Amazon Exclusive: Wes Anderson Reviews Robert Altman: The Oral Biography
Wes Anderson is the writer/director of the films Bottle Rocket, Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums (for which he was nominated for an Academy Award), The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, and The Darjeeling Limited. His latest film is an adaptation of Roald Dahl's Fantastic Mr. Fox. Read Anderson's exclusive Amazon guest review of Robert Altman: The Oral Biography:
I just spent a very full Saturday with Robert Altman: An Oral Biography, eavesdropping on a group of the most interesting people sharing in one of my absolute favorite topics of conversation--and I just now put it down feeling heartbroken but happily and deeply inspired by him (the topic) once again. I congratulate Mr. Zuckoff on this book which is destined to become an essential part of the permanent record--and is wonderful. Also, he doesn’t mind including some of the real dirt here and there. I liked that choice, and I speculate that Robert Altman would have, too. --Wes Anderson
(Photo © 2007 Twentieth Century Fox)
A Q&A with Mitchell Zuckoff
Question: Do you think there’s any director who blazed the way for Altman or was he just a maverick, a complete original?
Mitchell Zuckoff: In a technical sense, Bob was always quick to credit to his predecessors. When people talked about his innovative use of overlapping dialogue, for instance, he’d tell them to look at the films of Howard Hawks. But the real answer to your question is no, there isn’t anyone you’d call a model or a trailblazer for Bob. In terms of his approach to filmmaking and his relationship with the business, Bob earned the titles people hung on him--maverick, renegade, iconoclast, you name it. Even during the years when he was pretty much working inside the Hollywood system--the 1970s, mostly--he did things his own way. Think of it like this: Hollywood runs on genres--comedy, romance, war, westerns, etc.--with certain fairly narrow, clearly defined expectations for each, based on successful films that have come before. In one film after another, one genre after another, Bob knew the rules then purposefully inverted and subverted them, as only a true original can.
Question: If you had to choose one film as Altman’s "masterpiece," which would it be and why?
Mitchell Zuckoff: I’d rather pick three, or five, or seven, but if I had to choose one I’d say Nashville. Before I explain why, though, I’ve got to tell you why Bob hated the word "masterpiece." He felt--rightly, I think--that it turned away audiences, making them think of a pile of vegetables they should eat because it’s good for them. So if we use the masterpiece label, let’s agree that Nashville is nothing like that. It’s an enormously entertaining movie that happens to be an absolutely brilliant portrait of America. Without using any of these terms, or laying it on too thick, it gets underneath and exposes the peculiarly American nature of power, fame, race, sex, violence, and character. Think of a painting you’d consider a masterpiece. You appreciate its beauty on the surface the first time you look at it. But why do we keep looking at it, again and again, for hours at a time? It’s because the deeper we engage with a masterpiece, whether in oil or marble or on film, the more it touches what Bob called "deep down in the dermis"--the layers of ourselves far beneath the skin. Nashville does just that.
Question: What do you think is Altman’s most underestimated film and why?
Mitchell Zuckoff: A few fit the bill, but I’d have to go with Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson. It was the complete opposite of what people expected, it painted a bleak portrait of an American icon at a time when Americans were celebrating the bicentennial, it played Paul Newman against type, and it took a jaundiced eye to popular history and show business. But if you set aside your expectations and take another look, you’ll see a movie that never got credit for what’s really there on the screen.
Question: What was your reaction when you first saw M*A*S*H?
Mitchell Zuckoff: It was a long time ago, but I remember it perfectly. I had this wonderful, furtive, guilty feeling of, "Are we gonna get caught?" It was so wild, so funny, so subversive--in short, so in tune with my adolescent heart--that I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. As great as the actors were, it was the first time I had a sense of a director, someone moving all these amazing pieces around the set. Even still, that first time I loved it purely on the surface. Only later did I figure out what was really going on--the way Bob was commenting on war (Vietnam specifically)--and then I got even more excited because that meant you could make a serious, powerful, important statement in a way that was still hilarious. I felt like I was learning a new language. Not too many people remember this, but there was a series of paperbacks that followed the movie--M*A*S*H Goes to London, M*A*S*H Goes to Las Vegas, and on and on. Bob had nothing to do with them, of course. But as a teenager I read the whole series, hoping to feel the same way I did in the theater the first time I saw the movie. It didn’t work.
