0:00:17 > 0:00:21Actress, activist and bestselling writer,
0:00:21 > 0:00:24Shirley MacLaine has been lighting up the screens
0:00:24 > 0:00:28since her award-winning 1955 film debut
0:00:28 > 0:00:33in Alfred Hitchcock's The Trouble With Harry.
0:00:33 > 0:00:37She has been both an insider and an outsider in Hollywood,
0:00:37 > 0:00:41part of the elite as Warren Beatty's big sister
0:00:41 > 0:00:44and a member of Frank Sinatra's Rat Pack Clan
0:00:44 > 0:00:50but also on the edge thanks to her outspokenness on women's rights
0:00:50 > 0:00:53and her belief in spiritualism and reincarnation.
0:00:54 > 0:00:58Her first appearance on the BBC came in 1962
0:00:58 > 0:01:00when she was interviewed by Peter Duvall
0:01:00 > 0:01:03for the programme Picture Parade.
0:01:04 > 0:01:06Miss MacLaine, in the last seven years,
0:01:06 > 0:01:10you have been swept along on a fantastic wave of critical acclaim
0:01:10 > 0:01:13into the very front ranks of world entertainers.
0:01:13 > 0:01:15If I may quote just a single comment
0:01:15 > 0:01:19which was made recently about you, it was simply this:
0:01:19 > 0:01:23"I have only one point to make about Miss MacLaine. That is she is brilliant."
0:01:23 > 0:01:28Now, does this kind of critical adulation embarrass you at all or does it inspire you?
0:01:29 > 0:01:33If you said it to me in person, I think it would embarrass me, yes,
0:01:33 > 0:01:38but to read it alone in my bedroom is something I enjoy very much.
0:01:38 > 0:01:43With every film you make, you seem to attract a new adjective from the screenwriters.
0:01:43 > 0:01:47The latest one is the word which I don't know. It's the word 'cook'.
0:01:47 > 0:01:51Now, do you know what this word means? Are you embarrassed by it at all?
0:01:51 > 0:01:52I don't know what it means.
0:01:52 > 0:01:57I think it started in the United States maybe with a few articles, singular articles.
0:01:57 > 0:02:00I had never heard the word before and people ask me what it means.
0:02:00 > 0:02:02If you find out, I wish you'd tell me.
0:02:02 > 0:02:05Well, I'm told it means 'zany' or 'unconventional'.
0:02:05 > 0:02:09Would you say this was a correct description of you?
0:02:09 > 0:02:12Well, part of me, yes but by no means all of me.
0:02:12 > 0:02:16I can't be that all the time or I'd need to eat sugar all day.
0:02:16 > 0:02:18I really don't know what it means.
0:02:18 > 0:02:20I thought they meant I was a good cook for a while
0:02:20 > 0:02:23until I realised I was pronouncing it wrong.
0:02:23 > 0:02:25I don't know what the word means, no.
0:02:25 > 0:02:27So, it's a word they have made up purely for you in America?
0:02:27 > 0:02:29They made it up, yes.
0:02:29 > 0:02:35I suppose press people need something with which the public can attach an image, you know.
0:02:35 > 0:02:39And so out of a few very widely-read articles
0:02:39 > 0:02:44came this impression of me as a cook, like the Clan, the same thing.
0:02:44 > 0:02:48One man was responsible for having created this impression.
0:02:48 > 0:02:50There's no such thing as the Clan.
0:02:50 > 0:02:52I keep telling everybody that who asks me
0:02:52 > 0:02:56and so do the other so-called members, which by the way, widely vary.
0:02:56 > 0:02:59Sometimes, there are four of us, sometimes, there are 24.
0:02:59 > 0:03:03- This is the Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis unit. - That's right.
0:03:03 > 0:03:07Sometimes, it's President Kennedy who shows up at parties.
0:03:07 > 0:03:10So, as I say, you know, lots of times,
0:03:10 > 0:03:16things are created through a need to capture the imagination of the public
0:03:16 > 0:03:21and that is what has happened with this word 'cook', I suppose, and with the so-called Clan.
0:03:21 > 0:03:25Your early professional career, of course, found you as a dancer in musical shows.
0:03:25 > 0:03:28In fact, I believe you were making The Pajama Game
0:03:28 > 0:03:30when you were discovered for the cinema,
0:03:30 > 0:03:34and yet in the 13 films you've made, you have only made two which one can call musicals.
0:03:34 > 0:03:36Now, why is this?
0:03:38 > 0:03:42Well, it's difficult to pin it down to one reason.
0:03:42 > 0:03:44I think Hollywood in the last 10 years
0:03:44 > 0:03:49has ceased to make as many musicals as they used to, for lots of reasons.
0:03:49 > 0:03:54One is a family who will spend 2.50 to go see a musical in a theatre
0:03:54 > 0:03:56could stay at home and watch it
0:03:56 > 0:03:58on Sunday night free of charge, you know.
0:03:58 > 0:04:00There are not that many musicals being written.
0:04:00 > 0:04:04I don't think the studios are that anxious to make them.
0:04:04 > 0:04:06They're a terribly large investment
0:04:06 > 0:04:09and, because of the investment being so large,
0:04:09 > 0:04:13most of the foreign market now in the United States pictures
0:04:13 > 0:04:16are 60%-40%, I believe, whereas 10 years ago,
0:04:16 > 0:04:20it was maybe 40% foreign and 60% the United States
0:04:20 > 0:04:25so that means then that Hollywood has to rely a great deal on box office business abroad.
0:04:25 > 0:04:28Well, musicals are difficult to dub
0:04:28 > 0:04:32in each respective language that the picture is playing in that country
0:04:32 > 0:04:34and I think that's another reason.
0:04:34 > 0:04:36Of course, I didn't really...
0:04:36 > 0:04:39You see, I have an imbalance in my inner ear
0:04:39 > 0:04:43and when I move or fly in a plane or ride in a car
0:04:43 > 0:04:47or sometimes even take a short walk across the street, I get sick.
0:04:47 > 0:04:51So when I dance, that happens and that's one reason why all my life,
0:04:51 > 0:04:54I danced so often and so hard and so long every day.
0:04:54 > 0:04:58I had to if I wanted to be a dancer and that's all I wanted to be when I was young.
0:04:58 > 0:05:02So, it's a kind of physical disability, really, which has got in the way.
0:05:02 > 0:05:05It stopped me or less. It was very uncomfortable for me.
0:05:05 > 0:05:07I would really get sick. When I made Can-Can,
0:05:07 > 0:05:11I began to rehearse maybe two months ahead of the shooting time
0:05:11 > 0:05:15because I had to adjust myself to that much turning again
0:05:15 > 0:05:18and I would rehearse it an hour and be sick the rest of the day
0:05:18 > 0:05:21and then the next day, I would rehearse maybe two hours
0:05:21 > 0:05:25and I worked up finally so that I could work nine and 10 and 11 hours.
0:05:25 > 0:05:27Of all the films you have made, The Apartment,
0:05:27 > 0:05:31certainly as far as this country is concerned, is the favourite.
0:05:31 > 0:05:34Could you say whether this was your own particular favourite?
0:05:34 > 0:05:37Did it give you the most pleasure to make?
0:05:37 > 0:05:40No, it's not my favourite film. It's one of my favourites.
0:05:40 > 0:05:44It may perhaps be the best film I have been in that has been shown to the public so far.
0:05:44 > 0:05:47I have two that they haven't seen that I am just as fond of.
0:05:47 > 0:05:51You know, when you're speaking of Billy Wilder, in my opinion,
0:05:51 > 0:05:56he's a genius and Billy Wilder has great control
0:05:56 > 0:05:59and he's the master of the ship on his pictures
0:05:59 > 0:06:04so that you have to look to Billy and say, "He did it, I didn't,"
0:06:04 > 0:06:07and when you have that kind of feeling about something,
0:06:07 > 0:06:11it's difficult to be that much involved in anything but adoration for Billy Wilder.
