September 22, 2025 • 50 mins
Back to the Future: The Podcast
Produced and Hosted by Brad Gilmore
July 3rd, 1985 — the day a little time travel movie produced by Steven Spielberg and directed by Robert Zemeckis changed cinema forever. Back to the Future hit theaters and instantly became a cultural phenomenon. This podcast dives deep into the world of Back to the Future — exploring the trilogy’s unforgettable characters, iconic moments, hidden details, and behind-the-scenes stories that helped make it one of the greatest film franchises of all time. So buckle in, make sure your flux capacitor is... fluxing, and enjoy the 88 mile-per-hour adventure through time.
🎉 Order the new expanded edition of Brad Gilmore’s book — Why We Love Back to the Future
Back to the Future: The Podcast is independently produced and presented by Brad Gilmore. This program is not affiliated with the Back to the Future franchise and is intended solely for entertainment and documentary purposes. All views expressed are those of the host and guests and do not reflect the opinions of any other entity or sponsor. This show respects the intellectual property rights of Universal Pictures and all creators of Back to the Future.
Produced and Hosted by Brad Gilmore
July 3rd, 1985 — the day a little time travel movie produced by Steven Spielberg and directed by Robert Zemeckis changed cinema forever. Back to the Future hit theaters and instantly became a cultural phenomenon. This podcast dives deep into the world of Back to the Future — exploring the trilogy’s unforgettable characters, iconic moments, hidden details, and behind-the-scenes stories that helped make it one of the greatest film franchises of all time. So buckle in, make sure your flux capacitor is... fluxing, and enjoy the 88 mile-per-hour adventure through time.
🎉 Order the new expanded edition of Brad Gilmore’s book — Why We Love Back to the Future
Back to the Future: The Podcast is independently produced and presented by Brad Gilmore. This program is not affiliated with the Back to the Future franchise and is intended solely for entertainment and documentary purposes. All views expressed are those of the host and guests and do not reflect the opinions of any other entity or sponsor. This show respects the intellectual property rights of Universal Pictures and all creators of Back to the Future.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
God stop stop, Okay, black Shot, it's me.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
It's great, it's Martin.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
You can't be it's just such a back to the future.
Speaker 4 (00:12):
Oh, I know you did send me back to the future,
but I'm back. I'm back from the future.
Speaker 5 (00:21):
Wait, gosh, f are you're telling me that you built
the time machine.
Speaker 4 (00:32):
The way I see it?
Speaker 3 (00:33):
If you're gonna build a time machine out, why not
doing some style?
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Thanks too.
Speaker 4 (00:38):
I same the time that I really enjoyed this movie.
I'spect to talk to you.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Awesome, Thank you so much.
Speaker 4 (00:43):
Hey, you know, I don't know if you recall this
or not, but it's maybe a little over a year ago.
You were here in Houston for a comic Balus and
I got the moderate a panel for Napoleon Dynamite with
you and Ephron and I remember being backstage and the
one thing I wanted to talk to you about was
this movie. I was like, I can't wait to see
what waltson, what Brando's gonna be about. We talked about
kind of the production of it and things of that nature.
(01:04):
Now people are finally getting to see it, how does
it kind of make you feel that it's out there?
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Finally, finally it's out there.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
You know, with every independent film, you never know, like
you know, for at first, when I signed on to
do the movie, it was like during COVID and so like, wow,
is this movie ever gonna happen? Now, every single independent
film you never know. It is like are they gonna
get the funding and are they gonna get all their
ducks lined in a row?
Speaker 1 (01:31):
And then and then after you make.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
It, you're like, Okay, the people are like, when's it
coming out. I was like, I don't know, It's gonna
come out at some point. Hopefully it could take you know,
sometimes it takes years, sometimes it takes a few months.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
And so it's finally here. I'm glad. So I'm very
excited for people to see it.
Speaker 4 (01:48):
Well, you know what, and I mean this honestly. I
got to talk to Billy about the movie, and after
seeing it, it's it's one of my favorite films of
the year, just how the story, because you know, I
think Brando has he's got some weird mystique about him
where people think of him in a certain perspective, and
this really opens it up to the kind of fun
(02:09):
that Marlon Brando had with the practical jokes and the
interplay between him and Bernard and the movie it just
kind of, I don't know, it shines a light on
a different aspect of who I thought this guy was.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Yeah, you kind of have what I kind of dug about,
is like, here's an actor who's played some of the
most dramatic roles, and he probably had real drama in
his life. He had his house in la and there's
probably you know, drama and things going on in his life.
But this was like a chance to see from the
point of view of kind of an everyman my character
(02:42):
Bernard seeing this guy like in his comfort zone. Here
he is and not just comfort zone, his playground to heat.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
He bought this island because he.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
Fell in love with the with the culture, the people,
this country, and he goes and by his design and
it's just whenever he was into he's kind of just
I don't want to think about the stress of work.
I don't want to think about my jobs. I don't
want to think about being an actor. I just want
to be me and lay back and sip my ties
(03:14):
and hang out. And really it was kind of his way,
and so you get a much more looser version of
what we know as Brando played by Billy Zay, who
does an incredible job, but you know he's walking around
the film either half naked or in a sorong or
you know, just kind of doing whatever he wants because.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
He's like, this is my place.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
But he's like, I need to make this playground real.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
I need to make it, design it the way I
want it to be.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
And that's where my character comes in and he's like,
I need you to help me realize this.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
And which is a total job for Bernard.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Brando was extremely smart, but still he was kind of like,
I'm gonna let you take the reins.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
I need someone who knows what they're doing.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
So Bernard, you know, my character has to come in
and wants to have fun, but also I gotta get
this impossible task done.
Speaker 4 (04:08):
But what's fun about the interplay between Brando and Bernard
is there are times where Bernard thinks that he is
absolutely insane for trying to do the things that he
wants to do. But then we'll see these little spots
to where maybe it's actually a possibility, and Bernard's mind
kind of opens up to maybe I can make this
Zana do and it becomes just as much of a
passion for Bernard as it does for Brando, and this
(04:31):
beautiful friendship is formed.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
Yeah, one hundred percent.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
He is like at first kind of like all right, yeah,
I'm paid to do these kinds of jobs where I
have to make the uninhabitable habitable. But yeah, Brandos throws
them all kinds of you know, curveballs and like, wait,
are you serious? And at first he's like, I can't
tell this guy serious, and then he kind of just
(04:54):
starts like going for it, and just like you know what,
he may be serious or not, but yeah, he starts
to buying into it and like let's do this, and
he takes the reins and he You're.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Almost by the end, you're like, Bernardo, are you okay?
Like do you really know what you're doing?
Speaker 4 (05:12):
And you know. But what I also loved is there's
a scene where Bernard's character, you know, obviously played so
great by you. I really loved you in this movie,
and Billy's been obviously very complimentary of you as a
dramatic actor in this but there's a great comedic moment
to where Bernard wants to get back at Billy for
all kind of the high jinks and the pranks, and
he finally figures out I'm gonna really get him back
(05:32):
in this one and has the whole scene that you
have about telling the story and trying to scare him
or what have you, only for Brando to still have
the one up on Bernard at the end of it.
