Robert Altman

by Mitchell Zuckoff

  Altman loved parties and he loved to party. He invited me to a party one weekend and I invited everybody from the company. Jack Nicholson and Artie Garfunkel were the only two that wanted to come along. We stood outside the party and I still remember Jack looking at Warren Beatty and saying, “He’s the right height for a movie star.” He said, “I’m too short.” And I introduced them.

  * * *

  RENÉ AUBERJONOIS: I couldn’t believe when Bob said he was going to use Leonard Cohen for the score. I thought he would be using fiddle music and flute music. That was the genius of it. Now it’s unimaginable that that wouldn’t be part of that film.

  LEONARD COHEN (singer and songwriter): The first time I heard from him I was recording a record in a studio in Nashville. I was living in Tennessee, a little town outside Franklin called Big East Fork. I had come into Nashville early one day and gone to a movie called Brewster McCloud. It was a grand movie, as you know. There was a phone call. Somehow he tracked me down to the Columbia studios in Nashville.

  He said, “This is Bob Altman. I’d like to use your songs in a movie I’m making.”

  I said, “Okay, that sounds good. Is there any movie you’ve done I might have seen?”

  He said, “M*A*S*H.” I told him I hadn’t seen it. But I heard it had done well. Then he said, “I also did a small movie that nobody saw—Brewster McCloud.”

  I told him, “I just saw it this afternoon—I loved it. You can have anything you want.”

  I saw McCabe under very bad circumstances, and he warned me that the circumstances were bad. He invited me to a screening in New York and it was for some executives of a large studio. The atmosphere was tense and the projection was bad and the sound was very bad. And I didn’t have a positive feeling about it. Then, later, I went to a theater and it was glorious. I phoned him—I felt that I had to rush to a phone to tell him.

  With Leonard Cohen, several years after Cohen’s music became the sound track for McCabe

  * * *

  RENÉ AUBERJONOIS: When M*A*S*H opened, Bob and I were walking down Eighth Avenue and he said, “Did you hear that?” He was talking about the people who were walking uptown as we were walking downtown. The conversations that we would hear pieces of—“and she needs a hysterectomy” … “his brother-in-law.” He said, “That’s the key to it. You don’t need to hear everything people are saying to know the world they’re living in.” That’s what he was always looking for, and that’s what he did in McCabe & Mrs. Miller. That drove critics crazy. And now it’s recognized as a breakthrough.

  VILMOS ZSIGMOND: The sound track was very, very courageous because he deliberately made the sound so too many people are talking at the same time. I even questioned him myself. I said, “Robert, the sound mix, I can’t understand what they’re saying.” He said, “But have you ever been in a bar where there’s so much noise, so many people arguing, do you hear everything that they say three tables away? Well, that’s what I try to do. That’s exactly what I want to have, the feeling of reality. Not that clear, perfect, beautiful sound recorded on a sound-stage.”

  He recorded on sixteen tracks. He needed the separation of the tracks, because in the mixing stage, he could actually bring one forward and leave the others in the back. So he would select which voice should be dominating and the other ones secondary. That was brilliant, and nobody else used the sixteen tracks in those days, only music recording did.

  JOAN TEWKESBURY: Warren was used to clean, Hollywood sound, and Bob was encouraging a mess. And yes, there were drawbacks to that. But there was also Bob fighting—literally fighting—with the mixer to pull stuff out, and he couldn’t do it. It was frustrating for him too, but I think probably more frustrating for Warren because he was used to a whole different kind of technology.

  JULIE CHRISTIE: The sound? I thought that was how Robert liked it. I know that the sound is on top of other sound, all multilayered. It’s not doing what films have done more or less, which is each person talking after another so the audience can hear every word. Robert was into creating more of a tapestry sound. It never mattered what anybody said. It gets the atmosphere. So when you’re in a bar you really get it.

  KEITH CARRADINE: Bob was developing his style, a sort of cinema verité approach to the way people actually talked to one another. People don’t stop and listen, people talk over one another all the time. He mastered that technique and there is a heightened sense of reality you get when you see one of Bob’s movies because of that. I think Warren was very, very mistrustful of what he was doing in that regard. He was afraid that no one would be able to hear, no one would be able to understand the movie.

