Sick In The Head: Conversations About Life And Comedy Part 13

Jim: And we followed his show, which was the best thing that happened to us.

Judd: You were on right after. So that night on TV was All in the Family and Mary Tyler Moore, M*A*S*H, The Bob Newhart Show, and then Carol Burnett?

Jim: It was a great night.

Judd: A perfect night.

Jim: The last big Sat.u.r.day night.

Judd: It's completely different now, because no one's watching any show in those kinds of numbers. The biggest night of Breaking Bad is half of what The Mary Tyler Moore Show would get.

Jim: I had a show canceled with a thirty-five share. (Laughs) Judd: How do you think that changes the culture, the fact that we're not watching the same things together anymore?

Jim: Well, it's changed it enormously. Look at sports. Or American Idol, a few years ago. These are the only kinds of things that bring people to the watering hole now, you know? We all come and talk about it the next day. We're all bound together. We all had a common experience. All of that is changing. There's a price to that.

Judd: Yeah.

Jim: But television is still the greatest job. We agree on that, right? Television is the greatest job?

Judd: Yes. Yes. So, was Mary Tyler Moore eight seasons?

Jim: Seven.

Judd: Seven seasons, and it went right into Lou Grant.

Jim: Yes.

Judd: That was one of the great transitions of all time.

Jim: Yeah. When is a spin-off not a spin-off?

Judd: I used to love that show.

Jim: You know what was so great about that? We got our stories from the newspapers, literally.

Judd: And so after Mary Tyler Moore, you went into Taxi?

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Judd: What was that like, working with Andy Kaufman?

Jim: He'd always be in character. He was great. I tell Andy stories all the time. How can you resist Andy stories? He invented performance art, just amazing, bizarre stuff. But when you gave him notes, he'd be in that character, and you'd give him notes and it would be like he was Latka with an American talking fast at him. And then he'd do the note. He'd always do the note.

Judd: But he was in character the whole time he was on set?

Jim: Yes.

Judd: Did you have private moments with him when he wasn't in character?

Jim: My favorite private moment with him was when he was hospitalized after the wrestling match, and I found out it was all a fake.

Judd: Who told you?

Jim: We had been really scared. We were running the tape and then we froze up and we saw-he did a very difficult physical stunt, a brilliant physical stunt. There's no way a stuntman could do that stunt better than he did. That's how good Andy was. And I was p.i.s.sed off because- Judd: Because he scared everyone?

Jim: This was on front pages! Yeah. And I said, "Do you know what it's like to think you were seriously injured?" And he says, "Do you know what it's like to be in traction for a few days?" (Laughs) Judd: (Laughs) For no reason. Where were you when you had that conversation?

Jim: I was in my office and I think he was still in the hospital. I don't know.

Judd: And so when he would make a joke like that, what was his tone like? Did he ever talk about what the purpose of it was?

Jim: He'd talk like a guy who just came up with a good bit.

Judd: To him the bit was just riling people up? There's no point to it, really, other than isn't it funny that you're going to get upset about this?

Jim: He was inventing an art form, for Christ sake. He was an original talent.

Judd: You spent years around him, but there were very few moments when he would drop it and say, "The reason I'm doing this is because..."

Jim: It was deeper than that. And it's not even a question of dropping it. He was in it.

Judd: Writer-wise, Taxi was like the all-star team of all time. Has there ever been more great writers in the same s.p.a.ce at once?

Jim: We had a great time. We really worked. It was great. The Charles brothers. David Lloyd. It just worked. And the cast was great, too. We had fun. We had a party every Friday night. And this was in the days when- Judd: When everyone was on that lot?

Jim: Yes. And it was literally segregated. Television people used one entrance and movie people used another. At that time, n.o.body who ever worked in television got a movie job. But you know that.

Judd: You couldn't be a movie star and a television star.

Jim: You couldn't get a job. You couldn't get a writing job. n.o.body was interested. You did television. You were lower order.