That seemed to be though a real fun scene to play.
Speaker 3 (05:47):
It was, and actually, in real life, you know, almost
every scene and every moment is taken straight from the book,
and that Bernard said happen, and that really was real.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
He loved to prank it.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
He wanted to get him back, and he knew I
don't know how apparent was, but it was like a
known fact that Brando was very superstitious and very scared
of ghosts.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
And things like that. So he tells that story.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
I think in real life though after he tells it,
Brando legitimately was scared and freaked out.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
And you know, in the movie we.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Turn it around pretty quickly like he pranks it back,
But in real life I think he was pretty he
was pretty shook by that experience.
Speaker 4 (06:32):
When you're there with Billy. I think that when you
do a biopick, especially if somebody as recognizable as Brando,
you have like the inclination to do impression, and it's
really easy to fall into impression and what somebody thinks
of this guy. I think, you know, when someone does,
for instance, a Seinfeld impression, it doesn't really sound like Seinfeld,
but it sounds like what you think he sounds like. Yeah,
in this one, though, I don't think Billy does as
(06:53):
much impression as it's like the essence of Brando and
kind of a more of a vibe than it is
a one to one one exactly sounding just alike if
you understand what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
You because he was.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
You know, there are certain scenes for sure that you know,
we portray in the film that are straight from The
Godfather or some of his famous scenes, and so yeah,
there's I think he's doing it, you know, a straight
up impression and kind of copying. But then you know,
most of the rest of the movie is taken from
undocumented moments in his life that really was at least
(07:30):
wasn't film documented.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
It was.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
There's pictures that we have from Bernard's book and things
like that, but it's all mostly at the word of
Bernard saying, yeah, you know, Brando said this, Brandon said that,
So I thought Billy did an incredible job of portraying
and kind of, you know, playing this character.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
There's an element of impression of doing an impression.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
Of him, but for the most part, you're right, he's
getting the vibe and he's playing with like I think
this is how he was, and it captures a book
pretty well well.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
And also, my favorite Tarantino film is Once Upon a Time.
And what I loved about Once upon a Time is
it felt like you were just hanging out with these characters.
It wasn't so much one plot driven, although it you know,
it had its elements in it, but it was just
a hang. It was a fun hang and that's what
this movie feels like in a similar sense of like
just seeing Brando and Bernard hang out bond through this
(08:22):
you know, singular project that they're working on, but it's
more so hanging out with buddies and just kind of
being the fly.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
On the wall. Yeah. Yeah, I mean that's what I
liked about it. It's a buddy film.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
You have like two polar opposites kind of coming from
different worlds and learning to uh work and lived together
and become one. It's funny because it was it takes
place exact same time as Once upon a Time in Hollywood,
where it's like nineteen's like spans from about like ear late.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Sixties to the mid seventies.
Speaker 3 (08:53):
But yeah, it was, uh, you know, it's what you
like about this kind of film. So, I mean, Billy
and I had to working relationship beforehand. We had worked
actually on another film just prior, but it was for
a short time. And so being able to now like, Okay,
this is Island Billy. This is Island Billy portraying Island Brando.
(09:16):
He's more relaxed, it is laid back, and that's what
it was. It was like we got to hang out
and play in Tahitian just like our characters.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
When we wouldn't be shooting, we'd go and we'd swim
with the sharks for real.
Speaker 4 (09:30):
I mean that it just had to be so much fun.
I'll end on this and again thank you so much
to taing the time. But Billy has made a lot
about you as an actor in this role. He felt
like this is something that really you sunk your teeth
into from a dramatic side, and there are a lot
of great dramatic scenes. Is that something that you want
to continue to formulate and what is that connectivity from
(09:52):
comedy to drama that works so well when a comedic
actor takes on a more dramatic part.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
Just look, you know, at each roll and just think,
can I do this? Will this be fun? Do I
like this character? Can I portray it? And that's really
kind of I don't have, like, you know, a quota
I'm trying to meet where I'm like, well, I got
to do a comedy, then a drama, then a horror.
Speaker 1 (10:17):
Then I got to go back and do this.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
I think every drama is a comedy to me, and
that you know, you're putting real people in sometimes crazy situations,
and you know it's just how much stress and horror,
how much how serious we take those moments that will
either make it a comedy or make it a drama.
But I mean, sometimes my favorite comedy is are essentially
(10:42):
just dramas with less stress.
Speaker 4 (10:45):
That's a really interesting way to put it. Well, you
know what, this movie, even though I had stressful moments
for Bernard, for sure, it was a fun ang to
be able to watch and just like again be on
a fly on the wall for it. It's one of
my favorite of the years. So congrats on the film
and thanks so much. Man, have to take the time
to talk to you again. Of course, thank you well
joining me right now. You've seen this actress in so
many projects over the years as you. Incredible talent, incredible singer,
(11:09):
and she's bringing it to us again with the new
film Waltzing with Brando Tia. Thank you so much for
joining the show.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Bret.
Speaker 4 (11:19):
Well, look, I want to jump right into this movie
because and I mean this honestly, I've gotten to talk
to Billy, I've gotten to talk to John. This is
one of my favorite movies of the entire year. I
just loved being able to vibe with this film. Now
it's coming out, the people can see it now. How
do you feel about it finally getting out there to
the public.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
I'm so excited because you know, you do these little
movies and you hope that it does well, you hope
that it gets a theatrical release. To see it on
the big screen and to see the beauty of Tahiti
and all of our great work, I couldn't be more pleased.
We have a big screening on Monday at the man
Chinese here in Los Angeles. The historic theater where they
(12:04):
have the hands and footprints in front. So it's great
to have you know, Billy up on the big screen
at the at the big historic theater. And I've seen
my big mug in one really funny scene, so I'm
very excited. I love this scene.
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Yeah, the scene. The scene is great. And I want
to talk about obviously Madame Lee Royan and everything that
you did in this movie. But but Tahiti itself. What
a beautiful backdrop for this film. And I think I
mean obviously getting to shoot there made it even more
impactful and brought that authenticity. Talk to me about Tahiti.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
It's it's like another character in the film. You know,
you can't double it double anyplace else. For Tahiti, it's pristine.
The air is sultry. It's you know, just the heaviness
of the air. As soon as you get off the plane,
it's like you're in an oven, but like a moist sensual.
(13:00):
I mean, say, these gorgeous I want to go back there.
You don't even understand how beautiful it is. And that
was just Papeete and they got to go to you know,
Texiao and and Morea, which is even further flung. It
was a gift getting to be there.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
Yeah, it's it is like another character in the movie.
It really is, and you feel the essence of the film.