  * * *

  JOAN TEWKESBURY: During McCabe, I remember Aljean Harmetz coming to do an article about Bob for The New York Times. We were in the car and Bob was railing on about something involving her. I can’t remember exactly, but it wasn’t very complimentary about her—and she was in the backseat! When he realized, Bob was like, “Oh shit.” And she still was worshipful in that article.

  KATHRYN REED ALTMAN: Joan’s got that wrong. That wasn’t Bob. That was Tommy Thompson. He was the one driving the car.

  Aljean Harmetz, story headlined “The 15th Man Who Was Asked to Direct ‘M*A*S*H’ (and Did) Makes a Peculiar Western,” The New York Times, June 20, 1971: It is 4:30 on a Friday afternoon in late December, and the Canadian darkness has fallen like a stone. Water pours down Robert Altman’s Mephistophelean beard, and an incongruously thin string of love beads circles his massive neck. At 2 a.m. the preceding night he lurched to bed, a last glass of Scotch in one hand, a last joint of marijuana in the other. But the indulgences of the night have no claim over the day. He was the first man on the set in the winter darkness of 7 a.m. He will be the last man to leave in the slippery frozen twilight. …

  In the few hours of daylight, he has completed 34 camera setups. He is pleased with himself, and he does not try to hide it. Later tonight, swacked on Scotch, grass, red and white wine, he will announce, “I was so good today it was fabulous. I embarrassed myself.”

  At 46, Robert Altman is Hollywood’s newest 26-year-old genius. The extra 20 years are simply the time he had to spend, chained and toothless, in the anterooms of power—waiting for Hollywood to catch up to him. While he was waiting, he made a million dollars as a television director and spent two million; fathered four children on three wives; gave up the last remnants of Catholicism for hedonism; and occasionally lost $2,000 in a single night in Las Vegas without losing half an hour’s sleep over the money. Eighteen months ago, Hollywood caught up—with a vengeance.

  * * *

  DAVID FOSTER (producer): Warren and Bob started to work together about the character. Bob and Warren got along and then something went astray. Warren was very bright and is still a bright guy. We got him at a time when he was a writer, producer, director, star, marketing maven, and he wasn’t going to do that in this picture. We had a director, and we had two producers, me and my partner, Mitch Brower. He wasn’t going to do any of that. It was hard for him to accept. In his mind he was doing everything—he thinks that he directed himself. It’s just a load of bullshit. I just don’t know why a guy would say that. Even if it was true. Bob’s great facility as a director is he would get the actors to do the things he wanted them to do, but they thought they came up with the idea themselves.

  I was trying to be a peacemaker. Bob was so smart—whatever was going on he would never show it to Warren. With me he would say, “That son of a bitch, I’m the director.” Bob was the director. Make no bones about that. The only actor he ever had a problem with was Warren Beatty.

  RENÉ AUBERJONOIS: When Bob and Warren met he was really on the ascendancy. M*A*S*H had announced him as a major talent. Warren was at his peak as a major Hollywood star. It was like a meeting of two titans. Bob in his later films worked with a lot of celebrities. In the beginning he invented actors. His work with Warren Beatty was like a grain of sand making this pearl. There was a lot of tension there.


  ALAN LADD, JR. (producer): He wouldn’t take Warren Beatty’s bullshit. Warren wanted to discuss every scene—Warren wants to negotiate over everything. Bob just wanted to get on with it.

  JOHN SCHUCK: My experience with Warren was he was a perfectionist all right, but he’s such a subtle actor that there were lots of differences, you know? But I found him very, very easy. What I did sense overall was for some reason I don’t think they trusted each other.

  JOHNNIE PLANCO (agent): Julie was always best on the first take. It took Warren fifteen, twenty takes to warm up. Julie would get a little less fresh. One night at three a.m. Bob said, “That’s it.” Julie was wiped out. Warren kept saying, “One more, Bob, one more.” Bob went over to Warren and said, “Look, Warren, I have to get up in three hours and I think we got the shot. But if you want, I’ll leave the cinematographer here and you can keep shooting.” Bob told me later, what Warren didn’t know was that there was no film in the camera.