0:06:11 > 0:06:13He's fantastic.
0:06:13 > 0:06:1527?
0:06:15 > 0:06:16You may not realise it, Miss Kubelik,
0:06:16 > 0:06:18but I am in the top 10 efficiency-wise
0:06:18 > 0:06:21and this may be the day promotion-wise.
0:06:21 > 0:06:23You're beginning to sound like Mr Kirkeby already.
0:06:23 > 0:06:26Why not now that they're kicking me upstairs?
0:06:26 > 0:06:28It couldn't happen to a nicer guy.
0:06:28 > 0:06:31You know, you're the only one around here who ever takes his hat off in the elevator.
0:06:31 > 0:06:34- Really?- The characters you meet. Something happens to men in elevators.
0:06:34 > 0:06:37It must be the change of altitude. The blood rushes to their head.
0:06:37 > 0:06:40- I could tell you stories that... - I'd love to hear them.
0:06:40 > 0:06:44Maybe we could have lunch in the cafeteria sometime or some evening after work.
0:06:44 > 0:06:46- 27.- Oh.
0:06:46 > 0:06:49- I hope everything goes all right. - I hope so.
0:06:49 > 0:06:52They called me on a day like this, what with a cold and everything!
0:06:52 > 0:06:55- How do I look?- Fine. Wait.
0:06:55 > 0:06:58Thank you! That's the first thing I ever noticed about you.
0:06:58 > 0:07:02When you were still in the local elevator, you always wore a flower.
0:07:02 > 0:07:04Good luck. And wipe your nose.
0:07:06 > 0:07:08Over the next decade,
0:07:08 > 0:07:12Shirley's roles in films like Gambit with Herbert Lom and Michael Caine,
0:07:12 > 0:07:15Sweet Charity the musical
0:07:15 > 0:07:18and her Golden Globe-winning appearance in Irma La Douce
0:07:18 > 0:07:23earned her a reputation as one of cinema's finest comic actresses.
0:07:24 > 0:07:28It's a reputation she lived up to on the small screen too.
0:07:28 > 0:07:35Here, in a famously flirty encounter with Michael Parkinson from 1971.
0:07:35 > 0:07:37What are the disadvantages, though, Shirley, do you think,
0:07:37 > 0:07:39of being an internationally famous star?
0:07:39 > 0:07:42You're the kind of person who runs away from it, aren't you?
0:07:42 > 0:07:45- From being a star? - Yes, from the acclaim.
0:07:46 > 0:07:49Oh, no, I really don't mind that.
0:07:49 > 0:07:51I don't get a great large charge out of it either
0:07:51 > 0:07:55because I think the invasion of privacy is difficult to handle sometimes.
0:07:55 > 0:07:56I do love anonymity.
0:07:56 > 0:08:01I really do love to go to a market and melt into the shopping bags.
0:08:01 > 0:08:03- Is it possible?- Sure.
0:08:03 > 0:08:06Oh, listen, those stars who tell you that they go to buy a loaf of bread
0:08:06 > 0:08:08and they're surrounded by millions of zealots
0:08:08 > 0:08:12are the ones who have spent three hours putting on lashes and leopard underwear.
0:08:12 > 0:08:15LAUGHTER
0:08:15 > 0:08:18"Oh, God, they won't leave me alone." That's crap.
0:08:18 > 0:08:22LAUGHTER
0:08:22 > 0:08:27I did an experiment once with a man who was doing this cover story or something
0:08:27 > 0:08:30and he wanted to know that and I said, "Let's try this."
0:08:30 > 0:08:32It was in New York, Fifth Avenue,
0:08:32 > 0:08:36and I had on a suit and just little heels like that
0:08:36 > 0:08:39and my hair was like it used to be in that pixie style.
0:08:39 > 0:08:40Oh, lovely.
0:08:40 > 0:08:43I look like a road company Susan Hayward this way, don't you think?
0:08:43 > 0:08:46LAUGHTER
0:08:46 > 0:08:48Anyway, we did this thing where I said,
0:08:48 > 0:08:52"OK, for 10 blocks, I'm going to walk as though I'm a star
0:08:52 > 0:08:55"and everybody will notice me
0:08:55 > 0:09:00"because I won't feel amalgamated with the shoppers and the day
0:09:00 > 0:09:01"and the sort of buses
0:09:01 > 0:09:05"that all people really actually naturally do when they walk.
0:09:05 > 0:09:06"I am a star."
0:09:06 > 0:09:09So I walked that way for 10 blocks and it was murder.
0:09:09 > 0:09:11I mean, the leopard underwear ladies were right.
0:09:11 > 0:09:13Mm.
0:09:13 > 0:09:16Then at something like 56th Street, I said,
0:09:16 > 0:09:21"Now, just watch the change in attitude if I can swiftly make this transition in time,"
0:09:21 > 0:09:24and I started becoming interested in the shoes in the windows
0:09:24 > 0:09:28and the sizes of the dresses and the colour combinations and other people.
0:09:28 > 0:09:30- Yes.- Not one person noticed me.
0:09:30 > 0:09:32That's fascinating. That's amazing.
0:09:32 > 0:09:35It really does depend on the sort of personal vibrations
0:09:35 > 0:09:37- you have about yourself.- Yes.
0:09:37 > 0:09:41Have you on the other hand, though, have you ever been guilty
0:09:41 > 0:09:46of using the fact that you are an internationally-known star to your advantage?
0:09:46 > 0:09:48- Have you ever come...? - Yes, I make your show better.
0:09:48 > 0:09:52LAUGHTER
0:09:52 > 0:09:57APPLAUSE
0:10:01 > 0:10:03- I'll ask you that question again. - LAUGHTER
0:10:03 > 0:10:05Can you button your shirt up first?
0:10:05 > 0:10:09LAUGHTER
0:10:09 > 0:10:14Let's see your top, Michael.
0:10:15 > 0:10:18For those of you who haven't got colour television,
0:10:18 > 0:10:21- I'm bright pink now. - Is that a wig or is that real?
0:10:21 > 0:10:23It's real. Pull it.
0:10:23 > 0:10:24There you go.
0:10:24 > 0:10:28You see, people who write in and say, "Is it a wig?.."
0:10:28 > 0:10:32Now they'll say, "We've always wondered, now we know."
0:10:32 > 0:10:35If they're men, I always write back and say, "You're allowed one free pull."
0:10:35 > 0:10:37Oh, my God! On what?!
0:10:37 > 0:10:39LAUGHTER
0:10:49 > 0:10:52Do you want to talk about birth control some more?
0:10:52 > 0:10:55That story had a good punchline but it's not going to follow yours.
0:10:55 > 0:10:58What shall we talk about now, Shirley MacLaine?
0:10:58 > 0:11:00LAUGHTER
0:11:00 > 0:11:02About what job you're going to have tomorrow.
0:11:02 > 0:11:04LAUGHTER
0:11:06 > 0:11:07Yes. Well...
0:11:10 > 0:11:14The band think you're hilarious.
0:11:14 > 0:11:17They've been hearing the same old stuff for so long.
0:11:18 > 0:11:21- Well, we've got another five minutes. - Is that all we've got?
0:11:21 > 0:11:25What shall we talk about on here, then? We've talked about America. No, we haven't.
0:11:25 > 0:11:27I tell you what I'd like to ask you.
0:11:27 > 0:11:29You've been over here for some time now.
0:11:29 > 0:11:31What are your feelings about this country,
0:11:31 > 0:11:35about the mood of this country and how does it differ from America, do you think?
0:11:35 > 0:11:38Because we always think we've got a special relationship with America, don't we?
