0:02

This is Alec Baldwin and you were

0:04

listening to Here's the Thing from

0:06

iHeart Radio. James

0:09

Naughton is known for his decades of

0:11

stellar work on stage in American

0:13

classics, from Tennessee Williams

0:15

to Eugene O'Neill. The Drama

0:17

Desk winner made his off Broadway

0:19

debut in nineteen seventy one in

0:22

Long Day's Journey in Tonight, which

0:24

earned him a Theater World Award. He

0:27

directed the Tony nominated production

0:29

of Arthur Miller's The Price and Thornton

0:32

Wilder's Our Town, which was later

0:34

broadcast on PBS's Masterpiece

0:37

Theater. Naughton is equally

0:39

comfortable with the Great American Songbook.

0:42

He won his first Tony for the

0:44

musical City of Angels in nineteen

0:46

ninety. He then originated

0:48

the role of Billy Flynn in

0:50

the hit Broadway revival of Chicago,

0:53

alongside Anne Rhymeking and

0:56

B. B. Newworth. It earned him his second

0:58

Tony and became the second longest

1:00

running show in Broadway history.

1:04

I don't care about expensive things,

1:07

cashmere coats, diamond

1:09

rings, stunt made a thing.

1:13

All I care about is long

1:16

That's what I'm here for. I

1:18

don't care for, where it's silk cravats.

1:22

This is James Naughton with all

1:24

I care about, from the Broadway

1:26

cast recording of the Chicago

1:29

Revival, with all

1:31

of his theater bonafides. Naughton

1:34

is no stranger to film, appearing

1:36

in the Devilwears product, nor

1:38

television working on Who's the Boss,

1:40

Planet of the Apes and Ally McBeal.

1:43

I wanted to connect the dots between

1:45

his great theatrical success and

1:48

his beginnings in Middletown, Connecticut.

1:51

I was born there, but grew up where

1:54

in West Hartford and West We moved to West

1:56

Harford when I was three and a half, and

1:58

it was it was the halcyon days

2:01

of the early fifties. It was spectacular,

2:04

you know, playing baseball, football,

2:06

basketball outside every day all

2:08

year long, depending on what the season

2:10

was. That's what the sport was. And your parents

2:12

were both teachers. What do they teach? My

2:15

father would say, students, that's my father.

2:18

They taught everything, you know. He actually said,

2:20

well, I said to him, so when we moved

2:22

to West Hartford, you got a job teaching

2:24

at a school that I eventually went to a junior

2:27

high school. And he said, yeah, I

2:29

was. I taught English, I taught math, I taught

2:31

social studies. I thought I taught

2:33

students. And my mother was a business

2:35

head person. She could do typing all

2:38

that stuff. Yeah, and my dad told a straight economics.

2:41

Of course, it's like contemporary problems

2:44

they called it. Where you got himself in a lot of trouble. Oh

2:46

yeah, well, I Massapeaker was not Paris.

2:49

It was not open minded place on earth.

2:51

But the cultural scene in

2:54

your home. Were your parents into movies?

2:56

That?

2:56

Were they theater goers? Loved music concerts?

2:58

Why did that get into your bloodstream?

3:01

Well?

3:01

Music was I think a part of the deal. There's

3:04

an old story in the family that my

3:06

father, Bob and ray Eberly

3:09

had a hit called Pennies from Heaven in

3:11

the thirties I think, and they went

3:13

to some dance and it was a dance band, and

3:16

somebody challenged my father

3:18

to get up and sing Pennies from Heaven

3:20

with the band. And

3:23

the person with the challenger went up to the band

3:25

leader and said, we had Bob and Ray Everley's

3:27

younger brother, Jimmy Everley here in the house,

3:29

you know, would you like him to get up and sing a song? So

3:32

they said, and he got up and sang Pennies from

3:34

Heaven. So that was an old

3:36

story in the family, and of course

3:38

it was one of the first songs I learned.

3:41

But for you, how did it begin? Like school productions

3:44

or.

3:44

Yeah, you know, we used to do plays

3:46

in school, elementary school and you had.

3:48

An interest in that, yeah, in and around

3:50

sports. Yeah.

3:51

And we remember in the cub Scouts we

3:53

had these pack meetings like once a month,

3:56

and our den mother was interested in that stuff,

3:58

so she used to put these little plays together.

4:01

I remember playing King Arthur pulling the sword

4:03

out of the rock, and I was probably nine years

4:06

old. I was very authoritative, though.

4:09

But for you plays while you were

4:12

athletic.

4:13

Well you know the story. My

4:16

story is in high school I was

4:18

playing soccer and basketball and baseball,

4:20

but I quit basketball. I wasn't really very good

4:22

at it, but I was playing soccer and baseball

4:25

and in my junior year I went to my coach

4:28

and I said, Coach, I have a problem. He so what I

4:30

said, Well, mister Lawer, who is the director of

4:32

the choir and the director

4:34

of all the musicals, wants

4:36

to cast me as the lead in the musical this spring.

4:39

And he says, Jimmy, that's great, you have to do it,

4:41

and I go, well, yeah, but I want to play baseball.

4:44

He said, well, let me talk to mister Lawer, so that

4:46

later that day he comes back. He says, Bill

4:48

Lawer, and I are going to make it possible for you to

4:50

do both in May, right,

4:53

We're going to let you. And

4:55

so what was the part I was playing? I was a sixteen

4:58

year old am Beck.