And you know what, I think what's so great about
this movie is that one of my favorite Quentin Tarantino
films is Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and this
reminds me of that in the sense of similar time period,
but also you feel like you're hanging out with all
the characters and you're just a fly on the wall
(13:35):
in these few years of trying to build this incredible
Xana do that that Brando is trying to do, and
it just feels like a fun hangout movie at times.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Yeah, it's uh, and it's what it's as well. Versus
as I am in Hollywood history, I didn't know most
of this stuff. You know, we all knew that Brando,
you know, declined his Academy Award and sent Satcheing up
there to shine a light on Native American uh, you
know issues. But he was the first ecologically minded, you know,
(14:09):
a person in the Western world. And uh, he was
so visionary making sure that there was water and that
it was clean and that you know that the the
first Ego Eco Lodge and now it's a huge business,
multi billion dollar business. And he was the first guy
and everybody thought he was a crackpot. So I loved
learning about that and about how he was trying to
(14:30):
figure out clean water sources, which is nudge nudge wing
when we know the scene, and to see what he
went through at the same time as The Godfather and
and it's it's it. I think people film siniists, you know,
people that love film will want to watch this movie
just for that to understand more about the man and
the myth and and that timeline. It is. It was
(14:52):
fun hanging out in this era.
Speaker 4 (14:54):
Yeah, yeah, you're right, because I think I had this,
you know, preconception of who Marlon Brando was, because he's
such a great mad actor and you think of him
in The Godfather and Superman and you think about the
Academy Award moment, but you don't realize that he was
kind of just a fun guy at times. He was
just fun and Billy brings the fun out of love.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Beautiful women, yes, yes, beautiful Island women, yes.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
Well, you know he had he had just such a
fun essence about him, and I think that that's What
Billy brought more than anything, is just figuring out who
this guy was from a completely different perspective than I
think anybody's ever talked about him in mm hmm.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
Yeah, it's the charm and the you know, the wink
in his eyes. I mean. I got to work with
Brando on a little movie up in Montreal many years ago,
and he was a little he was a character, you know,
he was a you know, kind of trouble maker, had
a funny sense of humor to him. So it's love.
I love seeing that part of him in this film
through Billy.
Speaker 4 (15:55):
Well, talk about your relationship with Billy. Did y'all had
y'all worked together prior to this movie? How well did
y'all know one another?
Speaker 2 (16:02):
I'm known of for oh gosh, I don't know twenty
is it thirty years? Yeah, probably thirty years. But it's
we're both like actors that always, you know, we did
our stuff. We just kept working and we'd see each
other parties, and we knew each other socially and stuff
like that. But we had never worked together until this
And even now I still haven't work with him because
I worked with John Heater in my scene right, right,
So one of these days I'll work with Billy.
Speaker 4 (16:24):
But John, also, I feel like is so good in
this movie. This is maybe his best performance in several years,
and not saying that he hasn't done great work, but
this one he really brings it as Bernard, and it's
so fun to watch his character kind of try to
maneuver his way through the island of Tahiti.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
Well, and also it's just it's so wacky and zany,
all the stuff this poor guy had to deal with.
And it's true, it was like, if you think about
how wild and untouched Tahiti is now, think about when
these guys were doing their their you know, building, He
didn't know when he got off the plane who he
was dealing with. I mean, who's who? Is it true
what they're saying is, you know, how do I buy
(17:04):
this land? And it was it was a wild, wild West.
Speaker 4 (17:08):
Yeah, it was. And even even his first interaction with Brando,
he wasn't sure what kind of guy he was dealing
with because Brando was kind of a prankster. So it's
interesting to say that when you worked with him, you
kind of picked up on that sense of he was
a little bit of a troublemaker like to have some fun.
Did he Were you intimidated to be around him?
Speaker 2 (17:27):
Oh, certainly, I mean this is towards his later years,
and so he was he was. He was very large
and you know, unhealthy at that point, which was sad.
But I came on set and We're supposed to do
like a one page scene. I'm just an insurance adjuster
trying to give him his check. But he didn't give
me the paperwork that this was to give me, and
so we had this whole conversation with he goes, are
you an island girl? You look like an exotic? Are
(17:49):
you from Tahiti?
Speaker 4 (17:50):
Are you from what?
Speaker 2 (17:50):
I was like, what's going on here? I'm looking on
the other side, like the director like, okay, I'll just
stay improvising with him and see if it comes back
around to the dialogue in the scene that I memorized.
So we had this like a whole meandering, I don't know,
fifteen minute scene about what island I'm from, and that
his kids and his family and just so it got
(18:11):
cut from the film, but I had a blast. We
never got to the part where I give him the check.
He actually snatches the check out of my hand. He
sticks it in his shirt. He goes, now I have it.
How are you going to get it back? I'm like,
I don't know what to do?
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Well, you know, his unpredictability is another part of his charm,
right is you never know where we're going to get
from him, and you see that in this movie. Okay,
let me ask you this. More intimidating to work with
Brando or Connery?
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Brando definitely, because he's so well. Also because Sean Connery.
I got to be at a big table read with everybody,
Harvey Kaitel, Steve Bushami, the you know, Oscar nominee director,
all these amazing people, big room, Sean Connery, everybody's laughing, talking,
the doors open, been double doors open on the conference
(19:01):
room in walk Sean Connery and it looks around and
clash falls over the room. And then he says something
funny and then and everybody starts laughing, and then we
carried on. But it was, you know, that kind of
broke the eyes. I think he knows. Sean Connery knew
when he walked into a room that he comes in
with that legend energy and he has to he has
(19:22):
to just poke a hole in it. To release the tension.
So he was very very nice. I loved working with him.
Speaker 4 (19:28):
I'm sure, I'm sure he's got to work.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
With great Sean Connery.
Speaker 4 (19:31):
There he is, there, he is right there, Madame Leroy.
Talk about this. When you read this script and they
send it to you, it comes to you, however, however
it does and you read it, do you go immediately like, oh,
I'm all the way in. I want to do this
so bad.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
Oh yeah, with this one, definitely. And I also came
up with some other bits. That certain word that I
say in the scene. I added that in like, uh,
the mispronounce because I was reading it out loud, memorizing
the lines, and that pronunciation came out and I started
laughing because I thought it was hilarious. And I said
(20:09):
to the director, to Bill Fishman, I said, hey, is
it okay if I riff on this? And Bobby goes, yeah, yeah, sure,
And so I just go with it, and I was
cracking myself up. And I love that everybody loves it too,
because it was just one of those serendipitous moments where
you stumble upon something and it becomes comedy.
Speaker 4 (20:28):
Gold Well and it's got to be freeing as an
actress to have a director who just allows that freedom,
you know, especially in a film like this where you
can just kind of riff and have fun and see
where it goes.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
It made it much more naturalistic. And I'm sure Billy
and John did the same thing. Sometimes words you know,
written on a page, when you say them, it doesn't
feel real coming out of your mouth. So it's great
that Bill's open to that sort of reinterpretation in your
own voice. Uh So, I love that he was open
to collaboration because it's basically a one standalone scene. It
(21:04):
could be just drop it off, here's the funny, and
then you continue on with the story. So he was.
He was willing to go with it a little further
than it even started out, as we made it crazy.
And then I loved it. When I walked into the house,
you see, I walk in front of some horns, and
that was quite by accident. He's framing up the shot
(21:25):
and I walk in and I stand at this place
and he goes, oh my gosh, a little bit to
the left, a little bit to the right, Oh yeah, perfect,
right there, and then he goes, wait till you see this,
So like my accent with that word and then this,
you know, the horns coming up. It's hilarious.
