Shirley Maclaine Talking Pictures


Shirley Maclaine

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Actress, activist and bestselling writer,

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Shirley MacLaine has been lighting up the screens

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since her award-winning 1955 film debut

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in Alfred Hitchcock's The Trouble With Harry.

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She has been both an insider and an outsider in Hollywood,

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part of the elite as Warren Beatty's big sister

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and a member of Frank Sinatra's Rat Pack Clan

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but also on the edge thanks to her outspokenness on women's rights

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and her belief in spiritualism and reincarnation.

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Her first appearance on the BBC came in 1962

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when she was interviewed by Peter Duvall

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for the programme Picture Parade.

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Miss MacLaine, in the last seven years,

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you have been swept along on a fantastic wave of critical acclaim

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into the very front ranks of world entertainers.

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If I may quote just a single comment

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which was made recently about you, it was simply this:

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"I have only one point to make about Miss MacLaine. That is she is brilliant."

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Now, does this kind of critical adulation embarrass you at all or does it inspire you?

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If you said it to me in person, I think it would embarrass me, yes,

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but to read it alone in my bedroom is something I enjoy very much.

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With every film you make, you seem to attract a new adjective from the screenwriters.

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The latest one is the word which I don't know. It's the word 'cook'.

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Now, do you know what this word means? Are you embarrassed by it at all?

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I don't know what it means.

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I think it started in the United States maybe with a few articles, singular articles.

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I had never heard the word before and people ask me what it means.

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If you find out, I wish you'd tell me.

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Well, I'm told it means 'zany' or 'unconventional'.

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Would you say this was a correct description of you?

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Well, part of me, yes but by no means all of me.

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I can't be that all the time or I'd need to eat sugar all day.

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I really don't know what it means.

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I thought they meant I was a good cook for a while

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until I realised I was pronouncing it wrong.

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I don't know what the word means, no.

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So, it's a word they have made up purely for you in America?

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They made it up, yes.

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I suppose press people need something with which the public can attach an image, you know.

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And so out of a few very widely-read articles

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came this impression of me as a cook, like the Clan, the same thing.

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One man was responsible for having created this impression.

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There's no such thing as the Clan.

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I keep telling everybody that who asks me

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and so do the other so-called members, which by the way, widely vary.

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Sometimes, there are four of us, sometimes, there are 24.

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-This is the Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis unit.

-That's right.

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Sometimes, it's President Kennedy who shows up at parties.

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So, as I say, you know, lots of times,

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things are created through a need to capture the imagination of the public

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and that is what has happened with this word 'cook', I suppose, and with the so-called Clan.

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Your early professional career, of course, found you as a dancer in musical shows.

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In fact, I believe you were making The Pajama Game

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when you were discovered for the cinema,

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and yet in the 13 films you've made, you have only made two which one can call musicals.

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Now, why is this?

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Well, it's difficult to pin it down to one reason.

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I think Hollywood in the last 10 years

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has ceased to make as many musicals as they used to, for lots of reasons.

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One is a family who will spend 2.50 to go see a musical in a theatre

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could stay at home and watch it

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on Sunday night free of charge, you know.

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There are not that many musicals being written.

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I don't think the studios are that anxious to make them.

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They're a terribly large investment

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and, because of the investment being so large,

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most of the foreign market now in the United States pictures

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are 60%-40%, I believe, whereas 10 years ago,

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it was maybe 40% foreign and 60% the United States

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so that means then that Hollywood has to rely a great deal on box office business abroad.

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Well, musicals are difficult to dub

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in each respective language that the picture is playing in that country

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and I think that's another reason.

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Of course, I didn't really...

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You see, I have an imbalance in my inner ear

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and when I move or fly in a plane or ride in a car

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or sometimes even take a short walk across the street, I get sick.

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So when I dance, that happens and that's one reason why all my life,

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I danced so often and so hard and so long every day.

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I had to if I wanted to be a dancer and that's all I wanted to be when I was young.

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So, it's a kind of physical disability, really, which has got in the way.

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It stopped me or less. It was very uncomfortable for me.

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I would really get sick. When I made Can-Can,

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I began to rehearse maybe two months ahead of the shooting time

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because I had to adjust myself to that much turning again

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and I would rehearse it an hour and be sick the rest of the day

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and then the next day, I would rehearse maybe two hours

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and I worked up finally so that I could work nine and 10 and 11 hours.

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Of all the films you have made, The Apartment,

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certainly as far as this country is concerned, is the favourite.

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Could you say whether this was your own particular favourite?

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Did it give you the most pleasure to make?

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No, it's not my favourite film. It's one of my favourites.

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It may perhaps be the best film I have been in that has been shown to the public so far.

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I have two that they haven't seen that I am just as fond of.

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You know, when you're speaking of Billy Wilder, in my opinion,

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he's a genius and Billy Wilder has great control

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and he's the master of the ship on his pictures

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so that you have to look to Billy and say, "He did it, I didn't,"

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and when you have that kind of feeling about something,

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it's difficult to be that much involved in anything but adoration for Billy Wilder.

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He's fantastic.

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27?

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You may not realise it, Miss Kubelik,

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but I am in the top 10 efficiency-wise

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and this may be the day promotion-wise.

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You're beginning to sound like Mr Kirkeby already.

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Why not now that they're kicking me upstairs?

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It couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

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You know, you're the only one around here who ever takes his hat off in the elevator.

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-Really?

-The characters you meet. Something happens to men in elevators.

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It must be the change of altitude. The blood rushes to their head.

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-I could tell you stories that...

-I'd love to hear them.

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Maybe we could have lunch in the cafeteria sometime or some evening after work.

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-27.

-Oh.

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-I hope everything goes all right.

-I hope so.

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They called me on a day like this, what with a cold and everything!

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-How do I look?

-Fine. Wait.

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Thank you! That's the first thing I ever noticed about you.

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When you were still in the local elevator, you always wore a flower.

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Good luck. And wipe your nose.

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Over the next decade,

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Shirley's roles in films like Gambit with Herbert Lom and Michael Caine,

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Sweet Charity the musical

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and her Golden Globe-winning appearance in Irma La Douce

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earned her a reputation as one of cinema's finest comic actresses.