0:11:38 > 0:11:42And I reckon that we are more foreign to the Americans
0:11:42 > 0:11:45- than Zulus are. - Oh, boy, that's very true.
0:11:45 > 0:11:48I'm doing a series here for Sir Lew Grade.
0:11:48 > 0:11:50I'm interested in television now.
0:11:50 > 0:11:53- I really think television is something else.- Mm?
0:11:53 > 0:11:56Maybe not after tonight but up to now.
0:11:56 > 0:11:59LAUGHTER
0:11:59 > 0:12:02And the thing that struck me in working with the British...
0:12:02 > 0:12:06I make a lot of pictures here but never for, like, nine months
0:12:06 > 0:12:08and very intimately involved.
0:12:08 > 0:12:13And just because you speak the same language doesn't mean you have the same thoughts.
0:12:13 > 0:12:17- Yes.- Very, very profoundly, it hit me.- Yes.
0:12:17 > 0:12:20Because the assistant director will come to me and he'll say,
0:12:20 > 0:12:22"Would you like a rehearsal?"
0:12:22 > 0:12:25And I say, "No, I'm all right. I know the lines.
0:12:25 > 0:12:29"Just tell him to go ahead and call me when you're ready."
0:12:29 > 0:12:33He goes back down to the director and says, "She won't come."
0:12:33 > 0:12:35LAUGHTER
0:12:35 > 0:12:37He said, "I told her you're ready, she won't come."
0:12:37 > 0:12:40Comes back up to me. "Would you like a rehearsal?"
0:12:40 > 0:12:43I said, "I told you, you know. Why are you coming and asking me again?
0:12:43 > 0:12:46"Do you mean the director wants me there for a rehearsal?
0:12:46 > 0:12:49"Oh! Now I'll come!" I get down and he says, "Where were you?"
0:12:49 > 0:12:52LAUGHTER
0:12:52 > 0:12:55That sort of thing.
0:12:55 > 0:12:58This is probably an unfair question because you really haven't...
0:12:58 > 0:12:59It's a kind of...
0:12:59 > 0:13:02If you're working over here as you are and working all the time,
0:13:02 > 0:13:04it's a kind of phoney area that you are in.
0:13:04 > 0:13:06You don't really get to know the problems of the people here.
0:13:06 > 0:13:09What about the colour problem here, for instance?
0:13:09 > 0:13:13Has it occurred to you that we might have something like the American situation?
0:13:13 > 0:13:18Well, I think you are not facing it and that's why you can't compare the two.
0:13:18 > 0:13:22I was amazed that Enoch Powell was as popular as he seemed to be,
0:13:22 > 0:13:25that he actually was listened to.
0:13:25 > 0:13:27- Mm.- It's a big thing.
0:13:28 > 0:13:32The conflict of colour in America is probably at the bottom
0:13:32 > 0:13:35of why we feel so unhappy about ourselves.
0:13:37 > 0:13:40I don't think you can stave off the problem for very much longer.
0:13:40 > 0:13:43Can I finish by asking a question
0:13:43 > 0:13:46that I have always wanted to ask a woman as beautiful as you?
0:13:46 > 0:13:48You're always...
0:13:48 > 0:13:52People write about you as being a sort of sexy and attractive woman.
0:13:52 > 0:13:55Who do you think is the sexiest man in the world?
0:13:55 > 0:13:56You.
0:13:56 > 0:13:59LAUGHTER
0:13:59 > 0:14:02APPLAUSE
0:14:13 > 0:14:15- Next to me.- I'm next to you.
0:14:15 > 0:14:17No, apart from me.
0:14:17 > 0:14:19LAUGHTER
0:14:19 > 0:14:24You're making a joke out of something I said offhandedly last week.
0:14:24 > 0:14:27I told him I thought Zhou Enlai was the sexiest man.
0:14:27 > 0:14:29- Zhou Enlai. - How do you like that?
0:14:29 > 0:14:31A 73-year-old Communist he's worried about.
0:14:31 > 0:14:35LAUGHTER
0:14:35 > 0:14:39APPLAUSE
0:14:39 > 0:14:43A year after that meeting, performing made way for politics.
0:14:43 > 0:14:45Shirley became a fundraiser for
0:14:45 > 0:14:49Democrat Senator George McGovern's presidential election battle
0:14:49 > 0:14:51with Richard Nixon.
0:14:51 > 0:14:56Later, in an interview with Vincent Hanna on the Tonight programme,
0:14:56 > 0:15:00she spoke seriously about combining acting with activism
0:15:00 > 0:15:03and the failure of Senator McGovern's campaign.
0:15:03 > 0:15:07I think he didn't know how to manipulate,
0:15:07 > 0:15:11to orchestrate his personality on television.
0:15:11 > 0:15:14I think a great many people of good leadership quality
0:15:14 > 0:15:17don't know how to do that.
0:15:17 > 0:15:20And I think that's a shame because that is what's required.
0:15:20 > 0:15:22If the people don't feel that you can communicate,
0:15:22 > 0:15:24then you can't inspire them,
0:15:24 > 0:15:25so it has become a world
0:15:25 > 0:15:28where you have to know how to orchestrate the media.
0:15:28 > 0:15:29What about 1976?
0:15:29 > 0:15:32Do you say Ronald Reagan is an excellent communicator
0:15:32 > 0:15:34doing well because of those very reasons?
0:15:34 > 0:15:35Yes. Having been an actor,
0:15:35 > 0:15:38having travelled on the road for General Electric,
0:15:38 > 0:15:39having made so many speeches,
0:15:39 > 0:15:42having tried out his personality in front of masses of people,
0:15:42 > 0:15:44he knows how to do it.
0:15:44 > 0:15:48There is no-one more cool or more capable when the red light goes on
0:15:48 > 0:15:49than Ronald Reagan
0:15:49 > 0:15:52and that's why she is a very dominant force in American politics today.
0:15:52 > 0:15:55Are you saying then that...
0:15:57 > 0:16:01..it's the communicators who will eventually succeed in politics?
0:16:01 > 0:16:04That it's better to be a good communicator than a good politician?
0:16:04 > 0:16:06I think so.
0:16:06 > 0:16:07But I think the actors also,
0:16:07 > 0:16:11we all have to be very sure of what we believe in, of what we mean.
0:16:11 > 0:16:14Look, we are representatives of the emulation of human life, right?
0:16:14 > 0:16:20If I'm asked to play a woman on welfare who lives with no husband
0:16:20 > 0:16:24and the prospect of supporting six children and I have no income,
0:16:24 > 0:16:26I've got to go study her.
0:16:26 > 0:16:29I've got to find out what her problems are, what her tensions are,
0:16:29 > 0:16:31what her frustrations are, what her joys are.
0:16:31 > 0:16:34I've got to somehow find that dimension about her life
0:16:34 > 0:16:36in order to portray her.
0:16:36 > 0:16:38Therefore, I have to come to some human conclusion
0:16:38 > 0:16:40at the end of that research.
0:16:40 > 0:16:44I can't just walk away then, if I have any sensitivity at all,
0:16:44 > 0:16:47and use her life as a role model for how I'm going to play a part
0:16:47 > 0:16:49and get an award.
0:16:49 > 0:16:52I have to somehow remember that that woman I just emulated
0:16:52 > 0:16:55is still back there in the ghetto.
0:16:55 > 0:16:57That's what makes actors social-political animals,
0:16:57 > 0:17:00if they have any sensitivity or any intelligence.
0:17:00 > 0:17:04Therefore, when someone asks me, "What about that part you played?"
0:17:04 > 0:17:08it is a very short hop and skip from doing something about her problem.
0:17:08 > 0:17:10Therefore, doing something about welfare.
0:17:10 > 0:17:12Therefore, doing something about military spending.
0:17:12 > 0:17:14Therefore, doing something about who's president.
0:17:14 > 0:17:18Of course, some people might say that you're doing the easy thing.