5:01

I thought I was really I was really on it. And

5:03

then I saw a picture of myself a couple of years ago

5:05

that somebody gave me. Looked like a little

5:07

boy with a little white crap in

5:09

his hair, you know. And anyway,

5:12

they did it, and so I played baseball, which

5:14

meant I always left rehearsal a little bit

5:16

early after school, making mister Lauer

5:18

unhappy. And then I'd get to baseball a little late,

5:21

which made mister Key, who was a tough guy,

5:23

very unhappy. But the next year

5:25

they did it again, and we did Carousel, and

5:28

I played Billy Biglow and played baseball

5:31

at the same time. So I've always done that. What

5:33

did you like about it?

5:35

About? What about getting up in front of an orders?

5:37

You like performing in front.

5:38

Of people well, you know you should

5:40

know something about this. You know, they say, if you're

5:42

Irish or Irish American, you either

5:44

want to sing or fight, or possibly

5:47

both. And I think the deal is first

5:49

you fight and then you sing about it.

5:51

I mean, you sing and then you got

5:53

to punch somebody out. And I don't like you're saying.

5:55

Right, But it's always been that way. And even

5:57

when I was in college, I

5:59

didn't get into the theater until really late, and

6:02

all my friends were jocks. My roommate

6:04

was a hockey player and a football player,

6:07

and I was a soccer player and a baseball player.

6:09

You went to Brown for American civilization

6:11

was your major? American literature actually,

6:13

is what I wound up being. I went there thinking I was

6:15

going to be in pre med. But you couldn't

6:17

do pre med and do labs in the afternoon

6:19

and go to soccer practice. So you know, if

6:22

you're like me, were you you had really lofty

6:24

goals that were very academic in lecture, and

6:26

they.

6:26

Were like, nah, I go becoming active. Lofty

6:28

goals are chief I'll go to law.

6:30

School and I'm like, nah, maybe not that yeah,

6:33

but when you go to Yale, I mean you go to

6:35

one of the great drama school drama schools

6:37

in the world, and you go for there for the MFA.

6:40

By the end of the Brown thing, what's making

6:42

you want to go get an advanced degree in theater?

6:45

Well? I walked into the theater for the

6:47

first time in my junior year because

6:49

this girl at Pembroke, which is now

6:51

part of Brown, had told me, Hey, by the way,

6:54

there's something going on at the theater today. You

6:55

should you should come by tonight. I had

6:57

never been in the theater out time

7:00

there it's November. I wander

7:02

her in there auditioning for a musical Guys

7:04

and dolls, and the guy he said,

7:06

okay, who's next, and she did one of these you

7:09

know, she pointed and get him up there.

7:11

So the guy said come on, and I said, I'm

7:14

not here to audition. He said, don't be shy.

7:16

What have you done? I go, I haven't done anything. I did a couple of

7:18

high school musicals. He goes, all right,

7:20

we'll sing a song from one of those. I don't have any

7:22

music. I'm not here to audition. I'm just here to visit

7:24

my friend Judy. He says, get up

7:27

here and sing a song. So I got up and sang a song. He

7:29

said, okay, here go take this scene and

7:31

go out in the hall and look at it and come back in ten minutes

7:33

and read it. So I did, and he said, all right, everybody,

7:36

take five. He said, come here. You've

7:38

obviously been on the stage before. What are you a freshman?

7:40

And I said no, I'm a junior. He

7:42

goes, well, where the hell have you been, That's what he said, and

7:44

I said, I've been playing soccer and baseball and

7:46

he said, oh, one of those he

7:49

actually did, and I said yeah. He said, well,

7:51

i'd like you to be in the show and I said I couldn't

7:53

do both. We're still playing. We're in the NCAA tournament.

7:56

We played to get eliminated.

7:59

I couldn't do both. He said, no, you couldn't. Will you come

8:01

see me in January? So I forgot

8:03

about it, and it was Christmas vacation when I went back, and I

8:05

was trying to find an arts course

8:08

that would satisfy I had to take one

8:10

for a graduation, and I don't

8:12

have any visual artistic ability

8:14

at all, graphic ability, so I

8:16

thought maybe maybe drama. So I went and found

8:19

him and he opened the door, and he sat me

8:21

down and he said, Jim, I'm glad you came.

8:23

Listen.

8:24

I think if you wanted to, I think you could

8:26

do this. And

8:28

I said, what you mean for real? And

8:30

he said yes. And I said,

8:32

how do you know that? I just sang

8:34

you a song and read a couple of pages. He

8:36

says, cause I've been doing this for forty years and

8:38

I'm telling you if you And I said,

8:41

so, how do I get there from here? He said, should take my class.

8:43

It's a scene study class that meets three

8:45

hours every afternoon, four.

8:47

Days a week.

8:47

I said, wow, that's a lot of time. He goes, Yes, it is,

8:50

he says, and when you graduate in a year and a half,

8:52

you go to Yale Drama School. And I said,

8:54

just like that and he said, yeah, just like that done.

8:57

So he didn't tell me you had to audition. But

8:59

a year later I audition and I got in and

9:01

I went with the idea, well, we'll see how

9:03

this goes, right, me too? But I was there

9:05

two days and I went Finally

9:09

I found out where the hell I belonged, because while

9:11

I was in college, I didn't know where, you

9:13

know, I didn't know what to do, like drama

9:15

school, law school, go to.

9:17

It's a tough time. It's a tough time that you when I did

9:20

it, Remember I said to my dad,

9:22

I mean the joke in my family. I've told this joke on the

9:24

show before, which is I call my parents

9:26

and I go. I got offered a full scholarship

9:28

to go to and drama tuition scholarship.

9:31

It's a need based scholarship. I go, but I auditioned

9:33

and I'm going to get a full scholarship and I'm gonna leave

9:35

after three years at GW, only

9:38

one more year left to go. I'm gonna go to NYU for drama.

9:40

My mother is screaming on the phone.

9:41

Are you out of your mind?

