very cold.

741
00:42:54,646 --> 00:42:58,309
And then the three of them - Helen, Bill
and Fred - showed up wearing white.

742
00:42:58,416 --> 00:43:02,477
You know, something they'd made out
of sheets - looked a little spooky, not funny.

743
00:43:02,587 --> 00:43:07,286
And they took us into the basement of this house
that had burned down on the property.

744
00:43:07,392 --> 00:43:11,453
And in this ruined basement, they had set up
a table with benches they'd made.

745
00:43:11,563 --> 00:43:16,660
And on this table they had laid out paper,
pencils, wine and glasses.

746
00:43:16,768 --> 00:43:22,035
And we were all asked to sit at the table
and to make out our last will and testament.

747
00:43:22,140 --> 00:43:25,667
You know, to think about and write down
whatever our last words were to the world...

748
00:43:25,777 --> 00:43:28,075
or to somebody we were very close to.

749
00:43:28,179 --> 00:43:30,807
And that's quite a task.

750
00:43:30,915 --> 00:43:34,373
I must have been there for about
an hour and a half or so, maybe two.

751
00:43:34,485 --> 00:43:37,921
And then one at a time they would ask
one of us to come with them...

752
00:43:38,022 --> 00:43:39,990
and I was one of the last.

753
00:43:40,091 --> 00:43:42,491
And they came for me,
and they put a blindfold on me...

754
00:43:42,594 --> 00:43:44,789
and they ran me through these fields -
two people.

755
00:43:44,896 --> 00:43:48,992
And they'd found a kind of potting shed -
you know, a kind of shed, on the grounds...

756
00:43:49,100 --> 00:43:52,592
a little tiny room
that had once had tools in it.

757
00:43:52,704 --> 00:43:55,696
And they took me down the steps,
into this basement...

758
00:43:55,807 --> 00:44:00,676
and the room was just filled
with harsh white light.

759
00:44:00,778 --> 00:44:04,305
Then they told me to get undressed
and give them all my valuables.

760
00:44:04,415 --> 00:44:06,815
Then they put me on a table,
and they sponged me down.

761
00:44:06,918 --> 00:44:11,412
Well, you know, I just started flashing
on-on-on death camps and secret police.

762
00:44:11,522 --> 00:44:15,322
I don't know what happened to the other people,
but I just started to cry uncontrollably.

763
00:44:15,426 --> 00:44:19,954
Uh, then-then they got me to my feet
and they took photographs of me, naked.

764
00:44:20,064 --> 00:44:22,862
And then naked, again blindfolded,
I was run through these forests...

765
00:44:22,967 --> 00:44:26,164
and we came to a kind of tent made of sheets,
with sheets on the ground.

766
00:44:26,271 --> 00:44:28,262
And there were all these naked bodies...

767
00:44:28,373 --> 00:44:31,865
huddling together
for warmth against the cold.

768
00:44:31,976 --> 00:44:34,103
Must have been left there
for about an hour.

769
00:44:34,212 --> 00:44:37,340
And then again, one by one,
one at a time, we were led out.

770
00:44:37,448 --> 00:44:39,416
The blindfold was put on...

771
00:44:39,517 --> 00:44:43,180
and I felt myself being lowered
onto something like a stretcher.

772
00:44:43,288 --> 00:44:48,191
And the stretcher was carried a long way,
very slowly, through these forests...

773
00:44:48,293 --> 00:44:54,061
and then I felt myself
being lowered into the ground.

774
00:44:54,165 --> 00:44:57,862
They had, in fact, dug six graves...

775
00:44:57,969 --> 00:45:00,597
eight feet deep.

776
00:45:00,705 --> 00:45:05,039
And then I felt these pieces of wood
being put on me.

777
00:45:05,143 --> 00:45:08,510
And I cannot tell you, Wally,
what I was going through.

778
00:45:08,613 --> 00:45:11,912
And then the stretcher was lowered
into the grave...

779
00:45:12,016 --> 00:45:13,984
and then this wood was put on me...

780
00:45:14,085 --> 00:45:16,576
and then my valuables were put on me,
in my hands.

781
00:45:16,688 --> 00:45:19,452
And they'd taken, you know,
a kind of sheet or canvas...

782
00:45:19,557 --> 00:45:22,048
and they'd stretched about this much
above my head...

783
00:45:22,160 --> 00:45:24,924
and then they shoveled dirt
into the grave...

784
00:45:26,264 --> 00:45:30,860
so that I really had the feeling
of being buried alive.

785
00:45:33,004 --> 00:45:35,871
And after being in the grave
for about half an hour-

786
00:45:35,974 --> 00:45:39,205
I mean, I didn't know how long
I'd be in there -

787
00:45:39,310 --> 00:45:41,835
I was resurrected,
lifted out of the grave...

788
00:45:41,946 --> 00:45:44,312
blindfold taken off,
and run through these fields.

789
00:45:44,415 --> 00:45:48,852
And we came to a great circle of fire,
with music and hot wine...

790
00:45:48,953 --> 00:45:51,046
and everyone danced until dawn.

791
00:45:51,155 --> 00:45:54,454
And then at dawn...

792
00:45:54,559 --> 00:45:57,528
to the best of our ability,
we filled up the graves...

793
00:45:57,628 --> 00:46:00,290
and went back to New York.

794
00:46:03,401 --> 00:46:07,098
And that was really the last big event.
I mean, that was the end.

795
00:46:07,205 --> 00:46:09,173
I mean, you know, I began to realize...

796
00:46:09,273 --> 00:46:11,935
I just didn't want to do these things
anymore, you know?

797
00:46:12,043 --> 00:46:16,480
I felt sort of becalmed, you know,
like that chapter in <i>Moby Dick...</i>

798
00:46:16,581 --> 00:46:19,675
where the wind goes out of the sails.

799
00:46:19,784 --> 00:46:22,514
And then last winter, without, uh,
thinking about it very much...

800
00:46:22,620 --> 00:46:26,920
I went to see this agent I know to tell him
I was interested in directing plays again.

801
00:46:27,025 --> 00:46:29,391
Actually,
he seemed a little surprised...

802
00:46:29,494 --> 00:46:32,952
to see that Rip Van Winkle
was still alive.

803
00:46:38,669 --> 00:46:40,569
Mmm.

804
00:46:40,671 --> 00:46:42,662
God.

805
00:46:42,774 --> 00:46:44,639
I didn't know they were so small.

806
00:46:47,545 --> 00:46:49,638
Well, you know, frankly...

807
00:46:49,747 --> 00:46:52,545
I'm sort of repelled by the whole story,
if you really want to know.

808
00:46:52,650 --> 00:46:55,050
- What?
- Ah, you know -

809
00:46:55,153 --> 00:46:57,121
Who did I think I was, you know?

810
00:46:57,221 --> 00:47:01,851
I mean, that's the story of some kind
of spoiled princess, you know.

811
00:47:01,959 --> 00:47:04,223
Who did I think I was,
the Shah of Iran?

812
00:47:04,328 --> 00:47:09,095
You know, I really wonder if people such
as myself are really not Albert Speer, Wally.

813
00:47:09,200 --> 00:47:13,398
- You know, Hitler's architect, Albert Speer?
- What?

814
00:47:13,504 --> 00:47:17,133
No, I've been thinking a lot about him recently
because, uh, I think I am Speer.

815
00:47:17,241 --> 00:47:20,267
And I think it's time that I was caught
and tried the way he was.

816
00:47:20,378 --> 00:47:22,005
What are you talking about?

817
00:47:22,113 --> 00:47:25,947
Well, you know, he was a very cultivated man,
an architect, an artist, you know...

818
00:47:26,050 --> 00:47:29,417
so he thought the ordinary rules of life
didn't apply to him either.

819
00:47:32,123 --> 00:47:35,923
I mean, I really feel
that everything I've done...

820
00:47:36,027 --> 00:47:38,552
is horrific, just horrific.

821
00:47:38,663 --> 00:47:41,598
My God. But why?

822
00:47:41,699 --> 00:47:46,261
You see -You see, I've seen a lot of death
in the last few years, Wally...

823
00:47:46,370 --> 00:47:48,668
and there's one thing
that's for sure about death -

824
00:47:48,773 --> 00:47:51,207
You do it alone, you see.
That seems quite certain, you see.

825
00:47:51,309 --> 00:47:54,437
That I've seen. That the people
around your bed mean nothing.

826
00:47:54,545 --> 00:47:57,537
Your reviews mean nothing.
Whatever it is, you do it alone.

827
00:47:57,648 --> 00:48:01,675
And so the question is, when I get on my
deathbed, what kind of a person am I gonna be?

828
00:48:01,786 --> 00:48:04,619
And I'm just very dubious about the kind
of person who would have lived his life...

829
00:48:04,722 --> 00:48:06,622
those last few years the way I did.

830
00:48:06,724 --> 00:48:09,352
Why should you feel that way?

831
00:48:09,460 --> 00:48:13,897
You see, I've had a very rough time
in the last few months, Wally.

832
00:48:13,998 --> 00:48:17,900
Three different people in my family
were in the hospital at the same time.

833
00:48:18,002 --> 00:48:19,936
Then my mother died.

834
00:48:20,037 --> 00:48:23,029
Then Marina had something wrong with her back,
and we were terribly worried about her.

835
00:48:23,141 --> 00:48:26,269
You know, so - so, I mean,
I'm feeling very raw right now.

836
00:48:26,377 --> 00:48:29,505
I mean, uh - I mean, I can't sleep,
my nerves are shot.

837
00:48:29,614 --> 00:48:31,582
I mean, I'm affected by everything.

838
00:48:31,682 --> 00:48:35,778
You know, la-last week I had this really nice
director from Norway over for dinner...

839
00:48:35,887 --> 00:48:38,082
and he's someone
I've known for years and years...

840
00:48:38,189 --> 00:48:40,453
and he's somebody
that I think I'm quite fond of.

841
00:48:40,558 --> 00:48:43,721
And I was sitting there just thinking
that he was a pompous, defensive...

842
00:48:43,828 --> 00:48:46,228
conservative stuffed shirt
who was only interested in the theater.

843
00:48:46,330 --> 00:48:49,788
He was talking and talking. His mother
had been a famous Norwegian comedienne.

844
00:48:49,901 --> 00:48:54,235
I realized he had said "I remember my mother"
at least 400 times during the evening.

845
00:48:54,338 --> 00:48:57,466
And he was telling story after story
about his mother.

846
00:48:57,575 --> 00:49:00,442
You know, I'd heard these stories
20 times in the past.

847
00:49:00,545 --> 00:49:03,241
He was drinking this whole bottle
of bourbon very quietly.

848
00:49:03,347 --> 00:49:05,406
His laugh was so horrible.

849
00:49:05,516 --> 00:49:09,111
You know, I could hear his laugh -
the pain in that laugh, the hollowness.

850
00:49:09,220 --> 00:49:11,620
You know, what being that woman's son
had done to him.

851
00:49:11,722 --> 00:49:15,385
You know, so at a certain point I just had
to ask him to leave - nicely, you know.

852
00:49:15,493 --> 00:49:18,951
I told him I had to get up early
the next morning, 'cause it was so horrible.

853
00:49:19,063 --> 00:49:21,463
It was just as if he had died
in my living room.

854
00:49:21,566 --> 00:49:25,627
You know, then I went into the bathroom
and cried 'cause I felt I'd lost a friend.

855
00:49:25,736 --> 00:49:27,863
And then after he'd gone,
I turned the television on...

856
00:49:27,972 --> 00:49:30,372
and there was this guy who had
just won the something-something.

857
00:49:30,474 --> 00:49:33,910
Some sports event - some kind of a great big
check and some kind of huge silver bottle.

858
00:49:34,011 --> 00:49:36,411
And he, you know - he couldn't stuff
the check in the bottle...

859
00:49:36,514 --> 00:49:39,711
and he put the bottle in front of his nose
and pretended it was his face.

860
00:49:39,817 --> 00:49:42,115
He wasn't really listening
to the guy who was interviewing him...

861
00:49:42,220 --> 00:49:45,656
but he was smiling malevolently at his friends,
and I looked at that guy and I thought...

862
00:49:45,756 --> 00:49:49,749
"What a horrible, empty,
manipulative rat."

863
00:49:49,860 --> 00:49:53,762
Then I thought, "That guy is me."

864
00:49:53,864 --> 00:49:57,027
Then last night actually, you know,
it was our 20th wedding anniversary...

865
00:49:57,134 --> 00:49:59,329
and I took Chiquita to see
this show about Billie Holiday.

866
00:49:59,437 --> 00:50:02,929
I looked at these show business people who
know nothing about Billie Holiday, nothing.

867
00:50:03,040 --> 00:50:06,703
You see, they were really kind of,
in a way, intellectual creeps.

868
00:50:06,811 --> 00:50:10,645
And I suddenly had this feeling.
I mean, you know I was just sitting there,
crying through most of the show.

869
00:50:10,748 --> 00:50:13,546
And I suddenly had this feeling
I was just as creepy as they were...

870
00:50:13,651 --> 00:50:15,585
and that my whole life
had been a sham...

871
00:50:15,686 --> 00:50:18,519
and I didn't have the guts
to be Billie Holiday either.

872
00:50:18,623 --> 00:50:22,457
I mean, I really feel
that I'm just washed up, wiped out.

873
00:50:22,560 --> 00:50:25,256
I feel I've just squandered my life.

874
00:50:28,733 --> 00:50:32,669
André, now, how can you say
something like that?

875
00:50:32,770 --> 00:50:34,670
I mean -

876
00:50:42,413 --> 00:50:47,976
Well, you know, I may be in
a very emotional state right now, Wally...

877
00:50:48,085 --> 00:50:51,145
but since I've come back home I've just
been finding the world we're living in...

878
00:50:51,255 --> 00:50:53,689
more and more upsetting.

879
00:50:53,791 --> 00:50:56,692
I mean, last week I went down
to the Public Theater one afternoon.

880
00:50:56,794 --> 00:50:59,024
You know, when I walked in,
I said hello to everybody...

881
00:50:59,130 --> 00:51:01,963
'cause I know them all, and they all know me,
they're always very friendly.

882
00:51:02,066 --> 00:51:05,900
You know that seven or eight people
told me how wonderful I looked?

883
00:51:06,003 --> 00:51:09,530
And then one person - one - a woman
who runs the casting office, said...

884
00:51:09,640 --> 00:51:11,608
"Gee, you look horrible.
Is something wrong?"

885
00:51:11,709 --> 00:51:14,701
Now, she -You know, we started talking.
Of course, I started telling her things.

886
00:51:14,812 --> 00:51:18,771
And she suddenly burst into tears
because an aunt of hers who's 80...

887
00:51:18,883 --> 00:51:23,081
whom she's very fond of, went into
the hospital for a cataract, which was solved.

888
00:51:23,187 --> 00:51:26,679
But the nurse was so sloppy,
she didn't put the bed rails up...

889
00:51:26,791 --> 00:51:29,885
and so the aunt fell out of bed
and is now a complete cripple.

890
00:51:29,994 --> 00:51:32,360
So you know, we were talking
about hospitals.

891
00:51:32,463 --> 00:51:35,728
Now, you know, this woman,
because of who she is -

892
00:51:35,833 --> 00:51:38,165
You know, 'cause this had happened
to her very, very recently.

893
00:51:38,269 --> 00:51:41,727
- She could see me with complete clarity.
- Uh-huh.

894
00:51:41,839 --> 00:51:43,864
She didn't know anything
about what I'd been going through.

895
00:51:43,974 --> 00:51:46,534
But the other people, what they saw
was this tan, or this shirt...

896
00:51:46,644 --> 00:51:48,612
or the fact that the shirt
goes well with the tan.