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It's a reputation she lived up to on the small screen too.

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Here, in a famously flirty encounter with Michael Parkinson from 1971.

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What are the disadvantages, though, Shirley, do you think,

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of being an internationally famous star?

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You're the kind of person who runs away from it, aren't you?

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-From being a star?

-Yes, from the acclaim.

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Oh, no, I really don't mind that.

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I don't get a great large charge out of it either

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because I think the invasion of privacy is difficult to handle sometimes.

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I do love anonymity.

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I really do love to go to a market and melt into the shopping bags.

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-Is it possible?

-Sure.

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Oh, listen, those stars who tell you that they go to buy a loaf of bread

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and they're surrounded by millions of zealots

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are the ones who have spent three hours putting on lashes and leopard underwear.

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LAUGHTER

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"Oh, God, they won't leave me alone." That's crap.

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LAUGHTER

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I did an experiment once with a man who was doing this cover story or something

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and he wanted to know that and I said, "Let's try this."

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It was in New York, Fifth Avenue,

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and I had on a suit and just little heels like that

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and my hair was like it used to be in that pixie style.

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Oh, lovely.

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I look like a road company Susan Hayward this way, don't you think?

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LAUGHTER

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Anyway, we did this thing where I said,

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"OK, for 10 blocks, I'm going to walk as though I'm a star

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"and everybody will notice me

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"because I won't feel amalgamated with the shoppers and the day

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"and the sort of buses

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"that all people really actually naturally do when they walk.

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"I am a star."

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So I walked that way for 10 blocks and it was murder.

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I mean, the leopard underwear ladies were right.

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Mm.

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Then at something like 56th Street, I said,

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"Now, just watch the change in attitude if I can swiftly make this transition in time,"

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and I started becoming interested in the shoes in the windows

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and the sizes of the dresses and the colour combinations and other people.

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-Yes.

-Not one person noticed me.

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That's fascinating. That's amazing.

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It really does depend on the sort of personal vibrations

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-you have about yourself.

-Yes.

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Have you on the other hand, though, have you ever been guilty

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of using the fact that you are an internationally-known star to your advantage?

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-Have you ever come...?

-Yes, I make your show better.

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LAUGHTER

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APPLAUSE

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-I'll ask you that question again.

-LAUGHTER

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Can you button your shirt up first?

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LAUGHTER

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Let's see your top, Michael.

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For those of you who haven't got colour television,

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-I'm bright pink now.

-Is that a wig or is that real?

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It's real. Pull it.

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There you go.

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You see, people who write in and say, "Is it a wig?.."

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Now they'll say, "We've always wondered, now we know."

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If they're men, I always write back and say, "You're allowed one free pull."

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Oh, my God! On what?!

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LAUGHTER

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Do you want to talk about birth control some more?

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That story had a good punchline but it's not going to follow yours.

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What shall we talk about now, Shirley MacLaine?

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LAUGHTER

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About what job you're going to have tomorrow.

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LAUGHTER

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Yes. Well...

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The band think you're hilarious.

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They've been hearing the same old stuff for so long.

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-Well, we've got another five minutes.

-Is that all we've got?

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What shall we talk about on here, then? We've talked about America. No, we haven't.

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I tell you what I'd like to ask you.

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You've been over here for some time now.

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What are your feelings about this country,

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about the mood of this country and how does it differ from America, do you think?

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Because we always think we've got a special relationship with America, don't we?

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And I reckon that we are more foreign to the Americans

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-than Zulus are.

-Oh, boy, that's very true.

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I'm doing a series here for Sir Lew Grade.

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I'm interested in television now.

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-I really think television is something else.

-Mm?

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Maybe not after tonight but up to now.

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LAUGHTER

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And the thing that struck me in working with the British...

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I make a lot of pictures here but never for, like, nine months

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and very intimately involved.

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And just because you speak the same language doesn't mean you have the same thoughts.

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-Yes.

-Very, very profoundly, it hit me.

-Yes.

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Because the assistant director will come to me and he'll say,

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"Would you like a rehearsal?"

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And I say, "No, I'm all right. I know the lines.

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"Just tell him to go ahead and call me when you're ready."

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He goes back down to the director and says, "She won't come."

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LAUGHTER

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He said, "I told her you're ready, she won't come."

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Comes back up to me. "Would you like a rehearsal?"

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I said, "I told you, you know. Why are you coming and asking me again?

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"Do you mean the director wants me there for a rehearsal?

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"Oh! Now I'll come!" I get down and he says, "Where were you?"

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LAUGHTER

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That sort of thing.

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This is probably an unfair question because you really haven't...

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It's a kind of...

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If you're working over here as you are and working all the time,

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it's a kind of phoney area that you are in.

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You don't really get to know the problems of the people here.

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What about the colour problem here, for instance?

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Has it occurred to you that we might have something like the American situation?

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Well, I think you are not facing it and that's why you can't compare the two.

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I was amazed that Enoch Powell was as popular as he seemed to be,

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that he actually was listened to.

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-Mm.

-It's a big thing.

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The conflict of colour in America is probably at the bottom

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of why we feel so unhappy about ourselves.

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I don't think you can stave off the problem for very much longer.

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Can I finish by asking a question

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that I have always wanted to ask a woman as beautiful as you?

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You're always...

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People write about you as being a sort of sexy and attractive woman.

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Who do you think is the sexiest man in the world?

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You.

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LAUGHTER

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APPLAUSE

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-Next to me.

-I'm next to you.

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No, apart from me.

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LAUGHTER

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You're making a joke out of something I said offhandedly last week.

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I told him I thought Zhou Enlai was the sexiest man.

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-Zhou Enlai.

-How do you like that?

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A 73-year-old Communist he's worried about.

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LAUGHTER

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APPLAUSE

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A year after that meeting, performing made way for politics.

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Shirley became a fundraiser for

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Democrat Senator George McGovern's presidential election battle

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with Richard Nixon.

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Later, in an interview with Vincent Hanna on the Tonight programme,

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she spoke seriously about combining acting with activism

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and the failure of Senator McGovern's campaign.