9:43

So you go to Yale? What's that like? Hard?

9:47

Well, you know, basically, I

9:49

think all drama schools say

9:51

what we're going to do is we're gonna break down all your bad

9:53

habits and then we're going to build you back

9:56

up. And they're very good at breaking

9:58

down your ego, and

10:00

you know, like, oh, we're

10:02

at a time we try and then then I don't have a clue

10:04

as to how to do the rest of it. So you kind of have to

10:07

go there and survive it, and you know,

10:09

it's kind of like the survivitoro you want. Yeah,

10:12

and if you get through it okay, it

10:15

maybe makes you a stronger person because

10:17

you've had to survive all that tearing down of

10:19

your of your self confidence and everything

10:21

else. My classmates were Henry

10:23

Winkler and Jill Iikeenberry. Henry

10:26

and I got hired into the al rep

10:28

out of the school. So that was my first job,

10:31

and that was wonderful because I had a wife and

10:33

a child, and you

10:35

and Pam had your daughter Greg Greg,

10:38

ye, he's older than Kira.

10:40

Yeah. And I was looking for a

10:42

job that could pay me some money. And

10:44

of course, you know, the options were go

10:46

to the Guthrie and work for fifty dollars a

10:48

week and become a journeyman for seven years

10:51

and then maybe you'll be an equity act fort and bross,

10:53

you know what I mean. And this was

10:55

all of a sudden full equity card.

10:57

Bam.

10:57

I'm you know. I was making big money, like

11:00

one hundred and sixty dollars a week,

11:02

which was a lot in New Haven at the time

11:04

in nineteen seventy.

11:07

Yeah, and then a year later I was

11:09

working in New York and you know, I've been lucky

11:12

enough to keep working.

11:13

So when you leave Yale,

11:15

what's the first job you get the play

11:17

you mentioned? Oh, I got so

11:20

lucky.

11:21

I was at Yale rep from the

11:23

someth We worked all summer out

11:26

at Guildhall in East Hampton. That was our first

11:28

something. We did the whole summer season, and then

11:30

we came back to New Haven and we did a bunch of plays

11:33

and I was impossibly the worst production of

11:35

the Scottish play that's ever been done. But everybody

11:37

I know says no no. I was in the Worst Scottman

11:39

and it was directed by Robert Brustein, who

11:42

was not a director, he was a critic.

11:45

And anyway, we got hammered. My friend

11:47

David Ackroyd played McDuff and

11:49

I played the guy and we had a sword fight

11:51

together.

11:52

Yeah.

11:52

I can't even remember the character.

11:53

Who who is the thinge?

11:55

Lee Richardson, Lee Richardson,

11:58

do you remember him? Yeah?

11:59

And Carmen de Lavalla played

12:02

Lady McDuff, the dancer. She

12:04

was a lovely woman. Anyway, I got

12:06

hired out of that show to come

12:08

to New York and do Long Day's Journey

12:10

in Tonight with Robert Ryan,

12:12

Geraldine Fitzgerald, and Stacy Keach

12:15

playing.

12:15

My That was my audition monologue.

12:17

I did Edmund and the guy in the auditions

12:19

like sag oh Jesus,

12:23

everybody did Edmund.

12:25

Yeah, where'd you do it? At the Promenade

12:27

Theater which doesn't exist anymore? In seventy

12:29

six and Broadway and Arvin Brown directed

12:31

it, and yeah, it was like sort of starting

12:34

at you know, at the top of the

12:36

game if you're.

12:36

Doing on Robert Ryan and

12:38

Geraldine Fitzgerald.

12:40

She was the most fun to be on stage with. She used

12:42

to come in if I did something a little differently,

12:45

you know, instead of coming by the numbers

12:47

what we always did. I could see the fire

12:49

would light up in her eyes and she'd go, oh boy, here

12:52

we go. Yeah, And so she would come in to me every

12:54

night before the show and she goes, well, Ducks,

12:56

what do you want to do different tonight? And

12:58

you know, she loved it, and that

13:01

was fun because then we were playing with

13:03

each They call us the players, right, we were

13:05

playing with each other.

13:06

That's I like that too. I like it when you I

13:09

try as the as it goes on, just as

13:11

a as an exercise maybe, but it does

13:13

lead to something which is to expand my relationship,

13:16

not just with the other actors on the catch, but with the set.

13:19

You know. I used to do this thing. We did a play where the guy

13:21

came in and the guy was his childhood home

13:23

and his family's poor and he's rich now, and the place

13:25

repulsed him. He wouldn't touch

13:27

anything or sit down. He thought you

13:30

could catch a disease from every just being in

13:32

this space with us. This is entertaining mister Sloan

13:34

and with his sister and her father's father,

13:37

and the whole play unfolds and my character

13:39

is this rich guy that comes in. He's paying for everything and maintaining

13:41

them. And I'd come in and by the end of the play,

13:43

I was like rubbing the couch

13:46

and not going on this couch. So many memories

13:48

of this couch, you see, just something to play,

13:51

I mean. But when you would do that with

13:53

her, she was cool with it. Oh, she she welcomed

13:55

it.

13:56

She thrived on it. Yeah, so did

13:58

Joanne Woodward when we did Glass and Aerie.

14:01

You know, Joeanne plays Amanda Wingfield.

14:03

When did you do that?