897
00:51:48,713 --> 00:51:50,578
So they said, "Gee, you look wonderful."

898
00:51:50,681 --> 00:51:53,980
Now, they're living
in an insane dreamworld.

899
00:51:54,085 --> 00:51:57,316
They're not looking.
That seems very strange to me.

900
00:51:57,421 --> 00:52:00,652
Right, because they just didn't
see anything, somehow...

901
00:52:00,758 --> 00:52:04,091
except, uh, the few little things
that they wanted to see.

902
00:52:07,198 --> 00:52:11,726
Yeah, you know, it's like what happened
just before my mother died.

903
00:52:11,836 --> 00:52:14,270
You know, we'd gone to the hospital
to see my mother...

904
00:52:14,372 --> 00:52:16,738
and I went in to see her...

905
00:52:16,841 --> 00:52:21,369
and I saw this woman who looked as bad
as any survivor of Auschwitz or Dachau.

906
00:52:21,479 --> 00:52:25,176
And I was out in the hall
sort of comforting my father...

907
00:52:25,282 --> 00:52:29,343
when a doctor who was a specialist
in a problem she had with her arm...

908
00:52:29,453 --> 00:52:32,251
went into her room
and came out just beaming.

909
00:52:32,356 --> 00:52:36,122
And he said, "Boy, don't we have
a lot of reason to feel great?

910
00:52:36,227 --> 00:52:39,788
Isn't it wonderful
how she's coming along?"

911
00:52:39,897 --> 00:52:44,800
Now, all he saw was the arm.
That's all he saw.

912
00:52:44,902 --> 00:52:49,339
Now, here's another person
who's existing in a dream.

913
00:52:49,440 --> 00:52:51,874
Who, on top of that,
is a kind of butcher...

914
00:52:51,976 --> 00:52:54,206
who's committing
a kind of familial murder...

915
00:52:54,311 --> 00:52:57,508
because when he comes out of that room,
he psychically kills us...

916
00:52:57,615 --> 00:52:59,606
by taking us into a dream world...

917
00:52:59,717 --> 00:53:03,153
where we become confused
and frightened...

918
00:53:03,254 --> 00:53:06,519
'cause the moment before,
we saw somebody who already looked dead...

919
00:53:06,624 --> 00:53:11,118
and now here comes a specialist
who tells us they're in wonderful shape.

920
00:53:11,228 --> 00:53:13,958
I mean, they were literally
driving my father crazy.

921
00:53:14,064 --> 00:53:17,158
I mean, you know, here's an 82-year-old man
who's very emotional...

922
00:53:17,268 --> 00:53:20,260
and you know, and if you go in one moment,
and you see the person's dying...

923
00:53:20,371 --> 00:53:23,363
and you don't want them to die, and then
a doctor comes out five minutes later...

924
00:53:23,474 --> 00:53:25,442
and tells you they're in wonderful shape -

925
00:53:25,543 --> 00:53:28,137
I mean, you know, you can go crazy.

926
00:53:28,245 --> 00:53:32,011
- Yeah. I know what you mean.
- I mean, the doctor didn't see my mother.

927
00:53:32,116 --> 00:53:34,607
The people at the Public Theater
didn't see me.

928
00:53:34,718 --> 00:53:37,710
I mean, we're just walking around
in some kind of fog.

929
00:53:37,822 --> 00:53:41,918
I think we're all in a trance.
We're walking around like zombies.

930
00:53:42,026 --> 00:53:45,655
I don't - I don't think we're even aware
of ourselves or our own reaction to things.

931
00:53:45,763 --> 00:53:48,596
We -We're just going around all day
like unconscious machines...

932
00:53:48,699 --> 00:53:51,793
and meanwhile there's all of this rage
and worry and uneasiness...

933
00:53:51,902 --> 00:53:53,995
just building up
and building up inside us.

934
00:53:54,104 --> 00:53:56,402
That's right. It just builds up, uh...

935
00:53:56,507 --> 00:53:59,806
and then it just leaps out
inappropriately.

936
00:54:01,312 --> 00:54:03,974
I mean, I remember
when I was, uh, acting in this play...

937
00:54:04,081 --> 00:54:06,049
based on <i>The Master and Margarita</i>
by Bulgakov.

938
00:54:06,150 --> 00:54:08,516
And I was playing the part of the cat.

939
00:54:08,619 --> 00:54:11,053
But they had trouble, uh,
making up my cat suit...

940
00:54:11,155 --> 00:54:14,784
so I didn't get it delivered to me
till the night of the first performance.

941
00:54:14,892 --> 00:54:18,487
Particularly the head - I mean,
I'd never even had a chance to try it on.

942
00:54:18,596 --> 00:54:22,123
And about four of my fellow actors
actually came up to me...

943
00:54:22,233 --> 00:54:24,793
and they said these things
which I just couldn't help thinking...

944
00:54:24,902 --> 00:54:26,870
were attempts to destroy me.

945
00:54:26,971 --> 00:54:30,805
You know, one of them said, uh,
"Oh, well, now that head...

946
00:54:30,908 --> 00:54:33,376
"will totally change your hearing
in the performance.

947
00:54:33,477 --> 00:54:36,537
"You may hear everything
completely differently...

948
00:54:36,647 --> 00:54:38,911
"and it may be very upsetting.

949
00:54:39,016 --> 00:54:42,179
"Now, I was once in a performance
where I was wearing earmuffs...

950
00:54:42,286 --> 00:54:45,949
and I couldn't hear anything
anybody said."

951
00:54:46,056 --> 00:54:49,753
And then another one said, "Oh, you know,
whenever I wear even a hat on stage...

952
00:54:49,860 --> 00:54:51,828
I tend to faint."

953
00:54:51,929 --> 00:54:54,864
I mean, those remarks
were just full of hostility...

954
00:54:54,965 --> 00:54:58,401
because, I mean, if I'd listened to those people,
I would have gone out there on stage...

955
00:54:58,502 --> 00:55:01,300
and I wouldn't have been able to hear anything,
and I would have fainted.

956
00:55:01,405 --> 00:55:03,339
But the hostility
was completely inappropriate...

957
00:55:03,440 --> 00:55:05,408
because, in fact,
those people liked me.

958
00:55:05,509 --> 00:55:08,945
I mean, that hostility was just
some feeling that was, you know...

959
00:55:09,046 --> 00:55:11,879
left over from
some previous experience.

960
00:55:11,982 --> 00:55:15,349
Because somehow
in our social existence today...

961
00:55:15,452 --> 00:55:18,683
we're only allowed to
express our feelings, uh...

962
00:55:18,789 --> 00:55:20,916
weirdly and indirectly.

963
00:55:21,025 --> 00:55:23,459
If you express them directly,
everybody goes crazy.

964
00:55:23,561 --> 00:55:26,724
Well, did you express your feelings
about what those people said to you?

965
00:55:26,830 --> 00:55:30,857
No. I mean, I didn't even know
what I felt till I thought about it later.

966
00:55:30,968 --> 00:55:34,335
And I mean, at the most, you know,
in a situation like that, uh...

967
00:55:34,438 --> 00:55:36,668
even if I had known what I felt...

968
00:55:36,774 --> 00:55:39,470
I might say something,
if I'm really annoyed...

969
00:55:39,577 --> 00:55:43,377
like, uh, "Oh, yeah.
Well, that's just fascinating...

970
00:55:43,480 --> 00:55:47,177
and, uh, I probably will
faint tonight, just as you did."

971
00:55:47,284 --> 00:55:50,151
I do just the same thing myself.

972
00:55:50,254 --> 00:55:53,553
We can't be direct, so we end up
saying the weirdest things.

973
00:55:53,657 --> 00:55:56,854
I mean, I remember a night. It was
a couple of weeks after my mother died.

974
00:55:56,961 --> 00:55:58,861
And I was in pretty bad shape.

975
00:55:58,963 --> 00:56:01,090
And I had dinner with three
relatively close friends...

976
00:56:01,198 --> 00:56:03,166
two of whom had
known my mother quite well...

977
00:56:03,267 --> 00:56:05,792
and all three of whom
had known me for years.

978
00:56:05,903 --> 00:56:08,701
You know that we went through that
entire evening without my being able to...

979
00:56:08,806 --> 00:56:10,740
for a moment,
get anywhere near what -

980
00:56:10,841 --> 00:56:13,036
Not that I wanted to sit
and have this dreary evening...

981
00:56:13,143 --> 00:56:16,010
in which I was talking about all this pain
that I was going through and everything.

982
00:56:16,113 --> 00:56:17,740
Really, not at all.

983
00:56:17,848 --> 00:56:20,009
But the fact that nobody could say...

984
00:56:20,117 --> 00:56:22,950
"Gee, what a shame about your mother"
or "How are you feeling?"

985
00:56:23,053 --> 00:56:26,386
It was just as if nothing had happened.
They were all making these jokes and laughing.

986
00:56:26,490 --> 00:56:28,458
I got quite crazy, as a matter of fact.

987
00:56:28,559 --> 00:56:31,084
One of these people mentioned
a certain man whom I don't like very much...

988
00:56:31,195 --> 00:56:35,063
and I started screeching about how
he had just been found in the Bronx River...

989
00:56:35,165 --> 00:56:39,295
and his penis had dropped off from gonorrhea,
and all kinds of insane things.

990
00:56:39,403 --> 00:56:44,067
And later, when I got home, I realized I'd just
been desperate to break through this ice.

991
00:56:44,174 --> 00:56:45,641
Yeah.

992
00:56:45,743 --> 00:56:49,770
I mean, do you realize, Wally, if you brought
that situation into a Tibetan home -

993
00:56:49,880 --> 00:56:52,872
That'd be just so far out. I mean,
they wouldn't be able to understand it.

994
00:56:52,983 --> 00:56:55,417
That would be simply-
simply so weird, Wally.

995
00:56:55,519 --> 00:56:59,353
If four Tibetans came together,
and tragedy had just struck one of the ones...

996
00:56:59,456 --> 00:57:04,086
and they spent the whole evening going -

997
00:57:04,194 --> 00:57:06,424
I mean, you know,
Tibetans would have looked at that...

998
00:57:06,530 --> 00:57:09,556
and would have thought that was
the most unimaginable behavior.

999
00:57:09,667 --> 00:57:11,999
- But for us, that's common behavior.
- Mm-hmm.

1000
00:57:12,102 --> 00:57:15,833
I mean, really, the - the Africans would have
probably put their spears into all four of us...

1001
00:57:15,939 --> 00:57:17,873
'cause it would have driven them crazy.

1002
00:57:17,975 --> 00:57:20,500
They would have thought we were
dangerous animals or something like that.

1003
00:57:20,611 --> 00:57:24,411
- Right.
- I mean, that's absolutely abnormal behavior.

1004
00:57:24,515 --> 00:57:26,642
Is everything all right, gentlemen?

1005
00:57:26,750 --> 00:57:28,650
- Great.
- Yeah.

1006
00:57:32,823 --> 00:57:35,018
But those are
typical evenings for us.

1007
00:57:35,125 --> 00:57:39,255
I mean, we go to dinners and parties
like that all the time.

1008
00:57:39,363 --> 00:57:42,389
These evenings are really
like sort of sickly dreams...

1009
00:57:42,499 --> 00:57:44,967
because people are talking in symbols.

1010
00:57:45,069 --> 00:57:49,301
Everyone is sort of floating through
this fog of symbols and unconscious feelings.

1011
00:57:49,406 --> 00:57:51,738
No one says what they're
really thinking about.

1012
00:57:51,842 --> 00:57:56,836
Then people will start making these jokes
that are really some sort of secret code.

1013
00:57:56,947 --> 00:57:59,347
Right. Well, what often happens
in some of these evenings...

1014
00:57:59,450 --> 00:58:03,853
is that these really crazy little fantasies
will just start being played with, you know...

1015
00:58:03,954 --> 00:58:07,048
and everyone will be talking at once
and sort of saying...

1016
00:58:07,157 --> 00:58:11,025
"Hey, wouldn't it be great if Frank Sinatra
and Mrs. Nixon and blah-blah-blah...

1017
00:58:11,128 --> 00:58:13,619
were in such and such a situation?"

1018
00:58:13,731 --> 00:58:17,064
You know, always with famous people,
and always sort of grotesque.

1019
00:58:17,167 --> 00:58:19,795
Or people will be talking about
some horrible thing...

1020
00:58:19,903 --> 00:58:24,363
like - like, uh, the death of that girl
in the car with Ted Kennedy...

1021
00:58:24,475 --> 00:58:26,909
and they'll just be
roaring with laughter.

1022
00:58:27,010 --> 00:58:29,444
I mean, it's really amazing.
It's just unbelievable.

1023
00:58:29,546 --> 00:58:34,643
That's the only way anything is expressed,
through these completely insane jokes.

1024
00:58:34,752 --> 00:58:37,983
I mean, I think that's why I never understand
what's going on at a party.

1025
00:58:38,088 --> 00:58:41,251
I'm always completely confused.

1026
00:58:41,358 --> 00:58:46,091
You know, uh, Debby once said,
after one of these New York evenings...

1027
00:58:46,196 --> 00:58:48,460
she thought she'd traveled
a greater distance...

1028
00:58:48,565 --> 00:58:52,057
just by journeying from her origins
in the suburbs of Chicago...

1029
00:58:52,169 --> 00:58:54,103
to that New York evening...

1030
00:58:54,204 --> 00:58:57,230
than her grandmother had traveled
in, uh, making her way...

1031
00:58:57,341 --> 00:58:59,969
from the steppes of Russia
to the suburbs of Chicago.

1032
00:59:00,077 --> 00:59:02,375
I think that's right.

1033
00:59:03,547 --> 00:59:06,141
You know, it may- it may be, Wally,
that one of the reasons...

1034
00:59:06,250 --> 00:59:08,184
that we don't know
what's going on...

1035
00:59:08,285 --> 00:59:11,152
is that when we're there at a party,
we're all too busy performing.

1036
00:59:11,255 --> 00:59:12,552
Uh-huh.

1037
00:59:12,656 --> 00:59:16,057
That was one of the reasons
that, uh, Grotowski gave up the theater.

1038
00:59:16,160 --> 00:59:20,290
He just felt that people in their lives now
were performing so well...

1039
00:59:20,397 --> 00:59:23,059
that performance in the theater
was sort of superfluous...

1040
00:59:23,167 --> 00:59:25,067
and, in a way, obscene.

1041
00:59:25,169 --> 00:59:27,330
Huh.

1042
00:59:27,437 --> 00:59:30,167
Isn't it amazing
how often a doctor...

1043
00:59:30,274 --> 00:59:32,970
will live up to our expectation
of how a doctor should look?

1044
00:59:33,076 --> 00:59:36,568
When you see a terrorist on television,
he looks just like a terrorist.

1045
00:59:36,680 --> 00:59:39,148
I mean, we live in a world
in which fathers...

1046
00:59:39,249 --> 00:59:41,444
or single people, or artists...

1047
00:59:41,552 --> 00:59:43,747
are all trying to live up
to someone's fantasy...

1048
00:59:43,854 --> 00:59:47,813
of how a father, or a single person,
or an artist should look and behave.

1049
00:59:47,925 --> 00:59:50,723
They all act as if they know exactly how
they ought to conduct themselves...

1050
00:59:50,828 --> 00:59:52,728
at every single moment...

1051
00:59:52,830 --> 00:59:54,889
and they all seem totally self-confident.

1052
00:59:54,998 --> 00:59:57,466
Of course, privately people
are very mixed up about themselves.

1053
00:59:57,568 --> 00:59:58,694
Yeah.

1054
00:59:58,802 --> 01:00:00,997
They don't know what they should
be doing with their lives.