Speaker 4 (21:41):
I'm sure you can't wait to see that at the
Chinese theater, like with a whole crowd, because it's it's
one of the memorable moments, stand out parts of the
film obviously, and people will see it when they see
it and understand.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
I come on up, Brad, come to La.
Speaker 4 (21:54):
You know what, if I can come with.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
You, I'll be there.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
I can get you on the list.
Speaker 4 (21:59):
Okay, that's in the same row. Okay, I love it. Now.
You've just had such an incredible year. I mean a
billion dollars with Lilo and Stitch.
Speaker 2 (22:07):
Crazy in like a month. A billion dollars in like
a month. That's how fast people went to it again
and again and ye because we're so hungry for joy,
We're so hungry for connection and family and good vibes
and nostalgia because I did the original cartoon twenty three
years ago, so people want to fill their hearts. It's
it's such a difficult and scary and sad and divisive time,
(22:30):
no matter what side of the aisle you're on, and
I feel like we just need to pull together and
just hug each other and love each other through anything
that comes up, you know. But maybe it's Polyannish of me,
but that's the way I see it.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
You know.
Speaker 4 (22:42):
Well, No, I think that you're right, And I think
Lelo and Stitch does that. I think the brand of
this movie does that too, because you you just you
fall in love with this man and just the way
that he thinks and the way that he acts, and
like you said, the scenery that you're chewing on is beautiful.
Lelo and Stitch, what's a beautiful movie. And also just
you know, putting Hawaiian culture, Polynesian culture, you know, showing Tahiti.
(23:06):
It feels like it's become a more mainstream than ever before,
especially with Moana and what Dwayne in the Rock than
they're doing with the live action version. It just seems
to be like mainstream story now.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
Yeah. I love that we're bringing like yiloha spirit to
Tahitian yourana to the world because it's good vibes. There's
a reason why people dream of paradise and they see
Hawaii or Tahiti in their minds to eye. And I
am so fortunate, so blessed, so happy that I got
(23:40):
to go to the Philippines like Cebu, the Island, you know,
Hawaii and Tahiti in the past. You know, a couple
of years working on these movies. I just have to
pinch myself and go, how do I get so lucky?
Forty one years later in the.
Speaker 6 (23:53):
Business, it's still going, still going, from that grocery store
in Hawaii to all the way here now? Still don't
And if you know what the Last Resort I know
is coming out. I think sometime next year, I believe,
is the name of the movie.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Yeah, at the Last Result with Dazy Ridley and Alden
Aaron rech It's gonna be great. It's a rom com
and I get to play another you know, eccentric character.
I love playing the eccentric characters. It's fun.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
You know.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
It's a crazy aunt, the crazy mom, the whatever.
Speaker 4 (24:22):
Now, I will say this, and you've been generous with
your time. Walterson with Brando is a phenomenal film. But
I got to end on this. When when is it
going to happen? When are we going to do it?
Can we write it together? I want Aurella Hunter reboot.
I want this show to come back so much. I
loved this show. It's a guilty not even a guilty pleasure.
(24:42):
It's a pleasure pleasure of mine. It's one of the
shows that I put on when I'm feeling down and
I just want to pick me up if I just
want to watch it and binge it. You and Sidney,
Fox and Nigel and all the adventures love this show,
and I feel like it's a prime time for Sidney
to come back. She's got a gang of younger relic hunters. Yeah,
why don't we make this happen? We should make this happen.
(25:04):
I love this show.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
I know. I think so too. I can reach out
to the producers in Germany and France. I really agree.
I think they tried to do with that show Librarian,
but it was not This had a joy to it
and the comic banter between Nigel and I. I think
it's hilarious. And we could also jump in and do
a relic hunt or two just for old times sake,
(25:27):
and it's like, oh my back, Oh I think I
stubbed my toe or I don't know whatever, you know,
I don't know by bresiitis or whatever. That would make
these funny jokes about all these things that are falling
apart on us, like don't you remember Sidney when we
used to do that. I'm like, yeah, I'm too tired.
Speaker 4 (25:46):
It would be great, but I feel like it's prime.
There's a lot of story that could be told with
Sidney Fox in twenty twenty five, twenty twenty six. I
would love to see it. But you know what, You've
been a good idea. You've been doing so much great work,
and I know you're going to continue to do it.
This movie is added to the great pantheon of your
career and it's really one of my favorite films of
the year. So thank you so much for taking the
(26:07):
time today.
Speaker 2 (26:08):
Thank you so much. My next step is writing, directing,
and producing this movie that I'm a starring in Hawaii.
It's a little small, indeed dramatic piece, and it's about time.
I've been doing this a long time, speaking other people's
words and telling other people's stories, and this is this
is an important story for me.
Speaker 4 (26:25):
And what is the story about.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
It's like the economic divide. It's like people that are
just falling off the bottom society in Hawaii and and
becoming homeless. It's not the feel good story of the
of the century, but it does turn around. It's it's
a really good, good script. So I'm looking for financing
out there, So tell everybody and wherever it.
Speaker 4 (26:45):
Is, Yeah, to spread the word. Yeah, I think that
would be amazing. Well, Tia again, thank you. Great to
speak to you as always, and I really appreciate your time.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
Thank you, Aloha and yao Runa, thanks.
Speaker 4 (27:00):
So much, dear, thank you, thank you so much. Have
a good one you two, bye bye bye all right.
Uh joining me right now is a man who I've
been a fan of for a very long time. I
followed his career throughout several projects. He actually holds a
distinction of being in two of my favorite ten favorite
films of all time, two of them on my top
ten list. And you know what, I think he just
(27:21):
added another one to it with Walton with Brando. He
is the one and only billy' zay and Billy, thank
you so much taking the time.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
Brad, thank you so much. What a pleasure. What were
those two? If I can let me try to guess,
go for it? Demon Knight?
Speaker 4 (27:33):
Demon Knight? Isn't there no no?
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Now? Interesting hold on the Phantom?
Speaker 4 (27:37):
The Phantom is one, yes, of course.
Speaker 5 (27:40):
And uh could be Zulander could be Titanic. I can't
quite tell.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
What Lander's on there.
Speaker 4 (27:45):
You know what Zuelander is on there? So is Back
to the Future what you're in as well?
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Oh my god, all right, so what were your two?
What were your two with?
Speaker 4 (27:52):
It was Back to the Future and The Phantom.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Without my prompting, those are fine films.
Speaker 4 (27:57):
Yes, you know what. I actually got to talk to
Simon Winsor, who direct to The Phantom, one time, and
he said it was a lovely experience, a beautiful film,
beautiful scenery that you all got to shoot in. And
he said you were always offset getting ready and getting
all pumped up before you had to be on camera.
Do you remember that?
Speaker 5 (28:12):
I do, because I didn't want to wear a muscle suit,
and boy, there was times I regretted that because I realized,
you know, it was a very unforgiving costume, nothing quite
to it, and it was about that big on a
hangar and nuts I got, you know, I thought, naturalist hero,
he needs to have Tarzan muscle, no rubber armor.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
That was tough.
Speaker 4 (28:34):
But you know what, that movie was so great and
your scenes would treat williams Or literally a treat to
watch the interplay between the two of you. He was
so charismatic and off the page in that movie.