14:05

We did it at Williamstown in the eighties and then we

14:07

did it once again at Long Wharf like

14:09

six months later, and on closing

14:12

night, I came into the theater at Long Wharf

14:14

in New Haven and joe Anne said she

14:17

grabbed me, pulled me in the corner. She said, I

14:19

figured this is going to be you know the end right, And she

14:23

said, we're going to make a movie of this and

14:25

Paul's going to direct it. You want to be in

14:27

it? Did you sure? Laura

14:30

was Karen Allen and Joanne

14:32

was Amanda and we had three different

14:34

times. John Sales did it first the

14:37

movie Directory Writer Treat

14:39

Williams, The Late Treat Williams did it second

14:42

at Long Warf and Malcovich did the film

14:44

and Michael Ballhouse shot the film

14:46

and Paul directed it.

14:48

You did the thing with Joeanne. You did it

14:50

at Williamstown first? Was that your debut

14:52

at Williamstown? No, you've been at Williamstown

14:54

before?

14:55

Oh?

14:55

Yeah? What was it about that place that everybody

14:57

made that a home for a period of time?

14:59

Well, I mean, you know, we all talk about

15:01

a company making a company, we talk

15:03

about an ensemble, but

15:05

that's what it really was. And we all came back

15:07

there every summer together and Nicos

15:10

who was I mean, he

15:12

was a gifted entrepreneurs what he was?

15:15

You know, he really was waiting for your explanation.

15:18

Well, he was. He could be a

15:20

terrific director, but he

15:22

was a producer in addition

15:24

to that, and so he put people together.

15:27

He was trying to get Joanne to come up, and

15:29

so finally they did and he said to me, what

15:31

are you doing for the rest of the summer. I was in like

15:33

the first play of the summer, and

15:35

I said, well, I don't know. I hope we're going to go to Maine

15:38

for a while because my family we grew

15:40

up there. He said, well, will

15:42

you keep August open because I think Joanne's

15:45

going to come. We might do glass

15:47

Man Azri and if we do, i'd like you to come and be

15:49

in. Said, oh, okay, yeah,

15:51

sure, I'll see what I can do. Keep

15:53

my schedule open for that. And that

15:56

turned out to be a home run.

15:57

You know, actor

16:02

and director James Naughton. If

16:04

you enjoy conversations with musical

16:07

theater greats, check out my episode

16:09

with the legendary Patty Lapone.

16:12

I don't go out there going They're gonna dig me. I

16:14

go out there and I do know that the people

16:16

that have come to see me know that I

16:19

have them in mind and that

16:22

I already have them on my side. They

16:24

know that I'm doing it for them. It

16:26

could be a persona could be a body

16:28

language thing, but they know that I know they're

16:30

there. And the difference is when

16:33

actors don't acknowledge the audience, the audience

16:35

can't come. When

16:37

an actor acknowledges the audience, then

16:40

you can have a moment of ecstasy.

16:47

To hear more of my conversation with Patty

16:49

Lapone, go to Here's the Thing

16:52

dot Org. After the

16:54

break, James Norton shares his

16:56

experience being directed by

16:58

and then directing Paul Newman.

17:12

I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening

17:14

to hear the thing. James Naughton

17:17

starred in the nineteen eighty seven film

17:19

adaptation of the Tennessee Williams

17:21

classic The Glass Menagerie. The

17:23

movie was directed by Paul Newman and

17:26

began a lifelong friendship for the

17:28

two actors.

17:30

I met Paul after because I was

17:32

doing Glass Menagerie with Joanne and

17:34

we were up in Williamstown doing it, and you know, he'd

17:37

come up for a couple of days, like the husband

17:40

right of the actress, and he felt so

17:42

out of it. And you know how Paul could be

17:45

socially awkward and shy and all those

17:47

things, and because he was basically ye

17:50

talk about that, yeah, yeah.

17:51

And so he'd.

17:52

Come up and I realized we'd

17:54

all felt kind of crazy, like there's

17:56

Paul Newman. And you know, Joanne

17:58

was a part of our company. She was like, you know, someone

18:00

I'm I'm working with, I'm playing with. We felt

18:03

great together, but then Paul would committed

18:05

and everybody be so awkward.

18:08

And then I realized he's the one who feels really

18:10

awkward because he's not a part of the company. He's

18:12

the husband coming up to visit. So

18:14

anyway, when we started to when

18:17

they said he's going to make the film, he's going to direct

18:19

the film, he insisted on a couple of weeks

18:21

of rehearsal, and I think it

18:23

was partly so that he and

18:25

we could all break down that stuff,

18:28

you know, And and he'd come over.

18:30

Karen and I'd be sitting there together because

18:32

we were playing all the scenes together, and

18:35

he'd come over and he'd tell us some ridiculous jokes,

18:38

and and then he turned around and walk away, and

18:40

we look at each.

18:40

Other like, whoa is that he's

18:43

gotten this far with that man? We were

18:45

so we were so everybody was so awkward.

18:47

But in the course of a couple of weeks

18:49

that broke down and then we became really close. And

18:51

then he discovered that he and I

18:53

live five minutes from each other in Connecticut,

18:56

and he discovered, oh yeah, I like to shoot

18:58

pool too, and I like to drink beer two

19:00

and so that's what we did.

19:02

So you go and do the film, and he wants

19:05

a couple of weeks of rehearsal. And

19:07

you hadn't directed anybody yourself by

19:09

then, had you? No?

19:10

Not at that point. The first

19:13

time I directed anything, I directed Maria

19:15

Tucci, my friend who had translated

19:18

Filomena by Eduardo

19:21

di Filippo for the stage,

19:24

and then she played it, and I directed her because

19:26

she and I had done a lot of stuff together on stage

19:29

the Crucible and at Williamstown and

19:31

Yet and Rose Tattoo and a

19:34

whole bunch of stuff, you know, at Williamstown. And

19:36

so that's the first time I directed.

19:38

What was Newman's directing technique was he light?

19:41

Was he really straightforward?

19:43

And to the point. Yeah,

19:45

he was.