0:17:18 > 0:17:21You're taking all these serious topics and packaging them neatly
0:17:21 > 0:17:24and putting them up on a stage where people can look at them
0:17:24 > 0:17:28and say, "Super, I have fulfilled my social conscience now for the year.
0:17:28 > 0:17:29- "I've satisfied my..." - Oh, come on.
0:17:29 > 0:17:32If that's not the most typical, cynically journalistic question
0:17:32 > 0:17:34I have ever heard.
0:17:34 > 0:17:37There is nothing tougher than to be up on that stage. It's terrifying.
0:17:37 > 0:17:38For you, but what about the audience?
0:17:38 > 0:17:41What do they get out of it? You can't expect them to go out...
0:17:41 > 0:17:44I mean, many people will go and see you portray these roles,
0:17:44 > 0:17:46they're not going to be more socially aware.
0:17:46 > 0:17:49- No, but they had a good time. - They'll be less socially aware.
0:17:49 > 0:17:52No. When you are removed by...
0:17:52 > 0:17:54human expression, it...
0:17:54 > 0:17:58it makes you socially aware of human sensitivity.
0:17:58 > 0:18:00That is the purpose of art in this world.
0:18:00 > 0:18:02Art makes human beings human.
0:18:02 > 0:18:05Politics makes human beings organised.
0:18:05 > 0:18:08I like a little of both, yes, that's true.
0:18:08 > 0:18:10But we need more humanity now.
0:18:10 > 0:18:12That's why I'm going back into art.
0:18:12 > 0:18:14That doesn't mean I'm out of politics.
0:18:14 > 0:18:16I think politics is too important a subject
0:18:16 > 0:18:18to be left up to the politicians.
0:18:18 > 0:18:24One can't help think about the parallels between your own career
0:18:24 > 0:18:29and that of Vanessa Redgrave's, who also is involved in politics.
0:18:29 > 0:18:31Now, she seems to have, so far,
0:18:31 > 0:18:35failed in getting across to the general public the message that...
0:18:37 > 0:18:39..she wishes to. Where has she gone wrong, in your opinion?
0:18:39 > 0:18:41She lost her sense of humour.
0:18:43 > 0:18:44Explain.
0:18:44 > 0:18:47I can't. I don't know why that happens.
0:18:47 > 0:18:49I have experienced it and it is extremely painful,
0:18:49 > 0:18:53so I sympathise with her and I identify with that problem.
0:18:53 > 0:18:57I lost mine too for about three years.
0:18:57 > 0:19:00So, I ate a lot, I got fat. I gained 25lb.
0:19:00 > 0:19:02I didn't cut my hair, it was long and stringy.
0:19:02 > 0:19:05You saw some pictures of me. I saw them. Running here...
0:19:05 > 0:19:08I look like Peter Lorre, you know. INTERVIEWER SNIGGERS
0:19:08 > 0:19:10I was running around happy to get any point across
0:19:10 > 0:19:13when you're so damned sombre.
0:19:13 > 0:19:15Have you any personal experience of this loss of sense of humour
0:19:15 > 0:19:17on Vanessa's part?
0:19:17 > 0:19:19Yes, she came...
0:19:19 > 0:19:24I was playing in Las Vegas, which she thought was a colossal inconsistency,
0:19:24 > 0:19:26why someone with my political views should play Las Vegas.
0:19:26 > 0:19:30So, I went through explaining that this business of being on the stage
0:19:30 > 0:19:35to me is bringing joy and wherever the stage is where I have the play
0:19:35 > 0:19:37and that happens to be the show business capital
0:19:37 > 0:19:39in America right now, not Broadway.
0:19:39 > 0:19:40So, she came up.
0:19:40 > 0:19:44She was there to have a political discussion about a new...
0:19:45 > 0:19:48..group of people she was organising.
0:19:48 > 0:19:50No, she didn't want to see my show.
0:19:50 > 0:19:53No, she didn't want to discuss how her life was then,
0:19:53 > 0:19:56she didn't want to discuss anything that had to do with...
0:19:57 > 0:20:00..the reality of the world in its dimension
0:20:00 > 0:20:03that has some jokes attached to it.
0:20:03 > 0:20:05She wanted to talk about only what was on her mind.
0:20:06 > 0:20:10And she did it sombrely and she did it with very complicated rhetoric
0:20:10 > 0:20:11that frankly, I didn't understand.
0:20:11 > 0:20:14I mean, I really didn't know what she was saying and I said to her,
0:20:14 > 0:20:18"Hey, is this how you sit down in the pub and talk to some worker?"
0:20:18 > 0:20:20So, we talked for about 5 or 6 hours,
0:20:20 > 0:20:23mostly me trying to understand and her going on.
0:20:23 > 0:20:28But when we then did begin to discuss her role
0:20:28 > 0:20:32in a play she was doing downtown,
0:20:32 > 0:20:38her eyes lit up, her face changed, her smile just beamed,
0:20:38 > 0:20:43her teeth showed and her whole demeanour became alive.
0:20:43 > 0:20:44And I thought, "Now, hmm."
0:20:44 > 0:20:47If she could get that into the political message
0:20:47 > 0:20:51she's trying to say, somehow combine these two things
0:20:51 > 0:20:56so that the seriousness of breaking the omelette
0:20:56 > 0:20:58to make the egg of the revolution -
0:20:58 > 0:21:01breaking the egg to make the omelette of the revolution
0:21:01 > 0:21:03was not quite so...
0:21:04 > 0:21:05..doom-making...
0:21:06 > 0:21:09..people would listen a little bit closer.
0:21:09 > 0:21:12I mean, it's when you make any speech, you've got to tell some jokes first
0:21:12 > 0:21:14and then they'll listen to the serious part.
0:21:14 > 0:21:17So, I say it's essentially a theatrical mistake that she's making,
0:21:17 > 0:21:20very likely because she feels over-privileged
0:21:20 > 0:21:22to have had such a fabulous background.
0:21:22 > 0:21:24Someone like me who came from nobody,
0:21:24 > 0:21:28I don't feel that I have to pay those dues of guilt, you see?
0:21:28 > 0:21:31I feel that I earned and therefore, I'm going to use it.
0:21:32 > 0:21:37In 1975, MacLaine hadn't acted in a film for three years.
0:21:37 > 0:21:41Instead, she had directed, written and produced a documentary
0:21:41 > 0:21:43about the women in China.
0:21:43 > 0:21:46It was called The Other Half Of The Sky
0:21:46 > 0:21:49and promoting it meant another conversation
0:21:49 > 0:21:53with her old sparring partner Michael Parkinson.
0:21:53 > 0:21:56APPLAUSE
0:22:01 > 0:22:03Oh, that was smashing.
0:22:05 > 0:22:08- You know, we should explain why you're doing that.- You explain.
0:22:08 > 0:22:09HE CHUCKLES
0:22:09 > 0:22:11Because the last time Shirley was on my program,
0:22:11 > 0:22:14I had a button missing on my shirt
0:22:14 > 0:22:17and she poked her forefinger into my belly button
0:22:17 > 0:22:21as I was trying to talk about the Nixon administration.
0:22:21 > 0:22:22Needless to say, it did more for me
0:22:22 > 0:22:25than it did the Nixon administration.
0:22:25 > 0:22:28It was the best poke you had all year, wasn't it?
0:22:28 > 0:22:29LAUGHTER
0:22:29 > 0:22:31All right, enough of that.
0:22:31 > 0:22:33He walked over to me earlier and he said,
0:22:33 > 0:22:36"Why does this always happen? I get a nosebleed."
0:22:36 > 0:22:39I said, "Whenever you come near me, you get a nosebleed."
0:22:39 > 0:22:40- That's right.- It's the altitude.
0:22:40 > 0:22:43- LAUGHTER - I mention, in fact, that...