1055
01:00:01,104 --> 01:00:03,231
- They're reading all these self-help books.
- Oh, God!

1056
01:00:03,340 --> 01:00:05,831
I mean, those books are just so touching,
because they show...

1057
01:00:05,943 --> 01:00:08,844
how desperately curious we all are
to know how all the others of us...

1058
01:00:08,946 --> 01:00:10,914
are really getting on in life...

1059
01:00:11,014 --> 01:00:13,710
even though, by performing
these roles all the time...

1060
01:00:13,817 --> 01:00:16,809
we're just hiding the reality of ourselves
from everybody else.

1061
01:00:16,920 --> 01:00:19,480
I mean, we live in such
ludicrous ignorance of each other.

1062
01:00:19,590 --> 01:00:21,785
We usually don't know
the things we'd like to know...

1063
01:00:21,892 --> 01:00:23,860
even about our supposedly
closest friends.

1064
01:00:23,961 --> 01:00:25,861
I mean - I mean, you know...

1065
01:00:25,963 --> 01:00:28,454
suppose you're going through
some kind of hell in your own life.

1066
01:00:28,565 --> 01:00:31,932
Well, you would love to know if your friends
have experienced similar things.

1067
01:00:32,035 --> 01:00:34,003
But we just don't dare to ask each other.

1068
01:00:34,104 --> 01:00:36,504
No. It would be like asking
your friend to drop his role.

1069
01:00:36,607 --> 01:00:40,008
I mean, we just put no value at all
on perceiving reality.

1070
01:00:40,110 --> 01:00:43,705
I mean, on the contrary, this incredible
emphasis that we all place now...

1071
01:00:43,814 --> 01:00:45,748
on our so-called careers...

1072
01:00:45,849 --> 01:00:50,479
automatically makes perceiving reality
a very low priority...

1073
01:00:50,587 --> 01:00:55,217
because if your life is organized around
trying to be successful in a career...

1074
01:00:55,325 --> 01:01:00,388
well, it just doesn't matter what
you perceive or what you experience.

1075
01:01:00,497 --> 01:01:03,762
You can really sort of shut your mind off
for years ahead, in a way.

1076
01:01:03,867 --> 01:01:06,802
You can sort of
turn on the automatic pilot.

1077
01:01:06,904 --> 01:01:10,237
You know, just the way your mother's doctor
had on his automatic pilot...

1078
01:01:10,340 --> 01:01:12,535
when he went in
and he looked at the arm...

1079
01:01:12,643 --> 01:01:15,077
and he totally failed
to perceive anything else.

1080
01:01:15,178 --> 01:01:19,137
That's right. Our- Our minds are just
focused on these goals and plans...

1081
01:01:19,249 --> 01:01:21,183
which in themselves
are not reality.

1082
01:01:21,285 --> 01:01:24,618
No. Goals and plans are not -

1083
01:01:24,721 --> 01:01:29,090
I mean, they're - they're fantasy.
They're part of a dream life.

1084
01:01:29,192 --> 01:01:32,719
I mean, you know, it always just
does seem so ridiculous, somehow...

1085
01:01:32,829 --> 01:01:36,492
that everybody has to have
his little - his little goal in life.

1086
01:01:36,600 --> 01:01:40,866
I mean, it's so absurd, in a way, when you
consider that it doesn't matter which one it is.

1087
01:01:40,971 --> 01:01:43,405
Right. And because people's
concentration is on their goals...

1088
01:01:43,507 --> 01:01:46,499
in their life
they just live each moment by habit.

1089
01:01:46,610 --> 01:01:49,738
Really, like the Norwegian telling
the same stories over and over again.

1090
01:01:49,846 --> 01:01:52,371
- Mm-hmm.
- Life becomes habitual.

1091
01:01:52,482 --> 01:01:54,677
And it is today.

1092
01:01:54,785 --> 01:01:56,810
I mean, very few things happen now
like that moment...

1093
01:01:56,920 --> 01:01:59,684
when Marlon Brando sent the Indian woman
to accept the Oscar...

1094
01:01:59,790 --> 01:02:01,690
and everything went haywire.

1095
01:02:01,792 --> 01:02:04,226
Things just very rarely
go haywire now.

1096
01:02:04,328 --> 01:02:07,320
And if you're just operating by habit...

1097
01:02:07,431 --> 01:02:10,229
then you're not really living.

1098
01:02:10,334 --> 01:02:12,962
I mean, you know, in Sanskrit,
the root of the verb "to be"...

1099
01:02:13,070 --> 01:02:15,334
is the same as "to grow"
or "to make grow."

1100
01:02:15,439 --> 01:02:17,339
Huh.

1101
01:02:20,811 --> 01:02:22,711
- <i>Do you know about Roc?</i>
- Hmm?

1102
01:02:22,813 --> 01:02:24,838
Oh, well.

1103
01:02:24,948 --> 01:02:26,939
Roc was a wonderful man.

1104
01:02:27,050 --> 01:02:29,314
He was one of the founders
of Findhorn...

1105
01:02:29,419 --> 01:02:33,719
and he was one of Scotland's -well,
he was Scotland's greatest mathematician...

1106
01:02:33,824 --> 01:02:36,292
and he was one of the century's
great mathematicians.

1107
01:02:36,393 --> 01:02:41,524
And he prided himself on the fact
that he had no fantasy life, no dream life -

1108
01:02:41,631 --> 01:02:44,259
nothing to stand be -
no imaginary life -

1109
01:02:44,368 --> 01:02:48,771
nothing to stand between him
and the direct perception of mathematics.

1110
01:02:48,872 --> 01:02:52,831
And one day when he was in his mid-50s,
he was walking in the gardens of Edinburgh...

1111
01:02:52,943 --> 01:02:55,776
and he saw a faun.

1112
01:02:55,879 --> 01:02:59,440
The faun was very surprised because fauns
have always been able to see people...

1113
01:02:59,549 --> 01:03:02,177
but you know,
very few people ever see them.

1114
01:03:02,285 --> 01:03:04,947
You know, uh,
those little imaginary creatures.

1115
01:03:05,055 --> 01:03:06,955
- Not a deer.
- Oh.

1116
01:03:07,057 --> 01:03:10,322
- You call them fauns, don't you?
- I thought a fawn was a baby deer.

1117
01:03:10,427 --> 01:03:13,624
Yeah, well, there's a deer that's called a fawn,
but these are like those little imagi...

1118
01:03:13,730 --> 01:03:16,255
- Oh! The kind that Debussy-
- Yes. Right.

1119
01:03:16,366 --> 01:03:19,767
Well, so he got to know the faun,
and he got to know other fauns...

1120
01:03:19,870 --> 01:03:22,134
and a series of conversations began...

1121
01:03:22,239 --> 01:03:25,037
and more and more fauns would
come out every afternoon to meet him.

1122
01:03:25,142 --> 01:03:27,110
And he'd have talks with the fauns.

1123
01:03:27,210 --> 01:03:30,475
Then one day, after a while, when, you know,
they'd really gotten to know him...

1124
01:03:30,580 --> 01:03:33,048
they asked him
if he would like to meet Pan...

1125
01:03:33,150 --> 01:03:35,243
because Pan would like to meet him.

1126
01:03:35,352 --> 01:03:37,377
And of course,
Pan was afraid of terrifying him...

1127
01:03:37,487 --> 01:03:40,081
because he knew
of the Christian misconception...

1128
01:03:40,190 --> 01:03:43,785
which portrayed Pan as an evil creature,
which he's not.

1129
01:03:43,894 --> 01:03:46,829
But Roc said he would love to meet Pan,
and so they met...

1130
01:03:46,930 --> 01:03:49,626
and Pan indirectly sent him
on his way on a journey...

1131
01:03:49,733 --> 01:03:54,033
in which he met the other people
who began Findhorn.

1132
01:03:54,137 --> 01:03:57,231
But Roc used to practice
certain exercises -

1133
01:03:57,340 --> 01:04:00,434
like, uh, for instance,
if he were right-handed...

1134
01:04:00,544 --> 01:04:02,842
all today he would do everything
with his left hand.

1135
01:04:02,946 --> 01:04:05,676
All day- eating, writing,
everything - opening doors...

1136
01:04:05,782 --> 01:04:08,546
in order to break the habits of living.

1137
01:04:08,652 --> 01:04:11,212
Because the great danger,
he felt, for him...

1138
01:04:11,321 --> 01:04:14,586
was to fall into a trance,
out of habit.

1139
01:04:14,691 --> 01:04:19,219
He had a whole series of very simple
exercises that he had invented...

1140
01:04:19,329 --> 01:04:23,493
just to keep
seeing, feeling, remembering.

1141
01:04:23,600 --> 01:04:25,534
Because you have to learn now.

1142
01:04:25,635 --> 01:04:28,604
It didn't used to be necessary,
but today you have to learn something...

1143
01:04:28,705 --> 01:04:30,764
like, uh, are you really hungry...

1144
01:04:30,874 --> 01:04:33,934
or are you just stuffing your face -

1145
01:04:34,044 --> 01:04:36,239
Because that's what you do,
out of habit?

1146
01:04:36,346 --> 01:04:38,940
I mean, you can afford to do it,
so you do it...

1147
01:04:39,049 --> 01:04:41,017
whether you're hungry or not.

1148
01:04:41,118 --> 01:04:43,916
You know, if you go to
the Buddhist Meditation Center...

1149
01:04:44,020 --> 01:04:46,454
they make you taste
each bite of your food...

1150
01:04:46,556 --> 01:04:50,219
so it takes two hours -
it's horrible - to eat your lunch.

1151
01:04:50,327 --> 01:04:53,728
But you're conscious
of the taste of your food.

1152
01:04:53,830 --> 01:04:57,061
If you're just eating out of habit,
then you don't taste the food...

1153
01:04:57,167 --> 01:05:00,034
and you're not conscious of the reality
of what's happening to you.

1154
01:05:00,137 --> 01:05:02,196
You enter the dream world again.

1155
01:05:02,305 --> 01:05:05,741
Now, do you think maybe
we live in this dream world...

1156
01:05:05,842 --> 01:05:09,175
because we do so many things every day
that affect us in ways...

1157
01:05:09,279 --> 01:05:12,715
that somehow
we're just not aware of?

1158
01:05:12,816 --> 01:05:17,116
I mean, you know, I was thinking,
um, last Christmas...

1159
01:05:17,220 --> 01:05:20,383
Debby and I were given
an electric blanket.

1160
01:05:20,490 --> 01:05:25,223
I can tell you that it is just
such a marvelous advance...

1161
01:05:25,328 --> 01:05:29,856
over our old way of life, and it is just great.

1162
01:05:29,966 --> 01:05:33,402
But, uh, it is quite different
from not having an electric blanket...

1163
01:05:33,503 --> 01:05:36,404
and I sometimes sort of wonder,
well, what is it doing to me?

1164
01:05:36,506 --> 01:05:40,067
I mean, I sort of feel, uh,
I'm not sleeping quite in the same way.

1165
01:05:40,177 --> 01:05:42,077
No, you wouldn't be.

1166
01:05:42,179 --> 01:05:45,080
I mean, uh, and my dreams
are sort of different...

1167
01:05:45,182 --> 01:05:47,980
and I feel a little bit different
when I get up in the morning.

1168
01:05:49,119 --> 01:05:52,577
I wouldn't put an electric blanket on
for anything.

1169
01:05:52,689 --> 01:05:57,422
First, I'd be worried I might get electrocuted.
No, I don't trust technology.

1170
01:05:57,527 --> 01:06:01,122
But I mean, the main thing, Wally,
is that I think that that kind of comfort...

1171
01:06:01,231 --> 01:06:04,359
just separates you from reality
in a very direct way.

1172
01:06:04,467 --> 01:06:07,163
- You mean -
- I mean, if you don't have that electric blanket...

1173
01:06:07,270 --> 01:06:09,966
and your apartment is cold
and you need to put on another blanket...

1174
01:06:10,073 --> 01:06:13,509
or go into the closet and pile up coats
on top of the blankets you have...

1175
01:06:13,610 --> 01:06:15,737
well, then you know it's cold.

1176
01:06:15,845 --> 01:06:18,109
And that sets up a link of things.

1177
01:06:18,215 --> 01:06:21,707
You have compassion for the per-
Well, is the person next to you cold?

1178
01:06:21,818 --> 01:06:23,945
Are there other people in the world
who are cold?

1179
01:06:24,054 --> 01:06:26,488
What a cold night!
I like the cold.

1180
01:06:26,590 --> 01:06:30,026
My God, I never realized.
I don't want a blanket. It's fun being cold.

1181
01:06:30,126 --> 01:06:33,459
I can snuggle up against you even more
because it's cold.

1182
01:06:33,563 --> 01:06:36,123
All sorts of things occur to you.

1183
01:06:36,233 --> 01:06:39,566
Turn on that electric blanket,
and it's like taking a tranquilizer...

1184
01:06:39,669 --> 01:06:42,137
or it's like being lobotomized
by watching television.

1185
01:06:42,239 --> 01:06:44,207
I think you enter
the dream world again.

1186
01:06:45,875 --> 01:06:49,003
I mean, what does it do to us, Wally,
living in an environment...

1187
01:06:49,112 --> 01:06:53,105
where something as massive
as the seasons, or winter, or cold...

1188
01:06:53,216 --> 01:06:55,343
don't in any way affect us?

1189
01:06:55,452 --> 01:06:57,420
I mean, we're animals, after all.

1190
01:06:57,520 --> 01:06:59,420
I mean, what does that mean?

1191
01:06:59,522 --> 01:07:02,616
I think that means that instead
of living under the sun...

1192
01:07:02,726 --> 01:07:05,388
and the moon and the sky
and the stars...

1193
01:07:05,495 --> 01:07:08,293
we're living in a fantasy world
of our own making.

1194
01:07:08,398 --> 01:07:11,731
Yeah, but I mean, I would never
give up my electric blanket, André.

1195
01:07:11,835 --> 01:07:14,599
I mean, because New York
is cold in the winter.

1196
01:07:14,704 --> 01:07:17,901
I mean, our apartment is cold.
It's a difficult environment.

1197
01:07:18,008 --> 01:07:20,135
I mean, our lives
are tough enough as it is.

1198
01:07:20,243 --> 01:07:23,735
I'm not looking for ways to get rid of
the few things that provide relief and comfort.

1199
01:07:23,847 --> 01:07:26,645
I mean, on the contrary,
I'm looking for more comfort...

1200
01:07:26,750 --> 01:07:29,082
because, uh, the world is very abrasive.

1201
01:07:29,185 --> 01:07:31,585
I mean, uh,
I'm trying to protect myself...

1202
01:07:31,688 --> 01:07:35,283
because, really, there are these abrasive
beatings to be avoided everywhere you look.

1203
01:07:35,392 --> 01:07:39,385
But, Wally, don't you - don't you see
that comfort can be dangerous?

1204
01:07:39,496 --> 01:07:42,693
I mean, you like to be comfortable,
and I like to be comfortable too...

1205
01:07:42,799 --> 01:07:46,257
but comfort can lull you
into a dangerous tranquillity.

1206
01:07:47,404 --> 01:07:50,373
I mean, my mother knew
a woman, Lady Hatfield...

1207
01:07:50,473 --> 01:07:52,566
who was one of the richest women
in the world...

1208
01:07:52,676 --> 01:07:55,941
and she died of starvation
because all she would eat was chicken.

1209
01:07:56,046 --> 01:07:58,844
I mean, she just liked chicken, Wally,
and that was all she would eat.

1210
01:07:58,948 --> 01:08:02,008
And actually her body was starving,
but she didn't know it...

1211
01:08:02,118 --> 01:08:05,713
'cause she was quite happy eating her chicken,
and so she finally died.