Judd: Even as a writer, you couldn't cross over?

Jim: There were a few people who made it over the fence in the early eighties. But the fence was still up-which was great, because you not only had a job you loved, and were making terrific money, but you also got to feel like an underdog. (Laughs) Judd: While you were getting rich.

Jim: It was bliss. It was just bliss. Yadda, yadda, yadda.

Judd: And was that the great moment for you? I feel like, in my life, there was a brief moment where we were all together and then people started splitting off and doing different things, but still, there was that one moment where everyone is around each other for a while. Was Taxi your special moment, where everyone was at the perfect level of their career to bond and not be behind their gates and split off?

Jim: Yes, it was perfect. It was a community, a real community. Everyone's working. Everyone's having fun, doing something. I mean, that's it, you know?

Judd: And that's about when you started directing movies, right? With Starting Over?

Jim: Yes.

Judd: That was a big movie in our house. My dad and my mom really looked at that as one of the great, hilarious movies. They talked about it a lot.

Jim: Jesus.

Judd: Maybe because they were on the verge of breaking up, but they would talk about Candice Bergen singing that song, and it was one of their favorite moments of all time. But is that why you asked Burt Reynolds to do Terms of Endearment, because you had just worked with him in Starting Over?

Jim: No, I wasn't quite that foolish. (Laughs) I couldn't get Terms made. I forget what the budget was, but it was modest, and I couldn't come up with the money. But then Burt said he'd do it, and that made it happen. And then I'm revving up, doing the rest of the casting, and his publicity agent calls me and says, "Burt's not doing your movie, but he wants you to know he loves you." He'd taken another role.

Judd: Did the whole thing kind of fall apart at that moment?

Jim: Yeah.

Judd: So who became the great supporter of Terms of Endearment?

Jim: Grant Tinker, who had gone over to NBC, and pre-bought it for television.

Judd: I've never even heard of that.

Jim: That gave me the final million.

Judd: That's a good friend.

Jim: Great boss. A great boss. My obsession with the movie was that it was a literal comedy.

Judd: About cancer.

Jim: I wanted to do a truthful movie, but-I went through arguments with the Golden Globes where the studio had to put a muzzle on me because I cla.s.sified my movie as a comedy and they cla.s.sified it as a drama, and it was the whole point that I was doing a comedy. I lost that one and I won drama-but then, afterwards, when people didn't see it in theaters, the solitary experience, I think, is, you know, it's not a comedy. It's in a completely different tone because you're watching it alone, I think.

Judd: Because in the theater, it murdered.

Jim: Yeah, it did.

Judd: Why do you think it has transcended? I think a lot about culture, how quickly things disappear now. There's so much new stuff, but these shows and movies, they're timeless, whether it's Mary Tyler Moore or Terms of Endearment-they are surviving. What do you think they have in common?

Jim: I don't know. Humanity?

Judd: What do you think you did right as a parent?

Jim: Oh, G.o.d. It was an awful house my kids grew up in.

Judd: Yeah?

Jim: I don't know. (Laughs) Would anybody ask what your parents did right to produce you?

Judd: Well, I think it's always a combination of your parents love you and you watch their mistakes and some kids take some things from the mistakes, and some kids are injured from the mistakes- Jim: That's true. Jesus, why does everything you say sound so good? (Laughs) Judd: I'm just trying to calm myself down.

Jim: Can you heal, do you think?

Judd: I notice with my friends' kids, some of them crash early, and then they pull out, and they're kind of awesome and funny and interesting. Other kids seem kind of great, and they have trouble later, and it's fascinating how parenting relates to this environment-you've written a lot about it-in Spanglish, which is about how money and doing everything right doesn't always make a great kid- Jim: My whole goal in Spanglish-I had this kind of thing in my mind. I wanted to show the father as the saving parent instead of the mother as the saving parent. It was a big deal for me, because I was so tired of those things where Dad learns to feel.

