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00:00I would come into my trailer in the morning and I would put on, you know, the
00:08Maisel brothers documentary and I would be getting ready and doing everything
00:15but I would be hearing her voice and there would be a moment while I was
00:21listening where I felt the character just kind of go and then yeah but it was
00:28through the voice. Sometimes it's through music.
00:58I'll have some coffee. I'll have some coffee. And then we'll all go. And then we can all go.
01:14Oh my dear little cupboard.
01:18And there, my dear little cupboard.
01:25I've always scattered money about like a mad woman.
01:31And I married a man. I married a man.
01:37Welcome to the actor's side and I am so happy to have her with us today.
01:43Oscar winner, Emmy winner, millions of Golden Globes, so many awards but so
01:50many great performances and one of her greatest I believe and I'm on record
01:54saying that my my film review of the great Lillian Hall is the great
02:00Jessica Lange. How many times since you made the great Lillian Hall do people
02:04introduce you as the great Jessica Lange? I think you're the first. Oh really?
02:10It is an amazing movie. You can see it on max. HBO came out at the end of May and
02:18you're playing a fictional actress who's not going through dementia but sort of
02:24on the cusp, I would say. Yes, yes. Yeah and it's an extraordinary performance and I've
02:29seen you so many times playing actual real performers like Patsy Cline, like
02:35Joan Crawford, like Frances Farmer, on and on. This is a fictional one. I'm just
02:40curious how different that is when you're playing real versus... Well it's
02:45very different. I mean you know with when you're playing an actual person living
02:53person I mean you feel this great kind of obligation to get them right, to get
03:01the voice, their mannerisms, their you know the whole thing and that's part of
03:08the thrill of it too is because you get to immerse yourself in this other person
03:12and study everything about them but with this it was what I loved about this is
03:20that we didn't go all the way through. It was you know that to me was the best
03:27decision that was made that we don't see her at the end of the whole journey, at
03:34the end when she's completely lost in the dementia. We just see the battle that
03:41she puts up to get through the run of this play on Broadway and I thought that
03:48was such a brilliant way to tell this story because you see her as you know a
03:54real fighter, valiant in some way. She's going to get this, she's going to finish
03:59this production. Yeah. Because theater has meant the world to her and yeah I mean
04:07it was exciting to do because of course you know then you make it all up you can
04:14just kind of create it out of thin air. Except the cherry orchard. Except the
04:19cherry orchard. You didn't make that up. No I didn't. And that's the role she's playing.
04:23That was equally thrilling because you know I've never played Chekhov on stage.
04:29Yeah. Just the idea of being able to you know just to that extent of what we did
04:38in the film. Learning that role and going. And I also the thing that I really loved
04:45about this was how the character and the actor mirrored their lives kind of you
04:54know. Yeah. Mirror images. That was so that was so interesting. I mentioned all
04:59those great stars that you played, real stars from Joan Crawford,
05:03Patsy Cline. We're sitting here today in the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures
05:08here where we hear the ghost of all many of those people you've played. Have you
05:13ever been to this museum? I haven't. Isn't that shameful of me? So glad we could bring you
05:19here you know and show it off. Yeah no it's beautiful. I mean I wish I yeah I
05:24next time I come to LA I will have to make it make a point of like really
05:29touring the whole place. Oh yeah yeah and they have a lot of the original Oscar
05:33speeches. You've won a couple of those and things and you know you can go
05:37around and listen to it and even accept your own Oscar here. They have a. Oh
05:41really? Yeah. It's like a photo booth. Yeah exactly it's hilarious. At the time
05:50Lillian Hall came out you were also in New York. Yes. On stage again in Mother
05:55Play which I have to confess I happen to be in New York then and I saw it on
05:59Mother's Day. Oh. Which was appropriate. It was. Yeah yeah. I was headed to the Cannes
06:07Film Festival from New York and I had to find a play that was like under two
06:11hours so I wouldn't miss my plane. Right. So I looked down and I said I really want to
06:15see this show and it's like 90 minutes or something. Yep. So so I went on Mother's
06:20Day the Helen Hayes Theatre and I have to say amazing you know that was just
06:25another great performance obviously nominated for a Tony Award. Yeah. It was
06:30tough you know that play was tough because it's the the velocity of it was
06:37just relentless you know you you we came on stage and there wasn't a moment to
06:43catch your breath. Right. From one scene to another to another to another and we
06:47were covering 40 years in the lives of these of this family. In like 90 minutes
06:53no intermission. No intermission. No and I mean and nobody's really off stage for
07:00more than because we're even doing costume changes set changes everything
07:05right on stage and of course the you know the emotional experience that
07:13journey that we would take every night in that was was just exhausting. It was
07:19really exhausting. I just sometimes look at that eight times a week. Yeah. And there is it
07:25says it's a play in five evictions well the fourth eviction just blew me away.
