Take One (Jul-Aug 1971)

problem. But rather than polish it to perfection, he is likely to substitute still another idea that is nearly as good or maybe better. But, | would say, he is disinclined to sandpaper. Does he get a lot of coverage? | know Sam Peckinpah sometimes uses 18 or 19 cover shots on one set-up. No. Now mind you, at the time | made Touch of Evil | wasn’t as sophisticated an observer of the mechanics of filmmaking as | am now. But, nonetheless, in my memory... well, the first shot is... what l’ve said to you. There is no Cutting to that. They just got the slate off it and that’s the first three minutes of the film. The studio likes that kind of thing. (both laugh) Was Welles doing any rewriting when the film was being made? Or was he working straight through? Not once we started shooting. | think that’s one of the reasons Touch of Evil could be said to have turned out better than Major Dundee. Sam had to attempt to undertake his rewrite while shooting the film. Orson undertook his and accomplished it before shooting. How would you describe the working relationship you had with him during the film? Enchanted. Orson seduces you in. a marvelous way. You know he's one of the most charming men in the world, if it's important to him to be charming. He is, at minimum, interesting — but if it’s important to him to enlist your support and cooperation, he is as charming a man as | have ever seen. And was he so with the rest of the crew as well would you say? Oh yes. See, that’s an important thing. Orson elicits remarkable support from his companies, he asks a lot from them, his crews too, but he jokes with them and recognizes what they're doing, their contributions, and it works marvelous!y. They put out a great effort for him. It shows in the fact that he got tiny performances, one-scene performances, that are memorable. Yeah, that’s it. Sam, on the other hand, requires your commitment, and that’s not quite the same thing as eliciting your support. Because you can choose not to deliver your commitment. Personally, in my own style of work, | prefer working as an individual film actor, in a somewhat more detached manner. | think you tend to get into a hothouse atmosphere. You're living in each other's laps anyway, and it's long days, and | frankly prefer a little more detached and cool relationship. But you've got do to it the way the director wants. In both the case of Sam, who demanded it and required it, and Orson, who elicits it, that’s the way you go. But some people won't make that kind of commitment to Sam. On individual scenes when you'd be working with Welles — would he say do this and this and this and this — in a way some directors will — or is he a director who will let you create and then say “well, maybe this and maybe this?” * 3 By and large, assuming the contribution of professional actors... in my experience on 40 films the complexities of the mechanics of filming and the creative problems they present tend to preoccupy a director to a large degree. A good actor is likely to have a fairly free hand in the shaping of his — certainly of his character, possibly of the scene as well. I’m not speaking of a Wyler or Stevens or Lean, but most directors, even directors like those |’ve mentioned, who work in incredibly tiny detail in altering facets of a performance, they often tend not to do so in acting terms, if you follow me. | think Wyler, for example, has an absolutely infallible taste for a performance. If he says it’s right — it’s right. There’s just no question. But | don’t think he’s particularly empathic with actors. Orson probably taught me more about acting than any film director I've worked for. Which is not to say | necessarily did my best film performance for him, but he taught me a great deal about acting — the whole, acting generically. He's both specificin technical details, and in broad concepts about acting, and | found it an enormously stimulating experience. The scenes you did with Welles — did you find those to be your most difficult scenes? The most difficult? The most difficult, or the most draining, | would say. It’s really the word | would use. Draining would also mean that when you were finished with them you probably felt the most satisfied. | recall performing in the whole picture, doing the whole picture, as being as satisfying creatively as anything I’ve ever done. | don’t recall it as being — the part was not an enormously difficult part. There was never a scene that you look on as a major jump — you know, a barrier that somehow you have to clear. Like the dagger speech in Macbeth. Or Antony’s suicide. They were scenes that you did with as much creative juice as you could call on at that time. Orson helps you quite a lot. The sequence with the shoebox is a brilliant scene. It’s also brilliantly directed and photographed, again because the camera is constantly moving in that scene. That's about 13 pages. That was the first day's work on the picture. And Orson deceived the studio, and he conned them, because the scene was scheduled for three days of shooting, which is about reasonable, which would be a little over four pages a day — which is a respectable day's work in an “‘A”’ picture. He, in fact, had rehearsed the scene in his home with the actors over a Sunday or two. He proceeded to lay out the scene in terms of one shot with a crab dolly, that encompassed all the eight or nine performers who had lines in the scene. The action ranged through two rooms, a closet and a bathroom, and, as | said, 13 pages of dialogue. It was quite a complex shot, with doors having to be pulled, walls having to be pulled aside — very intricate markings, inserts on the shoebox, and things like that. All of which were in one shot. When you're shooting, the production office is informed when the camera turns over the first time, when the first print is made, and so on. And of course we never turned a camera until way... Lunch went by, and uneasy little groups of executives began to huddle about in the shadows, not quite willing to approach Orson but increasingly convinced. that they were on the brink of disaster, cause we hadn't turned a camera and it was, by now, three or four o’clock in the afternoon. Finally, at about 4:30, we turned. And of course it was tricky. We did several takes — seven or eight takes. Finally we got a print, just before six o’clock. And Orson said, “OK, that’s a print. Wrap.” He said, “We're two days ahead of schedule. We go to the other set tomorrow.” The executives must have been down on their knees. Everybody thought it was marvelous. Of course he never did that again, you see, but they always thought he might.