Name: Quincy Jones Talks About The Making Of "Thriller" | Letterman
Uploaded: 2022-06-14T21:58:31.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Quincy Jones Talks About The Making Of "Thriller" | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-06-14. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Quincy Jones Talks About The Making Of "Thriller" | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-06-14. Transcript available.

My next guest, ladies and gentlemen, is a fine musician.
He's also a terrific composer and an arranger and the most successful,
this is unbelievable, the most successful record producer of all time.
He is also the producer of a brand new motion picture opening December 18th,
rather, called Color Purple, The Color Purple.
And on top of all of that, this man is the only guest we've ever had on this
show
named Quincy.
Please say hello to Quincy Jones.
Thank you all right.
Nice to meet you.
Thank you very much for joining us.
How you doing?
Okay.
You're doing it all.
You do everything.
No, I think after this two-year stint, I'm going to rest for about two years.
It took you two years to do the movie and then other things as well, right?
Is that what you're talking about?
Right.
But the movie was almost every day for two years.
Now, how do you go from being an arranger, a composer, and a record producer to
producing
your own motion picture?
You're not in it, but I mean, you're producing the picture.
Well, it just, it's something I'd always wanted to do inside, David.
And about two years ago, I guess October in 83, Peter Goober, who was a
producer out in
California, came to me to talk about an Olympic theme for gymnastics.
And we said, okay, but then I really got interested when he said, I'd also like
you to get involved
in a book called The Color Purple, which I had taken on vacation with me.
And I couldn't believe it because I fell in love with the book.
It was small and I took it with me and read it.
And it touched me more than anything I've ever read in my life.
And it also helped me to understand from a woman writer's standpoint what that
was all
about.
I mean, Alice is a very truthful writer.
Alice Walker?
Yes.
She's the one who wrote The Color Purple.
Now, how do you, let me short circuit you here, but how do you go from that
step to hiring
Steven Spielberg to direct the film and getting the cast and all of that sort
of thing?
Well, you have to let everybody call you crazy at first because I said, Peter,
can you let
me just take this and see what I can do with it?
He said, fine.
And if I get in trouble, you can pull me back.
And he said, who are you thinking about directing?
I said, Steven Spielberg.
He said, yeah, that's true.
Yeah.
And everybody else did.
And at the same time, Steven had been thinking about the movie and we were
friends before.
He knew about the film.
You know, he knew about the book.
Yeah.
And was circling the field about the same time.
And then I just stayed with it.
And 11 months later, I found myself with Steven and Kathy Kennedy and Frank
Marshall, all pros
on a rocket and through every stage of the film.
It turned out very nicely.
I saw it the other day.
It turned out really nice.
You must be very proud of it.
But when you're working with Spielberg, now this is a story of a family and a
group of people
working in the early 1900s in Georgia.
Right.
Did you have trouble with Spielberg wanting to put, like, you know, Martians in
it and
stuff?
No.
Some little guy coming down from Jupiter and being...
No way.
No way.
This...
In the beginning, we talked about this.
And I said, Steven, this is all...
No flying.
He knew.
This is just some black people walking around on the ground.
You know?
No, he's an incredible, one of the most incredible director.
Yeah.
Like I said, it was a very impressive piece of work.
Now, by the way, I mentioned your name is Quincy.
What's your middle name?
No, really.
Do you have a middle name?
Delight.
Quincy Delight.
Right.
But it was my father's name, too.
So it's not a stage name or anything.
I wouldn't do that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So what was your father's first name?
Quincy Delight Jones.
Oh, you got the whole name.
Right.
And my son got the whole thing, too.
You passed on the Delight, so to speak.
Yes.
You got it all.
What are we going to do?
We have some footage here?
You want to do this?
You want to take a look at some of this?
You want to talk about records for a while?
Okay.
We're going to see a minute or two from The Color Purple, which opens December
18th, all
over the United States, huh?
Yes.