Speaker 5 (28:46):
He was masterful, you know, on stage and screen. One
of my favorite actors. Rest his soul is beautiful man,
beautiful man, real real pleasure, real pleasure working with him.
Speaker 4 (28:57):
You Know. It's interesting to even bring up the Phantom,
because I think it kind of gets right into Waltzing
with Brando, because the Phantom, literally in the comic book pages,
had a duality about him, kit walker and then this
protector of a jungle. And when I was watching Waltzing
with Brando last night, loved the movie. By the way,
He's such a duality Debrando that I didn't I think
recognized before. He is this serious, great craftsman of an actor,
(29:19):
but also completely silly at times, a practical joker, a conservationist,
an environmentalist, a civil rights activist. There's a duality in
this guy.
Speaker 5 (29:29):
Wow, you're pretty good at this. You should host a show.
My goodness, what a great distillation. Now, he was certainly
full of complexities and contradictions, And what we really wanted
to do was kind of reclaim the legacy from the
trauma that befell him at the end of his life
and really shine a light on where he was just
the tip of the spear of activism. There were no
(29:51):
Hollywood activists at the time. The man really walked the
walk for civil rights, indigenous rights, and the little known
fact that he championed environmental rights as early as nineteen
sixty nine, that wasn't really a thing. You know, incredible
and a very a kind of an entertaining and fun
(30:12):
telling of his relationship with his architect while they're trying
to figure out how to you know, it's like these
interesting buddies trying to figure out how to bring power
and water to his island without fossil fuels at the time,
which was kind of unheard.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
It was pretty wild early solar and you know, yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:32):
And an innovator, you know, and just the idea of
his throwing ideas out there of like, hey, let's electric eels.
Let's see what can we do with electric heels. And
I love the moment in the film where there's the
eels in the pond and then you see the lights
start to flicker and John Heater's character almost looks off
like did he figure this out? Yeah, Brando really figure
it out. But you know, with movies like this, when
(30:54):
you portray such a well known figure. I go back
to wa Keane Phoenix as Johnny Cash, or you been
recently Austin Butler as Elvis.
Speaker 5 (31:03):
You can go to Jamie as you know. I mean,
that's the that's the bar right there, man.
Speaker 4 (31:09):
You know, yeah, Jamie is ras killer right.
Speaker 5 (31:12):
You know. All of those performances were stellar.
Speaker 4 (31:16):
But even like Michelle Williams when she took on Marilyn Monroe,
some of these are less about impression and more about essence.
I felt like they all embodied an essence of the person,
not trying to do a one to one impression. Because
Brando has such a unique and distinct way of speaking
and carrying himself, maybe one of the most impressioned individuals
(31:39):
of his era. I'm sure that it was sometimes difficult
to not want to slip into that impression, but I
felt like you really embodied an essence of him.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
Thank you. That was the objective. Really.
Speaker 5 (31:50):
There's lots of people do great impressions of him, and
that was the last thing I really wanted to do,
and it just seemed more organic to connect with the
similarities we shared as an on ramp. In terms of process.
I don't really think he was that much of a
method actor. I think he really liked improvisation, and I
(32:11):
think he liked being blindsided and kept off balance and
certainly not knowing his lines, which I could relate to
in some ways. I kind of like being a little loose,
you know, on those two, much to the chagrin of
some of my coaster as I imagine. However, sorry, however
the it was it to approach him, I had to
(32:39):
approach him as if and ask the question is, how
would Marlin do this?
Speaker 1 (32:42):
And that was.
Speaker 5 (32:46):
To not I don't think he'd give a heck, you
know what I mean. It was such an important undertaking
that I had to resist the reverence and the the
otherness of of simply, you know, worshiping at the temple
of Brando, as every actor does. So I had to
just do away with all that and just be the
(33:07):
guy in flow the way he does, you know what
I mean?
Speaker 4 (33:11):
Yeah, No, And that came across and even to me
one of the beautiful things about this portrayal of Brando.
And again I found myself when I was watching this movie,
I found myself just wanting to be in his presence.
It was a fun movie to watch. Whereas some of
these you know, biopics and look and sometimes they have
to tell the whole story of an individual and that
goes through dark and tumultuous times. What I loved about
(33:33):
this film it was actually an enjoyable experience to just
sit there and watch him in his you know, Tahiti
mansion and embodying the essence of that island, and even
seeing the poetry of the person when he says to
John Heater's character, when you say something to the effect
of the island is to kiss the lips of God
or something along those lines. The poetry of the person.
(33:54):
I just found out that I wanted to hang out
with him. I'm sure that you wanted to hang out
with this I did.
Speaker 5 (33:59):
Indeed, that was you know, It's my favorite takeaway from
people who see the film is, you know, we as
a producer of the project, I really wanted to you know,
provide it, and we collectively wanted to make an offering
that really differentiates from a lot of movies, which inevitably
are filled with levels of trauma or vengeance or familiar
tropes and structures right in any genre, this one just
(34:22):
floats along in such a refreshing way. It's almost like
a relief. You know, we want people to go back
to the cinema. September nineteenth. By the way, when we open,
please do go see it in cinema because the cinematography
is lovely. We shot in Tahiti on His Island, on
Morea and Papie Ede, and it's really, like you say,
it's like you go on vacation with this really funny,
(34:46):
slightly dysfunctional and quite functional family of friends and co workers,
and you feel like you went on holiday. And that's
really what we wanted to do was create an oasis
of sorts or a vacation, you know, cinemas as a
retreat for a minute, just to kind of just drop
(35:07):
the shoulders and ease the mind and learn stuff you
didn't really ever, you couldn't imagine went down while serving
up these incredibly familiar kind of sacred spaces like scenes
from The Godfather, scenes from Last Tango, interviews with Johnny
Carson and Cabot that we've you know, meticulously and painstakingly
(35:30):
recreated in order to earn this complete departure into seeing
the man in his absolutely most relaxed and humorous and
joyful self.
Speaker 4 (35:40):
Yeah, yeah, I love the intersects of Dick Cabot how
the movie starts off, and Johnny Carson. I mean, and
it's even great to have that Johnny Carson footage, some
of which his early sixties footage was erased and lost,
but that Brando interview lives on YouTube and I've seen
it several times as a big admirer of Johnny, and
I wanted to ask you this. The relationship that you
and John have, or your characters have in the film
(36:03):
is a unique relationship that an artist and an architect
have with each other, this bond to try to bring
a vision to life. And John I actually got to
spend some time with about a year ago. We were
backstage at an event, and all I wanted to ask
him about was this movie. We weren't talking about Napoleon Dynamite.
We're actually talking about Walton with Brando and The Phantom
of all things Basy. But there's a particular scene where
(36:27):
John heaters characters trying to get over on Marlon Brando
and play a practical joke on him, and then it
seems as though he gets him, but Brando's always a
step ahead, and it's kind of a beautiful metaphor to
what he was throughout the movie is always kind of
a step ahead of not just his friends in playing
practical jokes, but trying to innovate in islands and like
(36:50):
you said, trying to figure out how to power things
without water. Did you find him to be an innovator
when you were kind of researching and always a step
ahead of people?