19:47

He was remarkably light handed,

19:50

gentle, not a lot of crazy stuff,

19:52

and you know, not a lot of direction. But

19:55

he spent some time with Michael Ballhouse, who shot

19:57

it, and he was about as good as it gets.

20:00

Yeah, and a wonderful guy. Yeah, yeah, as you

20:02

know, and they'd be they'd discuss

20:04

stuff, and then you know, he'd committed say blah blah

20:06

blah, Okay, I want

20:08

to do that again. Yeah, okay, anything different,

20:11

No, it was okay, that was good. You just keep doing that,

20:13

you know, that sort of suff.

20:14

And then the tables turning, you direct him. Yeah,

20:17

how did that go?

20:19

Well? That that went awfully?

20:21

Well? Yeah, we did Our Town

20:24

at the Westport Playhouse. Well,

20:26

actually, Joanne called me up one night in about

20:28

two thousand and three, after

20:31

nine to eleven, and she said, Jimmy,

20:33

you know i've aw She was the artistic director of the Westport

20:35

Playhouse. She said, you know how I've always

20:37

wanted to do a production of Our Town.

20:40

And I said, yeah, actually you have talked about

20:42

that before. She said, well, I think now's

20:44

the time. I think we could

20:47

all use a little our Town right

20:49

now. After nine to eleven she

20:51

said, and Paul wants

20:53

to play the stage manager. I go,

20:56

what she and I have been I was shocked. We'd

20:58

been after him for twenty years to try

21:00

to, you know, to do something on the stage, and he

21:02

would go, oh, no, no, I can't. My

21:04

brain's all foam, that's what he'd said. But

21:07

he was excited about it, and she said, I

21:09

just walked out of the room and he said I want

21:11

to do this. And I was out of the room for twenty

21:14

five minutes. I came back in and he had learned

21:16

the first monologue, and

21:18

I said, you got to be kidding. She said, So, we were wondering

21:21

if maybe you'd like to direct it. You

21:24

say, no, my brain is all phowed. Well,

21:26

you know what I said to her, It was true. I said,

21:28

Joanne, I'm probably the only American

21:31

actor who's never seen a production of

21:33

this play or read it or worked

21:35

on a scene from it in an acting class. So

21:37

why don't I have a copy of it in my library?

21:40

Why don't I read it tonight and I'll call you tomorrow.

21:42

She said, Okay, So I

21:45

read it that night and I and I said, wow,

21:48

I had just somehow I'd

21:50

escaped ever working on it. You know up to that

21:52

point, and so I called

21:54

her and I said, okay, I'd love

21:56

to Paul hasn't been on the

21:58

stage for thirty six years, so

22:01

that's going to take a little doing. And I don't

22:03

think it would be helpful for him to

22:06

just be in a room with tape on the floor. We

22:08

got to find a place where you can actually get up on

22:10

the stage and be in and

22:12

so we rehearsed it at the White Barn

22:14

Theater over in Wilton, and

22:17

that was a great idea because he was

22:19

very uncomfortable being up on the

22:21

stage and he used to do this he crossed

22:24

his arms like this and sort of looked down

22:26

at his feet.

22:28

Well, Spencer, Tracy's calling acting.

22:29

Well, he's standing on the stage supposedly, and

22:32

he's addressing the audience. And I actually

22:34

went up to him and I said, you know, this would

22:36

even be a lot better if you kind of share

22:38

some of this way with the audience. And

22:40

he goes, you know, I

22:43

know, he said, but I'm just

22:46

terrified that I'm going to make eye

22:48

contact with somebody in the audience. So

22:52

I said, okay, look, you know you're going to be on

22:54

the stage and there's going to be a lot of lights shining

22:56

on you. It's going to be hard to see the audience.

22:59

And you know how a balcony at

23:01

the playoffs, and the facade in

23:03

front of the balcony the bars, you know what

23:05

I mean. I said, if you just look at that, it'll

23:07

look like you're looking at the metal.

23:10

Yeah, and you know you'll be protected.

23:13

So I mean, over the course of the first

23:16

couple of weeks while we were playing it

23:18

in performance, that had eventually

23:21

kind of started to come up a little more and

23:23

a little more and a little more. And

23:25

we shot it. By the way, we shot it for Masterpiece

23:28

Theater and a co production Masterpiece

23:30

Theater and Showtime.

23:31

I want to find that it's wonderful. I saw the

23:33

show. I went and saw it.

23:34

Well, he's even better in the

23:37

film version. And he's bigger.

23:39

He's bigger in the film. And I said to him afterwards,

23:42

I said, you know, the book is that when

23:44

you get on film, you don't have to be as big as you are

23:46

on the stage. But you've gotten bigger. You're actually

23:49

doing more and I can

23:51

will you explain that to me, because this guy is

23:53

a guy we know is a wonderful film actor.

23:56

And he said, Oh, I

23:58

don't know. It just seemed like was just

24:00

the camera there. So I guess I had to. I just

24:03

felt I ought to do more.

24:06

It's contrary

24:08

to everything we think about, right, he was more at home

24:10

there.

24:10

Yeah, he was more at home there.

24:12

Anyway, his performance is quite spectacular,

24:14

and so are the other people in the Jeff Demon

24:16

and Jane Atkinson and Jane Curtin

24:19

and Frank Convers, Frank.