It's going to be a big movie.
You can feel it, can't you?
I hope so.
Yeah.
All right.
Let's take a look at it here and see what we got.
Who are the people in there?
That's Danny Glover as the father.
And his son is Willard Pugh.
And he's auditioning his new fiancée for a bride-to-be, and that's Oprah Winfrey
from
Chicago.
She was a talk show hostess out there.
Yeah.
Now, that's an interesting story.
The other lady that we saw in there is, of course?
Seeley.
That's Whoopi Goldberg.
Right.
Now, explain the woman from Chicago and how she got into the film.
Well, I was in Chicago out there to testify of Michael Jackson's lawsuit for
the plagiarism
trial, supposedly.
And I stayed up all night, so I was walking around, pacing the floor.
Turned on the TV set at 9.15 in the morning, and I saw this lady and said, felt
to myself,
there's Sophia.
I didn't even know whether she could act or not.
And so we asked to get a videotape and sent it to Stephen, and there she is.
This is the luckiest woman on the face of the earth, isn't it?
And talented, too.
Yeah, she does a very nice job in there.
Now, how many record albums did this thing end up selling?
Was it, how many?
It's now tied with one other, I think.
Which one?
Thriller.
Oh, 38.
38?
Million.
38 million.
Good Lord.
Now, do you still do that for people?
If I came to you and wanted to make a record album, would you produce one for
me?
Can you sing?
No, I can't sing at all.
But now, you and Michael Jackson worked on it together?
Yes.
You wrote songs together?
Yes, I wrote one song.
Michael wrote four.
Uh-huh.
And we had various songs in the album.
Now, when you're putting together an album like that, are you ever surprised
that a song
that goes on the album becomes a hit, or are you ever surprised that it doesn't
become a hit?
I'm surprised.
I mean this sincerely.
Everybody goes into the studio to make the biggest record in the world.
Sure.
And everybody's always surprised when it isn't the biggest record in the world.
You're surprised when it's not.
200 that haven't done that, you know.
So, you're surprised when there's one that you really have a lot of hopes for
and nothing happens to it.
That really shakes your antenna up, you know.
Now, when you get down to the final cut, do you ever take a song off and
replace it with another one
and then save that song and then later give it to somebody else and it does
well?
That's happened.
On Thriller, we had four songs on there and had all the songs finished.
Took four off and replaced it with PYT and Beat It and Human Nature.
What became the four you took off?
Some other people recorded.
Yeah, and what happened to them?
It was okay.
You know, it wasn't...
So, you knew what you were doing in that case?
No, we just got lucky.
Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah.
And then tell me about the first band you worked with when you were starting
out.
Well, I was 14 years old and I, 16 year old, was Ray Charles in Seattle.
Ray was 16, you were 14.
He was 16 and I was 14.
And it was Bumps Blackwell's band and we used to play for shot issues and
everything else
and we'd get together at 3 o'clock in the morning to play what we really liked,
which was bebop.
And then from that on, you stayed with it right on through, huh?
Right.
Lionel Hampton and I wrote for Count Basie and just...
As a kid, you worked here in New York?
Oh, yes.
We did the first TV shows with Maury Amsterdam and Milton Berle, 1952.
You don't even remember all that, do you?
No, of course I do.
What do you think I am?
Of course, no, I'm like I'm four or something.
No, I remember that, sir.
Gee, well, I couldn't be happier for you.
That's a great suit, by the way.
The movie opens the 18th and I'm sure it'll be a big success for you.
Like you need another success.
Congratulations, Quincy.
Nice meeting you.
We'll be back, folks.
That's it.
Quincy, thank you very much for being here.
My thanks to Martin Mull and Barbara Avant, the woman who peels hard-boiled
eggs tomorrow.
Marv Albert will be here, Madeline Kahn and Tom Hanks.
Have a nice evening, ladies and gentlemen.
Marv Albert will be here, Madeline Kahn and Tom Hanks.