1212
01:08:05,822 --> 01:08:09,952
See, I honestly believe
that we're all like Lady Hatfield now.

1213
01:08:10,060 --> 01:08:13,996
We're having a lovely, comfortable time
with our electric blankets and our chicken...

1214
01:08:14,097 --> 01:08:17,965
and meanwhile we're starving because
we're so cut off from contact with reality...

1215
01:08:18,068 --> 01:08:21,868
that we're not getting any real sustenance,
'cause we don't see the world.

1216
01:08:21,971 --> 01:08:23,871
We don't see ourselves.

1217
01:08:23,973 --> 01:08:26,100
We don't see how our actions
affect other people.

1218
01:08:26,209 --> 01:08:29,303
Have you read Martin Buber's book
<i>On Hasidism?</i>

1219
01:08:29,412 --> 01:08:31,607
- No.
- Well, here's a view of life.

1220
01:08:31,715 --> 01:08:34,650
I mean, he talks about the belief
of the HasidicJews...

1221
01:08:34,751 --> 01:08:36,651
that there are spirits chained
in everything.

1222
01:08:36,753 --> 01:08:39,654
There are spirits chained in you.
There are spirits chained in me.

1223
01:08:39,756 --> 01:08:42,122
Well, there are spirits chained
in this table.

1224
01:08:42,225 --> 01:08:47,128
And that prayer is the action of liberating
these enchained embryo-like spirits...

1225
01:08:47,230 --> 01:08:49,255
and that every action of ours in life...

1226
01:08:49,366 --> 01:08:52,392
whether it's, uh,
doing business, or making love...

1227
01:08:52,502 --> 01:08:54,470
or having dinner together,
or whatever-

1228
01:08:54,571 --> 01:08:57,165
that every action of ours
should be a prayer...

1229
01:08:57,273 --> 01:08:59,070
a sacrament in the world.

1230
01:08:59,175 --> 01:09:01,735
Now, do you think we're living like that?

1231
01:09:01,845 --> 01:09:03,870
Why do you think
we're not living like that?

1232
01:09:03,980 --> 01:09:06,972
I think it's because if we allowed ourselves
to see what we do every day...

1233
01:09:07,083 --> 01:09:09,051
we might just find it too nauseating.

1234
01:09:09,152 --> 01:09:11,120
I mean, the way we treat other people.

1235
01:09:11,221 --> 01:09:14,782
You know, every day, several times a day,
I walk into my apartment building.

1236
01:09:14,891 --> 01:09:18,349
The doorman calls me Mr. Gregory,
and I call him Jimmy.

1237
01:09:18,461 --> 01:09:21,555
Already, what's the difference
between that...

1238
01:09:21,664 --> 01:09:24,462
and the Southern plantation owner
who's got slaves?

1239
01:09:24,567 --> 01:09:27,559
You see, I think that an act of murder
is committed in that moment...

1240
01:09:27,670 --> 01:09:29,638
when I walk into that building.

1241
01:09:29,739 --> 01:09:33,869
Because here's a dignified, intelligent man -
a man of my own age -

1242
01:09:33,977 --> 01:09:37,572
and when I call him Jimmy,
then he becomes a child, and I'm an adult...

1243
01:09:37,680 --> 01:09:39,944
because I can buy my way
into the building.

1244
01:09:40,049 --> 01:09:42,677
Right. That's right.

1245
01:09:42,786 --> 01:09:46,654
I mean, my God,
when I was a Latin teacher...

1246
01:09:46,756 --> 01:09:48,849
I mean, people used to treat me -

1247
01:09:48,958 --> 01:09:51,722
I mean, uh, you know,
if I would go to a party...

1248
01:09:51,828 --> 01:09:54,695
of professional or literary people...

1249
01:09:54,798 --> 01:09:58,290
I mean, I was just treated, uh,
in the nicest sense of the word...

1250
01:09:58,401 --> 01:10:00,028
uh, like a dog.

1251
01:10:00,136 --> 01:10:02,161
I mean, in other words,
there was no question...

1252
01:10:02,272 --> 01:10:05,901
of my being able to participate on
an equal basis in a conversation with people.

1253
01:10:06,009 --> 01:10:08,443
I mean, you know, I'd occasionally
have conversations with people...

1254
01:10:08,545 --> 01:10:11,036
but then, uh,
when they asked what I did...

1255
01:10:11,147 --> 01:10:13,615
which would always happen
after about five minutes...

1256
01:10:13,716 --> 01:10:15,843
uh, you know, their faces -

1257
01:10:15,952 --> 01:10:19,683
Even if they were enjoying the conversation, or
they were flirting with me, or whatever it was -

1258
01:10:19,789 --> 01:10:23,225
their faces would just have that expression
just like the portcullis crashing down.

1259
01:10:23,326 --> 01:10:26,693
You know, those medieval gates.
They would just walk away.

1260
01:10:26,796 --> 01:10:30,129
I mean, I literally lived like a dog.

1261
01:10:30,233 --> 01:10:33,760
And I mean, uh, when Debby was
working as a secretary, you know...

1262
01:10:33,870 --> 01:10:37,431
if she would tell people what she did,
they would just go insane.

1263
01:10:37,540 --> 01:10:39,838
I mean, it would be just
as if she'd said, uh...

1264
01:10:39,943 --> 01:10:44,744
"Oh, well, I've been serving a life sentence
recently, uh, for child murdering."

1265
01:10:45,982 --> 01:10:49,941
I mean, my God, you know, when you talk
about our attitudes toward other people...

1266
01:10:51,321 --> 01:10:53,289
I mean, I think of myself...

1267
01:10:53,389 --> 01:10:57,348
as just a very decent,
good person, you know...

1268
01:10:57,460 --> 01:10:59,792
just because I think
I'm reasonably friendly...

1269
01:10:59,896 --> 01:11:02,126
to most of the people
I happen to meet every day.

1270
01:11:02,232 --> 01:11:04,894
I mean, I really think
of myself quite smugly.

1271
01:11:05,001 --> 01:11:08,095
I just think I'm a perfectly nice guy,
uh, you know...

1272
01:11:08,204 --> 01:11:11,264
so long as I think of the world
as consisting of, you know...

1273
01:11:11,374 --> 01:11:14,138
just the small circle of the people
that I know as friends...

1274
01:11:14,244 --> 01:11:17,236
or the few people that we know
in this little world of our little hobbies -

1275
01:11:17,347 --> 01:11:19,247
the theater or whatever it is.

1276
01:11:19,349 --> 01:11:22,375
And I'm really quite self-satisfied.
I'm just quite happy with myself.

1277
01:11:22,485 --> 01:11:24,612
I just have no complaint about myself.

1278
01:11:24,721 --> 01:11:26,689
I mean, you know, let's face it.

1279
01:11:26,789 --> 01:11:30,555
I mean, there's a whole enormous world
out there that I just don't ever think about.

1280
01:11:30,660 --> 01:11:34,892
I certainly don't take responsibility
for how I've lived in that world.

1281
01:11:34,998 --> 01:11:37,796
I mean, you know, if I were actually
to sort of confront the fact...

1282
01:11:37,901 --> 01:11:40,028
that I'm sort of sharing this stage...

1283
01:11:40,136 --> 01:11:42,627
with-with-with this starving person
in Africa somewhere...

1284
01:11:42,739 --> 01:11:45,230
well, I wouldn't feel so great
about myself.

1285
01:11:45,341 --> 01:11:50,040
So naturally I just - I just blot all those
people right out of my perception.

1286
01:11:50,146 --> 01:11:53,240
So, of course -
of course, I'm ignoring...

1287
01:11:53,349 --> 01:11:56,682
a whole section of the real world.

1288
01:11:56,853 --> 01:11:59,287
But frankly, you know...

1289
01:11:59,389 --> 01:12:03,689
when I write a play, in a way, one of the things
I guess I think I'm trying to do...

1290
01:12:03,793 --> 01:12:06,990
is I'm trying to bring myself up
against some little bits of reality...

1291
01:12:07,096 --> 01:12:10,122
and I'm trying to share that, uh,
with an audience.

1292
01:12:11,634 --> 01:12:14,535
I mean - I mean,
of course we all know, uh...

1293
01:12:14,637 --> 01:12:17,162
the theater is, uh,
in terrible shape today.

1294
01:12:17,273 --> 01:12:21,642
I mean, uh - I mean, at least a few years ago
people who really cared about the theater...

1295
01:12:21,744 --> 01:12:24,042
used to say, "The theater is dead."

1296
01:12:24,147 --> 01:12:27,048
And now everybody's redefined
the theater in such a trivial way...

1297
01:12:27,150 --> 01:12:29,084
that, I mean - I mean, God...

1298
01:12:29,185 --> 01:12:33,349
I know people who are involved with
the theater who go to see things now that -

1299
01:12:33,456 --> 01:12:35,788
I mean, a few years ago
these same people...

1300
01:12:35,892 --> 01:12:38,759
would have just been embarrassed
to have even seen some of these plays.

1301
01:12:38,861 --> 01:12:41,386
I mean, they would have just shrunk,
you know, just in horror...

1302
01:12:41,497 --> 01:12:43,692
at the superficiality of these things.

1303
01:12:43,800 --> 01:12:46,360
But now they say,
"Oh, that was pretty good."

1304
01:12:46,469 --> 01:12:48,437
It's just incredible.

1305
01:12:48,538 --> 01:12:51,666
And I really just find that attitude
unbearable...

1306
01:12:51,774 --> 01:12:55,540
because I really do think the theater
can do something very important.

1307
01:12:55,645 --> 01:13:00,514
I mean, I do think the theater can help
bring people in contact with reality.

1308
01:13:00,617 --> 01:13:05,247
Now, now, you may not feel that at all.
You may just find that totally absurd.

1309
01:13:06,656 --> 01:13:09,591
Yeah, but, Wally,
don't you see the dilemma?

1310
01:13:09,692 --> 01:13:13,651
You're not taking into account
the period we're living in.

1311
01:13:13,763 --> 01:13:15,924
I mean, of course that's what
the theater should do.

1312
01:13:16,032 --> 01:13:17,966
I mean, I've always felt that.

1313
01:13:18,067 --> 01:13:21,434
You know, when I was a young director,
and I directed the <i>Bacchae</i> at Yale...

1314
01:13:21,537 --> 01:13:24,802
my impulse, when Pentheus has been
killed by his mother and the Furies...

1315
01:13:24,907 --> 01:13:27,501
and they pull the tree back,
and they tie him to the tree...

1316
01:13:27,610 --> 01:13:30,841
and fling him into the air, and he flies
through space and he's killed...

1317
01:13:30,947 --> 01:13:33,916
and they rip him to shreds
and I guess cut off his head -

1318
01:13:34,017 --> 01:13:37,646
my impulse was that the thing to do was
to get a head from the New Haven morgue...

1319
01:13:37,754 --> 01:13:39,722
and pass it around the audience.

1320
01:13:39,822 --> 01:13:42,655
Now, I wanted Agawe
to bring on a real head...

1321
01:13:42,759 --> 01:13:45,227
and that this head should be
passed around the audience...

1322
01:13:45,328 --> 01:13:48,923
so that somehow people realized
that this stuff was real, see?

1323
01:13:49,032 --> 01:13:51,557
That it was real stuff.

1324
01:13:51,668 --> 01:13:55,399
Now, the actress playing Agawe
absolutely refused to do it.

1325
01:13:55,505 --> 01:13:57,564
You know, Gordon Craig
used to talk about...

1326
01:13:57,674 --> 01:14:01,838
why is there gold or silver in the churches
or something - the great cathedrals -

1327
01:14:01,944 --> 01:14:05,471
when actors could be wearing
gold and silver?

1328
01:14:05,581 --> 01:14:09,278
And I mean, people who saw Eleonora Duse
in the last couple of years of her life, Wally-

1329
01:14:09,385 --> 01:14:12,752
people said that is was like
seeing light on stage, or mist...

1330
01:14:12,855 --> 01:14:14,823
or the essence of something.

1331
01:14:14,924 --> 01:14:17,552
I mean, then when you think
about Bertolt Brecht -

1332
01:14:17,660 --> 01:14:20,788
He somehow created a theater
in which people could observe...

1333
01:14:20,897 --> 01:14:23,092
that was vastly entertaining
and exciting...

1334
01:14:23,199 --> 01:14:26,225
but in which the excitement
didn't overwhelm you.

1335
01:14:26,335 --> 01:14:30,601
He somehow allowed you the distance
between the play and yourself...

1336
01:14:30,707 --> 01:14:33,574
that, in fact, two human beings need
in order to live together.

1337
01:14:33,676 --> 01:14:37,703
You know, the question is whether
the theater now can do for an audience...

1338
01:14:37,814 --> 01:14:41,181
what Brecht tried to do
or what Craig or Duse tried to do.

1339
01:14:41,284 --> 01:14:43,184
Can it do it now?

1340
01:14:43,286 --> 01:14:46,619
'Cause, you see, I think that
people today are so deeply asleep...

1341
01:14:46,723 --> 01:14:49,351
that unless, you know, you're putting on
those sort of superficial plays...

1342
01:14:49,459 --> 01:14:51,689
that just help your audience
to sleep more comfortably...

1343
01:14:51,794 --> 01:14:54,558
it's very hard to know
what to do in the theater.

1344
01:14:56,666 --> 01:15:01,262
Because, you see, I think that if you
put on serious, contemporary plays...

1345
01:15:01,370 --> 01:15:03,270
by writers like yourself...

1346
01:15:03,372 --> 01:15:06,034
you may only be helping to deaden
the audience in a different way.

1347
01:15:06,142 --> 01:15:08,702
What do you mean?

1348
01:15:08,811 --> 01:15:10,836
Well, I mean, Wally...

1349
01:15:10,947 --> 01:15:14,280
how does it affect an audience
to put on one of these plays...

1350
01:15:14,383 --> 01:15:17,352
in which you show that people
are totally isolated now...

1351
01:15:17,453 --> 01:15:20,650
and they can't reach each other,
and their lives are desperate?

1352
01:15:20,757 --> 01:15:24,124
Or how does it affect them to see a play
that shows that our world...

1353
01:15:24,227 --> 01:15:28,391
is full of nothing but shocking
sexual events, and terror, and violence?

1354
01:15:28,498 --> 01:15:30,762
Does that help to wake up
a sleeping audience?

1355
01:15:30,867 --> 01:15:33,995
See, I don't think so,
'cause I think it's very likely...

1356
01:15:34,103 --> 01:15:37,129
that the picture of the world that you're
showing them in a play like that...

1357
01:15:37,240 --> 01:15:40,266
is exactly the picture of the world
they have already.

1358
01:15:40,376 --> 01:15:43,174
I mean, you know, they know
their own lives and relationships...

1359
01:15:43,279 --> 01:15:45,247
are difficult and painful.

1360
01:15:45,348 --> 01:15:47,509
And if they watch the evening news
on television...

1361
01:15:47,617 --> 01:15:50,745
well, there what they see
is a terrifying, chaotic universe...

1362
01:15:50,853 --> 01:15:54,880
full of rapes and murders
and hands cut off by subway cars...

1363
01:15:54,991 --> 01:15:58,518
and children pushing their parents
out of windows.

1364
01:15:58,628 --> 01:16:01,893
So the play tells them that
their impression of the world is correct...

1365
01:16:01,998 --> 01:16:03,966
and that there's absolutely no way out.

1366
01:16:04,066 --> 01:16:05,966
There's nothing they can do.

1367
01:16:06,068 --> 01:16:09,003
And they end up feeling
passive and impotent.

1368
01:16:09,105 --> 01:16:11,573
I mean, look- look, at something
like that christening...