07:29Yeah. Because you're on stage by yourself silent. Yeah. It's like silent movies
07:34almost. Yeah. And I was watching that and I'm going like wow this is so beautifully
07:39choreographed for whatever reason of what you're doing and how you're doing
07:43that. Was that a difficult kind of thing to pull off? Actually it was it was my
07:48favorite part. Oh yeah. It was really it was one of my favorite moments in the
07:53play. I mean it wasn't a moment it was like almost 15 minutes just being on
07:59stage by myself with no dialogue no nothing. But you know it it was such it
08:10was such an investigation of loneliness. Yeah. That it in every night it would
08:18present itself in some variation of that. And it was you know I mean we had the
08:25guideposts obviously the milestones you know come in you take your jacket off
08:30you turn the radio on you turn the lights on you and you know there's
08:35dinner there's this there's the TV. But throughout all of it the experience is
08:44when you're that lonely and that alone how do you feel the time? What do you do
08:51just to survive the evening by yourself? One more evening alone. Yeah. And yeah it
08:59was really I loved it. I loved I loved everything about it. The way she creates
09:06moments of you know that are obviously driven by memory and yeah. And like
09:15Lillian Hall you have played on stage some of this was an original play. Yes.
09:19The first time I did. First time you've done an original play. I thought that
09:23might be the case because you've done all these classics. Right. Tennessee
09:27Williams at least three times with Streetcar, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Glass
09:32Menagerie. The great one I'm waiting for this film version that they shot of Long
09:38Day's Journey and Tonight. My favorite part ever. Oh ever? The whole world. Mary Tyrone. Mary
09:44Tyrone. It's just extraordinary. Did you watch like I mean I just saw like three
09:49months ago the Catherine Hepburn A Long Days. Oh I had seen it a long time ago. Yeah.
09:54Yeah. So I was watching I had never seen it and it was such a great play.
09:59So well written. Oh. You haven't seen it on stage though. No I have not. Because it's
10:05four hours on stage. Yeah it's it's a it's a monster to do but I think it's
10:14the greatest American play. Yeah. I mean of all time it and it it really was you
10:21know the beginning of that whole genre of family plays really. Yeah. You know and
10:29what he wrote about in in in in his introduction to the play when he you
10:35know he thanks his wife Carlotta for kind of giving him that love and space
10:41to be able to confront you know the ghosts. So great. And you played it on on Broadway and
10:49also in London right? Yeah. You know all of this Broadway you know in the theater
10:53world fascinates me. That's what one reason I also loved Lillian Hall. Yeah.
10:57Because it's set in that world of theater and I've seen so many movies set
11:02there. Yeah. Of course all about Eve probably being the pinnacle. Yes I would
11:07say so. I'd put that up there. And Jenna Rollins and. Yeah. Opening night. Yeah. One
11:13called Forever Female. I loved with Ginger Rogers and you know on and on. It's
11:17a great you know place. It's a great venue for it. Yeah. I know that I mean because
11:24there are a lot of people you know who are going to see this film and not have
11:29ever been to the theater. Right. And I mean there's such lore and mythology
11:38about theater and and especially doing a play like this Cherry Orchard. It was
11:44and that was one of the reasons I really wanted to do this part was because I
11:49knew I was never going to play the Cherry Orchard on stage. Well never say never. But this was
11:56going to give me the opportunity to yeah to actually play this character. To do it
12:02and your director is great a Michael Christopher. Yes he's wonderful. Yeah.
12:07I saw a play he had done decades ago in LA The Shadow Box. Yeah. Yeah. And it's
12:15very talented. Yes. Yeah. And I love Kathy Bates. Isn't she wonderful? You two were
12:20great together. The kind of the Thelma Ritter part. It is the Thelma Ritter part but she
12:28knows and she recognizes you as a friend as also somebody that's working for you.
12:33Yeah. No I love working with Kathy. We've worked together many times and Lily
12:39Rabe who is just heartbreaking in that part. Yeah. And I mean I thought we had
12:47just a great cast across the board. Jesse Williams. Of course Pierce Brosnan. Who
12:53wouldn't want to kiss him? Kathy Bates is now doing a weekly series. She's doing
12:59Matlock every week and it's a hit. Yeah. So I mean she'll probably be doing this
13:04for eight or nine years. Oh boy. Like Angela Lansbury did Murder She Wrote.
13:07Could you ever see yourself doing that? Kind of playing the same character over
13:13and over and over? No. No. No. Because I loved you in American Horror Story but
13:17you're always playing. Yes. There were. I did those first four seasons and they
13:21were completely different characters. Completely different stories. Yeah. Which
13:26is great. Yeah. That's the only way I could do something like that. And it was
13:30great. It's like kind of appointment television. Yeah. But we're gonna see. It
13:34was. You know what I loved about it was it was like a repertory company. And you
13:40know we would do seasons. There would be this play, these characters, this play,
13:45these characters. So it was. Yeah. You know. I like that part of it very much.