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I think he didn't know how to manipulate,

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to orchestrate his personality on television.

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I think a great many people of good leadership quality

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don't know how to do that.

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And I think that's a shame because that is what's required.

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If the people don't feel that you can communicate,

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then you can't inspire them,

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so it has become a world

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where you have to know how to orchestrate the media.

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What about 1976?

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Do you say Ronald Reagan is an excellent communicator

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doing well because of those very reasons?

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Yes. Having been an actor,

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having travelled on the road for General Electric,

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having made so many speeches,

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having tried out his personality in front of masses of people,

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he knows how to do it.

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There is no-one more cool or more capable when the red light goes on

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than Ronald Reagan

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and that's why she is a very dominant force in American politics today.

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Are you saying then that...

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..it's the communicators who will eventually succeed in politics?

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That it's better to be a good communicator than a good politician?

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I think so.

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But I think the actors also,

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we all have to be very sure of what we believe in, of what we mean.

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Look, we are representatives of the emulation of human life, right?

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If I'm asked to play a woman on welfare who lives with no husband

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and the prospect of supporting six children and I have no income,

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I've got to go study her.

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I've got to find out what her problems are, what her tensions are,

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what her frustrations are, what her joys are.

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I've got to somehow find that dimension about her life

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in order to portray her.

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Therefore, I have to come to some human conclusion

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at the end of that research.

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I can't just walk away then, if I have any sensitivity at all,

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and use her life as a role model for how I'm going to play a part

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and get an award.

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I have to somehow remember that that woman I just emulated

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is still back there in the ghetto.

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That's what makes actors social-political animals,

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if they have any sensitivity or any intelligence.

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Therefore, when someone asks me, "What about that part you played?"

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it is a very short hop and skip from doing something about her problem.

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Therefore, doing something about welfare.

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Therefore, doing something about military spending.

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Therefore, doing something about who's president.

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Of course, some people might say that you're doing the easy thing.

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You're taking all these serious topics and packaging them neatly

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and putting them up on a stage where people can look at them

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and say, "Super, I have fulfilled my social conscience now for the year.

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-"I've satisfied my..."

-Oh, come on.

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If that's not the most typical, cynically journalistic question

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I have ever heard.

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There is nothing tougher than to be up on that stage. It's terrifying.

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For you, but what about the audience?

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What do they get out of it? You can't expect them to go out...

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I mean, many people will go and see you portray these roles,

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they're not going to be more socially aware.

0:17:440:17:46

-No, but they had a good time.

-They'll be less socially aware.

0:17:460:17:49

No. When you are removed by...

0:17:490:17:52

human expression, it...

0:17:520:17:54

it makes you socially aware of human sensitivity.

0:17:540:17:58

That is the purpose of art in this world.

0:17:580:18:00

Art makes human beings human.

0:18:000:18:02

Politics makes human beings organised.

0:18:020:18:05

I like a little of both, yes, that's true.

0:18:050:18:08

But we need more humanity now.

0:18:080:18:10

That's why I'm going back into art.

0:18:100:18:12

That doesn't mean I'm out of politics.

0:18:120:18:14

I think politics is too important a subject

0:18:140:18:16

to be left up to the politicians.

0:18:160:18:18

One can't help think about the parallels between your own career

0:18:180:18:24

and that of Vanessa Redgrave's, who also is involved in politics.

0:18:240:18:29

Now, she seems to have, so far,

0:18:290:18:31

failed in getting across to the general public the message that...

0:18:310:18:35

..she wishes to. Where has she gone wrong, in your opinion?

0:18:370:18:39

She lost her sense of humour.

0:18:390:18:41

Explain.

0:18:430:18:44

I can't. I don't know why that happens.

0:18:440:18:47

I have experienced it and it is extremely painful,

0:18:470:18:49

so I sympathise with her and I identify with that problem.

0:18:490:18:53

I lost mine too for about three years.

0:18:530:18:57

So, I ate a lot, I got fat. I gained 25lb.

0:18:570:19:00

I didn't cut my hair, it was long and stringy.

0:19:000:19:02

You saw some pictures of me. I saw them. Running here...

0:19:020:19:05

I look like Peter Lorre, you know. INTERVIEWER SNIGGERS

0:19:050:19:08

I was running around happy to get any point across

0:19:080:19:10

when you're so damned sombre.

0:19:100:19:13

Have you any personal experience of this loss of sense of humour

0:19:130:19:15

on Vanessa's part?

0:19:150:19:17

Yes, she came...

0:19:170:19:19

I was playing in Las Vegas, which she thought was a colossal inconsistency,

0:19:190:19:24

why someone with my political views should play Las Vegas.

0:19:240:19:26

So, I went through explaining that this business of being on the stage

0:19:260:19:30

to me is bringing joy and wherever the stage is where I have the play

0:19:300:19:35

and that happens to be the show business capital

0:19:350:19:37

in America right now, not Broadway.

0:19:370:19:39

So, she came up.

0:19:390:19:40

She was there to have a political discussion about a new...

0:19:400:19:44

..group of people she was organising.

0:19:450:19:48

No, she didn't want to see my show.

0:19:480:19:50

No, she didn't want to discuss how her life was then,

0:19:500:19:53

she didn't want to discuss anything that had to do with...

0:19:530:19:56

..the reality of the world in its dimension

0:19:570:20:00

that has some jokes attached to it.

0:20:000:20:03

She wanted to talk about only what was on her mind.

0:20:030:20:05

And she did it sombrely and she did it with very complicated rhetoric

0:20:060:20:10

that frankly, I didn't understand.

0:20:100:20:11

I mean, I really didn't know what she was saying and I said to her,

0:20:110:20:14

"Hey, is this how you sit down in the pub and talk to some worker?"

0:20:140:20:18

So, we talked for about 5 or 6 hours,

0:20:180:20:20

mostly me trying to understand and her going on.

0:20:200:20:23

But when we then did begin to discuss her role

0:20:230:20:28

in a play she was doing downtown,

0:20:280:20:32

her eyes lit up, her face changed, her smile just beamed,

0:20:320:20:38

her teeth showed and her whole demeanour became alive.

0:20:380:20:43

And I thought, "Now, hmm."