Speaker 5 (37:01):
He was, you know, certainly mercurial, a trickster, a practical
joker like you know, and his family, who really loved
the film, you know, recognized that, oh my god, no
one's really seen that side of daddy, you know, is
the message we get.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
That was him, and that was you know, very reassuring
and emboldening. What blew me away was we shared a.
Speaker 5 (37:22):
Similar love of the sciences and leveraging the curious access
celebrity affords to either heads of state and captains of industry,
but really to scientists who might have unique solutions to problems.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
And that was just a thing I dug doing and would.
Speaker 5 (37:41):
Bring white paper to the un and slide, you know,
slide some answers through. It was just you know, an
interesting way to kind of apply. And then when I
learned that he was you know, speed dialing folks at NASA.
I work with some folks at JPL. I live in Pasadena,
work with some guys at Caltech. It's my happy place. Oddly,
(38:03):
I just really like being with engineers and being the
artist at the table. I had no idea this was
part of his mo and I thought, Okay, we're on
the right path here at least, and some of his
discoveries what he's spearheaded is being used today on the island.
I mean, he achieves his dream in such a unique
way where the Brando itself is this kind of living
(38:27):
lab where they invite other people to come and study
the processes of something called swack saltwater air conditioning, which
he coined, having you know, bringing cold.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
Water off of a reef through PBC.
Speaker 5 (38:40):
Pipes up to you know, villas and workers housing, you know,
without using a diesel engine.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
No one's ever done that. Attribute that to Marlon Brando.
Speaker 5 (38:49):
It's crazy, you know the fact that they do high
speed composting, that they turned they had no plastic on
the island and they turned glass bottles back into sand.
Came to reshure the title erosion on the beaches. It's
like the most insane and brilliant closed loop process that
we should all be following. I mean, it's really quite
(39:11):
brilliant how they find the balance there and honor the place,
and you know, the film fundamentally is a love letter
to Tihiti, to the people of Tahiti, and really to
Marlon Brando and to reclaim this incredible legacy for stuff
he's really not known for.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (39:26):
Yeah, And that's what I loved about the film is
I kind of felt like I learned more about who
he was as a person, not so much the caricature
that we know as Jo l or Vito Corleone or
what have you, what many people associate with him. There's
a particular moment in the film I wanted to ask
what your take was it when you read it in
the script. Was when there's the bee and he takes
(39:48):
to be off and puts it on his tongue and
the little girl thinks that, you know, he's eating the
bee or what have you, and then it floats away,
and that was the whole scene. What did that mean
to you about Brando? What do you think it says
about him?
Speaker 5 (39:58):
That stems from from two stories? So a lot of this,
you know, we ended up doing a lot of research
with some of his assistants and his family. While we
were developing the script further, Bill Fishman, the writer directed
at a tremendous job adapting a fairly sterile account based
on the memoirs by Bernard Judge, who John Heater plays
and turning it into a very appealing, almost comedic buddy picture.
(40:22):
And then we started going deeper into the stories through
the research and found that was a combination of two stories.
One that happened in a pool with a bee that
he put on his tongue. And the line that I
say they're hard workers comes from a friend of mine,
actress Leslie Bega, who grew up with his daughter Cheyenne,
and had witnessed a line of ants crawling over his
(40:45):
foot and continuing and she said to him, Marlin, there's
ants on your feet, like there's ants on your feet,
and he didn't want to move his foot.
Speaker 1 (40:52):
He said, well, they're hard workers, Like who am I
to interrupt their flow? That was just like that.
Speaker 5 (40:58):
I said, we have to put that in the movie.
And that little girl was actually my daughter Donavazzay who
plays who plays Sabrina John's daughter, which was Bill's idea
not mine to put her in. So I was very
grateful for that suggestion, and she did a tremendous job.
Speaker 4 (41:15):
Yeah, and it was a beautiful moment and a beautiful scene.
And what you just explained there, to me is also
comes through with what Brando says, even when he's talking
about acting, He's like, I'm a craftsman. I'm no different
than anybody else. This is a job everyone. It almost
looks like in his mind, in the ecosystem, in the world,
in Hollywood, wherever it might be, everybody has their job
(41:36):
to do. And I'm not bigger than any other active
nature or act of any other craft or what have you.
That definitely came through in the movie as well, which
I absolutely love. And to me too, John does such
a wonderful job in this movie. And I know you're
known for Blades of Glory, He's known for Napoleon Dynamite.
But there's something sometimes about a comic when they come
(41:57):
into a work that has a little bit more drama
into it. Did they know how to play that drama
almost sometimes better than your traditional dramatic actor.
Speaker 5 (42:07):
I agree completely. I think comedians make some of my
favorite you know, do some of my favorite work. And
in drama or like they they you have to understand
levels of tragedy to find true humor.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
I think Jim Carrey finds it.
Speaker 5 (42:21):
Kristin Wigg is one of my favorite actresses, dramatic or otherwise.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
Like what an improvisational genius. Anyone who's that quick.
Speaker 4 (42:29):
And on it.
Speaker 5 (42:31):
Is just you know, Bill Hater, you know, like you
look at these performances and you just go, they do
great work. And John found such nuance and a great onboard.
I just I really loved working with him. We had
such a great dynamic and we mind you know, something
(42:52):
that really happens in a funny kind of working relationship,
not not with the actors, but in the characters where
it's like that blur between our you're my employer, you're
my friend, you're my employer. How fickle that place can be. Yeah,
and how you know the proximity of genius is sometimes
you fancy you know, I'm the brando of architecture. He
(43:12):
probably thought got way over his skis, you.
Speaker 1 (43:15):
Know, completely ate it, you know, And it's these are these.
Speaker 5 (43:19):
Very subtle and human foibles that come with mixing those
extremes in a cocktail and giving it the space to
to blend and percolate and overpower it.
Speaker 1 (43:33):
That was really what was a lot of fun to
to explore and not just push plot, do you know
what I mean?
Speaker 5 (43:44):
Yeah, like drive a movie on character an objective. We
have a very clear objective. There is a there is
a hurdle or threat and time and money being it.
But the rest was just to kind of luxuriate in
the human condition and how it manages, which is somehow,
I think more familiar to all of our stories because
(44:04):
we're not all, you know, cracking codes and saving well
maybe you're saving the world in this movie.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
In a slow motion you know process. It's certainly not
Red Wire, Green Wire. But you know, although today we're
kind of at that level.
Speaker 5 (44:19):
The fact he end the foresight to see realize that
ticking bomb of climate change, yeah back then, and how
it really faced those atolls, they were the front lines
of rising sea levels, and you know, I just I
marvel at his foresight.
Speaker 4 (44:35):
You know, And what you just said, and I want
to be respectful of your time. So just a couple
more questions if you don't mind, but what you just
said in this movie, yes, there's obviously objective there's obviously plot,
there's obviously things to set up and further the scenes.