0:22:44 > 0:22:45I mentioned...
0:22:45 > 0:22:47- OK.- What's the matter?
0:22:47 > 0:22:49I just wondered where your finger had been.
0:22:49 > 0:22:51LAUGHTER
0:22:51 > 0:22:54If you want to do one of those kind of interviews...
0:22:54 > 0:22:57You're very disconcerting, Shirley MacLaine, you know that?
0:22:57 > 0:23:00- Yeah.- Yeah. Deliberately so.
0:23:00 > 0:23:03- No.- No. Just you are normally provocative?
0:23:04 > 0:23:07Just your regular middle-class girl.
0:23:07 > 0:23:10I find that very hard to believe, indeed I do.
0:23:10 > 0:23:13I mentioned in the introduction, in fact, that your name is Beaty.
0:23:13 > 0:23:16Why, in fact, did you choose the name MacLaine
0:23:16 > 0:23:19when you went on your career as a film star?
0:23:19 > 0:23:21Shirley MacLaine Beaty is my name.
0:23:21 > 0:23:24Yes, that's your mother's name, I know. But why not Shirley Beaty?
0:23:24 > 0:23:26I mean, your brother didn't do bad with it, did he?
0:23:26 > 0:23:28He had to change the spelling to do good with it.
0:23:28 > 0:23:30- Really?- Yeah.
0:23:30 > 0:23:34It was B-E-A-T-Y and people called me 'Beety', 'Be-atty',
0:23:34 > 0:23:36'Beauty', 'Beastly'.
0:23:36 > 0:23:38LAUGHTER
0:23:38 > 0:23:40I didn't like the last, so I took my middle name.
0:23:40 > 0:23:43What sort of background was it that you came from?
0:23:43 > 0:23:44What sort of parents did you have?
0:23:46 > 0:23:49Mother was Canadian, and Dad was
0:23:49 > 0:23:54a small-town, middle-class, American WASP, you know.
0:23:54 > 0:23:57- Really?- Yeah. White American, Southern Protestant.
0:23:58 > 0:24:00With all that's intended to follow that,
0:24:00 > 0:24:02politically and that sort of thing?
0:24:02 > 0:24:05Yeah. That's just so long and complicated, Michael, and...
0:24:07 > 0:24:10..and it was inspirational to get out of, you know.
0:24:10 > 0:24:11I mean, have you changed him?
0:24:11 > 0:24:14I mean, has daughter changed father in his point of view?
0:24:14 > 0:24:17Because, I mean, that's the last thing you are, isn't it?
0:24:17 > 0:24:21Yeah. I don't know if I have. I think I've made a couple of stabs at it.
0:24:21 > 0:24:24When...
0:24:24 > 0:24:26He always...he always wondered
0:24:26 > 0:24:29why I went around the world caring, you know.
0:24:29 > 0:24:31He used to call me a missionary in a skirt.
0:24:31 > 0:24:34- In a kind of derogatory sense?- Yes.
0:24:34 > 0:24:38In a pejorative sense, as though the best way to conduct one's life
0:24:38 > 0:24:41was to never upset the apple cart, you know.
0:24:41 > 0:24:45And to observe the status quo and not make any noise
0:24:45 > 0:24:46because it upsets the neighbours.
0:24:46 > 0:24:48Well, you've made a lot of noise
0:24:48 > 0:24:51and you've upset a lot of people in your career.
0:24:51 > 0:24:54Have you always done this or is it something that came
0:24:54 > 0:24:56after you'd made it in Hollywood as a film star?
0:24:58 > 0:25:02I think I always did because very early on when I was really little...
0:25:03 > 0:25:06..Oh, 1.5 or 2 years old, I remember feeling...
0:25:06 > 0:25:11Because they tell me to always be quiet, I'm going to, "Bleurgh!"
0:25:11 > 0:25:12LAUGHTER You know?
0:25:12 > 0:25:16They make...they make people...
0:25:16 > 0:25:19They inspire you to be radical. They inspire you to be...
0:25:21 > 0:25:22..deviant...
0:25:22 > 0:25:24when they want you to conform.
0:25:24 > 0:25:27But it must have been very difficult for you when you were in Hollywood
0:25:27 > 0:25:29because I would think of all societies,
0:25:29 > 0:25:32Hollywood is the most conformist, isn't it, in that sense?
0:25:32 > 0:25:36No, not really. I think that's a...
0:25:36 > 0:25:38I think it's a combination of things.
0:25:38 > 0:25:42Hollywood is looking for the individual who can break through
0:25:42 > 0:25:46and become a star and sell their product as a result of it.
0:25:46 > 0:25:49After you become a star and sell their product,
0:25:49 > 0:25:53they want you to conform to making the money they want to make.
0:25:53 > 0:25:54- Hmm.- Yes.
0:25:54 > 0:25:57But it is a mixture of art and industry.
0:25:57 > 0:26:00But did you always want to be a film star?
0:26:00 > 0:26:02- Was that your ambition as a kid? - Oh, no, no.- No?- Mm-mm.
0:26:02 > 0:26:07I...I never really cared about being famous or being recognised anyway.
0:26:07 > 0:26:10All I wanted to do was, "Bleurgh!"
0:26:10 > 0:26:12- Express myself. - Well, what does 'bleurgh' mean?
0:26:12 > 0:26:13- I mean...- It means that.
0:26:13 > 0:26:16It means when you are in a conformist environment,
0:26:16 > 0:26:19you feel you have to bust your seams.
0:26:19 > 0:26:22That is another way of saying I wanted to express myself,
0:26:22 > 0:26:26whether it was in dancing, which is what I did originally,
0:26:26 > 0:26:30and then in musical comedy. And then I got more specific with acting.
0:26:30 > 0:26:35And then in writing. And then finally, I think, in...
0:26:35 > 0:26:37in political...
0:26:39 > 0:26:41..and social concern.
0:26:41 > 0:26:43It is all part of the same thing.
0:26:43 > 0:26:45If you study a person's life like my one,
0:26:45 > 0:26:48it's not really inconsistent with the other.
0:26:48 > 0:26:50No, right, fine. I accept that
0:26:50 > 0:26:53and we'll sort of take in a few spokes of that wheel as we go along.
0:26:53 > 0:26:56But I'm more interested in what started you off on this road.
0:26:56 > 0:26:59Because the road that you started off on as a performer...
0:26:59 > 0:27:01- As a dancer, wasn't it?- Yeah.
0:27:01 > 0:27:04So, was there one person who as a child you looked at and said,
0:27:04 > 0:27:05"Ah, that's what I want to be"?
0:27:05 > 0:27:07No, uh-uh.
0:27:08 > 0:27:12You know, I come also from a background of...
0:27:13 > 0:27:16..rather abstract prejudice, you know.
0:27:16 > 0:27:21I was born in the South in a state that is the Mason-Dixon Line,
0:27:21 > 0:27:23the state of five presidents,
0:27:23 > 0:27:25so it is very politically and socially aware,
0:27:25 > 0:27:29but at the same time won't let black people in the living room, you know?
0:27:29 > 0:27:32So, I was aware early in my life that something was wrong with that,
0:27:32 > 0:27:34was concerning, yet at the same time
0:27:34 > 0:27:38I was stimulated to be culturally sophisticated
0:27:38 > 0:27:39and the conflict bothered me.
0:27:39 > 0:27:43I think that's why, if you are sensitive or intelligent at all,
0:27:43 > 0:27:45you begin to pick up on that and say,
0:27:45 > 0:27:48"Well, now, what is it that's troubling me?"
0:27:48 > 0:27:52Because the negative emotion of prejudice is not easy to stand.
0:27:52 > 0:27:55But when you had these thoughts in Hollywood...