13:50That's fun. Do you have a preference? You know you do movies obviously. Television
13:55obviously. Theater obviously. Is there one you just like love more than the other
14:00one or do you like mixing it up? I like mixing it up. The thrill of being on
14:07stage is not. I mean there's nothing equal to it I don't think. Yeah. You walk
14:12out there and it's just. That's it. You don't have. You don't get a second take.
14:18You don't. You know. If you go up. If you forget your lines or whatever. Lose your
14:25place. You know. You've got to work your way through it. And that's happened to
14:31me on several occasions. Once when I was doing Streetcar. And the great Amy
14:39Madigan was playing Stella. And it was one early scene. And you know we'd been
14:48playing it for a while. I mean I knew this backward and forward. And something
14:52happens in your brain. And then you just walk out there and you're standing there
14:56and it's like. And she somehow very cleverly took my dialogue and put it in
15:05her mouth. And like. And the same thing happened. The same thing happened once
15:10with. On Mother Play. With Celia Keenan-Bolger. Where like. She's your
15:17daughter. Yeah. She saw that like I was just suddenly gone for a moment. And did
15:23the same thing. And as soon as that. You're back on track. And of course. But
15:28it's it's an odd phenomenon. Because it's not like you forget the lines. But it's
15:33like something. I mean that's when they say go up. You go up. Right. And it's
15:37almost like. Yeah. You're out of your. It's an out of body experience. Don't you
15:41like yell line. You know they always yell. No. It was too late for that. You can do
15:48that in rehearsal. Too late. Yeah. Exactly. I wanted to ask you about some of your
15:53films because you won your second Oscar. Your first Oscar for Tootsie. Yes.
15:58Famously nominated in both categories. Yeah. You know only a handful of
16:02performers have ever done that. And you did it with lead actress for Francis and
16:06supporting for Tootsie which you won. And then you won in 94 for Blue Sky. Yeah.
16:12Which is a great performance. And a great director. Yeah. Tony Richardson. That
16:18movie was like shot four years before that. Right. It was shot. Not four. I think
16:24it was maybe three. Again it was one of these things. One of these films that got
16:31caught in you know one studio buying out another studio. And I think that I mean
16:38it actually sat in a bank vault while they determined who owned what or
16:44whatever. Yeah. And what was really sad about it was Tony died before the film
16:50was released. Yeah. Yeah. And so he never got to see you win the Oscar for that.
16:56No. Or to see how well received his film was. Yeah. And it was really good. And you know when
17:01you when your film doesn't show up for three or four years say oh what's the trouble. There was
17:05nothing wrong with that. No. No. No. It was just one of those horrible things where I can't remember
17:11the particulars of it. But yeah somebody's some studio folded or was bought out by.
17:18Yeah. Movie business. We have something in common. We both made our film debuts in the same movie.
17:28King Kong. Really. Yeah. Now you went on. Who did you play. Well I was an extra in the stands when
17:36King Kong escapes the pet rock something and everybody's you know getting trampled and all
17:42of that. Right. They said okay this stand run and run through it. It was on the back lot at MGM.
17:48Yeah. I remember well I was working as a page at NBC and they they were looking for people. Yeah.
17:52I guess not to pay them. This sounds like fun. So we're out there doing King Kong and you know
17:59that was that was a memorable debut for you. You won a Golden Globe for it actually. Well I mean
18:04look at I was I was naive which is probably the best way to do that. I didn't know anything about
18:11anything. It was like yeah. But you know now that I look back on it what an incredibly crazy
18:20experience especially for I remember Chuck Grodin saying to me somewhere in like the
18:25eighth month of shooting he said you know most films aren't like this. So yeah.
18:33But we shot right up until and I think the film came out right around the end of the year right
18:40a Christmas release or something like that. Yeah. We were still shooting in November. Oh my god.
18:46It was like a nine month shoot. It was like being pregnant. I got my scene done one night.
18:54You had to go through the whole thing. Yeah. It's fun you know I mean to have that. But you didn't
18:59do another film for three years until All That Jazz right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. With Fosse.
19:05The next which is you do Fosse. You do Postman. Always Rings Twice. Yeah. Do you have a favorite
19:11film beyond you know character you mentioned Mary Tyrone? Mary Tyrone.
19:20You know when I think back I mean so many I mean different ones for different reasons but
19:27one of course would be Frances Farmer. Oh yeah. Because that was like I mean that was like a gift
19:35from the gods. Yeah. To be given that part especially since I hadn't I'd only done one or
19:41two films before that you know. And to have the opportunity to work with Kim Stanley was I mean.