But there was a movie that popped in my head
when I was watching it, which was one of my favorites,
Once upon a Time in Hollywood with Quentin Tarantino. What
(44:56):
I love about that movie is it's not so much
of about plot as it is living with these characters
over this three day period and in your case, several
year period in this movie, but just it being around
them a hang It's almost a hang yeah way, and
that definitely comes through in this movie. Tahiti is such
an incredible character in the film too. But when we talk,
(45:18):
you mentioned Jim Carrey. One of my great favorite Jim
Carrey movies. One of his great performances is when he
portrayed Andy Kaufman and On the Moon incredible, incredible, and
the documentary about that movie is also equally incredible. Agreed,
talking to Andy Kaufman's daughter as Andy Kaufman and bringing
some sort of peace to her soul with her father.
But let me ask you this, do you feel that
(45:41):
after wrapping on this and being so intimately intertwined with
Brando that there is now a spirit or a bit
of his essence. That's kind of embedded into you in
a similar way that Jim had with Andy.
Speaker 1 (45:53):
I hope. So yeah.
Speaker 5 (45:54):
I mean, you know, it's a nice jacket to wear,
you know what I mean, that's comfortable leather.
Speaker 1 (45:59):
I don't want to give it back.
Speaker 4 (46:02):
Yes, I can see it too. My final thing, and again,
this movie is phenomenal. I really do appreciate your time.
One of my favorite movies I've seen this entire year.
And I'm not just saying that. I really enjoy the
film so much.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
Wow, thank you.
Speaker 4 (46:15):
If I can go back to the future for one
moment with you, yes, one can go back. Can we
go back forty years ago? Famously, that movie originally starred
Eric Stultz and then was reash Out with Michael J.
Speaker 1 (46:27):
Fox.
Speaker 4 (46:28):
But that was a huge film, the biggest movie of
that year. Young in your career. What did that movie
mean to you to be on that set and around
those people and to experience the Hollywood system of changing
a lead and reshooting and doing all that craziness.
Speaker 5 (46:42):
Rand I'm so glad you asked that. You know, I
came to Hollywood with I had a family of actors.
My parents run stage. My sister is an actress Lisa
singer songwriter as well, and actually scored a movie I
directed which is coming out after this called The Interior
Hallway Night.
Speaker 1 (46:58):
Look for that. I think you're gonna like that too.
Speaker 5 (47:03):
But I wanted to be a filmmaker growing up, and
I was crewing on commercials when I was sixteen, and
I wanted to go to film school, but it was
in my dna being an actor.
Speaker 1 (47:12):
It was part of my you know, it was a
go to. It was easy, and it was there genetically
or what have you.
Speaker 5 (47:19):
What I was exposed to in terms of the theater arts,
and there weren't a lot of young filmmakers.
Speaker 1 (47:26):
At that time.
Speaker 5 (47:27):
It was a guild system back in the eighties when
I started. So being an actor made sense to start
because it was such a big teen movement, a lot
of teen movies, and that was where I could probably
get to the ground zero between camera and director and
really observe and learn there as opposed to the mailroom
or you know, hall and stuff like you know, delivering
(47:51):
editing machines like I was in Chicago.
Speaker 1 (47:53):
So I entered as an actor.
Speaker 5 (47:57):
Luckily got this job after two weeks of being in Hollow,
which was insane and worked for over six months because
we got to do it twice. YEA, I got a
do over and I got to work with the great
Eric Stoltz, which I had the privilege of doing again
in Memphis bell an awesome actor and got to work
with him, and they got to work with Michael j
and that rest of that incredible cast. But it was
(48:19):
being on set at Universal Studios every day, driving on
a lot in a completely immersive nineteen fifties set, which
to me was synonymous with cinema, you know, like historic,
nostalgic and running around her in all the breaks, terrorizing
the tour buses and cruising around to you know, it
(48:42):
was a kid in a candy store and all of
us would we would just that was the best film
school you could ever ask for.
Speaker 4 (48:49):
It was, it was.
Speaker 5 (48:51):
It was an incredible It was a baptism by fire,
you know what I mean, Like it was you hit
the ground running. And I also observing on part two
when we came back, you know, watching Steven Spielberg and
Robertson Mechis and Dian Coudney like.
Speaker 1 (49:09):
Craft or.
Speaker 5 (49:12):
Explore and demonstrate these new tool sets like motion control,
robotic cameras the first time that was being demonstrated for them.
Speaker 1 (49:21):
I'm I'm sitting there watching.
Speaker 5 (49:23):
I'd go to set every time, even I wasn't filming,
I'd show up, use my past just to watch the
making of all of it to learn.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
And they were very generous about it.
Speaker 5 (49:31):
But it was that it was an complete, you know,
educational experience with the masters of the craft.
Speaker 4 (49:38):
With the masters of the craft. Well, I'm so glad
that I asked that question, and I really appreciate you
taking time today. I think that you're going to be
in my city, Houston soon, maybe for the movie. I
would love to come and shake your hand.
Speaker 5 (49:49):
If that's the case, I will buy you a cocktail
or beverage of choice, sir.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
It would be my pleasure, aigo.
Speaker 4 (49:55):
It would be my honor, mister Zay, and I really
do appreciate it. Congratulations on the film. Sensational in it.
The film is sensational and I hope the world goes
and sees it.
Speaker 1 (50:04):
Oh, I thank you, mister Gilmore.
God stop stop, Okay, black Shot, it's me.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
It's great, it's Martin.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
You can't be it's just such a back to the future.
Speaker 4 (00:12):
Oh, I know you did send me back to the future,
but I'm back. I'm back from the future.
Speaker 5 (00:21):
Wait, gosh, f are you're telling me that you built
the time machine.
Speaker 4 (00:32):
The way I see it?
Speaker 3 (00:33):
If you're gonna build a time machine out, why not
doing some style?
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Thanks too.
Speaker 4 (00:38):
I same the time that I really enjoyed this movie.
I'spect to talk to you.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Awesome, Thank you so much.
Speaker 4 (00:43):
Hey, you know, I don't know if you recall this
or not, but it's maybe a little over a year ago.
You were here in Houston for a comic Balus and
I got the moderate a panel for Napoleon Dynamite with
you and Ephron and I remember being backstage and the
one thing I wanted to talk to you about was
this movie. I was like, I can't wait to see
what waltson, what Brando's gonna be about. We talked about
kind of the production of it and things of that nature.
(01:04):
Now people are finally getting to see it, how does
it kind of make you feel that it's out there?
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Finally, finally it's out there.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
You know, with every independent film, you never know, like
you know, for at first, when I signed on to
do the movie, it was like during COVID and so like, wow,
is this movie ever gonna happen? Now, every single independent
film you never know. It is like are they gonna
get the funding and are they gonna get all their
ducks lined in a row?
Speaker 1 (01:31):
And then and then after you make.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
It, you're like, Okay, the people are like, when's it
coming out. I was like, I don't know, It's gonna
come out at some point. Hopefully it could take you know,
sometimes it takes years, sometimes it takes a few months.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
And so it's finally here. I'm glad. So I'm very
excited for people to see it.