0:27:55 > 0:27:57I mean, you see, I don't think that these thoughts
0:27:57 > 0:28:00ever get off the ground with the majority of people
0:28:00 > 0:28:02you must have worked with in Hollywood.
0:28:02 > 0:28:04I mean, you must have been a complete outsider
0:28:04 > 0:28:07feeling like this in the situation you were in.
0:28:07 > 0:28:09I think you're probably right about that, yeah.
0:28:09 > 0:28:12I think people in Hollywood in the main
0:28:12 > 0:28:17are concerned with not upsetting the apple cart of their success
0:28:17 > 0:28:19or whatever their box office dictates.
0:28:19 > 0:28:23But nonetheless, for all this, you were a star. You are a star.
0:28:23 > 0:28:25And you allowed yourself, no doubt -
0:28:25 > 0:28:27and I know because it's in your book -
0:28:27 > 0:28:31to be pampered and treated like some sort of shampooed poodle.
0:28:31 > 0:28:35I mean, tell them what it was like to be a star when you were there.
0:28:35 > 0:28:39My make-up man used to have to knock me down and tackle me to put the make-up on me.
0:28:39 > 0:28:41LAUGHTER I didn't like being pampered, really.
0:28:41 > 0:28:44But what was it like, though, the system at that time?
0:28:44 > 0:28:47What was the set-up like of stardom? What did it being a star mean?
0:28:47 > 0:28:51Well, you were expected to lie back and enjoy it, I suppose.
0:28:51 > 0:28:53But that is part of the seduction.
0:28:53 > 0:28:59That's part of the exercise of believing your own myth.
0:28:59 > 0:29:00You're not anybody special,
0:29:00 > 0:29:07except that you excel in the art of emulating human life.
0:29:07 > 0:29:09That's where the specialty comes from.
0:29:09 > 0:29:12The fact that you make a lot of money or that you're privileged
0:29:12 > 0:29:16or that people should treat you with any more special attention
0:29:16 > 0:29:18than anyone else
0:29:18 > 0:29:22is what makes it very difficult to adjust to success.
0:29:22 > 0:29:26Success is so much tougher to adjust to than struggle.
0:29:26 > 0:29:31Failure is tough too, but struggle is where the real happiness lies.
0:29:31 > 0:29:34And when all of us...
0:29:34 > 0:29:35You know, I like Hollywood.
0:29:35 > 0:29:41I'm not one of those who really knocks it and means it.
0:29:41 > 0:29:43There's a lot about it that I would knock
0:29:43 > 0:29:45and be seriously concerned with and then...
0:29:45 > 0:29:47What would you knock about it?
0:29:47 > 0:29:49Well, for example...
0:29:51 > 0:29:54..to cast pictures with stars
0:29:54 > 0:29:59according to the box office receipts of their last pictures is silly.
0:29:59 > 0:30:02Some of the finest actors in the world can't get work for two or three years
0:30:02 > 0:30:06- because their last picture didn't do well. That's really awful.- Hmm.
0:30:06 > 0:30:09- That's not commensurate with good art or good industry.- Hmm.
0:30:09 > 0:30:11And the real secret, it seems to me,
0:30:11 > 0:30:14is to find the right subject matter, the right screenplay,
0:30:14 > 0:30:16and have the courage to cast that person,
0:30:16 > 0:30:19whether he or she is a star or not, in it
0:30:19 > 0:30:21- and then you'll make yourself a star. - Hmm.
0:30:21 > 0:30:24Do you find that that problem, the problem of being
0:30:24 > 0:30:28the artist in Hollywood the way you just specified,
0:30:28 > 0:30:31all the more difficult because you are a woman?
0:30:31 > 0:30:33In this sense that, you know, Hollywood is run by men.
0:30:33 > 0:30:36- In the main, the directors in Hollywood are men.- They are.
0:30:36 > 0:30:38It's really interesting now, Michael, what is going on.
0:30:38 > 0:30:41The parts for women don't exist, you might have noticed.
0:30:41 > 0:30:43Robert Redford is playing all our parts.
0:30:43 > 0:30:45LAUGHTER
0:30:45 > 0:30:50He is prettier than a lot of us too so I don't begrudge him that but...
0:30:52 > 0:30:55I started to figure that out the other day.
0:30:55 > 0:30:56I was walking on the beach in Malibu
0:30:56 > 0:30:59and I thought, "What on Earth is really going on here?"
0:30:59 > 0:31:01And then I remembered that in the old days,
0:31:01 > 0:31:04the old days meaning the '40s and '50s when the Hays Office
0:31:04 > 0:31:06was the censorship board
0:31:06 > 0:31:10and you had Barbara Stanwyck and Joan Crawford and Katharine Hepburn
0:31:10 > 0:31:14playing women judges, women politicians, women mayors,
0:31:14 > 0:31:16women scientists, blah, blah.
0:31:16 > 0:31:20You were not allowed to play a love scene in the bedroom
0:31:20 > 0:31:24with a double bed. It had to be two twin beds,
0:31:24 > 0:31:27even if the couple was married and regardless of what the scene was,
0:31:27 > 0:31:32one of the people had to have one foot on the floor.
0:31:32 > 0:31:34I could never figure out what difference that made. Could you?
0:31:34 > 0:31:37You could figure out something to do with that that'd be really kinky.
0:31:37 > 0:31:39That's right.
0:31:39 > 0:31:40AUDIENCE LAUGHS
0:31:40 > 0:31:42So what happened was since they couldn't play
0:31:42 > 0:31:44any real good sexy love scenes,
0:31:44 > 0:31:46they had to resort to giving women these parts
0:31:46 > 0:31:48that were sensational in real life.
0:31:48 > 0:31:53The Hays Office was abolished in the name of more liberal sexual attitudes
0:31:53 > 0:31:55and the rating system came in.
0:31:55 > 0:31:58Well, now, because men were running the studios,
0:31:58 > 0:32:00men were writing the scripts and men were the directors,
0:32:00 > 0:32:02they put us back in the bedroom,
0:32:02 > 0:32:06and we haven't been judges or politicians or mayors since.
0:32:06 > 0:32:09We can't get out of the bedroom now.
0:32:09 > 0:32:12- Why are you crying? - It sounds a great life though.
0:32:12 > 0:32:14I don't know what you're bothered about.
0:32:14 > 0:32:16I'd stay in Hollywood forever if that were the case.
0:32:16 > 0:32:2012 months after that interview,
0:32:20 > 0:32:23Shirley took on her first acting role for four years which
0:32:23 > 0:32:28earned her her fourth Oscar nomination for Best Actress.
0:32:28 > 0:32:33The film, The Turning Point, co-starred Anne Bancroft
0:32:33 > 0:32:37and focused on very familiar territory for Shirley -
0:32:37 > 0:32:39the world of ballet.
0:32:39 > 0:32:44I think a very eloquent sense of masochism is extremely important
0:32:44 > 0:32:47in the ballet. I mean, you have no idea how much it hurts.
0:32:47 > 0:32:50I was a ballerina for...
0:32:50 > 0:32:54Since I was two and I danced every day for eight hours a day.
0:32:54 > 0:32:56It was everything to me.
0:32:56 > 0:32:59More important than my schooling,
0:32:59 > 0:33:05more important than my social sense, more importance than any man or boy
0:33:05 > 0:33:10when I was young that I was attracted to or fell in love with.
0:33:10 > 0:33:12It was more important than anything.
0:33:12 > 0:33:17And then I realised how all-consuming ballet is.
0:33:17 > 0:33:21You haven't got time not to hurt. You haven't got time to have a good time.
0:33:21 > 0:33:25Talking of hurting, you once danced with a broken ankle. Is that right?
0:33:25 > 0:33:28- I did.- Can you tell us about that?
0:33:28 > 0:33:30Well, that was my first experience
0:33:30 > 0:33:36with self-motivated mind over matter.