19:53So rare and she didn't make that many movies. No at that point that was she only did one maybe
19:59and not one more. She was nominated as I recall. Yes. For supporting actors opposite you. I know.
20:10But we had the opportunity to work together because you know she was out of the actor's
20:17studio and I mean I had done work from you know out of the actor's studio with this wonderful coach
20:24and teacher Sandra Seacat. So we did like a couple weeks of just improv
20:33working together and Sandra would be there as the moderator and and Kim and I would just
20:39like do improvs all day long day after day after day just to get this sense of mother daughter and
20:46history and yeah it was a great it was just I don't know it was one of those gifts that you're
20:54given and especially because I was so young and it was so early on just to be able to work with
21:00somebody like Kim Stanley. Yeah I mean that was Seance on a Wet Afternoon. Oh or The Goddess.
21:08The Goddess yeah Patty Chayefsky wrote that. I know. I don't think anybody knows The Goddess.
21:14Really? They should see this movie. The young Patty Duke was even in it and you know.
21:20Yeah yeah I've you know I used to watch The Goddess before I'd start working on a film just to like
21:28remind myself what great acting was. Wow. Yeah. Is that part of your process? It was yeah.
21:36That's interesting. Yeah a lot of people you know have different ways. Oh I have a lot of different
21:40tricks and things. Which one of them? Well one of them was to watch The Goddess just
21:47to make me pay attention and to you know try to step up the game a little bit here.
21:54But yeah I mean I each I mean I find different approaches but a lot of times I find it through
22:00the voice my way into the character. Oh that's interesting. Like for instance when I was doing
22:07Grey Gardens. Yeah. But of course yeah Big Edie feel. Big Edie. You had I mean I would come into
22:16my trailer in the morning and I would put on you know the Maisel Brothers documentary. Oh yeah.
22:24And I would be getting ready and doing everything but I would be hearing her voice and there would
22:31be a moment while I was listening where I felt the character just kind of go and then yeah but
22:40it was through the voice. Sometimes it's through music. Yeah that was another example of getting
22:46to play a real a person and having that advantage. Yeah. Sometimes actors have books you know the
22:52movie's based on a book they go back to the book and find stuff that's not in the script. Yeah.
22:57Different kinds of ways of doing that. But you're not a method actor are you?
23:06Not to the not not in the purest sense no. But I mean I certainly did take a lot of
23:14a lot of Strasberg exercises to heart. Yeah because that's interesting to me because some
23:21actors will not get out of character on the set. Yeah. Daniel Day-Lewis famously
23:27said address me as President Lincoln. That's kind of funny. Yeah.
23:36It's amazing. Is there a role Jessica Lange still wants to play that you haven't gotten
23:41the chance to that you really either on stage or? Well there are a couple things yeah. There's a
23:48project that Michael Christopher and I have been developing that's been in kind of development hell.
23:55Not I mean the the script is there it's there a hundred percent. It's just getting it set up and
24:03made of Dietrich. Oh yeah okay. Yeah. So that's in that period of time where I mean in a way it
24:14it kind of mirrors the you know the Betty and Joan thing of you know an actor especially during
24:23that time getting to a certain age and then you know the bottom falls out and there's. Right.
24:31So this starts with Dietrich at a point in her life where she's no longer
24:38a viable movie star. Okay. And she started doing all those like Las Vegas acts and. With Burt
24:46Bacharach. Yes. He was her conductor. That's the story. This would be amazing. Yeah. The whole thing
24:52between Bacharach. I'm a big huge Bacharach fan. Yeah. So I I know his story and he wrote a book
24:57about it actually. Huh. But are his his book talks about doing Dietrich. Yeah. Yeah. So it kind of
25:03covers from that moment where he comes into her life and she's doing this rather
25:13you know bizarre act in Vegas. Yeah. And then crafts this whole new persona for her. Yeah. And
25:23she goes on tour and you know I mean there's all this she's going back to Germany and you know
25:30being for the first time and being spit on by people and called a traitor and everything.
25:37Yeah. This sounds great. It is. It's a great script. Yeah. Now hopefully we'll get that
25:42done. That's one part that I still want to play. And we're going to get this done because
25:48I'm going to put it all over deadline. We have. Okay. Yes. You help us here. I'm going to help
25:55get this done because that's really exciting. Oh man. Well there's so much that you've done
26:02so far that people really love and appreciate. And and the great Lillian Hall if you have not
26:09seen this yet just go to Max. However you can see this it's a it's a just an amazing performance.
26:16It really is. Yeah. It was a great it really was a great part and I love doing it. Yeah. Well
26:22Jessica Lange thank you so much for joining us on The Actor's Side. Thank you. It was a pleasure.