0:20:430:20:44

If she could get that into the political message

0:20:440:20:47

she's trying to say, somehow combine these two things

0:20:470:20:51

so that the seriousness of breaking the omelette

0:20:510:20:56

to make the egg of the revolution -

0:20:560:20:58

breaking the egg to make the omelette of the revolution

0:20:580:21:01

was not quite so...

0:21:010:21:03

..doom-making...

0:21:040:21:05

..people would listen a little bit closer.

0:21:060:21:09

I mean, it's when you make any speech, you've got to tell some jokes first

0:21:090:21:12

and then they'll listen to the serious part.

0:21:120:21:14

So, I say it's essentially a theatrical mistake that she's making,

0:21:140:21:17

very likely because she feels over-privileged

0:21:170:21:20

to have had such a fabulous background.

0:21:200:21:22

Someone like me who came from nobody,

0:21:220:21:24

I don't feel that I have to pay those dues of guilt, you see?

0:21:240:21:28

I feel that I earned and therefore, I'm going to use it.

0:21:280:21:31

In 1975, MacLaine hadn't acted in a film for three years.

0:21:320:21:37

Instead, she had directed, written and produced a documentary

0:21:370:21:41

about the women in China.

0:21:410:21:43

It was called The Other Half Of The Sky

0:21:430:21:46

and promoting it meant another conversation

0:21:460:21:49

with her old sparring partner Michael Parkinson.

0:21:490:21:53

APPLAUSE

0:21:530:21:56

Oh, that was smashing.

0:22:010:22:03

-You know, we should explain why you're doing that.

-You explain.

0:22:050:22:08

HE CHUCKLES

0:22:080:22:09

Because the last time Shirley was on my program,

0:22:090:22:11

I had a button missing on my shirt

0:22:110:22:14

and she poked her forefinger into my belly button

0:22:140:22:17

as I was trying to talk about the Nixon administration.

0:22:170:22:21

Needless to say, it did more for me

0:22:210:22:22

than it did the Nixon administration.

0:22:220:22:25

It was the best poke you had all year, wasn't it?

0:22:250:22:28

LAUGHTER

0:22:280:22:29

All right, enough of that.

0:22:290:22:31

He walked over to me earlier and he said,

0:22:310:22:33

"Why does this always happen? I get a nosebleed."

0:22:330:22:36

I said, "Whenever you come near me, you get a nosebleed."

0:22:360:22:39

-That's right.

-It's the altitude.

0:22:390:22:40

-LAUGHTER

-I mention, in fact, that...

0:22:400:22:43

I mentioned...

0:22:440:22:45

-OK.

-What's the matter?

0:22:450:22:47

I just wondered where your finger had been.

0:22:470:22:49

LAUGHTER

0:22:490:22:51

If you want to do one of those kind of interviews...

0:22:510:22:54

You're very disconcerting, Shirley MacLaine, you know that?

0:22:540:22:57

-Yeah.

-Yeah. Deliberately so.

0:22:570:23:00

-No.

-No. Just you are normally provocative?

0:23:000:23:03

Just your regular middle-class girl.

0:23:040:23:07

I find that very hard to believe, indeed I do.

0:23:070:23:10

I mentioned in the introduction, in fact, that your name is Beaty.

0:23:100:23:13

Why, in fact, did you choose the name MacLaine

0:23:130:23:16

when you went on your career as a film star?

0:23:160:23:19

Shirley MacLaine Beaty is my name.

0:23:190:23:21

Yes, that's your mother's name, I know. But why not Shirley Beaty?

0:23:210:23:24

I mean, your brother didn't do bad with it, did he?

0:23:240:23:26

He had to change the spelling to do good with it.

0:23:260:23:28

-Really?

-Yeah.

0:23:280:23:30

It was B-E-A-T-Y and people called me 'Beety', 'Be-atty',

0:23:300:23:34

'Beauty', 'Beastly'.

0:23:340:23:36

LAUGHTER

0:23:360:23:38

I didn't like the last, so I took my middle name.

0:23:380:23:40

What sort of background was it that you came from?

0:23:400:23:43

What sort of parents did you have?

0:23:430:23:44

Mother was Canadian, and Dad was

0:23:460:23:49

a small-town, middle-class, American WASP, you know.

0:23:490:23:54

-Really?

-Yeah. White American, Southern Protestant.

0:23:540:23:57

With all that's intended to follow that,

0:23:580:24:00

politically and that sort of thing?

0:24:000:24:02

Yeah. That's just so long and complicated, Michael, and...

0:24:020:24:05

..and it was inspirational to get out of, you know.

0:24:070:24:10

I mean, have you changed him?

0:24:100:24:11

I mean, has daughter changed father in his point of view?

0:24:110:24:14

Because, I mean, that's the last thing you are, isn't it?

0:24:140:24:17

Yeah. I don't know if I have. I think I've made a couple of stabs at it.

0:24:170:24:21

When...

0:24:210:24:24

He always...he always wondered

0:24:240:24:26

why I went around the world caring, you know.

0:24:260:24:29

He used to call me a missionary in a skirt.

0:24:290:24:31

-In a kind of derogatory sense?

-Yes.

0:24:310:24:34

In a pejorative sense, as though the best way to conduct one's life

0:24:340:24:38

was to never upset the apple cart, you know.

0:24:380:24:41

And to observe the status quo and not make any noise

0:24:410:24:45

because it upsets the neighbours.

0:24:450:24:46

Well, you've made a lot of noise

0:24:460:24:48

and you've upset a lot of people in your career.

0:24:480:24:51

Have you always done this or is it something that came

0:24:510:24:54

after you'd made it in Hollywood as a film star?

0:24:540:24:56

I think I always did because very early on when I was really little...

0:24:580:25:02

..Oh, 1.5 or 2 years old, I remember feeling...

0:25:030:25:06

Because they tell me to always be quiet, I'm going to, "Bleurgh!"

0:25:060:25:11

LAUGHTER You know?

0:25:110:25:12

They make...they make people...

0:25:120:25:16

They inspire you to be radical. They inspire you to be...

0:25:160:25:19

..deviant...

0:25:210:25:22

when they want you to conform.

