James Garner: You Ought to be in Pictures

Q: Otto Preminger was like that. And John Huston could be, too.

A: But John Huston didn't do it maliciously. If somebody wasn't coming up to standard then he got him and never let him up. He wasn't really unfair. It comes with casting: cast people who know what they're doing, then you don't have trouble.

Q: Sometimes Huston left an actor alone because he liked what the actor was doing, but the actor felt cheated that he wasn't getting any direction.

A: That happened between [director] Josh Logan and Marlon Brando during Sayonara. Marlon said to him, "Why don't you direct me?" Josh said, "Marlon, if you do something I don't like I'll tell you." Marlon wanted to be directed or at least have a confrontation about it, but Josh loved everything Marlon did. I was caught in the middle because I was doing the scenes with Marlon and we would improvise most of it, then we'd go to Josh and he'd say, "Great." And that would really make Marlon angry. I said to Marlon, "You're going to give Josh a heart attack." And he said, "The sonofabitch, he won't direct me." I said, "What are you doing this picture for?" "The money." "Okay, do it for the money, but don't kill Josh in the process." And he would have, he'd have given him a heart attack. I love Marlon.

Q: Did you stay in touch with him over the years?

A: No. Though he and I were a couple of the organizers for the March on Washington in '63 and I got to know him a little bit then, about his political side.

Q: Did you have any interest in politics?

A: I was approached to run for governor of California against [Pete] Wilson, but I didn't want to do it. I've got some things in my background that I wouldn't want out.

Q: I thought you'd been pretty blunt about your background.

A: No, there's more. It's like jumping into a den of vipers. The problem with being a politician is that to be successful you have to compromise. I couldn't compromise. What I feel is right I feel is right.

Q: You knew Ronald Reagan when he was the president of SAG. What was your opinion of him?

A: He was a dimwit then, he's a dimwit now. He played the part and [Nancy] told him what to say and do. He was the same in the Screen Actors Guild.

Q: You did The Great Escape with Steve McQueen. What was he like?

A: He was just a wild kid, loved his cars and his motorcycles. He was a little difficult as an actor. Not with other actors but with the producers and the directors. He was fired during the middle of that picture. Steve's agents talked him into staying. It turned out great for him, made a big star out of him, but Steve was a stubborn little cuss.

Q: Didn't McQueen have a problem with you because you did Grand Prix when he felt he should have done it?

A: He was gonna do it but he didn't get along with [director John] Frankenheimer, so he went off to make The Sand Pebbles. Then he was going to make [another racing] picture called The Champions with John Sturges directing. In the meantime, I called him in Taiwan when he was doing The Sand Pebbles and told him I was going to do Grand Prix. I got a letter from him saying, "Glad you're doing it," all the right things, but then he wouldn't talk to me for about a year and a half! Their picture went, like, eight months over schedule, so they didn't get their picture Le Mans made until after we were released.

Q: Any actors you'd like to work with?

A: I always wanted to work with Robert Duvall, and I thought I was going to in Lonesome Dove but he wouldn't do the other part, the one Tommy Lee Jones did. Then I dropped out because I had an aneurysm of the aorta and they said I couldn't ride a horse, so Duvall took [my] part and was wonderful.

Q: What do you think about such New York actors as Robert De Niro and Al Pacino?

A: I don't know who they are. I think of one and no, that's the other one. Pacino I like the best, but I put them all in a lump. I think it's my background, not what they do. I'm a country boy and I don't understand that inner-city thinking.

Q: Any actors you've worked with who you'd never work with again?

A: I'd never work with Bruce Willis again. I did that Blake Edwards film with him, Sunset. Willis is high school. He's not that serious about his work. He thinks he's so clever he can just walk through it, make up dialogue and stuff. I don't think you work that way.

Q: Were you surprised at his politics--that he supported George Bush in the last election?

A: Well, he would. That tells you something. I've heard that Willis has changed since I worked with him. If that's really the case, more power to him.

Q: Let's move on to some of your leading ladies. What did you think of your Cash McCall co-star, Natalie Wood?

A: She was very nice to me. We were under contract to the same studio. Natalie had some friends who sort of did her in--one of them turned out to be a gossip columnist and was selling stuff about Natalie while they were friends and Natalie didn't know.