1369
01:16:11,674 --> 01:16:13,972
that my group arranged for me
in the forest in Poland.

1370
01:16:14,076 --> 01:16:17,068
Well, there was an example of something
that really had all the elements of theater.

1371
01:16:17,180 --> 01:16:20,343
It was worked on carefully.
It was thought about carefully.

1372
01:16:20,449 --> 01:16:22,815
It was done with
exquisite taste and magic.

1373
01:16:22,919 --> 01:16:25,046
And they, in fact, created something...

1374
01:16:25,154 --> 01:16:28,885
which, in this case, was, in a way,
just for an audience of one -just for me.

1375
01:16:28,991 --> 01:16:32,859
But they created something
that had ritual, love, surprise...

1376
01:16:32,962 --> 01:16:34,930
denouement,
beginning, a middle and end...

1377
01:16:35,031 --> 01:16:38,296
and was an incredibly beautiful
piece of theater.

1378
01:16:38,401 --> 01:16:40,596
And the impact that it had
on its audience - on me -

1379
01:16:40,703 --> 01:16:43,001
was somehow a totally positive one.

1380
01:16:43,105 --> 01:16:45,573
It didn't deaden me.
It brought me to life.

1381
01:16:48,477 --> 01:16:50,741
Yeah, but I mean, are you saying
that it's impossible -

1382
01:16:50,847 --> 01:16:54,977
I mean, uh - I mean -
I mean, uh, isn't it a little upsetting...

1383
01:16:55,084 --> 01:16:58,884
to come to the conclusion that there's
no way to wake people up anymore...

1384
01:16:58,988 --> 01:17:03,288
except to involve them in some kind
of a strange, uh, christening in Poland...

1385
01:17:03,392 --> 01:17:05,952
or some kind of a strange experience
on top of Mount Everest?

1386
01:17:06,062 --> 01:17:10,431
I mean, uh, because, uh,
you know that the awful thing is...

1387
01:17:10,533 --> 01:17:12,728
if you really say that it's-it's necessary...

1388
01:17:12,835 --> 01:17:15,360
to, uh, take everybody to, uh, Everest...

1389
01:17:15,471 --> 01:17:19,464
it's really tough, because everybody
can't be taken to Everest.

1390
01:17:19,575 --> 01:17:22,772
I mean, there must have been periods in history
when it would have been possible...

1391
01:17:22,879 --> 01:17:25,814
to, uh, save the patient
through less drastic measures.

1392
01:17:25,915 --> 01:17:28,509
I mean, there must have been periods
when in order to give people...

1393
01:17:28,618 --> 01:17:30,586
a strong or meaningful experience...

1394
01:17:30,686 --> 01:17:33,655
you wouldn't actually have to
take them to Everest.

1395
01:17:33,756 --> 01:17:36,054
But you do now.
In some way or other, you do now.

1396
01:17:36,158 --> 01:17:38,956
You know, there was a time when you
could have just, for instance, written...

1397
01:17:39,061 --> 01:17:42,462
I don't know,
uh, <i>Sense and Sensibility</i> byJane Austen.

1398
01:17:42,565 --> 01:17:46,194
And I'm sure the people who read it had
a pretty strong experience. I'm sure they did.

1399
01:17:46,302 --> 01:17:48,964
I mean, all right, now you're saying
that people today wouldn't get it.

1400
01:17:49,071 --> 01:17:52,700
Maybe that's true. But I mean, isn't there
any kind of writing or any kind of a play-

1401
01:17:52,808 --> 01:17:55,276
I mean, isn't it still legitimate
for writers...

1402
01:17:55,378 --> 01:17:58,643
to try to portray reality
so that people can see it?

1403
01:17:58,748 --> 01:18:02,809
I mean, really, tell me, why do we
require a trip to Mount Everest...

1404
01:18:02,919 --> 01:18:05,217
in order to be able to perceive
one moment of reality?

1405
01:18:05,321 --> 01:18:08,119
I mean - I mean, is Mount Everest
more real than New York?

1406
01:18:08,224 --> 01:18:10,249
I mean, isn't New York real?

1407
01:18:10,359 --> 01:18:14,455
I mean, you see, I think if you
could become fully aware...

1408
01:18:14,563 --> 01:18:18,021
of what existed in the cigar store
next door to this restaurant...

1409
01:18:18,134 --> 01:18:20,102
I think it would just
blow your brains out.

1410
01:18:20,202 --> 01:18:22,693
I mean - I mean, isn't there
just as much reality to be perceived...

1411
01:18:22,805 --> 01:18:24,773
in a cigar store
as there is on Mount Everest?

1412
01:18:24,874 --> 01:18:26,466
I mean, what do you think?

1413
01:18:26,575 --> 01:18:29,237
I think that not only is there nothing
more real about Mount Everest...

1414
01:18:29,345 --> 01:18:31,370
I think there's nothing that different,
in a certain way.

1415
01:18:31,480 --> 01:18:33,971
I mean, because reality
is uniform, in a way...

1416
01:18:34,083 --> 01:18:36,051
so that if your-
if your perceptions are -

1417
01:18:36,152 --> 01:18:38,950
I mean, if your own mechanism
is operating correctly...

1418
01:18:39,055 --> 01:18:42,354
it would become irrelevant to go
to Mount Everest, and sort of absurd...

1419
01:18:42,458 --> 01:18:45,256
because, I mean - it just -
I mean, of course, on some level, I mean...

1420
01:18:45,361 --> 01:18:48,956
obviously it's very different
from a cigar store on 7th Avenue.

1421
01:18:49,065 --> 01:18:52,262
- But I mean -
- Well, I agree with you, Wally.

1422
01:18:52,368 --> 01:18:55,030
But the problem is that people
can't see the cigar store now.

1423
01:18:55,137 --> 01:18:57,605
I mean, things don't affect people
the way they used to.

1424
01:18:57,707 --> 01:19:00,107
I mean, it may very well be
that 10 years from now...

1425
01:19:00,209 --> 01:19:02,939
people will pay $10,000 in cash
to be castrated...

1426
01:19:03,045 --> 01:19:05,673
just in order to be affected by something.

1427
01:19:07,283 --> 01:19:10,377
Well, why-why do you think that is?
I mean, why is that?

1428
01:19:10,486 --> 01:19:14,946
I mean, is it just because people
are lazy today, or they're bored?

1429
01:19:15,057 --> 01:19:18,151
I mean, are we just
like bored, spoiled children...

1430
01:19:18,260 --> 01:19:20,751
who've just been lying
in the bathtub all day...

1431
01:19:20,863 --> 01:19:23,161
just playing with their plastic duck...

1432
01:19:23,265 --> 01:19:26,632
and now they're just thinking,
"Well, what can I do?"

1433
01:19:28,204 --> 01:19:30,968
Okay. Yes. We're bored.

1434
01:19:31,040 --> 01:19:33,008
We're all bored now.

1435
01:19:33,109 --> 01:19:35,304
But has it every occurred to you, Wally,
that the process...

1436
01:19:35,411 --> 01:19:37,902
that creates this boredom
that we see in the world now...

1437
01:19:38,014 --> 01:19:42,383
may very well be a self-perpetuating,
unconscious form of brainwashing...

1438
01:19:42,485 --> 01:19:45,716
created by a world totalitarian government
based on money...

1439
01:19:45,821 --> 01:19:48,449
and that all of this is much more dangerous
than one thinks...

1440
01:19:48,557 --> 01:19:51,390
and it's not just a question
of individual survival, Wally...

1441
01:19:51,494 --> 01:19:53,894
but that somebody who's bored
is asleep...

1442
01:19:53,996 --> 01:19:57,124
and somebody who's asleep
will not say no?

1443
01:19:57,233 --> 01:20:00,031
See, I keep meeting these people -
I mean, uh, just a few days ago...

1444
01:20:00,136 --> 01:20:02,070
I met this man whom I greatly admire.

1445
01:20:02,171 --> 01:20:04,469
He's a Swedish physicist.
Gustav Björnstrand.

1446
01:20:04,573 --> 01:20:07,098
And he told me that he
no longer watches television...

1447
01:20:07,209 --> 01:20:10,110
he doesn't read newspapers,
and he doesn't read magazines.

1448
01:20:10,212 --> 01:20:12,476
He's completely
cut them out of his life...

1449
01:20:12,581 --> 01:20:17,041
because he really does feel that we're living
in some kind of Orwellian nightmare now...

1450
01:20:17,153 --> 01:20:21,180
and that everything that you hear now
contributes to turning you into a robot.

1451
01:20:22,291 --> 01:20:25,920
And when I was at Findhorn, I met
this extraordinary English tree expert...

1452
01:20:26,028 --> 01:20:28,121
who had devoted his life
to saving trees.

1453
01:20:28,230 --> 01:20:30,596
Just got back from Washington,
lobbying to save the redwoods.

1454
01:20:30,699 --> 01:20:33,532
He's 84 years old,
and he always travels with a backpack...

1455
01:20:33,636 --> 01:20:35,604
'cause he never knows
where he's gonna be tomorrow.

1456
01:20:35,704 --> 01:20:38,696
And when I met him at Findhorn,
he said to me, "Where are you from?"

1457
01:20:38,808 --> 01:20:41,834
I said, "New York." He said, "Ah, New York.
Yes, that's a very interesting place.

1458
01:20:41,944 --> 01:20:45,846
Do you know a lot of New Yorkers who keep
talking about the fact that they want to leave,
but never do?"

1459
01:20:45,948 --> 01:20:48,576
And I said, "Oh, yes." And he said,
"Why do you think they don't leave?"

1460
01:20:48,684 --> 01:20:52,552
I gave him different banal theories.
He said, "Oh, I don't think it's that way at all."

1461
01:20:52,655 --> 01:20:57,217
He said, "I think that New York is the new
model for the new concentration camp...

1462
01:20:57,326 --> 01:20:59,760
"where the camp has been built
by the inmates themselves...

1463
01:20:59,862 --> 01:21:03,423
"and the inmates are the guards, and they
have this pride in this thing they've built.

1464
01:21:03,532 --> 01:21:05,432
"They've built their own prison.

1465
01:21:05,534 --> 01:21:07,525
"And so they exist
in a state of schizophrenia...

1466
01:21:07,636 --> 01:21:09,536
"where they are both guards
and prisoners.

1467
01:21:09,638 --> 01:21:13,005
"And as a result, they no longer have -
having been lobotomized -

1468
01:21:13,109 --> 01:21:15,475
"the capacity to leave
the prison they've made...

1469
01:21:15,578 --> 01:21:18,445
or to even see it as a prison."

1470
01:21:18,547 --> 01:21:21,744
And then he went into his pocket,
and he took out a seed for a tree...

1471
01:21:21,851 --> 01:21:23,785
and he said, "This is a pine tree."

1472
01:21:23,886 --> 01:21:27,481
He put it in my hand and he said,
"Escape before it's too late."

1473
01:21:28,757 --> 01:21:31,419
See, actually,
for two or three years now...

1474
01:21:31,527 --> 01:21:35,793
Chiquita and I have had this very unpleasant
feeling that we really should get out.

1475
01:21:35,898 --> 01:21:38,662
We really feel likeJews in Germany
in the late '30s.

1476
01:21:38,767 --> 01:21:40,667
Get out of here.

1477
01:21:40,769 --> 01:21:42,828
Of course, the problem is
where to go.

1478
01:21:42,938 --> 01:21:47,739
'Cause it seems quite obvious that the
whole world is going in the same direction.

1479
01:21:49,812 --> 01:21:53,077
See, I think it's quite possible
that the 1960s...

1480
01:21:53,182 --> 01:21:57,881
represented the last burst of the human being
before he was extinguished...

1481
01:21:57,987 --> 01:22:00,649
and that this is the beginning
of the rest of the future, now...

1482
01:22:00,756 --> 01:22:04,817
and that from now on there'll simply be
all these robots walking around...

1483
01:22:04,927 --> 01:22:07,225
feeling nothing, thinking nothing.

1484
01:22:07,329 --> 01:22:10,264
And there'll be nobody left almost
to remind them...

1485
01:22:10,366 --> 01:22:13,631
that there once was a species
called a human being...

1486
01:22:13,736 --> 01:22:15,704
with feelings and thoughts...

1487
01:22:15,804 --> 01:22:18,637
and that history and memory
are right now being erased...

1488
01:22:18,741 --> 01:22:21,642
and soon nobody
will really remember...

1489
01:22:21,744 --> 01:22:23,939
that life existed on the planet.

1490
01:22:25,614 --> 01:22:30,051
Now, of course, Björnstrand feels
that there's really almost no hope...

1491
01:22:30,152 --> 01:22:33,519
and that we're probably
going back to a very savage...

1492
01:22:33,622 --> 01:22:36,648
lawless, terrifying period.

1493
01:22:36,759 --> 01:22:39,193
Findhorn people
see it a little differently.

1494
01:22:39,295 --> 01:22:42,128
They're feeling that there'll be
these pockets of light...

1495
01:22:42,231 --> 01:22:44,290
springing up
in different parts of the world...

1496
01:22:44,400 --> 01:22:48,700
and that these will be, in a way,
invisible planets on this planet...

1497
01:22:48,804 --> 01:22:51,295
and that as we, or the world,
grow colder...

1498
01:22:51,407 --> 01:22:55,002
we can take invisible space journeys
to these different planets...

1499
01:22:55,110 --> 01:22:58,546
refuel for what it is we need to do
on the planet itself...

1500
01:22:58,647 --> 01:23:00,945
and come back.

1501
01:23:01,050 --> 01:23:03,917
And it's their feeling that
there have to be centers now...

1502
01:23:04,019 --> 01:23:08,319
where people can come and reconstruct
a new future for the world.

1503
01:23:08,424 --> 01:23:10,392
And when I was talking
to, uh, Gustav Björnstrand...

1504
01:23:10,492 --> 01:23:13,723
he was saying that actually these centers
are growing up everywhere now...

1505
01:23:13,829 --> 01:23:16,821
and that what they're trying to do,
which is what Findhorn was trying to do...

1506
01:23:16,932 --> 01:23:19,127
and, in a way, what I was trying to do -

1507
01:23:19,235 --> 01:23:21,567
I mean,
these things can't be given names...

1508
01:23:21,670 --> 01:23:25,868
but in a way, these are all attempts
at creating a new kind of school...

1509
01:23:25,975 --> 01:23:28,170
or a new kind of monastery.

1510
01:23:28,277 --> 01:23:30,745
And Björnstrand talks about
the concept of"reserves" -

1511
01:23:30,846 --> 01:23:33,610
islands of safety where history
can be remembered...

1512
01:23:33,716 --> 01:23:36,276
and the human being
can continue to function...

1513
01:23:36,385 --> 01:23:40,014
in order to maintain the species
through a dark age.

1514
01:23:42,124 --> 01:23:44,456
In other words, we're talking
about an underground...

1515
01:23:44,560 --> 01:23:47,188
which did exist in a different way
during the Dark Ages...

1516
01:23:47,296 --> 01:23:49,992
among the mystical orders
of the church.

1517
01:23:50,099 --> 01:23:52,192
And the purpose of this underground...

1518
01:23:52,301 --> 01:23:57,466
is to find out how to preserve
the light, life, the culture...

1519
01:23:57,573 --> 01:24:01,009
how to keep things living.

1520
01:24:01,110 --> 01:24:04,011
You see, I keep thinking
that what we need...

1521
01:24:04,113 --> 01:24:06,911
is a new language -

1522
01:24:07,016 --> 01:24:09,143
a language of the heart...

1523
01:24:09,251 --> 01:24:13,187
a language, as in the Polish forest,
where language wasn't needed.

1524
01:24:13,289 --> 01:24:18,226
Some kind of language between people
that is a new kind of poetry...