0:33:36 > 0:33:38I was 16, about 16.
0:33:38 > 0:33:43It was before the performance at Constitution Hall in Washington DC.
0:33:43 > 0:33:46We were dancing Cinderella and I was playing the fairy godmother.
0:33:46 > 0:33:49I was warming up before the performance,
0:33:49 > 0:33:52doing some grand jetes and some tour jetes and stuff
0:33:52 > 0:33:57around the stage and I fell and broke it.
0:33:59 > 0:34:02- During the overture. - You didn't know you'd broken it?
0:34:02 > 0:34:06Well, what happened was immediately my sense of the fact that that
0:34:06 > 0:34:08had occurred and the audience was there and the overture
0:34:08 > 0:34:11was almost finished and what on Earth were we going to do?
0:34:11 > 0:34:14It's like I understand some of the soldiers felt in the war.
0:34:14 > 0:34:17They didn't realise their leg had been shot off
0:34:17 > 0:34:19until after the battle was over.
0:34:19 > 0:34:21I simply got up on pointe
0:34:21 > 0:34:24and I remember the bone sticking through the toe shoe ribbon.
0:34:24 > 0:34:28I danced the whole thing completely numb with no anaesthetic, nothing.
0:34:28 > 0:34:32And when it was over, of course I went to bed for three months.
0:34:32 > 0:34:36But I had psyched myself into having to do it.
0:34:49 > 0:34:52Good girl.
0:34:52 > 0:34:53Deedee.
0:34:56 > 0:34:58Deedee.
0:34:58 > 0:35:01- I'm sick to death of your jealousy and resentment.- So am I.
0:35:01 > 0:35:04- Then stop blaming your goddamn life on me. You picked it.- You picked it!
0:35:04 > 0:35:07You took away my choice. You never let me find out if I was good enough.
0:35:07 > 0:35:09You aren't. You weren't good enough and you knew it.
0:35:09 > 0:35:11- That's why you married Wayne. - I loved Wayne.
0:35:11 > 0:35:14- So much so that you said to hell with your career?- Yes.
0:35:14 > 0:35:16- And then got pregnant to prove that you meant it.- Yes.
0:35:16 > 0:35:17Oh, don't lie to me, lie to yourself.
0:35:17 > 0:35:20You got married because you knew you were second rate.
0:35:20 > 0:35:22And you got pregnant because Wayne was a ballet dancer
0:35:22 > 0:35:24and in those days that meant queer so you had to prove
0:35:24 > 0:35:26- he was a man so you had a baby. - That is a goddamn lie!
0:35:26 > 0:35:28That's the goddamn truth and you know it.
0:35:28 > 0:35:31So you must have been very strongly motivated by the script
0:35:31 > 0:35:33or the idea to come back after four years.
0:35:33 > 0:35:36What motivated me was it was the only good script for women
0:35:36 > 0:35:39- I had read in four years. - Particularly for women?
0:35:39 > 0:35:41Do you still think women get a raw deal in the movies?
0:35:41 > 0:35:43There is no question about it.
0:35:43 > 0:35:46It's even become close to restraint of trade.
0:35:46 > 0:35:49It really has. Even now.
0:35:49 > 0:35:52And we have Julia, Looking For Mr Goodbar, Turning Point,
0:35:52 > 0:35:573 Women, Unmarried Woman. We have five very good films,
0:35:57 > 0:36:01very good films for women but still you see we are starring together.
0:36:01 > 0:36:04They are doing the Paul Newman - Robert Redford routine with us now.
0:36:04 > 0:36:09They are not making us scripts and stories where we can relate to men.
0:36:09 > 0:36:12They're still not doing love stories. Which is a shame.
0:36:12 > 0:36:15Do you think that is because of an unconscious down on women
0:36:15 > 0:36:18or just because men have been running the industry for so long
0:36:18 > 0:36:20they don't notice?
0:36:20 > 0:36:23I don't think they understand what has happened...
0:36:26 > 0:36:30..in the last five or six years.
0:36:30 > 0:36:31The advent of women's liberation,
0:36:31 > 0:36:34the impact of women's liberation in the United States
0:36:34 > 0:36:35is very, very strong.
0:36:36 > 0:36:40And it has permeated down through entire society.
0:36:40 > 0:36:45It hasn't quite gotten to Hollywood. It's a provincial town.
0:36:45 > 0:36:49But you haven't done any pictures for four years. The Turning Point is your first in four years.
0:36:49 > 0:36:51Is that a conscious decision? You wanted to get away from it?
0:36:51 > 0:36:54Or do you now feel you'd like to go back to the movies?
0:36:54 > 0:36:56Oh, yeah. Oh, I don't want to be just a movie star like I used to be
0:36:56 > 0:36:59when I was making two and a half or three films a year.
0:36:59 > 0:37:04It's a very debilitating experience to sit around your house in Bel-Air
0:37:04 > 0:37:06with your Jaguar and your swimming pool
0:37:06 > 0:37:10and you go to soundstage 27 at six o'clock in the morning
0:37:10 > 0:37:12and get out at seven o'clock at night
0:37:12 > 0:37:15and life does not exist when you live for film.
0:37:15 > 0:37:18On the other hand, you say that when you're working on a film
0:37:18 > 0:37:21the crew becomes a sort of family and you get very intimate with them.
0:37:21 > 0:37:24- Once year is what I'm saying.- Yes.
0:37:24 > 0:37:26But even though you're producing mediocre movies, it is
0:37:26 > 0:37:29still the experience and the time you've spent with them, so you say.
0:37:29 > 0:37:31That's lovely, it's wonderful.
0:37:31 > 0:37:36I get very comfortable and almost sleepy.
0:37:36 > 0:37:38It's kind of an embryonic environment.
0:37:38 > 0:37:41It's warm, everyone loves you,
0:37:41 > 0:37:42everyone is there to take care of you.
0:37:42 > 0:37:45You feel pampered, you know no one is going to let you
0:37:45 > 0:37:48look bad or be hurt. It's like having 39 mothers.
0:37:50 > 0:37:52Talking about looking bad, I hope you won't mind me saying so
0:37:52 > 0:37:54but you look a great deal better in real life
0:37:54 > 0:37:56than sometimes you do on the screen.
0:37:56 > 0:37:59In The Turning Point you let yourself rather bravely appear
0:37:59 > 0:38:01slatternly and down at heel.
0:38:01 > 0:38:03Sure. I had to gain 15lb for it.
0:38:03 > 0:38:06I had to look as though I had fallen apart a little bit
0:38:06 > 0:38:09because that is what she had done. Sure.
0:38:11 > 0:38:13I didn't like doing that coming back after four years
0:38:13 > 0:38:16because they might think I look like that, you know.
0:38:16 > 0:38:19But that's the way you get awards, so it's OK.
0:38:20 > 0:38:23As it turned out, Shirley might have been right on that point.
0:38:24 > 0:38:30She finally won a Best Actress Oscar for 1983's Terms Of Endearment
0:38:30 > 0:38:34and then her fourth Best Actress Golden Globe
0:38:34 > 0:38:36for 1988's Madame Sousatzka.
0:38:36 > 0:38:42Here she is talking about both films in a conversation with Terry Wogan.
0:38:42 > 0:38:45Madame Sousatzka, which is your latest triumph
0:38:45 > 0:38:47- chosen for the Royal Premiere. - Mmm.
0:38:47 > 0:38:49Can you tell us what it is about
0:38:49 > 0:38:51apart from being difficult to pronounce?
0:38:51 > 0:38:53Yeah, oh, gosh.
0:38:53 > 0:38:56I have to do like six-month's work in three minutes here.
0:38:56 > 0:38:58Well, make it a minute.
0:38:58 > 0:39:05It is the story of a teacher who is very imperious
0:39:05 > 0:39:08and bizarre and eccentric.