0:25:220:25:24

But it must have been very difficult for you when you were in Hollywood

0:25:240:25:27

because I would think of all societies,

0:25:270:25:29

Hollywood is the most conformist, isn't it, in that sense?

0:25:290:25:32

No, not really. I think that's a...

0:25:320:25:36

I think it's a combination of things.

0:25:360:25:38

Hollywood is looking for the individual who can break through

0:25:380:25:42

and become a star and sell their product as a result of it.

0:25:420:25:46

After you become a star and sell their product,

0:25:460:25:49

they want you to conform to making the money they want to make.

0:25:490:25:53

-Hmm.

-Yes.

0:25:530:25:54

But it is a mixture of art and industry.

0:25:540:25:57

But did you always want to be a film star?

0:25:570:26:00

-Was that your ambition as a kid?

-Oh, no, no.

-No?

-Mm-mm.

0:26:000:26:02

I...I never really cared about being famous or being recognised anyway.

0:26:020:26:07

All I wanted to do was, "Bleurgh!"

0:26:070:26:10

-Express myself.

-Well, what does 'bleurgh' mean?

0:26:100:26:12

-I mean...

-It means that.

0:26:120:26:13

It means when you are in a conformist environment,

0:26:130:26:16

you feel you have to bust your seams.

0:26:160:26:19

That is another way of saying I wanted to express myself,

0:26:190:26:22

whether it was in dancing, which is what I did originally,

0:26:220:26:26

and then in musical comedy. And then I got more specific with acting.

0:26:260:26:30

And then in writing. And then finally, I think, in...

0:26:300:26:35

in political...

0:26:350:26:37

..and social concern.

0:26:390:26:41

It is all part of the same thing.

0:26:410:26:43

If you study a person's life like my one,

0:26:430:26:45

it's not really inconsistent with the other.

0:26:450:26:48

No, right, fine. I accept that

0:26:480:26:50

and we'll sort of take in a few spokes of that wheel as we go along.

0:26:500:26:53

But I'm more interested in what started you off on this road.

0:26:530:26:56

Because the road that you started off on as a performer...

0:26:560:26:59

-As a dancer, wasn't it?

-Yeah.

0:26:590:27:01

So, was there one person who as a child you looked at and said,

0:27:010:27:04

"Ah, that's what I want to be"?

0:27:040:27:05

No, uh-uh.

0:27:050:27:07

You know, I come also from a background of...

0:27:080:27:12

..rather abstract prejudice, you know.

0:27:130:27:16

I was born in the South in a state that is the Mason-Dixon Line,

0:27:160:27:21

the state of five presidents,

0:27:210:27:23

so it is very politically and socially aware,

0:27:230:27:25

but at the same time won't let black people in the living room, you know?

0:27:250:27:29

So, I was aware early in my life that something was wrong with that,

0:27:290:27:32

was concerning, yet at the same time

0:27:320:27:34

I was stimulated to be culturally sophisticated

0:27:340:27:38

and the conflict bothered me.

0:27:380:27:39

I think that's why, if you are sensitive or intelligent at all,

0:27:390:27:43

you begin to pick up on that and say,

0:27:430:27:45

"Well, now, what is it that's troubling me?"

0:27:450:27:48

Because the negative emotion of prejudice is not easy to stand.

0:27:480:27:52

But when you had these thoughts in Hollywood...

0:27:520:27:55

I mean, you see, I don't think that these thoughts

0:27:550:27:57

ever get off the ground with the majority of people

0:27:570:28:00

you must have worked with in Hollywood.

0:28:000:28:02

I mean, you must have been a complete outsider

0:28:020:28:04

feeling like this in the situation you were in.

0:28:040:28:07

I think you're probably right about that, yeah.

0:28:070:28:09

I think people in Hollywood in the main

0:28:090:28:12

are concerned with not upsetting the apple cart of their success

0:28:120:28:17

or whatever their box office dictates.

0:28:170:28:19

But nonetheless, for all this, you were a star. You are a star.

0:28:190:28:23

And you allowed yourself, no doubt -

0:28:230:28:25

and I know because it's in your book -

0:28:250:28:27

to be pampered and treated like some sort of shampooed poodle.

0:28:270:28:31

I mean, tell them what it was like to be a star when you were there.

0:28:310:28:35

My make-up man used to have to knock me down and tackle me to put the make-up on me.

0:28:350:28:39

LAUGHTER I didn't like being pampered, really.

0:28:390:28:41

But what was it like, though, the system at that time?

0:28:410:28:44

What was the set-up like of stardom? What did it being a star mean?

0:28:440:28:47

Well, you were expected to lie back and enjoy it, I suppose.

0:28:470:28:51

But that is part of the seduction.

0:28:510:28:53

That's part of the exercise of believing your own myth.

0:28:530:28:59

You're not anybody special,

0:28:590:29:00

except that you excel in the art of emulating human life.

0:29:000:29:07

That's where the specialty comes from.

0:29:070:29:09

The fact that you make a lot of money or that you're privileged

0:29:090:29:12

or that people should treat you with any more special attention

0:29:120:29:16

than anyone else

0:29:160:29:18

is what makes it very difficult to adjust to success.

0:29:180:29:22

Success is so much tougher to adjust to than struggle.

0:29:220:29:26

Failure is tough too, but struggle is where the real happiness lies.

0:29:260:29:31

And when all of us...

0:29:310:29:34

You know, I like Hollywood.

0:29:340:29:35

I'm not one of those who really knocks it and means it.

0:29:350:29:41

There's a lot about it that I would knock

0:29:410:29:43

and be seriously concerned with and then...

0:29:430:29:45

What would you knock about it?

0:29:450:29:47

Well, for example...

0:29:470:29:49

..to cast pictures with stars

0:29:510:29:54

according to the box office receipts of their last pictures is silly.

0:29:540:29:59

Some of the finest actors in the world can't get work for two or three years

0:29:590:30:02

-because their last picture didn't do well. That's really awful.

-Hmm.

0:30:020:30:06

-That's not commensurate with good art or good industry.

-Hmm.