1525
01:24:18,327 --> 01:24:22,855
that's the poetry of the dancing bee
that tells us where the honey is.

1526
01:24:22,965 --> 01:24:26,025
And I think that in order
to create that language...

1527
01:24:26,135 --> 01:24:29,627
you're going to have to learn how
you can go through a looking glass...

1528
01:24:29,738 --> 01:24:31,706
into another kind of perception...

1529
01:24:31,807 --> 01:24:36,710
where you have that sense
of being united to all things...

1530
01:24:36,812 --> 01:24:40,009
and suddenly you understand everything.

1531
01:24:49,158 --> 01:24:51,422
Are you ready for some dessert?

1532
01:24:51,527 --> 01:24:53,654
Uh, I think I'll just have an espresso.
Thank you.

1533
01:24:53,762 --> 01:24:57,698
- Very good.
- I'll - I'll also have one. Thank you.

1534
01:24:57,800 --> 01:25:01,099
And -And, uh, could I also
have, uh, an amaretto?

1535
01:25:01,203 --> 01:25:03,831
Certainly, sir.

1536
01:25:03,939 --> 01:25:06,032
Thank you.

1537
01:25:06,141 --> 01:25:10,407
You see, Wally, there's this incredible
building that they built at Findhorn.

1538
01:25:10,512 --> 01:25:13,106
And the man who designed it
had never designed anything in his life.

1539
01:25:13,215 --> 01:25:15,149
He wrote children's books.

1540
01:25:15,250 --> 01:25:18,413
And some people wanted it to be
a sort of hall of meditation...

1541
01:25:18,520 --> 01:25:20,920
and others wanted it to be
a kind of lecture hall.

1542
01:25:21,023 --> 01:25:25,084
But the psychic part of the community
wanted it to serve another function as well...

1543
01:25:25,194 --> 01:25:28,789
because they wanted it to be a kind
of spaceship which at night could rise up...

1544
01:25:28,897 --> 01:25:31,661
and let the U.F.O.'s know that this
was a safe place to land...

1545
01:25:31,767 --> 01:25:33,735
and that they would find friends there.

1546
01:25:33,836 --> 01:25:37,602
So, the problem was -
'cause it needed a massive kind of roof-

1547
01:25:37,706 --> 01:25:40,766
was how to have a roof
that would stay on the building...

1548
01:25:40,876 --> 01:25:44,312
but at the same time be able to fly up
at night and meet the flying saucers.

1549
01:25:44,413 --> 01:25:47,143
So, the architect
meditated and meditated...

1550
01:25:47,249 --> 01:25:50,047
and he finally came up with
the very simple solution...

1551
01:25:50,152 --> 01:25:52,450
of not actually joining the roof
to the building...

1552
01:25:52,554 --> 01:25:54,522
which means that it should fall off...

1553
01:25:54,623 --> 01:25:57,751
because they have great gales
up in northern Scotland.

1554
01:25:57,860 --> 01:26:01,352
So, to keep it from falling off,
he got beach stones from the beach -

1555
01:26:01,463 --> 01:26:04,227
or we did,
'cause I-I worked on this building -

1556
01:26:04,333 --> 01:26:06,392
all up and down the roof,
just like that.

1557
01:26:06,502 --> 01:26:10,802
And the idea was that the energy
that would flow from stone to stone...

1558
01:26:10,906 --> 01:26:12,874
would be so strong, you see...

1559
01:26:12,975 --> 01:26:16,274
that it would keep the roof down
under any conditions...

1560
01:26:16,378 --> 01:26:20,872
but at the same time, if the roof needed
to go up, it would be light enough to go up.

1561
01:26:20,983 --> 01:26:24,646
Well -
it works, you see.

1562
01:26:24,753 --> 01:26:27,313
Now, architects
don't know why it works...

1563
01:26:27,423 --> 01:26:29,391
and it shouldn't work,
'cause it should fall off.

1564
01:26:29,491 --> 01:26:31,391
But it works. It does work.

1565
01:26:31,493 --> 01:26:35,190
The gales blow, and the roof should fall off,
but it doesn't fall off.

1566
01:26:39,868 --> 01:26:41,768
Yep.

1567
01:26:41,870 --> 01:26:43,770
Well, uh...

1568
01:26:44,907 --> 01:26:47,603
do you want to know
my actual response to all this?

1569
01:26:47,709 --> 01:26:50,007
- Do you want to hear my actual response?
- Yes!

1570
01:26:51,814 --> 01:26:54,078
See, my actual response -
I mean -

1571
01:26:54,183 --> 01:26:59,246
I mean - I mean,
I'm just trying to - to survive, you know?

1572
01:26:59,354 --> 01:27:02,482
I mean,
I'm just trying to earn a living...

1573
01:27:02,591 --> 01:27:05,219
just trying to pay my rent and my bills.

1574
01:27:05,327 --> 01:27:07,693
I mean, uh -

1575
01:27:07,796 --> 01:27:11,129
Ah, I live my life.

1576
01:27:11,233 --> 01:27:14,293
I enjoy staying home with Debby.

1577
01:27:14,403 --> 01:27:17,236
I'm reading Charlton Heston's
autobiography.

1578
01:27:17,339 --> 01:27:18,966
And that's that.

1579
01:27:19,074 --> 01:27:21,975
I mean, you know -
I mean, occasionally, maybe...

1580
01:27:22,077 --> 01:27:26,514
Debby and I will step outside,
we'll go to a party or something.

1581
01:27:26,615 --> 01:27:30,051
And if I can occasionally get my little talent
together and write a little play...

1582
01:27:30,152 --> 01:27:32,347
well, then that's just -
that's just wonderful.

1583
01:27:32,454 --> 01:27:35,423
And I mean, I enjoy reading about
other little plays people have written...

1584
01:27:35,524 --> 01:27:38,891
and reading the reviews of those plays
and what people said about them...

1585
01:27:38,994 --> 01:27:42,191
and what people said
about what people said.

1586
01:27:42,297 --> 01:27:46,734
And I mean, I have - I have a list of errands
and responsibilities that I keep in a notebook.

1587
01:27:46,835 --> 01:27:49,303
I enjoy going through the notebook...

1588
01:27:49,404 --> 01:27:51,804
carrying out the responsibilities,
doing the errands...

1589
01:27:51,907 --> 01:27:55,070
and crossing them off the list.

1590
01:27:55,177 --> 01:27:59,614
And, I mean, I just - I just don't know
how anybody could enjoy anything more...

1591
01:27:59,715 --> 01:28:04,084
than I enjoy, uh, reading
Charlton Heston's autobiography...

1592
01:28:04,186 --> 01:28:06,984
or, uh, you know, uh,
getting up in the morning...

1593
01:28:07,089 --> 01:28:10,581
and having the cup of cold coffee
that's been waiting for me all night...

1594
01:28:10,692 --> 01:28:13,160
still there for me
to drink in the morning...

1595
01:28:13,262 --> 01:28:16,663
and no cockroach or fly
has-has died in it overnight.

1596
01:28:16,765 --> 01:28:19,427
I mean, I'm just so thrilled
when I get up...

1597
01:28:19,535 --> 01:28:22,993
and I see that coffee there,
just the way I wanted it.

1598
01:28:23,105 --> 01:28:25,369
I mean, I just can't imagine...

1599
01:28:25,474 --> 01:28:28,034
how anybody could enjoy something else
any more than that.

1600
01:28:28,143 --> 01:28:31,977
I mean - I mean, obviously, if the cockroach -
if there <i>is</i> a dead cockroach in it...

1601
01:28:32,080 --> 01:28:34,844
well, then I just have a feeling
of disappointment, and I'm sad.

1602
01:28:34,950 --> 01:28:38,078
But I mean, I - I just -
I just don't think...

1603
01:28:38,186 --> 01:28:40,450
I feel the need for anything more
than all this.

1604
01:28:40,556 --> 01:28:43,150
Whereas, you know,
you seem to be saying...

1605
01:28:43,258 --> 01:28:46,159
that, uh...

1606
01:28:46,261 --> 01:28:49,628
it's inconceivable that anybody could
be having a meaningful life today...

1607
01:28:49,731 --> 01:28:51,858
and, you know,
everyone is totally destroyed...

1608
01:28:51,967 --> 01:28:54,527
and we all need to live
in these outposts.

1609
01:28:54,636 --> 01:28:57,264
But I mean, you know,
I just can't believe - even for you -

1610
01:28:57,372 --> 01:29:00,705
I mean, don't you find - Isn't it pleasant
just to get up in the morning...

1611
01:29:00,809 --> 01:29:04,245
and there's Chiquita,
there are the children...

1612
01:29:04,346 --> 01:29:06,780
and <i>The Times</i> is delivered,
you can read it.

1613
01:29:06,882 --> 01:29:09,749
I mean, maybe you'll direct a play,
maybe you won't direct a play.

1614
01:29:09,851 --> 01:29:12,479
But forget about the play
that you may or may not direct.

1615
01:29:12,588 --> 01:29:17,150
Why is it necessary to -Why not lean back
and just enjoy these details?

1616
01:29:17,259 --> 01:29:21,787
I mean, and there'd be a delicious cup
of coffee and a piece of coffeecake.

1617
01:29:21,897 --> 01:29:24,559
I mean, why is it necessary
to have more than this...

1618
01:29:24,666 --> 01:29:26,998
or to even think about
having more than this?

1619
01:29:27,102 --> 01:29:30,401
I mean, I don't really know
what you're talking about.

1620
01:29:31,707 --> 01:29:34,335
I mean - I mean,
I know what you're talking about...

1621
01:29:34,443 --> 01:29:37,241
but I don't <i>really</i> know
what you're talking about.

1622
01:29:37,346 --> 01:29:40,543
And I mean, you know, even if I were
to totally agree with you, you know...

1623
01:29:40,649 --> 01:29:43,846
and even if I were to accept the idea
that there's just no way for anybody...

1624
01:29:43,952 --> 01:29:45,977
to have personal happiness now...

1625
01:29:46,088 --> 01:29:48,454
well, you know,
I still couldn't accept the idea...

1626
01:29:48,557 --> 01:29:51,185
that the way to make life wonderful
would be to just totally...

1627
01:29:51,293 --> 01:29:53,591
you know,
reject Western civilization...

1628
01:29:53,695 --> 01:29:57,028
and fall back into some kind of belief
in some kind of weird something -

1629
01:29:57,132 --> 01:29:59,532
I mean, I don't even know how
to begin talking about this...

1630
01:29:59,635 --> 01:30:02,968
but you know, in the Middle Ages...

1631
01:30:03,071 --> 01:30:06,632
before the arrival of
scientific thinking as we know it today...

1632
01:30:06,742 --> 01:30:09,040
well, people could believe anything.

1633
01:30:09,144 --> 01:30:11,738
Anything could be true -
the statue of the Virgin Mary...

1634
01:30:11,847 --> 01:30:13,906
could speak or bleed
or whatever it was.

1635
01:30:14,016 --> 01:30:15,984
But the wonderful thing
that happened...

1636
01:30:16,084 --> 01:30:19,053
was that then in the development
of science in the Western world...

1637
01:30:19,154 --> 01:30:23,887
certain things did come slowly
to be known and understood.

1638
01:30:23,992 --> 01:30:26,552
I mean, you know...

1639
01:30:26,662 --> 01:30:30,098
obviously, all ideas in science
are constantly being revised.

1640
01:30:30,198 --> 01:30:32,098
I mean, that's the whole point.

1641
01:30:32,200 --> 01:30:37,160
But we do at least know that the universe
has some shape and order...

1642
01:30:37,272 --> 01:30:41,766
and that, uh, you know, trees do not
turn into people or goddesses...

1643
01:30:41,877 --> 01:30:44,175
and there are very good reasons
why they don't...

1644
01:30:44,279 --> 01:30:46,543
and you can't just believe
absolutely anything.

1645
01:30:46,648 --> 01:30:48,548
Whereas, the things
that you're talking about -

1646
01:30:48,650 --> 01:30:52,177
I mean - I mean, you found
the handprint in the book...

1647
01:30:52,287 --> 01:30:56,246
and there were - there were three Andrés
and one Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.

1648
01:30:56,358 --> 01:30:59,122
And to me that is a coincidence.

1649
01:30:59,227 --> 01:31:02,162
But -And-And then, you know,
the people who put that book together...

1650
01:31:02,264 --> 01:31:04,459
well, they had their own reasons
for putting it together.

1651
01:31:04,566 --> 01:31:07,763
But to you it was significant, as if that book
had been written 40 years ago...

1652
01:31:07,869 --> 01:31:11,828
so that you would see it,
as if it was planned for you, in a way.

1653
01:31:11,940 --> 01:31:13,999
I mean, really- I mean -

1654
01:31:14,109 --> 01:31:18,637
I mean, all right, let's say, if I get
a fortune cookie in a Chinese restaurant...

1655
01:31:18,747 --> 01:31:20,738
I mean, of course,
even I have a tendency-

1656
01:31:20,849 --> 01:31:23,647
I mean, you know - I mean, of course,
I would hardly throw it out.

1657
01:31:23,752 --> 01:31:26,721
I mean, I read it.
I read it, and - and, uh -

1658
01:31:26,822 --> 01:31:30,053
I just instinctively sort of-
You know, if it says something like, uh...

1659
01:31:30,158 --> 01:31:33,787
"A conversation with a dark-haired man
will be very important for you"...

1660
01:31:33,895 --> 01:31:36,887
well, I just instinctively think, you know,
"Who do I know who has dark hair?

1661
01:31:36,998 --> 01:31:39,762
Did we have a conversation?
What did we talk about?"

1662
01:31:39,868 --> 01:31:44,168
In other words, uh, there's something
in me that makes me read it...

1663
01:31:44,272 --> 01:31:47,901
and I instinctively interpret it
as if it were an omen of the future.

1664
01:31:48,009 --> 01:31:51,536
But in my conscious opinion, which is
so fundamental to my whole view of life -

1665
01:31:51,646 --> 01:31:54,809
I mean, I would just have to change totally
to not have this opinion.

1666
01:31:54,916 --> 01:31:56,884
In my conscious opinion,
this is simply something...

1667
01:31:56,985 --> 01:32:01,149
that was written in the cookie factory
several years ago and in no way refers to me.

1668
01:32:01,256 --> 01:32:03,986
I mean, you know,
the - the fact that I got it -

1669
01:32:04,092 --> 01:32:06,822
I mean, the man who wrote it
did not know anything about me.

1670
01:32:06,928 --> 01:32:08,919
I mean, he could not have known
anything about me.

1671
01:32:09,030 --> 01:32:11,658
There's no way that this cookie
could actually have to do with me.

1672
01:32:11,767 --> 01:32:14,292
And the fact that I've gotten it
is just basically a joke.

1673
01:32:14,402 --> 01:32:17,200
And I mean, if I were gonna go
on a trip on an airplane...

1674
01:32:17,305 --> 01:32:19,296
and I got a fortune cookie
that said "Don't go"...

1675
01:32:19,407 --> 01:32:23,173
I mean, of course, I admit I might feel
a bit nervous for about one second.

1676
01:32:23,278 --> 01:32:25,746
But in fact, I would go because,
I mean...

1677
01:32:25,847 --> 01:32:28,281
that trip is gonna be successful
or unsuccessful...

1678
01:32:28,383 --> 01:32:30,977
based on the state of the airplane
and the state of the pilot.

1679
01:32:31,086 --> 01:32:33,816
And the cookie is in no position
to know about that.

1680
01:32:33,922 --> 01:32:35,822
And I mean, you know, it's the same...

1681
01:32:35,924 --> 01:32:38,688
with any kind of, uh, prophecy,
or a sign, or an omen.

