Shaft's Big Score (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer) (1972)

GLAD IT WASN’T A TUBA Joseph Mascolo’s acting career was started by, of all things, an old clarinet. Mascolo is currently teamed with Richard Roundtree in MGM’s “Shaft’’ sequel, ‘‘Shaft’s Big Score!’’, as an organized crime boss who adds both action and problems to Roundtree’s life as a Harlem private detective. The dusty, antiquated clarinet with which Mascolo credits the evolution of his present success as an actor had lain ominously in a forgotten drawer in the Mascolo household for years before then six-year-old Joseph discovered it and decided immediately that he wanted to master the instrument. As clarinets go, this one was rather nondescript, but Joseph was genuinely infatuated at first sight and pleaded with his father for lessons. “Dad gave me this long lecture about the instrument not being a toy,’’ Mascolo recalls, ‘‘and | said | could take lessons if | did well in school. Well, what happened was that | was a natural with the thing. | took to it like nothing I’d ever done before.”’ Indeed he did. Mascolo garnered a full music scholarship to West Point, where he won the first chair in the band’s clarinet section. Then he transferred to the University of Miami, where he again won a full music scholarship and performed extensively in concerts. It was at the University of Miami that he met an English professor who had written a one-act play for television. He asked young Joseph to take time from his music studies because he felt the musician was a natural for a key role. Joseph declined at first, then, after much prodding by the professor, he relented. “| hadn’t had any training as an actor,”’ says Mascolo, ‘‘but | John Shaft (Richard Roundtree) uses a tombstone as cover during a gun battle in “‘Shaft’s Big Score!” from MGM. MAT NO. 2E figured I’d do it as a lark. Just a fun thing. | didn’t want to give much time to it because | was carrying:a full load at the time and | was doing a lot of concert work. But the role was essentially me and required very little effort.” So Joseph performed in the play and several people told him afterward that he should really take acting seriously. He put the idea in the back of his mind. After all, he was up for a Fulbright Scholarship to study opera in Milan. When he learned that program was filled, the opera impressario at Miami offered another scholarship in Germany, but Mascolo’s German repertoire ‘‘wasn’t that great,’’ so Mascolo, slowly growing more and more hooked on acting, decided to head for the footlights of New York’s Broadway. He had been recommended to a teacher, Stella Adler, and studied with her for about two years. As a supplement for his histrionic studies, he played clarinet for the Metropolitan Opera and even played with a band at the World’s Fair. A few more years at the Lincoln Center Repertory Company and his acting career was well on the way. Ironically, when he reported to the casting offices at Shaft Productions he was told by director Gordon Parks that he was reading for the part of Joe Mascola, which is the feminine version of his own last name. In addition, the character was required to play an instrument: (You guessed it) the clarinet, in key scenes. “So the whole thing has come full cycle,’’ notes Mascolo. ‘‘l started off as a clarinetist and now for the biggest part of my whole acting career, I’m required to portray a gangster who plays clarinet in opera recitals after hours. Now that | think about it, I’m glad my old man didn’t have a tuba stashed away in that drawer.” PRIVACY PRECIOUS A year may not seem a long time to most people, but to Richard Roundtree, star of MGM’s ‘“‘Shaft’’ and its sequel, ‘‘Shaft’s Big Score!”’ it’s been a lifetime. For it was only a year ago that the handsome young actor was snatched from the obscurity of a less than successful stage production on ‘‘The Great White Hope’”’ and signed by director Gordon Parks to star in MGM’s tremendously successful detective thriller. And, understandably, now that a year has passed there have been noticeable changes in Roundtree’s life. “The biggest change,”’ Richard noted recently at the New York location site of ‘‘Shaft’s Big Score!”’ is the growing need | feel for privacy. | never noticed it before. It used to never bother me having lots of people around, but now I’m beginning to really treasure my privacy. | certainly cherish it more than | did this time last year. “Now | want to be able to shut the door to my home and close the whole world out; the countless unnamed faces, the teeming sea of laughing, giggling, inquisitive, staring, condemning faces. That’s why I’m now actively involved in finding a place outside of New York City in the countryside. “Il thought a year ago that I’d wind up with more free time, especially when | knew | wouldn’t be filming all the time. But it isn’t that simple. The time when I’m. not filming seems to be the most hectic. There are appearances, meetings with lawyers, accountants, my personal manager, trips to benefits, all kinds of things. Everything but privacy. It’s exhausting. “Don’t get me wrong. | wouldn’t want it to suddenly change back to the way it was before | was signed for ‘Shaft’. It’s just that | wasn’t prepared mentally for all this confusion. | thought it would be much simpler. Much calmer. Far less hectic.” And once Richard does settle on a country residence, just how much time will he spend there? “‘Probably just the weekends,’”’ he smiles. ‘‘At least at first. After having been in all the confusion of New York City for so long, too much quiet at one time might drive me crazy. I’ll probably have to take it a little at a time.” SUNDAY PUNCH? Drew Bundini Brown is just about the non-actingest actor around. He doesn’t know how to act, has never studied acting, has no intentions of studying, yet he managed to turn in one of the most believable performances in MGM’s detective drama, ‘‘Shaft.”’ Brown played Willy, a hood-bodyguard for the character played by Moses Gunn, cast as Bumpy Jonas, Harlem numbers racketeer. Brown has also reprised the role in the second private eye film, “Shaft’s Big Score!’’ Brown is the first to admit that his “‘brilliant performance’”’ is in reality a case of Bundini putting Bundini on screen. And it is perhaps most convincing because, indeed, he isn’t attempting to act, but is instead just being natural to the sheer delight of audiences everywhere. Bundini’s film debut came about as the result of Gordon Parks’ fascination with and interest in him. Parks was in Miami doing a Life Magazine story on Muhammad Ali, who was training for an upcoming fight with Joe Frazier. Bundini was one of Muhammad’s trainers. The trainer and the photo journalist stayed in the same hotel and became good friends. Parks told him about ‘‘Shaft,’’ which was in preparation then. Bundini explained that he’d like to try WHEN YOU LOSE IT his hand at acting, but revealed that he couldn’t read the script, having never attended school. Parks, deeply touched and more convinced that he wanted Bundini for the role, explained that the trainer’s lines could be put on tape and later memorized. Parks was to remark later that Bundini, ‘‘despite his handicap, was one of the few actors who came to the set each day with his lines learned and ready to work.” And what was Muhammad's reaction to his trainer ‘“‘going Hollywood?” “Well,’”’ smiles Bundini with a genuine, innocent warmth, ‘‘you know, the champ and me have been doin’ a heap of acting all along. He didn’t mind. | think he might have been a little salty because he can’t find time to do some film acting himself. But he’s a good actor and one day he’II be doing it, too. “Ali saw ‘Shaft’ four or five times. One time while he was training in Chicago we went to see it in the rain and when | came on the screen he jumped up and yelled ‘That’s my trainer!’ ”’ Perhaps Ali’s classic statement on his trainer’s newly launched career is summed up by a photo which hangs in his living room. It’s of Bundini and it’s signed ‘‘To the champ, one of my biggest fans. This time | beat you to the punch!”’