0:30:060:30:09

And the real secret, it seems to me,

0:30:090:30:11

is to find the right subject matter, the right screenplay,

0:30:110:30:14

and have the courage to cast that person,

0:30:140:30:16

whether he or she is a star or not, in it

0:30:160:30:19

-and then you'll make yourself a star.

-Hmm.

0:30:190:30:21

Do you find that that problem, the problem of being

0:30:210:30:24

the artist in Hollywood the way you just specified,

0:30:240:30:28

all the more difficult because you are a woman?

0:30:280:30:31

In this sense that, you know, Hollywood is run by men.

0:30:310:30:33

-In the main, the directors in Hollywood are men.

-They are.

0:30:330:30:36

It's really interesting now, Michael, what is going on.

0:30:360:30:38

The parts for women don't exist, you might have noticed.

0:30:380:30:41

Robert Redford is playing all our parts.

0:30:410:30:43

LAUGHTER

0:30:430:30:45

He is prettier than a lot of us too so I don't begrudge him that but...

0:30:450:30:50

I started to figure that out the other day.

0:30:520:30:55

I was walking on the beach in Malibu

0:30:550:30:56

and I thought, "What on Earth is really going on here?"

0:30:560:30:59

And then I remembered that in the old days,

0:30:590:31:01

the old days meaning the '40s and '50s when the Hays Office

0:31:010:31:04

was the censorship board

0:31:040:31:06

and you had Barbara Stanwyck and Joan Crawford and Katharine Hepburn

0:31:060:31:10

playing women judges, women politicians, women mayors,

0:31:100:31:14

women scientists, blah, blah.

0:31:140:31:16

You were not allowed to play a love scene in the bedroom

0:31:160:31:20

with a double bed. It had to be two twin beds,

0:31:200:31:24

even if the couple was married and regardless of what the scene was,

0:31:240:31:27

one of the people had to have one foot on the floor.

0:31:270:31:32

I could never figure out what difference that made. Could you?

0:31:320:31:34

You could figure out something to do with that that'd be really kinky.

0:31:340:31:37

That's right.

0:31:370:31:39

AUDIENCE LAUGHS

0:31:390:31:40

So what happened was since they couldn't play

0:31:400:31:42

any real good sexy love scenes,

0:31:420:31:44

they had to resort to giving women these parts

0:31:440:31:46

that were sensational in real life.

0:31:460:31:48

The Hays Office was abolished in the name of more liberal sexual attitudes

0:31:480:31:53

and the rating system came in.

0:31:530:31:55

Well, now, because men were running the studios,

0:31:550:31:58

men were writing the scripts and men were the directors,

0:31:580:32:00

they put us back in the bedroom,

0:32:000:32:02

and we haven't been judges or politicians or mayors since.

0:32:020:32:06

We can't get out of the bedroom now.

0:32:060:32:09

-Why are you crying?

-It sounds a great life though.

0:32:090:32:12

I don't know what you're bothered about.

0:32:120:32:14

I'd stay in Hollywood forever if that were the case.

0:32:140:32:16

12 months after that interview,

0:32:160:32:20

Shirley took on her first acting role for four years which

0:32:200:32:23

earned her her fourth Oscar nomination for Best Actress.

0:32:230:32:28

The film, The Turning Point, co-starred Anne Bancroft

0:32:280:32:33

and focused on very familiar territory for Shirley -

0:32:330:32:37

the world of ballet.

0:32:370:32:39

I think a very eloquent sense of masochism is extremely important

0:32:390:32:44

in the ballet. I mean, you have no idea how much it hurts.

0:32:440:32:47

I was a ballerina for...

0:32:470:32:50

Since I was two and I danced every day for eight hours a day.

0:32:500:32:54

It was everything to me.

0:32:540:32:56

More important than my schooling,

0:32:560:32:59

more important than my social sense, more importance than any man or boy

0:32:590:33:05

when I was young that I was attracted to or fell in love with.

0:33:050:33:10

It was more important than anything.

0:33:100:33:12

And then I realised how all-consuming ballet is.

0:33:120:33:17

You haven't got time not to hurt. You haven't got time to have a good time.

0:33:170:33:21

Talking of hurting, you once danced with a broken ankle. Is that right?

0:33:210:33:25

-I did.

-Can you tell us about that?

0:33:250:33:28

Well, that was my first experience

0:33:280:33:30

with self-motivated mind over matter.

0:33:300:33:36

I was 16, about 16.

0:33:360:33:38

It was before the performance at Constitution Hall in Washington DC.

0:33:380:33:43

We were dancing Cinderella and I was playing the fairy godmother.

0:33:430:33:46

I was warming up before the performance,

0:33:460:33:49

doing some grand jetes and some tour jetes and stuff

0:33:490:33:52

around the stage and I fell and broke it.

0:33:520:33:57

-During the overture.

-You didn't know you'd broken it?

0:33:590:34:02

Well, what happened was immediately my sense of the fact that that

0:34:020:34:06

had occurred and the audience was there and the overture

0:34:060:34:08

was almost finished and what on Earth were we going to do?

0:34:080:34:11

It's like I understand some of the soldiers felt in the war.

0:34:110:34:14

They didn't realise their leg had been shot off

0:34:140:34:17

until after the battle was over.

0:34:170:34:19

I simply got up on pointe

0:34:190:34:21

and I remember the bone sticking through the toe shoe ribbon.

0:34:210:34:24

I danced the whole thing completely numb with no anaesthetic, nothing.

0:34:240:34:28

And when it was over, of course I went to bed for three months.

0:34:280:34:32

But I had psyched myself into having to do it.

0:34:320:34:36

Good girl.

0:34:490:34:52

Deedee.

0:34:520:34:53

Deedee.

0:34:560:34:58

-I'm sick to death of your jealousy and resentment.

-So am I.

0:34:580:35:01

-Then stop blaming your goddamn life on me. You picked it.

-You picked it!

0:35:010:35:04

You took away my choice. You never let me find out if I was good enough.

0:35:040:35:07

You aren't. You weren't good enough and you knew it.

0:35:070:35:09

-That's why you married Wayne.

-I loved Wayne.

0:35:090:35:11

-So much so that you said to hell with your career?

-Yes.