Judd: Yeah. (Laughs) Yeah.

Jim: I spent a lot of time as a parent thinking it was my duty to give my kids the lessons of being poor when they weren't.

Judd: Yeah.

Jim: It took me so long to stop-you know?

Judd: They're never going to appreciate it like you did.

Jim: It took me so long to get off it. I want them to be from New Jersey, and they're from Brentwood.

Judd: You think, Can my kids do well if they're not embarra.s.sed that they didn't grow up in pain and poverty?

Jim: I think, in some ways, the worst thing I did as a parent is that I pa.s.sed on the embarra.s.sment of riches, as if they should be embarra.s.sed.

Judd: I have that, too. As a kid I always said, "I want to leave this town," but there's no moment where my kids are like, "We've got to get the f.u.c.k out of Brentwood." Why would you leave? My daughter, it's time for her to get a car, and I think, My dad didn't get me a car. It wasn't even discussed as a possibility. And you think, How spoiled-am I teaching her a lesson by getting her a s.h.i.tbox? But I want it to be safe. And you're terrified that somehow it's going to ruin her.

Jim: Yes, yes, yes. A s.h.i.tbox with a five-star rating.

JAY LENO.

(1984).

When I was a kid, Jay Leno was hands-down my favorite stand-up comedian. He wasn't the host of anything yet, of course. He was a semiregular guest on Late Night with David Letterman and I went to see him several times at clubs in Long Island during high school. He was a master. He would tear down the house. His act worked so well because he was a pure workingman's comic. He was real. He talked about the things that annoyed him, he had brilliant observations, and it was all just about as good as a stand-up act in a comedy club can possibly be.

I have gotten to know Jay a bit in the years since our interview, and he's been nothing but nice to me, for reasons I still do not understand. He did this interview with me when I was in high school, first of all. Then, when I was in college, I sent him a whole list of jokes to see if he'd buy them for his Tonight Show monologues. And one night, not long after, my grandmother knocked on my door and said, "Jay Leno's on the phone." I didn't believe her. But I went to the phone anyway, and this voice said, "Hi, Judd. I read your jokes. They're not quite there yet. They're close, but they're not quite there," and then he proceeded to explain to me what, exactly, was wrong with my jokes in the kindest possible terms. He was so generous and encouraging, I didn't even realize that I was being rejected. That's not easy to do, to call a kid and tell him that his jokes aren't good, and the way he did it just made me want to work harder. It also made me want to treat people kindly, the way Jay treated me.

Then, much later, when I started directing my own movies, Jay would always book me as a guest on The Tonight Show. I never told him that one of the main reasons why I started making movies in the first place-why, from as early as I can remember, I wanted to get into this business-was so that I could one day become successful enough to be a guest on The Tonight Show. For me, The Tonight Show was the endgame, period. Sometimes I think movies were just a way to get there.

Jay Leno: Is there an interview, or am I just talking?

Judd Apatow: Well, yeah, you're talking to me. That kinda thing. Okay, um-I know it's hard to get going, but once you get going- Jay: Okay.

Judd: Where are you right now in your career, if you had to describe it?

Jay: Ah, about twenty-five miles outside of New Jers-outside of New York. I guess I'm in Jersey right now. Where am I? I have no idea. I mean, the last two years or so I've been doing the Letterman show a lot and that seems to have helped an awful lot. You know, the clubs are kind of full on Wednesday now, instead of just the weekends, so that's nice. But I don't know, I'm too close to it. I can't tell.

Judd: You're a draw, but you're not pulling like Universal Amphitheatre or anything.

Jay: (Laughs) No, but-I really can't tell. I mean, I like this stage of my career. Because I'm at the point where I know if the stuff is still funny. The audience is still at the point where, unless it's funny, they don't laugh. They might like you going in, but if it's not funny, they don't laugh. Sometimes when you get real big, they laugh at stuff that's really not that funny and you don't know anymore.