Name: Milos Forman on Letterman, 1985, 1986
Uploaded: 2018-04-15T03:33:00.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Milos Forman on Letterman, 1985, 1986' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2018-04-15. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Milos Forman on Letterman, 1985, 1986' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2018-04-15. Transcript available.

Milos Forman on Letterman, 1985, 1986

Thank you.
Nice to see you. Come on over here.
Congratulations on the Academy Award.
Thank you.
Now, here's the question you're sick of.
Was it as big a thrill or bigger thrill this time than it was in 76?
Well, two is better than none, much better than none, a little better than one.
Not as good as three, right?
Yeah.
But for most people, one is a career.
You can die a happy man.
You've proven to the world your talent.
Why should I die?
No, no, I didn't.
No, no.
But you know what I mean?
I would think the two ought to really give you an extremely good feeling about
what you're doing.
Well, I would say it's better than the other way around.
Yeah, yeah.
Did you, now it seems to me that your speech that evening was truncated, short,
brief.
Well, we were instructed, you know, they gave us instructions, you know, what
you can say, you can't say, and that you have to say it in 45 seconds.
Yeah.
Right, and 30 seconds for slowly, a red light starts blinking and then faster,
faster, faster.
And you don't think about anything else but the red light, which you can see in
the corner of your eye, you know.
So it was sort of, well, you know, you can't win, you know, because people
complain whatever you do.
If you let the show go, it runs for four hours, right?
But you have so many wonderful spontaneous, you know, awkwardness is there.
You know, this way, everything was so tight and everything, and you lose that
spontaneity.
You do it in three hours, you can go to bed in New York at midnight, right?
Yeah, yeah.
But, you know, that's one thing if you win an award for best catered lunch or
something.
But you're, you know, the director of the best director.
That's a big award.
Oh, yeah.
You would think that you could allow yourself some liberties and just go nuts
there.
Well, you know, everyone who is up there standing and accepting the statue, I
think that he or she is the most important around whom the whole evening is,
you know, built.
So, that's normal.
What did you do after the telecast?
I wouldn't talk.
Nah, come on.
No, because we were so many, you know, we were nominated in 11 categories, and
several categories have several people, you know, like sound has five people,
you know.
So, we were like, and wives and husbands, you know, 25 people, so...
Who was nominated in wives category again?
That's a good curse.
Okay, so after the award show, what do you do?
Everybody piles into big black limousines, and where do you go?
Well, no, you have to go to the ball, governor's ball, because if you win, it
would be a bad, you know, bad thing not to go there, of course, you know.
And if you lose, you would be considered a bad sport not to go there.
So, everybody's there, you know, trying to smile and be nice.
But were you able at any point that night to have an actual celebration where
you're actually unwound and...
Yeah, but it was already so late, and everybody was so drunk that I don't
remember anybody.
Now, let me ask you, this is probably a naive question, the category Picture of
the Year and Best Director.
Now, shouldn't that automatically one be the other?
Shouldn't the Best Director indicate that the Film of the Year would also be...
In your case, it was, but why are there two different categories?
Well, because, you know, it's not court of law, this award, so there is no
justice, really.
And it's a game, so you have to take it as a game.
It has its rules, you know, like, you know, I don't understand off-site or
things like that.
I think it's silly, you know, why can't you run wherever you want?
That's true, that's a good point.
But doesn't...
Doesn't it seem...
Wouldn't it seem unlikely that a film that gets the best director would not
then also get the best film?
Well, not necessarily, because, you know, sometimes...
And it's not, it's not...
You know, this is really interesting, because I was traveling with the film,
promoting film practically all over the world.
And everywhere they are telling me, well, listen, you know, it's all fixed,
right?
No, no, tell me, you know, it's all politics and manipulated.
And it's not.
No.
It's not, but it's emotional.
So, sometimes people, you know, who like one film and a little bit another one,
well, so they compensate.
So they give, well, I have to give this to this film, this film, this film, but
I can't forget totally this one.
So, you know, something goes to the other one.
Anything else, anything else that humans are involved in, it can't be purely
objective.
We're doing a commercial, and then we'll come back more with Milos Forman.
Milos Forman, before you directed the movie, did you have any specific interest
in Mozart?
Not, not exactly, really, you know, as much as anybody here in the audience,
you know.
But they tell you at school that he was a blonde angel sitting on a marble
pedestal, you know, behaving nicely, as the parents want you to behave, right?
So, you know, when I saw the play, Peter Schaffer's play, and then when I read
Mozart's letters, it was such a shock.
Did you go to the play with the notion in mind that one day it would be a film
project that you'd like to be a part of, or was this just a coincidence?
No, it was a total coincidence.
As a matter of fact, I didn't know even what I'm going to see, because I was in
London, and my friend, Mr. Lance, called me if I want to go in the theater, and
I had some people in the room.
I didn't ask him what to see.
I said, sure, yeah, let's go.
And that was my luck, because if he told me that's what he told me in the taxi,
you know, I would probably find an excuse not to go, because I saw about two or
three, you know, films or plays, biographies of musicians, composers.
They are the most boring films, you know, ever made, you know, so in the taxi,
I learned what I'm going to see, and I was just mesmerized, you know, and as a
matter of fact, in the intermission, I told, you know, my friend, you know, if
the play will continue with the same power in the second half, that could be a
movie.