0:35:110:35:14

-And then got pregnant to prove that you meant it.

-Yes.

0:35:140:35:16

Oh, don't lie to me, lie to yourself.

0:35:160:35:17

You got married because you knew you were second rate.

0:35:170:35:20

And you got pregnant because Wayne was a ballet dancer

0:35:200:35:22

and in those days that meant queer so you had to prove

0:35:220:35:24

-he was a man so you had a baby.

-That is a goddamn lie!

0:35:240:35:26

That's the goddamn truth and you know it.

0:35:260:35:28

So you must have been very strongly motivated by the script

0:35:280:35:31

or the idea to come back after four years.

0:35:310:35:33

What motivated me was it was the only good script for women

0:35:330:35:36

-I had read in four years.

-Particularly for women?

0:35:360:35:39

Do you still think women get a raw deal in the movies?

0:35:390:35:41

There is no question about it.

0:35:410:35:43

It's even become close to restraint of trade.

0:35:430:35:46

It really has. Even now.

0:35:460:35:49

And we have Julia, Looking For Mr Goodbar, Turning Point,

0:35:490:35:52

3 Women, Unmarried Woman. We have five very good films,

0:35:520:35:57

very good films for women but still you see we are starring together.

0:35:570:36:01

They are doing the Paul Newman - Robert Redford routine with us now.

0:36:010:36:04

They are not making us scripts and stories where we can relate to men.

0:36:040:36:09

They're still not doing love stories. Which is a shame.

0:36:090:36:12

Do you think that is because of an unconscious down on women

0:36:120:36:15

or just because men have been running the industry for so long

0:36:150:36:18

they don't notice?

0:36:180:36:20

I don't think they understand what has happened...

0:36:200:36:23

..in the last five or six years.

0:36:260:36:30

The advent of women's liberation,

0:36:300:36:31

the impact of women's liberation in the United States

0:36:310:36:34

is very, very strong.

0:36:340:36:35

And it has permeated down through entire society.

0:36:360:36:40

It hasn't quite gotten to Hollywood. It's a provincial town.

0:36:400:36:45

But you haven't done any pictures for four years. The Turning Point is your first in four years.

0:36:450:36:49

Is that a conscious decision? You wanted to get away from it?

0:36:490:36:51

Or do you now feel you'd like to go back to the movies?

0:36:510:36:54

Oh, yeah. Oh, I don't want to be just a movie star like I used to be

0:36:540:36:56

when I was making two and a half or three films a year.

0:36:560:36:59

It's a very debilitating experience to sit around your house in Bel-Air

0:36:590:37:04

with your Jaguar and your swimming pool

0:37:040:37:06

and you go to soundstage 27 at six o'clock in the morning

0:37:060:37:10

and get out at seven o'clock at night

0:37:100:37:12

and life does not exist when you live for film.

0:37:120:37:15

On the other hand, you say that when you're working on a film

0:37:150:37:18

the crew becomes a sort of family and you get very intimate with them.

0:37:180:37:21

-Once year is what I'm saying.

-Yes.

0:37:210:37:24

But even though you're producing mediocre movies, it is

0:37:240:37:26

still the experience and the time you've spent with them, so you say.

0:37:260:37:29

That's lovely, it's wonderful.

0:37:290:37:31

I get very comfortable and almost sleepy.

0:37:310:37:36

It's kind of an embryonic environment.

0:37:360:37:38

It's warm, everyone loves you,

0:37:380:37:41

everyone is there to take care of you.

0:37:410:37:42

You feel pampered, you know no one is going to let you

0:37:420:37:45

look bad or be hurt. It's like having 39 mothers.

0:37:450:37:48

Talking about looking bad, I hope you won't mind me saying so

0:37:500:37:52

but you look a great deal better in real life

0:37:520:37:54

than sometimes you do on the screen.

0:37:540:37:56

In The Turning Point you let yourself rather bravely appear

0:37:560:37:59

slatternly and down at heel.

0:37:590:38:01

Sure. I had to gain 15lb for it.

0:38:010:38:03

I had to look as though I had fallen apart a little bit

0:38:030:38:06

because that is what she had done. Sure.

0:38:060:38:09

I didn't like doing that coming back after four years

0:38:110:38:13

because they might think I look like that, you know.

0:38:130:38:16

But that's the way you get awards, so it's OK.

0:38:160:38:19

As it turned out, Shirley might have been right on that point.

0:38:200:38:23

She finally won a Best Actress Oscar for 1983's Terms Of Endearment

0:38:240:38:30

and then her fourth Best Actress Golden Globe

0:38:300:38:34

for 1988's Madame Sousatzka.

0:38:340:38:36

Here she is talking about both films in a conversation with Terry Wogan.

0:38:360:38:42

Madame Sousatzka, which is your latest triumph

0:38:420:38:45

-chosen for the Royal Premiere.

-Mmm.

0:38:450:38:47

Can you tell us what it is about

0:38:470:38:49

apart from being difficult to pronounce?

0:38:490:38:51

Yeah, oh, gosh.

0:38:510:38:53

I have to do like six-month's work in three minutes here.

0:38:530:38:56

Well, make it a minute.

0:38:560:38:58

It is the story of a teacher who is very imperious

0:38:580:39:05

and bizarre and eccentric.

0:39:050:39:08

It is a part and a half.

0:39:080:39:10

She is tyrannical, she is vulnerable, she's funny, she's cruel,

0:39:100:39:15

she's very broad stroked, she's possessive, she's proprietary,

0:39:150:39:20

she is loving, she's one wonderful teacher, a bit of a fraud,

0:39:200:39:24

suffers from mixed motives

0:39:240:39:28

and it is one of the best grand dame parts ever written,

0:39:280:39:32

so I just decided to do it and to commit to this old lady.

0:39:320:39:37

I'm going to try and digest that now.

0:39:370:39:39

Can we have a look at just a smidgen of Madame Sousatzka

0:39:390:39:43

while we're taking that in?

0:39:430:39:45

You move around far too much, Mr Virtuoso.

0:39:450:39:48

Perfect scales have no beginning and no end.

0:39:500:39:52

Each note is a smooth and as even as these beads, you see.