1682
01:32:38,794 --> 01:32:43,163
Because if you believe in omens,
then that means that the universe -

1683
01:32:43,265 --> 01:32:45,665
I mean, I don't even know how
to begin to describe this.

1684
01:32:45,767 --> 01:32:49,225
That means that the future
is somehow sending messages...

1685
01:32:49,337 --> 01:32:51,396
backwards to the present.

1686
01:32:51,506 --> 01:32:54,805
Which-Which means that the future
must exist in some sense already...

1687
01:32:54,910 --> 01:32:57,879
in order to be able
to send these messages.

1688
01:32:57,979 --> 01:33:02,109
And it also means that things in the universe
are there for a purpose - to give us messages.

1689
01:33:02,217 --> 01:33:04,617
Whereas I think that things
in the universe are just there.

1690
01:33:04,719 --> 01:33:06,619
I mean, they don't mean anything.

1691
01:33:06,721 --> 01:33:11,181
I mean, you know, if the turtle's egg falls out
of the tree and splashes on the paving stones...

1692
01:33:11,293 --> 01:33:14,353
it's just because that turtle was clumsy-
by accident.

1693
01:33:14,462 --> 01:33:18,558
And-And to decide whether to send
my ships off to war on the basis of that...

1694
01:33:18,667 --> 01:33:20,726
seems a big mistake to me.

1695
01:33:20,836 --> 01:33:24,431
Well, what information would
you send your ships to war on?

1696
01:33:24,539 --> 01:33:26,234
Because if it's all meaningless...

1697
01:33:26,341 --> 01:33:28,332
what's the difference whether
you accept the fortune cookie...

1698
01:33:28,443 --> 01:33:30,468
or the statistics
of the Ford Foundation?

1699
01:33:30,579 --> 01:33:32,547
It doesn't seem to matter.

1700
01:33:32,647 --> 01:33:36,777
Well, the meaningless fact
of the fortune cookie or the turtle's egg...

1701
01:33:36,885 --> 01:33:40,651
can't possibly have any relevance
to the subject you're analyzing.

1702
01:33:40,755 --> 01:33:43,986
Whereas a group of meaningless facts
that are collected and interpreted...

1703
01:33:44,092 --> 01:33:47,493
in a scientific way
may quite possibly be relevant.

1704
01:33:47,596 --> 01:33:50,258
Because the wonderful thing
about scientific theories about things...

1705
01:33:50,365 --> 01:33:53,960
is that they're based on experiments
that can be repeated.

1706
01:33:55,070 --> 01:33:56,970
Hmm.

1707
01:34:11,920 --> 01:34:14,013
Well, it's true, Wally.

1708
01:34:14,122 --> 01:34:16,818
I mean, you know,
following omens and so on...

1709
01:34:16,925 --> 01:34:19,655
is probably just a way
of letting ourselves off the hook...

1710
01:34:19,761 --> 01:34:24,061
so that we don't have to take individual
responsibility for our own actions.

1711
01:34:24,165 --> 01:34:26,463
But I mean, giving yourself over
to the unconscious...

1712
01:34:26,568 --> 01:34:31,870
can leave you vulnerable to all sorts
of very frightening manipulation.

1713
01:34:31,973 --> 01:34:35,306
And in all the work that I was involved in,
there was always that danger.

1714
01:34:35,410 --> 01:34:38,937
And there was always that question
of tampering with people's lives...

1715
01:34:39,047 --> 01:34:42,676
because if I lead one of these workshops,
then I do become partly a doctor...

1716
01:34:42,784 --> 01:34:44,877
and partly a therapist,
and partly a priest.

1717
01:34:44,986 --> 01:34:49,389
And I'm not a doctor,
or a therapist, or a priest.

1718
01:34:49,491 --> 01:34:52,051
And already some
of these new monasteries...

1719
01:34:52,160 --> 01:34:54,720
or communities or whatever
we've been talking about...

1720
01:34:54,829 --> 01:34:56,854
are becoming institutionalized...

1721
01:34:56,965 --> 01:35:00,162
and I guess even in a way, at times,
sort of fascistic.

1722
01:35:00,268 --> 01:35:04,295
You know, there's a sort of self-satisfied
elitist paranoia that grows up -

1723
01:35:04,406 --> 01:35:07,432
a feeling of"them" and "us" -
that is very unsettling.

1724
01:35:07,542 --> 01:35:11,740
But I mean, uh, the thing is, Wally, I think
it's the exaggerated worship of science...

1725
01:35:11,846 --> 01:35:13,814
that has led us into this situation.

1726
01:35:13,915 --> 01:35:16,509
I mean, science has been held up to us
as a magical force...

1727
01:35:16,618 --> 01:35:18,586
that would somehow solve everything.

1728
01:35:18,687 --> 01:35:20,882
Well, quite the contrary.
It's done quite the contrary.

1729
01:35:20,989 --> 01:35:22,957
It's destroyed everything.

1730
01:35:23,058 --> 01:35:25,026
So that is what has really led,
I think...

1731
01:35:25,126 --> 01:35:29,085
to this very strong, deep reaction
against science that we're seeing now...

1732
01:35:29,197 --> 01:35:31,893
just as the Nazi demons that were
released in the '30s in Germany...

1733
01:35:32,000 --> 01:35:35,800
were probably a reaction against
a certain oppressive kind of knowledge...

1734
01:35:35,904 --> 01:35:38,338
and culture and rational thinking.

1735
01:35:38,440 --> 01:35:41,967
So I agree that we're talking about
something potentially very dangerous.

1736
01:35:42,077 --> 01:35:45,308
But modern science has not been
particularly less dangerous.

1737
01:35:45,413 --> 01:35:47,347
Right. Well, I agree with you.

1738
01:35:47,449 --> 01:35:49,417
I completely agree.

1739
01:35:51,286 --> 01:35:53,754
No, you know, the truth is...

1740
01:35:53,855 --> 01:35:57,985
I think I do know what really disturbs me
about the work you've described...

1741
01:35:58,093 --> 01:36:01,085
and I don't even know if I can express it.

1742
01:36:01,196 --> 01:36:05,064
But somehow it seems that the whole point
of the work that you did in those workshops...

1743
01:36:05,166 --> 01:36:09,068
when you get right down to it
and you ask what was it really about -

1744
01:36:09,170 --> 01:36:11,104
The whole point, really, I think...

1745
01:36:11,206 --> 01:36:14,334
was to enable the people in the workshops,
including yourself...

1746
01:36:14,442 --> 01:36:18,811
to somehow sort of strip away
every scrap of purposefulness...

1747
01:36:18,913 --> 01:36:21,438
from certain selected moments.

1748
01:36:21,549 --> 01:36:24,780
And the point of it was so that you would
then all be able to experience...

1749
01:36:24,886 --> 01:36:28,083
somehow just pure being.

1750
01:36:28,189 --> 01:36:32,057
In other words, you were trying
to discover what it would be like
to live for certain moments...

1751
01:36:32,160 --> 01:36:35,254
without having any particular thing
that you were supposed to be doing.

1752
01:36:35,363 --> 01:36:37,695
And I think
I just simply object to that.

1753
01:36:37,799 --> 01:36:40,893
I mean, I just don't think I accept the idea
that there should be moments...

1754
01:36:41,002 --> 01:36:43,163
in which you're not trying
to do anything.

1755
01:36:43,271 --> 01:36:47,264
I think, uh,
it's our nature, uh, to do things.

1756
01:36:47,375 --> 01:36:49,275
I think we should do things.

1757
01:36:49,377 --> 01:36:51,470
I think that, uh, purposefulness...

1758
01:36:51,579 --> 01:36:55,913
is part of our ineradicable
basic human structure.

1759
01:36:56,017 --> 01:36:58,815
And to say that we ought to
be able to live without it...

1760
01:36:58,920 --> 01:37:02,879
is like saying that, uh, a tree ought to
be able to live without branches or roots.

1761
01:37:02,991 --> 01:37:05,687
But - But actually, without branches
or roots, it wouldn't be a tree.

1762
01:37:05,794 --> 01:37:08,627
I mean, it would just be a log.
Do you see what I'm saying?

1763
01:37:08,730 --> 01:37:10,357
Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

1764
01:37:10,465 --> 01:37:13,832
I mean, in other words, if I'm sitting at home
and I have nothing to do...

1765
01:37:13,935 --> 01:37:15,835
well, I naturally reach for a book.

1766
01:37:15,937 --> 01:37:19,634
I mean, what would be so great about
just sitting there and, uh, doing nothing?

1767
01:37:19,741 --> 01:37:21,641
It just seems absurd.

1768
01:37:21,743 --> 01:37:23,301
And if Debby is there?

1769
01:37:24,579 --> 01:37:26,479
Well, that's just the same thing.

1770
01:37:26,581 --> 01:37:29,448
I mean, is there really
such a thing as, uh...

1771
01:37:29,551 --> 01:37:33,453
two people doing nothing
but just being together?

1772
01:37:33,555 --> 01:37:35,546
I mean, would they simply then...

1773
01:37:35,657 --> 01:37:38,717
be, uh, "relating,"
to use the word we're always using?

1774
01:37:38,827 --> 01:37:40,727
I mean, what would that mean?

1775
01:37:40,829 --> 01:37:42,797
I mean, either we're
gonna have a conversation...

1776
01:37:42,897 --> 01:37:45,024
or we're going to, uh,
carry out the garbage...

1777
01:37:45,133 --> 01:37:48,694
or we're going to do something,
separately or together.

1778
01:37:48,803 --> 01:37:50,703
I mean, do you see what I'm saying?

1779
01:37:50,805 --> 01:37:54,673
I mean, what does it mean
to just, uh, simply, uh, sit there?

1780
01:37:54,776 --> 01:37:57,074
That makes you nervous.

1781
01:37:57,178 --> 01:38:01,581
Well, well, why shouldn't it make me nervous?
It just seems ridiculous to me.

1782
01:38:01,683 --> 01:38:03,651
That's interesting, Wally.

1783
01:38:04,819 --> 01:38:08,619
You know, when I went to Ladakh in western
Tibet and stayed on a farm for a month...

1784
01:38:08,723 --> 01:38:12,591
well, there, you know, when people come over
in the evening for tea, nobody says anything.

1785
01:38:12,694 --> 01:38:14,787
Unless there's something to say,
but there almost never is.

1786
01:38:14,896 --> 01:38:18,423
So they just sit there and drink their tea,
and it doesn't seem to bother them.

1787
01:38:21,436 --> 01:38:24,200
I mean, you see, the trouble, Wally,
with always being active and doing things...

1788
01:38:24,305 --> 01:38:27,399
is that I think it's quite possible
to do all sorts of things...

1789
01:38:27,509 --> 01:38:30,910
and at the same time
be completely dead inside.

1790
01:38:31,012 --> 01:38:33,412
I mean, you're doing all these things,
but are you doing them...

1791
01:38:33,515 --> 01:38:35,608
because you really feel
an impulse to do them...

1792
01:38:35,717 --> 01:38:38,447
or are you doing them mechanically,
as we were saying before?

1793
01:38:38,553 --> 01:38:41,147
Because I really do believe
that if you're just living mechanically...

1794
01:38:41,256 --> 01:38:43,486
then you have to change your life.

1795
01:38:43,591 --> 01:38:46,583
I mean, you know, when you're young,
you go out on dates all the time.

1796
01:38:46,694 --> 01:38:49,595
You go dancing or something.
You're floating free.

1797
01:38:49,697 --> 01:38:52,825
And then one day suddenly
you find yourself in a relationship...

1798
01:38:52,934 --> 01:38:55,061
and suddenly everything freezes.

1799
01:38:55,170 --> 01:38:57,934
And this can be true
in your work as well.

1800
01:38:58,039 --> 01:39:00,837
And I mean, of course,
if you're really alive inside...

1801
01:39:00,942 --> 01:39:02,910
then of course there's no problem.

1802
01:39:03,011 --> 01:39:05,241
I mean, if you're living with somebody
in one little room...

1803
01:39:05,346 --> 01:39:08,144
and there's a life going on between you
and the person you're living with...

1804
01:39:08,249 --> 01:39:12,709
well, then a whole adventure
can be going on right in that room.

1805
01:39:12,820 --> 01:39:16,415
But there's always the danger
that things can go dead.

1806
01:39:16,524 --> 01:39:20,085
Then I really do think you have to kind of
become a hobo or something, you know...

1807
01:39:20,195 --> 01:39:22,322
like Kerouac,
and go out on the road.

1808
01:39:22,430 --> 01:39:24,591
I really believe that.

1809
01:39:24,699 --> 01:39:28,533
You know, it's not that wonderful
to spend your life on the road.

1810
01:39:28,636 --> 01:39:33,164
My own overwhelming preference
is to stay in that room if you can.

1811
01:39:33,274 --> 01:39:36,471
But you know, if you live with somebody for
a long time, people are constantly saying...

1812
01:39:36,578 --> 01:39:40,207
"Well, of course it's not as great
as it used to be, but that's only natural.

1813
01:39:40,315 --> 01:39:43,751
The first blush of a romance goes,
and that's the way it has to be."

1814
01:39:43,851 --> 01:39:47,048
Now, I totally disagree with that.

1815
01:39:47,155 --> 01:39:51,819
But I do think that you have to constantly ask
yourself the question, with total frankness:

1816
01:39:51,926 --> 01:39:54,019
Is your marriage still a marriage?

1817
01:39:54,128 --> 01:39:56,289
Is the sacramental element there?

1818
01:39:56,397 --> 01:39:58,991
Just as you have to ask about
the sacramental element in your work-

1819
01:39:59,100 --> 01:40:01,432
Is it still there?

1820
01:40:01,536 --> 01:40:04,198
I mean, it's a very frightening thing, Wally,
to have to suddenly realize...

1821
01:40:04,305 --> 01:40:08,537
that, my God, I thought I was living my life,
but in fact I haven't been a human being.

1822
01:40:08,643 --> 01:40:10,543
I've been a performer.

1823
01:40:10,645 --> 01:40:13,808
I haven't been living. I've been acting.
I've - I've acted the role of the father.

1824
01:40:13,915 --> 01:40:17,442
I've acted the role of the husband.
I've acted the role of the friend.

1825
01:40:17,552 --> 01:40:20,953
I've acted the role of the writer,
or director, or what have you.

1826
01:40:21,055 --> 01:40:24,923
I've lived in the same room with this person,
but I haven't really seen them.

1827
01:40:25,026 --> 01:40:29,053
I haven't really heard them.
I haven't really been with them.

1828
01:40:29,163 --> 01:40:31,825
Yeah, I know some people
are just sometimes...

1829
01:40:31,933 --> 01:40:34,527
uh, existing just side by side.

1830
01:40:34,636 --> 01:40:39,539
I mean, uh, the other person's, uh, face
could just turn into a great wolf s face...

1831
01:40:39,641 --> 01:40:42,439
and, uh, it just wouldn't be noticed.

1832
01:40:42,543 --> 01:40:45,842
And it wouldn't be noticed, no.
It wouldn't be noticed.

1833
01:40:47,181 --> 01:40:49,342
I mean, when I was in Israel
a little while ago -

1834
01:40:49,450 --> 01:40:52,044
I mean, I have this picture of Chiquita
that was taken when she -

1835
01:40:52,153 --> 01:40:55,748
I always carry it with me. It was taken
when she was about 26 or something.

1836
01:40:55,857 --> 01:40:58,655
And it's in summer,
and she's stretched out on a terrace...

1837
01:40:58,760 --> 01:41:01,695
in this sort of old-fashioned long skirt
that's kind of pulled up.

1838
01:41:01,796 --> 01:41:04,287
And she's slim and sensual
and beautiful.