Question: How do you think a director like Altman would fare in today’s Hollywood?
Mitchell Zuckoff: I’m not sure there’s anyone like him, or ever will be. But the real answer is that I don’t think it’d be remotely possible for a director like Bob Altman to operate in today’s Hollywood. He couldn’t stand "the suits" back in the days when directors were enormously powerful in their own right. Nowadays, with power, money, and control so thoroughly concentrated in the studios, there’s no way someone like Bob Altman could survive there, at least not for long. And since Bob was never willing to abandon his vision in the interest of making a popcorn-friendly blockbuster, I don’t think Hollywood would care terribly about his absence. On the other hand, someone like Bob might have a chance to thrive as a true independent, as long as he or she had the talent, the spine and the willingness to repeatedly take potentially career-ending risks.
Question: What is Altman’s ultimate legacy to film-makers, film-making, and film audiences?
Mitchell Zuckoff: Bob was fearless when it came to making movies, and fearlessness is a quality that is in short supply. Plenty of good directors can paint by the numbers and succeed commercially. Bob is an icon because he wouldn’t play by the rules. And isn’t that where all great art comes from? I like what Martin Scorsese said when I asked him this same question. He said: "His legacy? His spirit. His spirit was to make pictures, to say what the hell he wanted to say on film. It may have angered people, it may have unsettled people, but he did it." He did it. Not a bad epitaph for Bob Altman. Other people might have talked about it or dreamed about it. He did it.
(Photo © Suzanne Kreiter)
Review
“Scrupulously intelligent and entertaining. . . . Noisy, funny, slightly ill considered, a bit chaotic, and wholly believeable. In short, Altmanesque.” —The New York Times Book Review
“[Zuckoff] uses a light editorial hand, allowing a wide range of contributors to have their say. . . . A comprehensive, 360-degree look at a complicated subject.” —Wall Street Journal
“[There are] many surprising and revealing comments that Zuckoff has assembled in his fittingly rambling book. . . . Life is complicated, often messy—as Altman showed us—and his life, as seen in Zuckoff’s book, was no exception.” —San Francisco Chronicle
“A brilliantly researched, near-cinematic evocation. . . . Altman never gave up creating his cinematic portraits of people on the margins—con artists, prostitutes, gamblers, theives, clowns, movie executives—if only to shed light on the falsity behind his country’s seemingly indefatigable, desperate pursuit of success.” —The New Yorker
“[Zuckoff] doesn’t try to resolve the many contradictions surrounding Altman’s life and work, but lets them stand awkwardly beside one another for the reader to sort out. . . . As a form, the oral biography is well suited to a director who loved the sound of noisy conversation.” —The New York Review of Books
“Splendidly well-assembled. . . . Altman made amazing films, which Zuckoff’s far-reaching interviews illuminate, and by all the included accounts, he led an amazing life.” —The Morning News
“Like Altman’s signature soundtracks, this babel of transcripts offers a panoramic portrait.” —Chicago Sun-Times
“[A] marvelous, epic, tapestry-like life-scape of Robert Altman. . . . Witness by witness, Zuc...
About the Author
Mitchell Zuckoff is a professor of journalism at Boston University. He is the author of three previous books, most recently Ponzi's Scheme: The True Story of a Financial Legend. As a reporter with The Boston Globe, he was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize and the recipient of numerous national writing awards.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
M*A*S*H
*
M*A*S*H (1970)
Pauline Kael, review inThe New Yorker, January 24, 1970: M*A*S*H is a marvelously unstable comedy, a tough, funny, and sophisticated burlesque of military attitudes that is at the same time a tale of chivalry. It's a sick joke, but it's also generous and romantic—an erratic episodic film, full of the pleasures of the unexpected. . . . It's a modern kid's dream of glory: Holden Caulfield would, I think, approve of [the heroes played by Donald Sutherland and Elliott Gould]. They're great surgeons, athletes, dashing men of the world, sexy, full of noblesse oblige, but ruthless to those with pretensions and lethal to hypocrites. . . . I think M*A*S*H is the best American war comedy since sound came in, and the sanest American movie of recent years.