0:39:520:39:56

Mm-hm.

0:39:560:39:57

Forget the fingers, don't think for one moment

0:39:570:40:00

that you play with your fingers. If he thought about his fingers

0:40:000:40:03

he would be at the bottom of the ocean never to be heard from again.

0:40:030:40:06

What are these 10 poor little worms? No!

0:40:060:40:10

This is where the music comes from, from the abdomen

0:40:100:40:13

and it rises higher and higher from the depths of your very soul.

0:40:130:40:19

Higher and higher from the deepest instincts

0:40:190:40:22

to the height of reason until it reaches here, you see?

0:40:220:40:27

Now begin. Begin.

0:40:270:40:30

HE PLAYS SCALE

0:40:300:40:31

That's it, play. Let it play.

0:40:310:40:34

Ebb and flow, each note, smooth and even. That's it.

0:40:360:40:43

He begins to play...

0:40:430:40:44

AUDIENCE APPLAUDS

0:40:440:40:48

You read the book,

0:40:520:40:54

that's where you formed your desire to play the part, was it?

0:40:540:40:57

No, I read the script first and then I read the book.

0:40:570:41:00

The script was quite different than the book.

0:41:000:41:02

Was your portrayal based on any character that you had met

0:41:020:41:05

-or that you knew?

-Mm-hm. Several ballet teachers that I had

0:41:050:41:08

when I was growing up when I was young.

0:41:080:41:10

Did they have the occasional grim desire

0:41:100:41:13

which she effects all the time?

0:41:130:41:15

Oh, yes, that's the way a classical teacher

0:41:150:41:17

effects inspiration, through tyranny.

0:41:170:41:20

And I was so much into the ballet I almost went into ballet theatre.

0:41:200:41:25

I had a teacher like Sousatzka,

0:41:250:41:27

by the way, who threw me across the room by my ear on the day that

0:41:270:41:32

I had my ears pierced. I'll never forget that.

0:41:320:41:35

And I did step right from then on.

0:41:350:41:37

I was one she didn't crush.

0:41:370:41:40

See, you find out what you're made of by that kind of challenge.

0:41:400:41:43

But the day that I woke up in the ballet

0:41:430:41:46

and realised that I didn't know who was president.

0:41:460:41:49

I didn't know anything except variations, classical music

0:41:490:41:52

and how to tie my toe shoes.

0:41:520:41:54

That's when I gave up the ballet and I went into musical comedy instead.

0:41:540:41:57

You are a woman of many interests.

0:41:570:42:00

You've written several very successful books. Do you...

0:42:000:42:04

Those seminars that you conduct,

0:42:040:42:06

do you still conduct those seminars in heightening consciousness, etc?

0:42:060:42:09

No, I haven't been doing it because I've been going back to

0:42:090:42:13

moviemaking, but I wrote a book that grew out of the seminars

0:42:130:42:17

that will be out in April

0:42:170:42:19

and I did a video cassette tape based really,

0:42:190:42:22

and the seminars were based really on techniques of stress reduction.

0:42:220:42:26

We're living in such a stressed out society in America that people were

0:42:260:42:30

really desperate to know about some rather pragmatic techniques to...

0:42:300:42:36

-To relax.

-To relax and to be more peaceful within.

0:42:360:42:40

My book is called Going Within.

0:42:400:42:42

-And where does it come from?

-The power that you have?

-Yeah.

0:42:420:42:46

Probably at the end of the day I would say belief in oneself.

0:42:460:42:51

When I learned to really feel that sense, I loved my work more.

0:42:530:42:58

I loved my relationships more.

0:42:580:42:59

Talking of relationships, the character of Madame Sousatzka

0:42:590:43:03

is a very possessive one, and five years ago

0:43:030:43:07

you won the Oscar for the part of Aurora in Terms of Endearment.

0:43:070:43:11

We'll just have a little look at that

0:43:110:43:13

then and draw a parallel between the two.

0:43:130:43:15

THEY LAUGH

0:43:150:43:19

Garrett.

0:43:210:43:23

No, no. You don't need outsiders now.

0:43:230:43:25

-No outsiders?

-See ya later.

-Please come.

0:43:250:43:28

Emma, this is Garrett.

0:43:280:43:30

Oh, pleasure to meet you. I've heard so much about you.

0:43:300:43:34

Yes, well, your mother's really been looking forward to this too.

0:43:340:43:37

So, go ahead.

0:43:390:43:42

Anything wrong, Garrett?

0:43:450:43:46

No.

0:43:460:43:48

It was very nice to have met you.

0:43:480:43:51

Must be nice to be home, huh?

0:43:510:43:53

Oh, it's great. It's great.

0:43:530:43:55

I'll be over later.

0:43:560:43:59

They're probably tired anyway and will get to sleep early

0:43:590:44:02

-and I'd like to get to bed early.

-Grandma! Grandma!

0:44:020:44:05

AUDIENCE APPLAUDS

0:44:050:44:07

You're laughing.

0:44:070:44:09

When we were just watching that little bit,

0:44:110:44:13

you were obviously amused by it. Bring back all sorts of memories?

0:44:130:44:16

I love Jack Nicholson.

0:44:160:44:18

He has been my role model, frankly.

0:44:180:44:20

Because he had such courage to take parts.

0:44:210:44:23

Look at that with his potbelly.

0:44:230:44:25

It's a good man. Oh, there's nothing wrong with that.

0:44:250:44:28

Is that what inspired you to put on the weight for Madame Sousatzka?

0:44:280:44:31

No, hardly, but I loved his courage.

0:44:310:44:33

I loved his comedic ability to be old and love it.

0:44:330:44:40

We've all got to get old, haven't we? There's no point hating it.

0:44:420:44:46

Oh, no. It's wonderful to enjoy being experienced and wise.

0:44:460:44:52

Today, as well as experience and wisdom, Shirley MacLaine

0:44:530:44:59

still has that ever-present aura of stardom.

0:44:590:45:04

Her recent appearances in Downton Abbey underlying the fact that

0:45:040:45:07

she remains one of the best loved, most commanding

0:45:070:45:11

and, yes, kooky characters in Hollywood.

0:45:110:45:15

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