Original subtitles

The notion of building a career slowly,

gradually, carefully

is because people want it too fast. They

want it immediately. They want to be on

television. You know, there is a school

of thought that you should take

anything, any job that comes along, no

matter what, take it. I've had a couple

of agents down the line who had that

philosophy. I didn't have that

philosophy.

I had a different philosophy, which is

that I didn't want to do things that I

felt I couldn't live with, and I didn't

want to do things that I thought that's

going to be on film forever and probably

don't want to see that late at night.

Um, so I turned down a lot of things as

I was starting out and it caused

relative amount of rumblings and

earthquakes within my agents who were,

you know, who the hell do you think you

are? And,

you know, they aren't my agents anymore.

I live with no regrets and I sleep very

well because I have a very, very clear

conscience.

He said that once. I think Dick Cavat

asked her, "How do you sleep so well?"

She said, "Good conscience.

Um,

every experience I've had

personally, professionally,

good, bad, ones I do again, ones I'd

never do again,

have gone into making me the man that I

am, the actor that I am,

and

I can live with all of it. I made that

choice. I did that thing. I said yes to

that.

I open that door.

Live with it. Sometimes it's gut

instinct. Sometimes it's also

all right. If I do this thing and this

thing offers me a chance to make certain

amount of money that I could then put

toward this thing that I really want to

do, can I live with myself, you know, in

the morning? I often make a joke that,

you know, I I have to shave in the

morning without wanting to slip my

throat. So, I I can only do things that

that I can look myself in the mirror in

the morning and and say, "Well, all

right. There is nothing wrong with

making money choices.

There's nothing wrong with wanting to be

successful. There's nothing wrong with

using something as a stepping stone.

I'm always having this conversation

with, you know, younger actors starting

out saying, you know, should I move to

New York? Should I move to Los Angeles?"

And my argument is, you know, it's not a

vast desert between Los Angeles and New

York.

There are extraordinary regional

theaters across this country that would

love to have someone like you where you

could go and work and do three plays and

then go somewhere else and do Chicago,

Seattle, Miami, Washington DC,

great Houston theater towns

where you could spend three or four

years building a body of work and

building relationships with director and

working.

If you think long view, take the long

view, not the short view, and say, not

where do I want to be in six months, but

where I want to be in six years or 10

years, and start building toward that.

And recognizing, by the way, that most

actors that you really admire, it took

them that long. And it really did. Henry

Fonda was 31 when he did his first

movie.

Dustin Hoffman was 31 when he did The

Graduate.

Nicholson was 34 when he did Easy Rider.

It's different for women. It's a harder

business for women.

They they have to sort of get in there

pretty early because we have a

youthoriented business, particularly in

terms of the way women are treated.

But most men that I admired really

didn't make get their breaks until they

were in their 30s. So it took me a while

to

realize that it was that my ship wasn't

coming in as as early as some of my

friends and classmates at Giuliard. I

mean, who were becoming famous like

that.

And I was jealous and I was ambitious.

And I didn't understand why my ship

wasn't coming in. Except I thought,

well, I just don't look like guys they

cast in movies.

And it took a while for me to be able to

a adjust to that and realize that

actually in a weird way, what was

happening was I was being able to watch

how fame

affected those people before it ever

happened to me.

So I was actually in the end very

grateful that

mine was more of a slow burn because I

learned a lot about fame and how I

wanted to handle it if it happened to me

because of observing other people.

The question of doubting doubting

oneself doubting one's talent doubting

whether you're ready.

um doubting whether you're right for a

part,

doubting whether you're figuring it out,

doubting your director.

And the funny thing is is that

I don't think that ever goes away.

I think it remains

and I think it's important

and I think it can be incredibly

valuable.

It's really interesting, you know,

because when I started out,

you know, there were like people that

I'd hang out with, you know, and you you

go out to a bar and you talk, you know,

actors would talk and you get a little

drunk and

and it was very interesting that I I

started to see a kind of pattern of

there was a certain kind of person

who was really energized

and hopeful,

believed in themselves and believed in

the craft and loved it and talked about

it in in really passionate ways that I

found inspiring and moving and

and I liked them as people.

And I kind of found myself gravitating

toward that kind of person because there

was another kind of person too which was

the bitter,

angry,

disappointed

person that would quote statistics of

how tough it was. You know, there so

many actors in the Screen Actors Guild,

there's so many actors in Actors Equity.

And I found that

that kind of attitude, that kind of

doubt, I thought was really destructive.

because it was destructive about

the whole profession.

It wasn't like being doubtful about a

specific thing. And I felt

really strongly that I never ever wanted

to end up

on a bar stool saying, "It should have

been me.

Should have been me."

And

It's really important for I think

someone starting out to recognize the

difference between those kinds of

personalities.

You know, you can get sucked into that

and not even realize that actually

all that someone is giving is

negativity.

And I think the pursuit of being an

actor, it's a noble one. It's a I think

it's an important profession. I think it

means something. People go to bars and

people go to restaurants and people come

to dinner and they sit around and they

talk about the latest movie they saw or

the book they read or the play they saw

or the TV show. People get obsessed by

characters and storytelling.

You know, it's what we talk about.

Doubt's part of it, but doubt doubt

shouldn't overwhelm it.

Because it's through doubt, I think that

you can then start asking yourself

questions about

why do I feel that way? Why did I think

I didn't achieve that thing I wanted to

try to you? Whether it's something

you're working on that day or you're

looking back at a run of a play you did

and you think, "Oh gosh." I mean we you

know all have heard the great stories

about you know the greats who

6 months after the run of a play wake up

in the middle of the night going ah

that's how to play that moment.

There's a great story about Olivier.

He's at the old Vic. He's doing

um I think he's doing a fellow.

And this was just one night where

suddenly

something started to happen on stage and

act one actors were starting to gather

at the wings to watch this extraordinary

thing that was happening. His

performance was just elevated to

something

incredibly unusual. People were getting

on the phones backstage and telling

their friends to race down to see the

second act.

And at the end of the evening, he took

something like 14 curtain calls. I mean,

it was thunderous.

The audience would not let him leave the

stage.

And he walked through a line of his

fellow actors applauding him as he went

to the dressing room and slammed the

door and locked the door.

And for the next half an hour, people

that tried to get into the room heard

nothing but the sounds of lamps being

thrown, glasses being broken, doors

being slammed,

tables being overturned.

And I think about an hour and some time

went by and finally everyone had left

the theater but Vanessa Redgrave who was

outside of his door. and he finally let

her in the room and she said, "Larry,

what's wrong?" It was the most

extraordinary performance that any of us

have ever seen.

And he said, "I know.

I know.

I just have no idea how to do it again.

And I have no idea how I did it."

that the

even in

what he achieved, he was filled with

doubt.

And that can't be anything but

frustrating

but extremely valuable

because it's the doubt that pushes us

on,

makes us want to be better.