* * *
From the M*A*S*H theme song, "Suicide Is Painless," lyrics by Michael Altman:
A brave man once requested me,
to answer questions that are key.
Is it to be or not to be?
And I replied, "Oh, why ask me?"
[Refrain] Suicide is painless. It brings on many changes,
and I can take or leave it if I please.
Memo titled "Synopsis of M*A*S*H " from James Denton, director of publicity, Twentieth Century Fox, July 16, 1969: Soon after Hawkeye Pierce (Donald Sutherland), Duke Forrest (Tom Skerritt) and Trapper John McIntyre (Elliott Gould) join the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH), Col. Henry Blake (Roger Bowen) ruefully realizes how placid his Korean War command had been before. The three surgeons have two things in common: They are the best in the Far East and they are hell- raising lunatics who make a shambles of army bureaucracy.
Michael Murphy: George Litto was an unsung hero of this movie. As brilliant as Bob was, studios worried about him because he was really an artist and he was rebellious and he wouldn't do it the way they wanted it. That's where George came in.
George Litto: The way it started was my client, Ring Lardner, Jr., was asked to review the book M*A*S*H for The New York Times. You know Ring's story? He was one of the blacklisted guys from the Hollywood 10, a brave guy who went to jail not to name names. I'm not a Communist. If anything I'm a capitalist—if anything I'm a royalist [laughs]. But I was very sympathetic to the fact that the blacklist was unfair. People have the right to disagree, they didn't do anything in my mind illegal; you know, believing in something that's not popular is not a crime. They have their First Amendment right. And they were treated terribly.
Anyway, he called me and said, "George, I think it would make a terrific movie." Well, Ingo Preminger was Ring's agent before me, and we were very friendly, and he was moving into producing. So I called up Ingo, and I said, "Ingo, your ex- client just sent me a terrific book. I read the book and I think it would make a wonderful movie. But one condition: If you like it and you buy it, you've got to hire Ring to write it." He said, "No problem."
Richard Zanuck (studio executive and producer): Ingo Preminger came into my office one day—he had a big literary agency—and he came in and he said, "I've read a book I'd like you to read over the weekend. If you like it I'll sell the agency if you let me produce it." I said, "Jesus, Ingo." He had substantial clients. It was a thriving agency. Ingo was much more civil than his brother Otto, who was an arrogant prick. Well, I read it, and I called him up and I said, "I have your office ready."
George Litto: I had a house in Benedict Canyon. We had a poker game there on Sundays with a lot of people in the industry—writers, directors, producers—and Bob came to the poker game, and at the end of the poker game he said, "George, I read M*A*S*H. I think it's great. Do you think you can get me this movie?" I said, "I don't really think so, but I'm going to try."
So Ingo and Ring wanted to have a meeting. "George, who should direct this movie?" And I said, "Stanley Kubrick." They say, "Yeah, that's a good idea." So I say, "How could you get him? You can't. Or, Bob Altman." And Ring said, "Who's Bob Altman?" Ingo said, "George, we can never get Bob Altman this job." I said, "I'm telling you right now, you want to know who can direct this movie? Stanley Kubrick or Bob Altman. That's all I got to say. You know everybody in town, Ingo. But I'm telling you who can make this a terrific movie."
Ingo says, "George, I can't get him the job." So, dissolve. Ingo and Ring called me up some days later. They said, "George, we got a problem. Practically every meaningful director in Hollywood has turned down the script." Fifteen, sixteen top directors turned it down. I learned later that many directors turned down M*A*S*H because it had a group of characters, but it was a series of vignettes, and they were used to the traditional beginning, middle, and end. You have to have a motor to get you to the middle and a motor to get you to the end. And this series of vignettes didn't seem to have a motor. The way Bob fixed that was brilliant, but that comes later.