  Julie Christie and Warren Beatty at the premiere of McCabe & Mrs. Miller

  VILMOS ZSIGMOND: I know that Warren for some reason didn’t like to work with Robert. Robert was probably too good, too strong, maybe, for him. He always thought about himself, Warren, that he’s the director, he’s a producer, he knows about everything. Maybe that was the conflict. I don’t know.

  Warren was happy because he was in love with Julie Christie in those days. But he was not happy about himself I think, because Julie was such a great actor. She did it the first time like this—perfect. And the second time was still good. The third time, she gets bored by the thing. She doesn’t like to repeat. And Warren gets bored only after take ten. But he did a great job. I mean a fantastic job. With Robert’s help, of course.

  I remember once Warren went something like forty-five takes. He started in the morning. It’s a long scene and he’s in his room and he’s talking to himself and he’s going on for like seven minutes, without a cut, actually. And we shot it with two cameras, and we shot it and we printed I don’t know how many times, but I know that we shot from eight o’clock in the morning until like ten o’clock at night. That one scene. Then after, I don’t know, forty-five takes, Warren said, “Let’s do one more.” And Robert said, “No, Warren, I think we got it on take seven. And if not, definitely on take nine. I’m not going to do any more shots. If you want to do some more, go ahead, but I’m going home.” Bob told people that Warren kept shooting? No, Warren actually got the message. He was ashamed, really. He wasn’t going to do it without Robert. See, Robert’s memories are, well …

  But Julie was so great. My God, Julie was unbelievably beautiful and I was in love with her, but the terrible guy Warren was with her [laughs]. There’s this one shot when Warren is coming into bed, and before he goes in the bed Julie points to the money. Warren gets up and Julie puts the cover up to her eyes, and you see those eyes laughing, smiling. It’s such great acting, those eyes, you know? That’s why I fell in love with her like that.

  JULIE CHRISTIE: Warren liked to be perfect. I liked to get the hell on with it. It’s all too painful—let’s get out of here.

  You had two very different types of ego working in a small area. I’m not going to go any further than that. To my mind it’s Bob’s best film. It needed the tightness that Warren brought to it and it needed the expansiveness that Robert brought to it.

  I think he’s a great director, a great, unique, adventurous, experimental, confrontational, provocative director.

  JOAN TEWKESBURY: The thing that I watched that happened between them—which I thought was pretty good for both of them—was that Warren presented Bob with a kind of discipline and Bob presented Warren with a looseness and an ability to stretch or grow or have a sense of humor about some things that possibly Warren hadn’t been able to have before. It was really kind of lovely to watch that unfold.

  Shelley Duvall, to Patricia Bosworth, from Show, April 1971: How’d I like working with Warren Beatty? No comment. ’Cept he’s difficult. “Pirate” and he didn’t get along at all. It was terrible. Warren shouting and cussing. Julie was nice. Warm. “Pirate” told me once, “You’ll make out OK in this business as long as you don’t take yourself seriously. If you do—you’re lost.”

  ROBERT ALTMAN: We shot the whole picture in sequence…. I remember calling for a coat—it got chilly out there—and I thought, “Jeez, what’s the temperature?” And it was twenty-eight degrees and I just started seeing these snowflakes. I said, “Get the guys out here with the water hoses.” And these guys were out in their black slick raincoats spraying that water. The next day we’re up there and crystals were frozen on the trees, on the wagons, and it was just beautiful, fantastic, and it was just starting to snow softly. I ran to Warren’s trailer and he was sitting there in his makeup chair and I said, “Warren, get ready—this is beautiful.”

  And he said, “We’re not going to shoot today.”

  I said, “What are you talking about?”

  He said, “Well, it’s snowing.” And he laughs and said, “What happens if it doesn’t continue?”

  I said, “We don’t have anything else to shoot, so let’s just do it.” And it kept snowing and snowing and snowing.

  VILMOS ZSIGMOND: This was the part at the very end when he decided to not flash the film. In the snow. Think about it—the whole movie basically is like a pipe dream, a fantasy, and now we are real, now McCabe is in danger. And that’s what happened. It becomes very stark, not hazy anymore, not foggy. It’s real.