Were there things that you came to learn about Mozart that were not included in
the film, or you did not see in the play?
Well, you know, we got a lot of sort of criticism from musicologists, you know,
that Mozart was not like that, well, it was worse.
He was worse than depicted?
Yeah, yeah.
In what regard?
Well, in what regard, like, we avoided, for example, certain aspects, like, he
was a gambler, he was, at his end of his life, he was an alcoholic, you know,
and he turned everybody against himself.
He was his own biggest enemy, you know, like, it's absolutely true what you see
in the film, when he died, this giant of music was less than ten people walking
behind the coffin.
And ten days later, there was a requiem mass for Mozart in Prague, 3,000 people
inside the church in December, freezing cold, 2,000 outside, you know.
So, here you see how he was appreciated outside, because people didn't have to
live with him.
I think somewhere we were talking about you this afternoon, and you made the
point that musicians today sometimes do outrageous things, and it's pretty safe
for them, because they generate so much money that they can get away with wrecking
a hotel, or turning over a car, or spitting on a subway, or whatever they're
doing.
But he was doing it, and in those days, there was really much more at stake for
him.
Well, a lot, because musicians at the time were servants.
In one of his letters, he's writing to his father that finally he eats with the
cooks, which is above the valet, you know.
And, you know, he couldn't marry anybody whom he wanted without the permission
of the employer.
He couldn't travel without the permission of the employer.
So, you know, when he stood up against, and there's absolutely authentic
dialogue in the film, you know, to the emperor, when the emperor said that
there's too many notes in the abduction from Seraglio, and he said,
What do you mean, your majesty?
There's as many, not more nor less than it's required.
That took a courage to say it.
That could end his career right there, you know.
Today, you're right, you know, if they wreck the hotel, they can buy it with
the owner.
Let me do another commercial here, Melosha, and then we'll be right back, folks.
Okay, we're nearly out of time.
Melosha, thank you very much for coming.
I appreciate it.
Come back again, and we'll talk about other stuff.
Thanks for the cigar, by the way.
Oh, very welcome.
That was very nice of you.
Oh, good.
We like to encourage the guests to bring gifts if we can.
Also, my thanks to George Benson, and I'm sorry I got to talking so much and
cheated everybody out of a second song,
and my apologies.
Perhaps George will come back in the near future.
Have a nice weekend.
Good night.
Thank you.
Thank you.
It's kind of like a birthday party that the Libyans would have ruined.
You know, if I had to blame one single group for this misfortunate accident
that just occurred,
I guess it would be the people who made these shoes, wouldn't you?
That looks awful.
God, it smells like a really inexpensive bakery, doesn't it?
How does it feel, though?
It feels not too bad.
It's kind of wet and kind of mushy, and I felt it before.
Nice.
Did I show you the meteorites, ladies and gentlemen?
My next guest is one of the finest movie directors in the world.
Oh, of course he is.
That's why he's out here after this debacle.
This man has actually won Academy Awards for Best Director in 1976.
Continue mopping, guys.
That's all right.
And for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.
And once again, last year, he won it as Best Director for Amadeus.
Please welcome back to the show, Miloš Forman, ladies and gentlemen.
I'm sorry.
I said cry.
How are you?
Good to have you back here.
Thank you.
Thanks for being here.
It was about, I guess, nearly a year ago this time you were here, right?
Right after you'd won the Academy Award last year?
Yeah.
Oh, I thought I was part of the stupid Patrick.
No, no, no, no, no, no.
We're honored and delighted that you're here.
I thought I demoted now to be just as a director here, you know?
So what are you doing now?
What are you working on?
Anything?
Can you update us here a little bit?
No, I'm not working.
I'm on a crusade.
Oh, a crusade.
Yeah.
Well, you've come to the right place.
Yeah, of course.
Of course, of course.
It's, I would call it truth in advertising.
All right.
I'm all for that.
Do you watch movies on television?
Occasionally, I'll watch films.
Do you?
Yeah.
Are you actually aware what version of the films you are seeing?
No.
Because that can make a big difference, you know?
Because, well, listen, I didn't want to talk about it.
Because I want to be on good terms with everybody.
Uh-huh.
You know, but too much is too much, right?
MGM UA sold a film I directed, Hair, to syndicated television, 116 station.
They cut out nine entire songs out of the film.
And it's a musical.
Mm-hmm.
It's a musical.
You know?
How many, how many songs are in it totally in the film?
Uh, about 18, so I would say half of it.
50% of the songs.
Half of it, yeah.
They didn't cut out, okay.
They didn't cut out my name.
Mm-hmm.
They still advertise it as a Milos Forman film in Hair.
Have you ever heard of a, let's say, gallery owner who cuts six inches of
Picasso here and five inches of Chagall here?
Chops of the feet of Michelangelo's David because ceiling is too low.
And he can better accommodate the space of the gallery.
You know?
And that's exactly what's happening to the movies.
Because the movies are cut for two reasons.
Censorship, you know, four-letter words, nudity, and like that.
Right.
And for time slot.
You have two-hour time slot, right?
Nine to eleven.
Eleven news has to start, right?
Well, minus, I don't know, 16, 18 minutes for commercials.
So every film has to be exactly the same lens.
So you have to cut seven minutes here, 20 minutes from this film, 30 minutes
from this film.
Who makes the cuts and what can you do about it?
That's funny.
That's very interesting.
One, I, film I directed, One Flour Cucousn