1839
01:41:04,399 --> 01:41:08,733
And I've always looked at that picture
and just thought about just how sexy she looks.

1840
01:41:08,836 --> 01:41:11,202
And then last year in Israel,
I looked at the picture...

1841
01:41:11,306 --> 01:41:15,572
and I realized that that face in the picture
was the saddest face in the world.

1842
01:41:15,677 --> 01:41:18,737
That girl at that time was just lost...

1843
01:41:18,846 --> 01:41:20,814
so sad and so alone.

1844
01:41:20,915 --> 01:41:24,442
I've been carrying this picture for years
and not ever really seeing what it is, you know.

1845
01:41:24,552 --> 01:41:27,680
I just never really
looked at the picture.

1846
01:41:29,724 --> 01:41:34,024
And then, at a certain point, I realized I'd
just gone for a good 18 years unable to feel...

1847
01:41:34,128 --> 01:41:36,323
except in the most extreme situations.

1848
01:41:36,431 --> 01:41:39,423
I mean, to some extent, I still had
the ability to live in my work.

1849
01:41:39,534 --> 01:41:41,434
That was why I was such a work junkie.

1850
01:41:41,536 --> 01:41:45,734
That was why I felt that every play that I did
was a matter of my life or my death.

1851
01:41:45,840 --> 01:41:48,001
But in my real life, I was dead.

1852
01:41:48,109 --> 01:41:50,669
I was a robot.

1853
01:41:50,778 --> 01:41:53,713
I mean, I didn't even allow myself
to get angry or annoyed.

1854
01:41:53,815 --> 01:41:56,613
I mean, you know, today
Chiquita, Nicolas, Marina -

1855
01:41:56,718 --> 01:42:00,552
All day long, as people do, they do things that
annoy me and they say things that annoy me.

1856
01:42:00,655 --> 01:42:03,419
And today I get annoyed.
And they say, "Why are you annoyed?"

1857
01:42:03,524 --> 01:42:05,617
And I say, "Because you're annoying,"
you know.

1858
01:42:07,328 --> 01:42:09,592
And when I allowed myself
to consider the possibility...

1859
01:42:09,697 --> 01:42:12,222
of not spending
the rest of my life with Chiquita...

1860
01:42:12,333 --> 01:42:16,030
I realized that what I wanted most in life
was to always be with her.

1861
01:42:17,472 --> 01:42:20,805
But at that time, I hadn't learned what
it would be like to let yourself react...

1862
01:42:20,908 --> 01:42:22,808
to another human being.

1863
01:42:22,910 --> 01:42:24,901
And if you can't react
to another person...

1864
01:42:25,012 --> 01:42:28,175
then there's no possibility
of action or interaction.

1865
01:42:28,282 --> 01:42:33,310
And if there isn't, I don't really know
what the word "love" means...

1866
01:42:33,421 --> 01:42:38,188
except duty, obligation,
sentimentality, fear.

1867
01:42:40,661 --> 01:42:43,152
I mean -

1868
01:42:44,198 --> 01:42:46,223
I don't know about you, Wally, but I -

1869
01:42:46,334 --> 01:42:50,361
I just had to put myself into a kind of training
program to learn how to be a human being.

1870
01:42:50,471 --> 01:42:52,666
I mean, how did I feel about anything?
I didn't know.

1871
01:42:52,774 --> 01:42:57,074
What kind of things did I like? What kind of
people did I really want to be with? You know?

1872
01:42:57,178 --> 01:42:59,578
And the only way
that I could think of to find out...

1873
01:42:59,680 --> 01:43:03,616
was to just cut out all the noise
and stop performing all the time...

1874
01:43:03,718 --> 01:43:07,051
and just listen to what was inside me.

1875
01:43:07,155 --> 01:43:10,147
See, I think a time comes
when you need to do that.

1876
01:43:10,258 --> 01:43:13,318
Now, maybe in order to do it,
you have to go to the Sahara...

1877
01:43:13,428 --> 01:43:15,396
and maybe you can do it at home.

1878
01:43:15,496 --> 01:43:17,828
But you need to cut out the noise.

1879
01:43:22,069 --> 01:43:24,037
Yeah. Of course, personally,
I-I just, uh -

1880
01:43:24,138 --> 01:43:27,801
I usually don't, uh -
like those quiet moments, you know.

1881
01:43:27,909 --> 01:43:29,536
I really don't.

1882
01:43:29,644 --> 01:43:34,343
I mean, uh, I don't know if
it's that, uh, Freudian thing or what -

1883
01:43:34,449 --> 01:43:37,111
But, uh, you know, the fear
of unconscious impulses...

1884
01:43:37,218 --> 01:43:40,381
or my own aggression
or whatever, but, uh...

1885
01:43:40,488 --> 01:43:44,151
if things get too quiet, and I find myself
just, uh, sitting there...

1886
01:43:44,258 --> 01:43:46,226
you know,
as we were saying before...

1887
01:43:46,327 --> 01:43:50,923
I mean, whether I'm by myself,
or-or I'm-I'm with someone else...

1888
01:43:51,032 --> 01:43:54,092
I just, uh -
I just have this feeling of...

1889
01:43:54,202 --> 01:43:58,229
uh, my God,
I'm going to be revealed.

1890
01:43:58,339 --> 01:44:02,469
In other words, I'm adequate
to do any sort of a task, um...

1891
01:44:02,577 --> 01:44:06,513
but I'm not adequate, uh,
just to - to be a human being.

1892
01:44:06,614 --> 01:44:08,514
I mean, in other words, I'm not, uh -

1893
01:44:08,616 --> 01:44:11,915
If I'm just, uh, trapped there
and I'm not allowed to do things...

1894
01:44:12,019 --> 01:44:15,420
but all I can do is just,
um, be there...

1895
01:44:15,523 --> 01:44:17,753
well, I'll just fail.

1896
01:44:17,859 --> 01:44:19,827
I mean, in other words, uh...

1897
01:44:19,927 --> 01:44:22,327
I can pass any other sort of a test...

1898
01:44:22,430 --> 01:44:26,196
and, you know, I can even get an "A"
if I put in the required effort...

1899
01:44:26,300 --> 01:44:28,427
but I just don't, uh -

1900
01:44:28,536 --> 01:44:31,232
I just don't have a clue
how to pass this test.

1901
01:44:31,339 --> 01:44:34,740
I mean - I mean, of course,
I realize this isn't a test...

1902
01:44:34,842 --> 01:44:37,538
but, um, I see it as a test...

1903
01:44:37,645 --> 01:44:39,670
and I feel I'm going to fail it.

1904
01:44:39,780 --> 01:44:41,714
I mean, it's - it's very scary.

1905
01:44:41,816 --> 01:44:46,048
I just feel, uh, just totally at sea.
I mean -

1906
01:44:46,153 --> 01:44:48,621
Well, you know,
I could imagine a life, Wally...

1907
01:44:48,723 --> 01:44:53,490
in which each day would become
an incredible, monumental, creative task...

1908
01:44:53,594 --> 01:44:55,755
and we're not necessarily up to it.

1909
01:44:55,863 --> 01:44:59,299
I mean, if you felt like walking out
on the person you live with, you'd walk out.

1910
01:44:59,400 --> 01:45:01,368
Then if you felt like it,
you'd come back.

1911
01:45:01,469 --> 01:45:05,132
But meanwhile, the other person
would have reacted to your walking out.

1912
01:45:05,239 --> 01:45:08,470
It would be a life of such feeling.

1913
01:45:08,576 --> 01:45:10,874
I mean, what was amazing
in the workshops I led...

1914
01:45:10,978 --> 01:45:14,573
was how quickly people seemed
to fall into enthusiasm...

1915
01:45:14,682 --> 01:45:19,016
celebration, joy, wonder,
abandon, wildness, tenderness.

1916
01:45:19,120 --> 01:45:21,281
Could we stand to live like that?

1917
01:45:21,389 --> 01:45:24,358
Yeah, I think it's that moment of contact
with another person.

1918
01:45:24,458 --> 01:45:26,358
I mean, that's what scares us.

1919
01:45:26,460 --> 01:45:29,861
I mean, that moment of being
face to face with another person.

1920
01:45:29,964 --> 01:45:31,864
I mean, now -

1921
01:45:31,966 --> 01:45:36,198
You wouldn't think it would be so frightening.
It's strange that we find it so frightening.

1922
01:45:36,304 --> 01:45:38,204
Well, it isn't that strange.

1923
01:45:38,306 --> 01:45:41,434
I mean, first of all, there are some
pretty good reasons for being frightened.

1924
01:45:41,542 --> 01:45:45,876
I mean, you know, the human being
is a complex and dangerous creature.

1925
01:45:45,980 --> 01:45:48,608
I mean, really,
if you start living each moment?

1926
01:45:48,716 --> 01:45:50,650
Christ, that's quite a challenge.

1927
01:45:50,751 --> 01:45:54,346
I mean, if you really reach out and you're
really in touch with the other person...

1928
01:45:54,455 --> 01:45:57,891
well, that really is something
to strive for, I think, I really do.

1929
01:45:57,992 --> 01:46:00,654
Yeah, it's just so pathetic
if one doesn't do that.

1930
01:46:00,761 --> 01:46:05,130
Of course there's a problem, because the closer
you come, I think, to another human being...

1931
01:46:05,232 --> 01:46:08,292
the more completely mysterious -
and unreachable -

1932
01:46:08,402 --> 01:46:10,302
that person becomes.

1933
01:46:10,404 --> 01:46:14,033
I mean, you know, you have to reach out,
you have to go back and forth with them...

1934
01:46:14,141 --> 01:46:18,100
and you have to relate, and yet you're
relating to a ghost or something.

1935
01:46:18,212 --> 01:46:20,180
I don't know,
because we're ghosts.

1936
01:46:20,281 --> 01:46:24,047
We're phantoms.
Who are we?

1937
01:46:24,151 --> 01:46:27,018
And that's to face, to confront the fact
that you're completely alone.

1938
01:46:27,121 --> 01:46:29,851
And to accept that you're alone
is to accept death.

1939
01:46:29,957 --> 01:46:33,188
You mean, because somehow when you
are alone, you're alone with death.

1940
01:46:33,294 --> 01:46:37,458
I mean, nothing's obstructing your view of it,
or something like that.

1941
01:46:37,565 --> 01:46:39,362
Right.

1942
01:46:39,467 --> 01:46:42,334
You know, if I understood it correctly,
I think, uh, Heidegger said...

1943
01:46:42,436 --> 01:46:46,702
that, uh, if you were to experience
your own being to the full...

1944
01:46:46,807 --> 01:46:51,744
you'd be experiencing the decay
of that being toward death...

1945
01:46:51,846 --> 01:46:54,212
as a part of your experience.

1946
01:46:54,315 --> 01:46:57,443
You know, in the sexual act there's
that moment of complete forgetting...

1947
01:46:57,551 --> 01:46:59,178
which is so incredible.

1948
01:46:59,286 --> 01:47:01,481
Then in the next moment,
you start to think about things:

1949
01:47:01,589 --> 01:47:03,819
work on the play,
what you've got to do tomorrow.

1950
01:47:03,924 --> 01:47:07,360
I don't know if this is true of you,
but I think it must be quite common.

1951
01:47:07,461 --> 01:47:09,952
The world comes in quite fast.

1952
01:47:10,064 --> 01:47:13,556
Now, that again may be because we're
afraid to stay in that place of forgetting...

1953
01:47:13,668 --> 01:47:15,693
because that, again, is close to death.

1954
01:47:15,803 --> 01:47:18,169
Like people
who are afraid to go to sleep.

1955
01:47:18,272 --> 01:47:22,140
In other words, you interrelate, and you
don't know what the next moment will bring.

1956
01:47:22,243 --> 01:47:24,234
And to not know
what the next moment will bring...

1957
01:47:24,345 --> 01:47:26,370
brings you closer
to a perception of death.

1958
01:47:26,480 --> 01:47:30,143
You see, that's why I think
that people have affairs.

1959
01:47:30,251 --> 01:47:32,651
I mean, you know, in the theater,
if you get good reviews...

1960
01:47:32,753 --> 01:47:35,153
you feel for a moment
that you've got your hands on something.

1961
01:47:35,256 --> 01:47:37,451
You know what I mean?
I mean, it's a good feeling.

1962
01:47:37,558 --> 01:47:39,856
But then that feeling goes quite quickly.

1963
01:47:39,960 --> 01:47:43,259
And once again you don't know
quite what you should do next.

1964
01:47:43,364 --> 01:47:44,991
What'll happen?

1965
01:47:45,099 --> 01:47:47,624
Well, have an affair,
and up to a certain point...

1966
01:47:47,735 --> 01:47:50,397
you can really feel
that you're on firm ground, you know.

1967
01:47:50,504 --> 01:47:54,065
There's a sexual conquest to be made.
There are different questions.

1968
01:47:54,175 --> 01:47:56,143
Does she enjoy the ears being nibbled?

1969
01:47:56,243 --> 01:47:59,701
How intensely can you talk about Schopenhauer
at some elegant French restaurant?

1970
01:47:59,814 --> 01:48:02,180
Whatever nonsense it is.

1971
01:48:02,283 --> 01:48:06,276
It's all, I think, to give you the semblance
that there's firm earth.

1972
01:48:06,387 --> 01:48:10,323
Well, have a real relationship
with a person that goes on for years -

1973
01:48:10,424 --> 01:48:13,052
That's completely unpredictable.

1974
01:48:13,160 --> 01:48:16,391
Then you've cut off all your ties to the land,
and you're sailing into the unknown...

1975
01:48:16,497 --> 01:48:18,931
into uncharted seas.

1976
01:48:19,033 --> 01:48:23,732
I mean, you know, people hold on to these
images of father, mother, husband, wife...

1977
01:48:23,838 --> 01:48:25,738
again for the same reason -

1978
01:48:25,840 --> 01:48:29,332
'cause they seem to provide
some firm ground.

1979
01:48:29,443 --> 01:48:31,741
But there's no wife there.

1980
01:48:31,846 --> 01:48:33,871
What does that mean?
A wife.

1981
01:48:33,981 --> 01:48:36,677
A husband. A son.

1982
01:48:36,784 --> 01:48:38,752
A baby holds your hands...

1983
01:48:38,853 --> 01:48:42,482
and then suddenly there's this huge man
lifting you off the ground...

1984
01:48:42,590 --> 01:48:44,490
and then he's gone.

1985
01:48:44,592 --> 01:48:46,492
Where's that son?

1986
01:49:05,679 --> 01:49:09,706
<i>All the other customers</i>
<i>seemed to have left hours ago.</i>

1987
01:49:09,817 --> 01:49:14,015
<i>We got the bill,</i>
<i>and André paid for our dinner.</i>

1988
01:49:14,121 --> 01:49:15,588
Really?

1989
01:49:41,882 --> 01:49:44,077
<i>I treated myself to a taxi.</i>

1990
01:49:45,586 --> 01:49:48,054
<i>I rode home through the city streets.</i>

1991
01:49:49,323 --> 01:49:51,951
<i>There wasn't a street,</i>
<i>there wasn't a building...</i>

1992
01:49:52,059 --> 01:49:55,324
<i>that wasn't connected</i>
<i>to some memory in my mind.</i>

1993
01:49:56,764 --> 01:49:59,858
<i>There, I was buying a suit</i>
<i>with my father.</i>

1994
01:50:02,536 --> 01:50:05,994
<i>There, I was having</i>
<i>an ice cream soda after school.</i>

1995
01:50:10,110 --> 01:50:13,511
<i>When I finally came in,</i>
<i>Debby was home from work...</i>

1996
01:50:13,614 --> 01:50:17,072
<i>and I told her everything</i>
<i>about my dinner with André.</i>