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Moshe The Explainer

Tuesday, 24 August 2004 09:15 PM

Should I say again how terrific the interviews at the Onion A.V. Club are, or has that become boring? This week's is with Peter Falk, whom I love most for Columbo, but also for The In-Laws (so much for this), for Murder By Death, for The Princess Bride.... And I think I love him even more for the shows and films I don't yet know about, because I can still enjoy them fresh.

Anyway, in Onion A.V.Club fashion, the interview touches upon the new video releases and book that presage the interview, but focuses on the things that any fan will drool over. For example:

I won't talk about the first play that I did, because that'll be in the book. But the second play I did—this is an indication of how huge a factor luck is in the course of an actor's career—was a huge hit. The Iceman Cometh at the Circle In The Square, directed by Jose Quintero. The lead was Jason Robards, who at that time was living in a one-room loft, barely able to pay the rent. He'd been acting for a long time, and he was just as good an actor five years prior to the opening of The Iceman Cometh, but no one knew who he was, because he'd never been in a hit. I was in New York for 10 minutes, and I got in that play. It ran for four hours, The Iceman Cometh. I was the bartender. I opened the play, and I stood there in front of the audience for four hours. It was hard to miss me. Therefore, every casting director in New York knew who I was. I had just arrived in New York! [Laughs.] Jason, in the meantime, had been there for 10 years, and they were just discovering him. So that has a lot to do with your career, when you get into a hit, if ever.

Another excerpt, this about the transition from broadcasting television live in New York to shooting in Los Angeles:

I certainly preferred the New York way. You'd rehearse on the Lower East Side, and there was always a delicatessen around the corner, and the weather was variable. Out here, it's always the same. It was a totally different lifestyle. There was something not-welcoming about going through a main gate with a guard and going into a studio and shooting. And it was a transition going from acting on a stage to acting in a studio. We were doing a television show once, and you always knew what camera was shooting, because there was a red light on. The other two actors in the scene and I almost simultaneously realized that the camera pointing at us didn't have its red light on. We knew we were either facing the wrong camera, or that the camera had suddenly gone off. So the camera in back of us, which was now on, photographed three actors turning in panic.

So much more to this interview, you must read it all.

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