24:21

Converse, who I thought was the best Mitch I've ever

24:23

seen in Streetcard. In Nicos's

24:25

production, Blythe was probably,

24:28

you know, one of certainly one of two or three of

24:30

the best Blanches I've ever seen. Blithe was a

24:32

great Blanche. Aidan Quinn

24:34

was They did a Lincoln Center and zachar Ropp was. I

24:36

auditioned and didn't get the part, and Aiden got

24:38

the part, and Aiden and

24:41

blythe Frank and Francis

24:43

McDormand Is Stella and

24:45

she was good. But Frank Converse, Yeah,

24:48

Frank Converse, man, he was great. I loved

24:50

anyway. I said that a million times now, God

24:53

that I go up to that camp. I've got

24:56

so many memories of that camp. I haven't been up

24:58

there in a while. Since he was there. But you know all

25:00

those the lifestyle things are going

25:02

to the pizza place after the show,

25:05

and knew man just being like so kind.

25:07

He didn't have to be kind. And the people I've got to meet there,

25:10

I mean, especially as he got older. This is not me

25:12

making fun of him, but Tony Randall would sit

25:14

there in a chair like he was a toy you had to wind

25:17

up. He would literally sit there

25:19

and he wouldn't move. He'd be on

25:21

the couch in the green room and there's all the snacks

25:23

everywhere and the shit everywhere, and his kids

25:25

are on the floor and Heather's on the other side

25:27

of the room and his kids are like coloring on the floor

25:30

and he's to sit there and kind of stare at them very quietly.

25:33

I'm assuming he's husbanding his energy. Then

25:35

all a sudden they say, Tony, you're on. He'd be

25:37

like hello, Yeah.

25:39

He was wonderful.

25:40

Oh he just turned on.

25:41

He could make the most out of bad

25:43

to mediocre material. He was

25:46

very funny, so charming. I'll tell you a funny story

25:48

about Tony. He had his first

25:50

child when he was seventy eight years old. He

25:53

had married Heather and who had been

25:55

an intern of his when he founded

25:58

the National. Yes, Tony

26:01

was just a wonderfully generous actor

26:03

and funny, funny guy. Jack

26:05

Klugman told me that they were doing The

26:08

Odd Couple in Manchester in

26:10

England or Noddingham or saying yeah,

26:12

they were doing it somewhere together. And

26:15

Tony got the word that Heather was pregnant, and Jack

26:17

said that he had a knock on his dressing

26:19

room door. He opened it and it was Tony. Tony says,

26:22

the machinery still works. And

26:26

then Heather told me, asked me if I would

26:28

sing the Chicago song

26:31

Razzle Dazzle had his memorial

26:33

service in the Theater in the York and

26:36

I said, geez, you know, Heather, I've never done

26:38

that song except in the show, and it's a big

26:40

production number and it kind of lays there.

26:42

It's not a great solo number. Give them

26:45

the old

26:48

She said, well, here's the reason I want you to do

26:50

it. Just Tony always wished

26:52

that he could play that part. And he used

26:54

to make us a martini and then we'd go into the

26:56

living room and he'd put on your CD

26:59

and he would lip sync to you,

27:01

singing Razzle dazzle,

27:04

and I said, you got to be kidding me. I didn't

27:06

know that.

27:06

She said yeah.

27:08

So I went out and I said to the audience, Okay, I've

27:10

never sang the song except in the show, but

27:13

Heather told me that Tony used to like to do it,

27:15

and he would. So I want you to picture.

27:18

I'll sing you the song, but you got a picture Tony

27:20

doing it for Heather in their living

27:22

room in their apartment up on Central Park

27:24

West after dinner at night with a martini,

27:27

and I sang it. And I came and I walked off

27:29

the stage and Jacques den Boise was there, and

27:32

Jacques said, Jim, you know, he said, I've seen

27:34

an awful lot of guys play that part. He said, you

27:37

sang that pretty well. I think you should play. You should

27:39

think talk to your urgent about maybe playing

27:41

that part. So I told Charlotte that

27:44

who had played the part after Annie ryin King

27:46

left and she says, oh, God,

27:48

Daddy, you know because I had

27:50

played the part. That's why they asked me to do it in the first.

27:52

Place, which brings me to your

27:55

version of the Legend of Chicago. So

27:57

I hear, I know Walter Encore

28:00

Walter Weissler's come wrap

28:02

it up exactly as it is, don't change anything. We're

28:04

gonna take it right to Broadway. Booty Boom. And

28:07

you originate the row Billy,

28:09

You originate Billy, Yeah, yeah,

28:12

And you weren't in the encorese thing I was. So

28:14

you were in the encourse yeah? And was everybody

28:16

or did they replace some of the cast.

28:17

Well, maybe one or two people, but it was pretty much

28:20

the entire production that we did Encourse.

28:23

And then the following fall we went

28:25

into production for the Broadway show, and

28:28

there was some talk about whether or not to, you

28:30

know, open it up and bring on sets

28:32

and all this. Suff they decided not to do that, and guess

28:34

what, it's still going twenty eight years

28:36

later, So I guess they made the right decision.

28:38

And how long did you do it?

28:39

For?

28:39

About a long year?

28:42

That was it?

28:42

A long year? You could still be doing it

28:44

now. I know.

28:46

They rotate back and forth, like it's asked

28:48

Harlem Globetrotters. These people.

28:50

I went in once for like three weeks when they

28:52

didn't have a Billy, about ten or fifteen years

28:54

ago now, and they called me up and asked me Gretchen

28:57

mal was going to be going in and they

28:59

didn't have a billion. They said, could you do it for

29:01

like three weeks?

29:02

Yeah?

29:02

I suppose so. And you know so, I said,

29:05

they said, you're gonna need a lot of rehearsalcle No,

29:07

I don't think so. I'll just kind of give

29:09

me the I'll look at the book. And then I called

29:11

them back a week. I said, yeah, I can probably rehearsal

29:15

there, dude. Yeah, yeah, And

29:17

you went back, was it fun? Well, after

29:19

three weeks I was definitely finished. Yeah,

29:22

it was like and it was it?