0:39:08 > 0:39:10It is a part and a half.
0:39:10 > 0:39:15She is tyrannical, she is vulnerable, she's funny, she's cruel,
0:39:15 > 0:39:20she's very broad stroked, she's possessive, she's proprietary,
0:39:20 > 0:39:24she is loving, she's one wonderful teacher, a bit of a fraud,
0:39:24 > 0:39:28suffers from mixed motives
0:39:28 > 0:39:32and it is one of the best grand dame parts ever written,
0:39:32 > 0:39:37so I just decided to do it and to commit to this old lady.
0:39:37 > 0:39:39I'm going to try and digest that now.
0:39:39 > 0:39:43Can we have a look at just a smidgen of Madame Sousatzka
0:39:43 > 0:39:45while we're taking that in?
0:39:45 > 0:39:48You move around far too much, Mr Virtuoso.
0:39:50 > 0:39:52Perfect scales have no beginning and no end.
0:39:52 > 0:39:56Each note is a smooth and as even as these beads, you see.
0:39:56 > 0:39:57Mm-hm.
0:39:57 > 0:40:00Forget the fingers, don't think for one moment
0:40:00 > 0:40:03that you play with your fingers. If he thought about his fingers
0:40:03 > 0:40:06he would be at the bottom of the ocean never to be heard from again.
0:40:06 > 0:40:10What are these 10 poor little worms? No!
0:40:10 > 0:40:13This is where the music comes from, from the abdomen
0:40:13 > 0:40:19and it rises higher and higher from the depths of your very soul.
0:40:19 > 0:40:22Higher and higher from the deepest instincts
0:40:22 > 0:40:27to the height of reason until it reaches here, you see?
0:40:27 > 0:40:30Now begin. Begin.
0:40:30 > 0:40:31HE PLAYS SCALE
0:40:31 > 0:40:34That's it, play. Let it play.
0:40:36 > 0:40:43Ebb and flow, each note, smooth and even. That's it.
0:40:43 > 0:40:44He begins to play...
0:40:44 > 0:40:48AUDIENCE APPLAUDS
0:40:52 > 0:40:54You read the book,
0:40:54 > 0:40:57that's where you formed your desire to play the part, was it?
0:40:57 > 0:41:00No, I read the script first and then I read the book.
0:41:00 > 0:41:02The script was quite different than the book.
0:41:02 > 0:41:05Was your portrayal based on any character that you had met
0:41:05 > 0:41:08- or that you knew?- Mm-hm. Several ballet teachers that I had
0:41:08 > 0:41:10when I was growing up when I was young.
0:41:10 > 0:41:13Did they have the occasional grim desire
0:41:13 > 0:41:15which she effects all the time?
0:41:15 > 0:41:17Oh, yes, that's the way a classical teacher
0:41:17 > 0:41:20effects inspiration, through tyranny.
0:41:20 > 0:41:25And I was so much into the ballet I almost went into ballet theatre.
0:41:25 > 0:41:27I had a teacher like Sousatzka,
0:41:27 > 0:41:32by the way, who threw me across the room by my ear on the day that
0:41:32 > 0:41:35I had my ears pierced. I'll never forget that.
0:41:35 > 0:41:37And I did step right from then on.
0:41:37 > 0:41:40I was one she didn't crush.
0:41:40 > 0:41:43See, you find out what you're made of by that kind of challenge.
0:41:43 > 0:41:46But the day that I woke up in the ballet
0:41:46 > 0:41:49and realised that I didn't know who was president.
0:41:49 > 0:41:52I didn't know anything except variations, classical music
0:41:52 > 0:41:54and how to tie my toe shoes.
0:41:54 > 0:41:57That's when I gave up the ballet and I went into musical comedy instead.
0:41:57 > 0:42:00You are a woman of many interests.
0:42:00 > 0:42:04You've written several very successful books. Do you...
0:42:04 > 0:42:06Those seminars that you conduct,
0:42:06 > 0:42:09do you still conduct those seminars in heightening consciousness, etc?
0:42:09 > 0:42:13No, I haven't been doing it because I've been going back to
0:42:13 > 0:42:17moviemaking, but I wrote a book that grew out of the seminars
0:42:17 > 0:42:19that will be out in April
0:42:19 > 0:42:22and I did a video cassette tape based really,
0:42:22 > 0:42:26and the seminars were based really on techniques of stress reduction.
0:42:26 > 0:42:30We're living in such a stressed out society in America that people were
0:42:30 > 0:42:36really desperate to know about some rather pragmatic techniques to...
0:42:36 > 0:42:40- To relax.- To relax and to be more peaceful within.
0:42:40 > 0:42:42My book is called Going Within.
0:42:42 > 0:42:46- And where does it come from? - The power that you have?- Yeah.
0:42:46 > 0:42:51Probably at the end of the day I would say belief in oneself.
0:42:53 > 0:42:58When I learned to really feel that sense, I loved my work more.
0:42:58 > 0:42:59I loved my relationships more.
0:42:59 > 0:43:03Talking of relationships, the character of Madame Sousatzka
0:43:03 > 0:43:07is a very possessive one, and five years ago
0:43:07 > 0:43:11you won the Oscar for the part of Aurora in Terms of Endearment.
0:43:11 > 0:43:13We'll just have a little look at that
0:43:13 > 0:43:15then and draw a parallel between the two.
0:43:15 > 0:43:19THEY LAUGH
0:43:21 > 0:43:23Garrett.
0:43:23 > 0:43:25No, no. You don't need outsiders now.
0:43:25 > 0:43:28- No outsiders?- See ya later. - Please come.
0:43:28 > 0:43:30Emma, this is Garrett.
0:43:30 > 0:43:34Oh, pleasure to meet you. I've heard so much about you.
0:43:34 > 0:43:37Yes, well, your mother's really been looking forward to this too.
0:43:39 > 0:43:42So, go ahead.
0:43:45 > 0:43:46Anything wrong, Garrett?
0:43:46 > 0:43:48No.
0:43:48 > 0:43:51It was very nice to have met you.
0:43:51 > 0:43:53Must be nice to be home, huh?
0:43:53 > 0:43:55Oh, it's great. It's great.
0:43:56 > 0:43:59I'll be over later.
0:43:59 > 0:44:02They're probably tired anyway and will get to sleep early
0:44:02 > 0:44:05- and I'd like to get to bed early. - Grandma! Grandma!
0:44:05 > 0:44:07AUDIENCE APPLAUDS
0:44:07 > 0:44:09You're laughing.
0:44:11 > 0:44:13When we were just watching that little bit,
0:44:13 > 0:44:16you were obviously amused by it. Bring back all sorts of memories?
0:44:16 > 0:44:18I love Jack Nicholson.
0:44:18 > 0:44:20He has been my role model, frankly.
0:44:21 > 0:44:23Because he had such courage to take parts.
0:44:23 > 0:44:25Look at that with his potbelly.
0:44:25 > 0:44:28It's a good man. Oh, there's nothing wrong with that.
0:44:28 > 0:44:31Is that what inspired you to put on the weight for Madame Sousatzka?
0:44:31 > 0:44:33No, hardly, but I loved his courage.
0:44:33 > 0:44:40I loved his comedic ability to be old and love it.
0:44:42 > 0:44:46We've all got to get old, haven't we? There's no point hating it.
0:44:46 > 0:44:52Oh, no. It's wonderful to enjoy being experienced and wise.
0:44:53 > 0:44:59Today, as well as experience and wisdom, Shirley MacLaine
0:44:59 > 0:45:04still has that ever-present aura of stardom.
0:45:04 > 0:45:07Her recent appearances in Downton Abbey underlying the fact that
0:45:07 > 0:45:11she remains one of the best loved, most commanding
0:45:11 > 0:45:15and, yes, kooky characters in Hollywood.