A Constant Forge Page #15

with me that you want to...

and I'll never-

In front of my husband!

He should have been smarter than that.

ButJohn never reneged.

I mean, he saw that

everybody got something...

aside from a career

and a nomination.

He was a totally honest man.

He hated liars,

he hated guys that were like this...

and studio people

that would lie to you.

He had no qualm about that.

And he would tell them.

The big argument with Stanley Kramer-

I don't know if you know that story.

I won't go in too deeply about it, but-

You have to realize, we were really young.

We really didn't know

the traditions of Hollywood.

I'll tell it. F*** him.

He's having Thanksgiving dinner

atJohn's house.

The phone rings. It's the cutter saying,

"John, Stanley's cutting behind your back. "

And there he was. Imagine!

I don't think we had any idea...

that someone else

might have the final cut.

You just thought the director did it

and that was it.

And Stanley stepped in

to cut it his way.

John had these really sick kids...

telling jokes...

full of life, full of humor...

and Kramer wanted to make it

this dour f***in' picture about illness.

John just went crazy.

He just couldn't believe it.

And they did have

a terrible knock-down, drag-out.

And that hurtJohn, by the way.

The phone didn't ring

for a couple of years because...

he pushed Stanley against the wall

in the screening room.

I have to say,just even talking aboutJohn

is a great honor for me.

To have known the man and to have had

these intimacies with him is a great honor.

I had great regard for him.

He could have been

tremendously useful...

in the - in politics,

in Congress and the Senate.

To have this kind of honesty...

and intolerance for bad behavior...

the way he had it...

would have served us so well.

I am amazing.

I was alone

that day in the limousine...

and he was sitting

with the handheld camera...

on the floor,

shooting up at me.

Then he put it down,

started discussing the film.

I never heard him discuss the film.

And he started discussing...

the petty people...

who eat at you.

And he started crying.

And I said, "Oh...

there's something here. "

And that was the beginning

of my really starting to dig...

inside...

for this guy.

'Cause he's John, you see.

There is a compromise made...

if you work on a commercial film...

and the compromise really isn't

how or what you do...

the techniques you use,

or even the content...

but really, the compromise is

beginning to feel a lack of confidence...

in your innermost thoughts.

These innermost thoughts

become less and less a part of you...

and once you lose them,

you don't have anything else.

Cosmo very clearly

is a self-portrait...

of the struggling

repertory theater manager...

who makes sure the show

must go on at all costs.

And in fact,John, at certain moments,

declared that he was abandoning filmmaking...

and went off and worked with

theater companies ofhis own creation.

He did three plays here...

and he did 'em simultaneously.

We're gonna rehearse all three

at the same time...

and then we're gonna run all three of'em

on alternate nights.

We started driving around

looking at old theaters...

rehearsal halls, big houses...

anything that might convert into...

something that we could put

three completely different plays on.

We found this little rehearsal hall on Citrus,

right above Santa Monica Boulevard...

kind of near Highland,

and it wasn't much of anything.

He was gonna translate it with a fellow

by the name ofJim Eric, who's a designer...

into a little space...

maybe 50 seats...

and then this runway in the front

that had several layers...

and it could go deep...

so you couldjust knock down

wall after wall in the space.

Small ceiling, though.

Couldn't fly anything away.

When you went there the first day,

there was a hundred people there.

Thirty-three, maybe, for each play.

Set designers, painting...

scripts, all this clerical staff,

the whole thing-

and nobody was getting paid.

While the theater was being built...

we had a back room,

a very large room...

with an L-shaped table...

a huge thing with anywhere from

15 to 40 people sitting, reading the plays...

and rewriting and reading,

rewriting and changing parts...

while the hammering was going on

and the stage was going up.

It was like a convention. Everybody there

was so into it and so happy to be there.

And if anybody showed up that could do

a little something, they'd put 'em to work.

It was like somebody showing up at your

house and you say, "We'll use them in the play. "

John didn't want any titles.

He didn't want you

to be the stage manager or something.

People would come and say, "I've been

a stage manager. " He'd say, "See what you think. "

John was down there

with hammers and nails and paint and stuff..

doing the set.

It was like making a piece of art

being inside it.

He made it like a piece of artwork-

"We should open up that wall.

Let's knock down that wall.

Then we can use that for this -"

You know, great stuff,just -

Nothing was sacrosanct.

You know what I mean?

"We can't do -"

"Sure, we can do that.

We just have to put the electricity back

after we do it. "

You know what I mean? "Let's have fun.

Let's do this, let's do that. You do it!"

I think we prepped for it for four, five months.

Readings, building the thing,

painting it...

bringing in artists to put

their artwork up in the lobby.

Joan Almond's photographs...

Steve Reisch's photographs of

the making of the theater went on the walls.

And then we opened.

The tickets were $4.00 at night

and 2.50 for matinees.

Anybody could come and see

Peter Falk orJon Voight...

or Gena Rowlands or Michael McGuire...

in a full three-act play.

No comps, no giveaways

for agents or studio people.

They had to stand in line.

He loved that.

And we could only run for five weeks.

We knew that going into it.

One of the plays

was actually Love Streams.

Jon Voight and Gena were in it,

and it was a fantastic play.

And I was in a thing called Knives.

My wife Shera was in it.

But I left my wallet-

Must've been about 100 in the morning.

"Where the hell is my wallet?

I must have left it in the theater.

Geez, I'm gonna go back there. "

And I got in. I don't know how.

Through a window or something.

But I heard some noise...

in one of the toilets.

And I went in there.

There was John.

He was fixing the toilet.

He had a wrench...

and he was replacing the pipes.

It took all of us working together,

and we had to be a family right away.

He threw us all in together to be a family,

and we became a family very quickly.

We all cared for each other,

and we all-

It was wonderful to have that person at

the head of the family creating the example.

So we all became more generous,

we all became more loving...

we all became more funny...

and we all became more creative too.

And it was brilliant!

It is high among the greatest

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