Ali MacGraw on Just Tell Me What You Want, Oprah's 'Nonsense' and the Drug of Celebrity

Ali MacGraw has lived the sort of life that usually seems confined to airport novels -- a Wellesley grad who spent the '60s doing grunt work for legendary Vogue editor Diana Vreeland, she became a fashion icon herself after starring in hits like Goodbye Columbus (1969) and Love Story (1970). Her passionate relationships, and eventual marriages, with Paramount chief Robert Evans and alpha-male Steve McQueen were the stuff of international headlines. She dried out at Betty Ford. And then she went to Santa Fe but remained active as an advocate for yoga and animal rights.

Before leaving Hollywood behind, MacGraw starred in 1980's Just Tell Me What You Want, which Warner Archive has just released on DVD for the first time. And while the sophisticated romantic comedy didn't strike a chord with audiences in its original release, time has been kind to this hilarious film. The tale of a kept woman (MacGraw) and her billionaire paramour (comedian Alan King) -- and how they learn that love is just another negotiation -- balances literate wit (Cabaret screenwriter Jay Presson Allen adapted her own novel) and outrageous slapstick (MacGraw and King's brawl at Bergdorf Goodman is the stuff of legend).

MacGraw, 72, spoke to Movieline by phone from her home in New Mexico:

You really had not done a lot of comedy at that point...

I had not done a lot of work, period. Let's cut to the chase. And I was lucky enough to be asked to meet [director] Sidney Lumet by his and my agent, the legendary Sue Mengers. She said, "Sidney and Jay Allen are interested in you for this movie," and I said, "Are you kidding?" She said, "You have to meet them; this is the best experience you will ever have, because he's really an actor's director." So I went to meet them, and I guess did some readings and stuff, and his reputation preceded him. They had already won numerous awards, as we know, and I met [Jay] for another project that didn't materialize, and I loved her. She was smart and funny and had great, great taste and education. She was someone I came to be very crazy about.

Sidney was a dream director for any actor, but particularly one like me, who had no education on how to act. And to be surrounded by that level of expertise, from every single member of the cast and crew, and of course led by someone who knew every single thing that he wanted to see and hear on film, so there was nothing accidental going on. It was tremendously well-rehearsed and prepared, and it was an eye-opening experience. I loved every second of it.

It's a very interesting cast -- you've got these Hollywood legends like Myrna Loy and Dina Merrill, an up-and-comer like Peter Weller, and at the center of it all, you were coming off a period of not having worked [McQueen had barred her from doing so during their marriage], and then Alan King, who was mainly known as a stand-up comic.

And then also there was Keenan Wynn, let's not forget, who I was crazy about. It was just inspired casting, in terms of those people, and to be someone with relatively little experience, chucked into the middle of that crowd, was spoiling. They were all so generous and kind and helpful to get whatever they could get out of me, but watching them work was just an inspiration. Because, you know, sometimes you go to work, people have varying degrees of experience, and if, like me, you don't have a lot of experience in terms of acting lessons and so forth, you're flying without a net.

In the case of working with Sidney Lumet, he had prepared us to have the script memorized and to come to New York and start working on what turned out to be three weeks of rehearsal -- this was a luxury beyond anything you can imagine. And the blocking was done after we were all so comfortable working on what he worked on us to do, so he could then bring his lighting guys in and say, "OK, this is where they're going to be moving and walking and sitting -- light it." Usually, it's the opposite: It's all set up, and you pick your way through it, hoping you can hit your mark and say your piece at the same time.

I had no real experience studying acting; I came to it having done other things for a living for many many years, and I have this gigantic respect for experience and technique. In film, there's so many little things where not just the actor can blow his lines, but technically, it doesn't quite come off in the perfect way envisioned. And if you have the intelligence -- which I lacked, at the time -- to take a serious acting study as a priority, you're prepared to come up with your stuff at a time when maybe something else is going wrong. And so I felt very very, very lucky to have gotten that part, because any number of people would have been terrific in it, but the experience was definitely spoiling.

You came to the film having had a couple of relationships with very powerful men who were used to getting their way. Did that inform how you played the character?

Oh no -- you know, it's funny, I don't think so. I think that a certain kind of woman is attracted to... You know, power is very attractive to some of us. I don't know whether it's true now, but certainly it was true then, and it's not to pass comment on the two major men in my life, for sure. But I bought the story, I bought the relationship, I thought that Jay had written a very clear and very smart script about people who are all three-dimensional, even more so when they were played by such intelligent, complicated human beings. So I guess I should say that I joined a family and believed everything that was done.

It was easy enough to... I mean, Alan King was an enormously attractive man. Besides being incredibly funny and smart, he was sexy. It wasn't hard to imagine having a big crush on him; it wasn't a stretch. We have sort of a stereotypical idea of what's supposed to be a typical leading man. Alan was as much a joy to be paired off with as any I ever had. I love his performance, and it reminds me of a couple of people I know. He was a very smart actor, and he and Sidney were friends and very clearly connected, and I watched that performance develop over our many scenes together, and it was a tremendous learning experience. Imagine the luck of getting to work with Myrna Loy! Oh my God.

Were you guys able to hang out between scenes?

I love the phrase "hanging out," in a way, but when everybody is at that level, and they were brilliant, this handful of actors, we were having a lovely time, but we were working. There are certain instances where everybody waits for seven or eight hours while they get the sunset shot right, but this was in New York City: "Time is money, we're all ready, we're all rehearsed, now we're gonna do it." Which I loved.

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