29:23

Is it psychological? Is it like, I don't

29:25

want to say boredom per se? But is it

29:27

psychological insofar as when

29:30

you do something that's got a shelf life.

29:32

And you're duck someone variety?

29:34

You know, some people can go on and they do these things

29:37

five years. I can't do that. I mean, I

29:39

go out there. I have to confess

29:42

that after you know, six or eight

29:44

weeks of playing it, after you've opened it,

29:46

and you know you're doing it now eight

29:49

times a week, and the

29:51

matin these days are tough. My buddies

29:53

are out there on the golf course. It's Wednesday afternoon,

29:55

it's to Southampton

29:58

yeah, and I got to go out there. I

30:00

will say this though, about doing a musical as

30:02

opposed to doing a straight play. When the music

30:05

starts, that does help you.

30:06

Then you win the Tony. You won City of

30:08

Angels a few years

30:10

before. Who directed City of Angels

30:13

Michael Blake Blakemore And if I remember,

30:16

that was kind of at the apex of Blake Moore's

30:18

West End and Broadway career. He

30:21

was doing a lot of big shows.

30:22

He was a good guy and he was an actor, you

30:24

know, right. And my co

30:26

star Greg Edelman, who's just a wonderful guy

30:29

and has one of the best voices on

30:31

Broadway, went up to Michael at one

30:33

point and he said, you know, Michael, you're

30:35

the first British director I've ever worked

30:37

with who wasn't a real son of a bitch or

30:39

something like that. And Michael said, that's because

30:42

I'm Australian, dear boy.

30:46

Most actors I know, regardless

30:49

of their pedigree and training

30:51

and experiences, you know, they want to win and they

30:53

want to win an Oscar. They think that's the sexiest

30:56

award to win. And then there's

30:58

a group that I always kind of identified with the

31:00

award. Do you want to win as a Tony and

31:02

that really is much more of a of

31:04

a mountain to climb. You win

31:07

the Tony Award the first time City

31:09

of Angels was a big hit. Does that change

31:11

things for you at all? Now?

31:12

You know, I've never lived in the city. I've always lived

31:15

out And so to add

31:17

to the deal and the kids you got commuting

31:20

and that that adds

31:23

a couple of levels of exhaustion

31:25

to the whole day. I've lived in Connecticut

31:28

forever and I drove home the other

31:30

night for the first time in a long time. How

31:33

the hell did I do this every night?

31:35

You know?

31:36

Because this are you know, two Balentine

31:38

hles actually in the car on the way home, and

31:40

by the time I got there, I was maybe

31:42

kind of coming down, ready.

31:44

To go to sleep by the fire. Yeah. Now

31:46

for you, a couple more questions for

31:48

you when you're on stage, when you're

31:50

in film, when you're in TV. And I'm literally

31:53

not joking when I'm referring to the Buddy Ebsen's

31:55

of the world. Are you doing shows

31:57

and your your heroes are around you?

32:00

Who are you excited to work with? Oh?

32:03

This wasn't on Broadway, but it was a TV show

32:05

version of Look Homeward Angel

32:08

with Geraldine Page. And

32:10

here was the cast of the show. This was done in

32:13

the seventies for CBS

32:15

Playhouse ninety. Charlie

32:18

Derning, Barney Hughes, E.

32:20

G. Marshall, Pamela Payton

32:23

Wright, Barbara Colby, Geraldine

32:25

Page. I mean that was terrific.

32:27

They did a rap party after we finished

32:30

shooting it, and Pamela Payton Wright

32:32

said to me, Jimmy, go ask Jerry to

32:34

dance. Jerry Page. She

32:37

was playing my mother, Geraldine Page. She'd

32:39

played the Princess Cosmonopolis

32:41

with Paul you know, in the Sweet Pew

32:43

and Sweet Purview on Broadway and

32:46

in the movie. And so I

32:48

said, really, go ask Jerry to dance. She'd go ask

32:50

her to dance. So I go over. I see Jerry

32:52

want to dance, and we have a band playing. You know,

32:56

well, Alex, she can dance the way she can

32:58

act. I mean, you can do anything with her.

33:00

And it's like she's been your partner for your

33:02

whole life. She's wonderful. So

33:04

I figured the song's over, she's gonna

33:07

she's gonna leave. She stands

33:09

there with me. So the music starts up

33:11

and we dance again. We

33:13

go back over and sit down and Geraldine

33:16

sits down next to Pala. I hate to dance,

33:19

and Plma is Jared, what do you

33:21

mean you hate to dance?

33:22

You're wonderful dancers.

33:23

I hate to dance? Why do you What do you mean?

33:25

I hate? It makes you want to do the real

33:28

thing? Actor

33:33

James Naughton. If you're enjoying

33:35

this conversation, tell a friend and

33:37

be sure to follow Here's the Thing on

33:40

the iHeartRadio app, Spotify

33:42

or wherever you get your podcasts.

33:45

When we come back, James Norton

33:47

shares the unexpected campaign he's

33:49

undertaking to an act of change

33:52

in his home state. I'm

34:04

Alec Baldwin and you're listening to

34:06

Here's the Thing. Actor

34:08

James Naughton lost his first wife,

34:10

Pamela Parsons Naughton, to cancer

34:13

in twenty thirteen. She was

34:15

sixty six at the time. The

34:17

loss began his engagement but

34:20

the fight for a right to die law in

34:22

Connecticut.