Q: You made two pictures with Doris Day, The Thrill of It All and Move Over, Darling. What was she like?

A: She was down-to-earth, I had a lot of fun with her. She was such a big star and she took it in stride.

Q: Julie Andrews?

A: We did The Americanization of Emily, one of my favorites, and Victor/Victoria together. We got along great, laughed, did good work.

Q: Lauren Bacall, with whom you made The Fan?

A: I really like Betty. She's been at it a long time, she just says what she thinks, and she's usually pretty right.

Q: How about your Murphy's Romance co-star Sally Field?

A: Sally is harder to know on a personal basis--she's got a little screen in front of her that keeps people backed off.

Q: Kim Novak, your Boys' Night Out co-star?

A: Kim was more interested in her appearance than the content of whatever she was doing. She was good, and she had this wonderful quality about her that people loved, but she was insecure.

Q: Audrey Hepburn, with whom you made The Children's Hour?

A: I loved her to death. A wonderful human being. And [The Children's Hour co-star] Shirley MacLaine, I got along great with her.

Q: Speaking of Shirley MacLaine, weren't you supposed to work together on The Pink Jungle?

A: I was told I'd get MacLaine, but they got some girl that somebody at the studio liked, but she hadn't done hardly any work at all. She was a nasty German bitch named Eva Renzi--we called her Eva Nazi.

Q: Any actresses you admire and want to work with?

A: I thought for Maverick we were going to work with Meg Ryan. I'd love to work with her. I love Meryl Streep and would like to work with her. And Emma Thompson, I think I'd really like her.

Q: Now that Streep has passed 40, Thompson is being considered the "new" Meryl Streep.

A: Which is the dumbest thing. Of course you've got producers who are only 24 years old, they think if you're over 30 you're ancient. Women are coming into their own at 40, they're more attractive. When Lana Turner was 40, I thought she was so much more attractive than she was when she was young. It's just dumb and stupid on the producers' and directors' part, but that's the way it is, I'm afraid.

Q: Were you surprised when TV Guide voted you the "All-Time Best" television dramatic actor?

A: Shocked. I was very pleased, but I didn't get anything, not even a free TV Guide. I don't take TV Guide. I quit it when Walter Annenberg was using it as a platform for Nixon, Reagan and Bush. I was offended by it.

Q: What's your opinion of James Woods, who acted with you in the TV films Promise and My Name Is Bill W.?

A: On the first one, I promised Jimmy an Emmy, which he got. He got one for the second, too, but I didn't think he deserved it--I thought Duvall did for Lonesome Dove. But Jimmy's brilliant, just as bright as can be. He's an MIT graduate, he has about a 140-something IQ, he's bordering on genius. But that mouth just keeps going. I love him at a cocktail party because there's never a dull moment. I got him into this country club.

Q: How long does it take to go from application to membership at this club?

A: Took me about six months. Took Jimmy Woods a year because he had some bad publicity and there were some guys on the board who were, frankly, pains in the butt.

Q: Do you often defend people to get them into the club?

A: Yeah, sometimes you have to. I told them with Jimmy, "You guys sit up here and you're reading the Enquirer, the Star, and you take it as gospel, when it's trash. The only thing that's true in there is their names. After that, it's made up."

Q: Let's talk about some of the things people have said or written about you. Roy Huggins, who created "Maverick," said, "... in [the] role of the charming con man, there is nobody better. It's when he has gotten away from that image that his career always seems to diminish." Agree?

A: Roy hasn't seen a lot of my work.

Q: "Rockford," according to TV Guide, made you beloved, but in real life you were known as a tempestuous man. Is that accurate?

A: I'm supposed to react to that? Tempestuous? Depending on the situation I can be tempestuous. And when I'm angry it wouldn't be wise to cross me. I kind of go blind, I don't care what I do or what I say.

Q: After five years of doing "The Rockford Files," you found out that Universal claimed the show was $9.5 million in debt. The show had earned over $40 million. Why do studios cheat actors?

A: It's in their nature. They're in it to make all the money that they can make and I swear they would rather screw the actor than make a good deal.

Q: Have you ever named the Universal executive you characterized as having the "head of a snake" and another as a Mafia hit man?

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