  Directing on his knees in the snow during McCabe

  JOAN TEWKESBURY: It made the movie. What would have been a gun-fight, just another gunfight in the town of Presbyterian Church, became this event in the snow. They were like animals tracking each other, and it’s fascinating to watch. This was when Bob was truly in his element the most, because he could just go out and make images. Warren’s death in McCabe, you know, sitting in the snow and freezing to death, never would have happened if the snowstorm hadn’t occurred.

  * * *

  MICHAEL MURPHY: Warren got mad because he thought the picture was too dark or something, and he yelled at Kathryn one night.

  KATHRYN REED ALTMAN: When we had the premiere in Vancouver, Bob for some reason couldn’t go back up for that. Mike Murphy accompanied me and it was important that the actors show, because it was a fund-raiser, it was a big deal that we’d been committed to. We were up in the balcony of this big old beautiful theater and it was completely sold out. The sound was not good and it hadn’t been refined as I guess it was to some degree later. And Warren had been difficult, as his reputation had preceded him—with many, many takes and lots of controversy and wanted it done his way. The party was tented next door to the theater. The lights went up and we stood up in the balcony and were waiting to get out. I guess Julie had to be with Warren. Anyhow, they were coming down the stairs and I was coming out of the aisle and before he even got down to me he hollered and pointed his finger and waved it in my face when I got out. “You can tell your fucking husband …” Some very profane stuff, I can’t give it to you exactly. But it was all about the sound. And it was all so hurtful and it was so loud and it was so embarrassing and it was so tasteless, it was so thoughtless. And he just considered himself such a bon vivant.

  ROBERT ALTMAN: Warren was terrific in the film. He had an attitude about it that I liked, and I thought he was right for it. … I don’t know why he and I didn’t get along too well.

  Robert Altman, to David Thompson, from Altman on Altman: I don’t think Warren would be happy with anybody’s methods. That’s him. He wasn’t happy with McCabe: he didn’t like the way I mixed it, that you couldn’t hear every word, with a lot of lights. It was scary for him, because he hadn’t done that before and he wasn’t used to it. Yet he was the one who sought me out for the film. He chased the picture; I didn’t go after him to do it. He was great in McCabe—the film would not be what it is without him. … But he just isn’t much fun to work with. He’s kind of a control freak
and he can’t let go because he’s a director, a producer, and was the last movie star of an era. The best thing he did was to bring Julie Christie in. These affairs of the heart help. Sometimes they’re better than the film, you know—“I got to do the picture, but I had to use the girl.” But this girl was better than he was.

  DAVID FOSTER: I would say part of it was that Julie got nominated for an Academy Award and it drove Warren mad.

  Dialogue from McCabe & Mrs. Miller:

  JOHN MCCABE (Played by Warren Beatty): If a man is fool enough to get into business with a woman, she ain’t going to think much of him.

  KEITH CARRADINE: You look at that movie now, it’s absolutely brilliant. I’d love to know if Warren can look at it now and go, “You know what? I was wrong.” It would take a huge man to say it, but Warren’s a big guy in many ways. He has room to admit that he was mistaken about that. I wonder if he will.

  WARREN BEATTY (actor/producer/writer/director): Julie Christie and I were going to make Shampoo together, but we couldn’t get to a script. So I sort of gave myself a deadline and said, “If we don’t have a script by that date, Julie and I are going to do another movie.” I was offered a movie called McCabe. I didn’t know who Bob Altman was. I couldn’t have chased the film. I talked to Stan Kamen, who said, “He’s done a very good movie, M*A*S*H. You should go see it.” I had come back from London that day and I went to see it in New York and I thought it was terrific. I thought he did a terrific job. I went to the hotel and said, “Say yes, we’ll do the movie.” With all due respect, Bob Altman didn’t have the reputation at that point that he quite deservedly acquired. The picture was kind of me and Julie, on the basis of what we’d done. This thing that I chased the movie is quite an invention.

  The movie came out of whatever Bob brought to it. It was extremely relaxed. Sometimes extreme relaxation can bite you in the tail. In the sound mix of the first two reels, it bit.