34:24

It's a law that is now legal

34:26

in ten states and the District of Columbia,

34:28

but not in the rest of the states yet. It's

34:30

also known as a right to die

34:32

with dignity I have a friend, a woman

34:35

who just lives

34:37

in Connecticut. Connecticut doesn't have this

34:40

law. I've been trying since

34:42

I lost my wife eleven years ago, Pam,

34:45

whom you knew, after a four year battle with pancreatic

34:47

cancer. One morning she looked

34:49

at me and she said, Jimmy, I don't want to wake up anymore.

34:53

And when she saw

34:55

the look on my face, she said, well, we've always known

34:58

this was a fatal disease, and

35:00

it was finally coming in to get her. It was

35:02

taken her down. And that night, when I

35:04

crawled into bed with her, she said, oh,

35:07

she woke up and she looked at me through the darkness

35:09

and she said, I thought I wasn't going to have to wake

35:11

up anymore. And I got to

35:13

tell you, Alec, you know when she said that, I

35:16

felt so guilty

35:20

that I couldn't help

35:22

her out give her what she wanted. Now,

35:25

in these ten states and the

35:28

District of Columbia, you can, you

35:30

know, if you get two doctors who say you have six

35:32

months or less to live and your sound

35:34

mind, you're not just depressed, you know, you can

35:37

get a medical cocktail. So the when a time

35:39

comes, Rene obergianoa used

35:42

this in California. He had stage

35:44

four metastatic lung cancer, and he kept it

35:46

to the end, and finally when he got to the end,

35:48

he availed himself of this and he said to his wife,

35:51

Judith, I'm just right to our friends

35:53

that I'm proud that I live in a state that recognizes

35:55

a person's right to die with dignity. So I've been working

35:58

very hard, really hard for like

36:00

the last six years to try to get this. I go up

36:02

there and testify before the Public Health

36:04

Committee, and we've gotten through the Health

36:06

Committee the last couple of years after not

36:08

being able to get there. The first time this was

36:10

brought up in Connecticut was nineteen ninety four,

36:13

and we're still trying to get it done. There's

36:16

a woman named Linda Shannon Bluestein

36:19

who went up to Vermont. She was

36:21

a friend of mine in Fairfield, Bridgeport,

36:24

and she sued the governor of Vermont

36:27

because all these

36:29

states have a residency requirement, and

36:32

she sued to say the residency requirement

36:35

was not legitimate, and she won in court,

36:37

and so they did away with the residency requirement.

36:39

And then she went up from Connecticut

36:42

got two doctors, got a place,

36:44

got a house an airbnb, got

36:46

a hospice nurse to commit and take care of her, and

36:48

she went up there about four weeks ago, early

36:51

in January and availed

36:54

herself of their law because she had

36:56

stage four Phillippian tube cancer and

36:58

it was taken her down. Was getting to the point where

37:01

if you have one of those terrible ones that

37:03

really, really, you know, is torturing

37:06

you. That's why this is for those

37:09

few people, and there aren't many people who avail

37:11

or need to avail themselves of it

37:13

when hospice isn't enough. That's what this

37:15

is about. So I'm working hard on that.

37:17

Thank you for mentioning all that as it relates to Pam.

37:20

You are remarried, of course, to your wife,

37:22

Sarah, Sarah, who's lovely. I want to but

37:24

it's funny I remember vividly

37:27

because your reaction was vivid,

37:30

and that is We're sitting at the pizza place and

37:32

I meet Pam and I'm

37:34

doing what everybody did around Pam. I'm just staring

37:36

at Pam because she was such an amazing

37:38

woman. Everybody loved, they were in love with Pam.

37:40

Yeah, one of the questions real quickly.

37:43

Have you done any full productions with either Greg or Kira

37:45

or yeah, you did

37:48

a full show with them?

37:49

Greg. You know, my son Greg started

37:51

and ran for seven years in New York the

37:53

Blue Light Theater Company. We did a production

37:55

of Golden Boy where he plays the

37:57

fighter and I play his manager and

38:00

Joanne who'd directed us. Yeah,

38:02

that was a one production we've done together. Kira

38:04

and I have done a bunch of stuff together. My daughter Kira

38:07

is an actor and a director. She's

38:09

directed me in a play up in the Berkshires

38:12

written by Eric Tarloff at the Berkshire

38:14

Theater Festival.

38:15

Anything lined up to you next in the theater now? Hope

38:17

not.

38:18

You know. I did a production last spring at

38:20

the Iveryton Playhouse in Connecticut of

38:23

on Golden Pond, playing

38:25

the old geezer who's losing

38:27

it and has dementia with Maya Dylan,

38:29

who's a wonderful actor. She was in our production

38:32

also of Our Town, and

38:35

it was pretty good and we were It

38:37

was fun because it's a unlike the movie,

38:39

it's really funny and the

38:42

old guy who says all kinds of inappropriate

38:44

things and is a curmudgeon, that's

38:47

a great part to play well, you know, the laughs,

38:49

timing the laughs with the audience. Guy

38:52

came out and said, would you guys consider maybe coming

38:55

back and doing this again next year in my theater.

38:58

I looked at Maya and we both went, I

39:00

don't think so, been there

39:02

and done that.

39:04

Boo boom my

39:07

thanks to James Norton. I'll

39:10

leave you with a little more of All I

39:12

care About from the Broadway cast

39:14

recording of the Chicago revival.

39:17

I'm Alec Baldwin. Here's the thing, is

39:19

brought to you by iHeart Radio

39:23

about Tuller.

39:25

Let me see her run

39:27

free and keep your money.

39:29

That's enough for me.

39:34

I don't care for driving packing

39:37

cars.

39:39

Or smoking law buck

39:42

cigars.

39:43

No, no, not me. All

39:46

I care about is doing a guy

39:48

and first picking on you,

39:51

twisting the rest that's.

39:53

Turning the scroll

40:02

S.