So Ingo said, "George, if we go to Fox with another turndown, they're going to cancel this project. We need a director who won't turn us down." I said, "Well, you know Kubrick probably will turn you down." He said, "George, stop being a smart- ass." I said, "But Bob Altman won't turn you down." That was the only lie I ever told Ingo. Because, you know, he did turn it down [laughs].
Ingo Preminger, from "Remembering M*A*S*H: The 30th Anniversary Cast and Crew Reunion": To get rid of George Litto, I went and met his client Robert Altman. And at that time he played a little film for me that dealt with the smoking of pot. It was short, it was sweet, and I loved it. I called Richard Zanuck and said, "We found the guy." He said, "You're crazy."
Richard Zanuck: Ingo said, "Look, this guy has done some talented work. Not much, but good work." That's when we ran the
Cold Day in the Park and something like fifteen episodes of Combat! He came in and we talked about his concept and how he would shoot it and all the rest. It was a gamble 'cause he really hadn't done anything quite like this.
David Brown (producer): We were absolutely bowled over by the book, but not by Altman. Ingo convinced us to go with Altman. Well, we weren't convinced, but we supported the producer.
George Litto: So I call up Bob, I tell him, "You won't believe this, but I got an offer from Ingo Preminger for you to direct M*A*S*H." It was like a hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars and five percent of the picture profits, but Ingo had two other options for more pictures. So that was the deal I made with him. Ingo was a good, smart guy. So Bob agrees and great, fine, I make the deal. Dissolve.
A few days go by. I get a call from Owen McLean, who was head of business affairs for Fox. He said, "George, we got a problem." He said, "Ingo did not have the authority to make a deal with you for Bob Altman. We're canceling that deal unless you agree to our terms." He said seventy-five thousand, flat, no profits. That's it, take it or leave it. I said, "You know, you're a big shit, Owen." He said, "George, are you leaving it? I guess you're leaving it." And you wonder why Bob had such an attitude about studios? I said, "Hey, Owen, I'm just a humble agent. I can only deliver your message. I cannot accept or reject your proposal" [laughs]. He said, "There's not a fucking thing that's humble about you" [laughs].
Richard Zanuck: When I made Jaws with Spielberg, he didn't have points and he had done a lot more work. He got no points and that was much later than Bob. In those days points weren't thrown around unless you were Bob Wise or Willie Wyler or somebody like that.
George Litto: So I called Bob and every profane word you can think of he uttered through the telephone about Owen and Fox, because he had a bad experience there. I don't know if you know this. He was doing a television show with a singer from Philadelphia, Fabian. Yeah, the Bus Stop thing.
So I said, "Bob, do you really want to fuck them?" He said, "Yeah, I'd love to fuck them." I said, "Take the deal." He said, "What?" I said, "Take the deal. You think it'll be a great movie. If it's a great movie, after that I'll get you anything you want. Any picture you want to make. I'll get you the biggest salary in Hollywood. Just take the deal." So I called Owen and I said, "Owen, I got bad news for you. Bob's taking the deal."
Richard Zanuck: When he was gearing up he came in and said, "I want to go scout Korea." I said, "Why? We're not going to Korea. We're going to the studio ranch in Malibu." He said, "This is ridiculous." I said, "Go out and look. I'll show you pictures of mountains in Korea. They match perfectly with what's out at the studio ranch." It was probably more Korea than had we gone to Korea. Nobody knows what Korea looks like, anyway. That's what I said to him and he got very angry.
He said, "We're going to shoot that golf scene in Tokyo." I said, "No we're not. We're going across the street to Rancho Park. There's a golf course. All you have to do is get a couple of Japanese girls and dress them up and they're caddies." One golf course looks like another. Why would we ever do that?
In those exchanges, Bob was a guy who didn't like authority. He was a real rebel. I always felt that underneath that anger there was kind of a playboy. I would see the way he would dress, in the Paris airport, with the hat, the flashy white suit. I think there was a rogue element about that.
George Litto: Now he's doing the picture. He's working with Ingo and Ring. They're doing the rewrite. They're planning the movie and talking to the production department. There's a guy by the name of Doc Berman that's like their executive in charge of physical production. Bob calls me up ...