Speaker 4 (01:48):
Well, you know what, and I mean this honestly. I
got to talk to Billy about the movie, and after
seeing it, it's it's one of my favorite films of
the year, just how the story, because you know, I
think Brando has he's got some weird mystique about him
where people think of him in a certain perspective, and
this really opens it up to the kind of fun
(02:09):
that Marlon Brando had with the practical jokes and the
interplay between him and Bernard and the movie it just
kind of, I don't know, it shines a light on
a different aspect of who I thought this guy was.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Yeah, you kind of have what I kind of dug about,
is like, here's an actor who's played some of the
most dramatic roles, and he probably had real drama in
his life. He had his house in la and there's
probably you know, drama and things going on in his life.
But this was like a chance to see from the
point of view of kind of an everyman my character
(02:42):
Bernard seeing this guy like in his comfort zone. Here
he is and not just comfort zone, his playground to heat.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
He bought this island because he.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
Fell in love with the with the culture, the people,
this country, and he goes and by his design and
it's just whenever he was into he's kind of just
I don't want to think about the stress of work.
I don't want to think about my jobs. I don't
want to think about being an actor. I just want
to be me and lay back and sip my ties
(03:14):
and hang out. And really it was kind of his way,
and so you get a much more looser version of
what we know as Brando played by Billy Zay, who
does an incredible job, but you know he's walking around
the film either half naked or in a sorong or
you know, just kind of doing whatever he wants because.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
He's like, this is my place.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
But he's like, I need to make this playground real.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
I need to make it, design it the way I
want it to be.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
And that's where my character comes in and he's like,
I need you to help me realize this.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
And which is a total job for Bernard.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Brando was extremely smart, but still he was kind of like,
I'm gonna let you take the reins.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
I need someone who knows what they're doing.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
So Bernard, you know, my character has to come in
and wants to have fun, but also I gotta get
this impossible task done.
Speaker 4 (04:08):
But what's fun about the interplay between Brando and Bernard
is there are times where Bernard thinks that he is
absolutely insane for trying to do the things that he
wants to do. But then we'll see these little spots
to where maybe it's actually a possibility, and Bernard's mind
kind of opens up to maybe I can make this
Zana do and it becomes just as much of a
passion for Bernard as it does for Brando, and this
(04:31):
beautiful friendship is formed.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
Yeah, one hundred percent.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
He is like at first kind of like all right, yeah,
I'm paid to do these kinds of jobs where I
have to make the uninhabitable habitable. But yeah, Brandos throws
them all kinds of you know, curveballs and like, wait,
are you serious? And at first he's like, I can't
tell this guy serious, and then he kind of just
(04:54):
starts like going for it, and just like you know what,
he may be serious or not, but yeah, he starts
to buying into it and like let's do this, and
he takes the reins and he You're.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Almost by the end, you're like, Bernardo, are you okay?
Like do you really know what you're doing?
Speaker 4 (05:12):
And you know. But what I also loved is there's
a scene where Bernard's character, you know, obviously played so
great by you. I really loved you in this movie,
and Billy's been obviously very complimentary of you as a
dramatic actor in this but there's a great comedic moment
to where Bernard wants to get back at Billy for
all kind of the high jinks and the pranks, and
he finally figures out I'm gonna really get him back
(05:32):
in this one and has the whole scene that you
have about telling the story and trying to scare him
or what have you, only for Brando to still have
the one up on Bernard at the end of it.
That seemed to be though a real fun scene to play.
Speaker 3 (05:47):
It was, and actually, in real life, you know, almost
every scene and every moment is taken straight from the book,
and that Bernard said happen, and that really was real.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
He loved to prank it.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
He wanted to get him back, and he knew I
don't know how apparent was, but it was like a
known fact that Brando was very superstitious and very scared
of ghosts.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
And things like that. So he tells that story.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
I think in real life though after he tells it,
Brando legitimately was scared and freaked out.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
And you know, in the movie we.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Turn it around pretty quickly like he pranks it back,
But in real life I think he was pretty he
was pretty shook by that experience.
Speaker 4 (06:32):
When you're there with Billy. I think that when you
do a biopick, especially if somebody as recognizable as Brando,
you have like the inclination to do impression, and it's
really easy to fall into impression and what somebody thinks
of this guy. I think, you know, when someone does,
for instance, a Seinfeld impression, it doesn't really sound like Seinfeld,
but it sounds like what you think he sounds like. Yeah,
in this one, though, I don't think Billy does as
(06:53):
much impression as it's like the essence of Brando and
kind of a more of a vibe than it is
a one to one one exactly sounding just alike if
you understand what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
You because he was.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
You know, there are certain scenes for sure that you know,
we portray in the film that are straight from The
Godfather or some of his famous scenes, and so yeah,
there's I think he's doing it, you know, a straight
up impression and kind of copying. But then you know,
most of the rest of the movie is taken from
undocumented moments in his life that really was at least
(07:30):
wasn't film documented.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
It was.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
There's pictures that we have from Bernard's book and things
like that, but it's all mostly at the word of
Bernard saying, yeah, you know, Brando said this, Brandon said that,
So I thought Billy did an incredible job of portraying
and kind of, you know, playing this character.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
There's an element of impression of doing an impression.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
Of him, but for the most part, you're right, he's
getting the vibe and he's playing with like I think
this is how he was, and it captures a book
pretty well well.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
And also, my favorite Tarantino film is Once Upon a Time.
And what I loved about Once upon a Time is
it felt like you were just hanging out with these characters.
It wasn't so much one plot driven, although it you know,
it had its elements in it, but it was just
a hang. It was a fun hang and that's what
this movie feels like in a similar sense of like
just seeing Brando and Bernard hang out bond through this
(08:22):
you know, singular project that they're working on, but it's
more so hanging out with buddies and just kind of
being the fly.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
On the wall. Yeah. Yeah, I mean that's what I
liked about it. It's a buddy film.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
You have like two polar opposites kind of coming from
different worlds and learning to uh work and lived together
and become one. It's funny because it was it takes
place exact same time as Once upon a Time in Hollywood,
where it's like nineteen's like spans from about like ear late.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Sixties to the mid seventies.
Speaker 3 (08:53):
But yeah, it was, uh, you know, it's what you
like about this kind of film. So, I mean, Billy
and I had to working relationship beforehand. We had worked
actually on another film just prior, but it was for
a short time. And so being able to now like, Okay,
this is Island Billy. This is Island Billy portraying Island Brando.
(09:16):
He's more relaxed, it is laid back, and that's what
it was. It was like we got to hang out
and play in Tahitian just like our characters.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
When we wouldn't be shooting, we'd go and we'd swim
with the sharks for real.
Speaker 4 (09:30):
I mean that it just had to be so much fun.
I'll end on this and again thank you so much
to taing the time. But Billy has made a lot
about you as an actor in this role. He felt
like this is something that really you sunk your teeth
into from a dramatic side, and there are a lot
of great dramatic scenes. Is that something that you want
to continue to formulate and what is that connectivity from
(09:52):
comedy to drama that works so well when a comedic
actor takes on a more dramatic part.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
Just look, you know, at each roll and just think,
can I do this? Will this be fun? Do I
like this character? Can I portray it? And that's really
kind of I don't have, like, you know, a quota
I'm trying to meet where I'm like, well, I got
to do a comedy, then a drama, then a horror.
Speaker 1 (10:17):
Then I got to go back and do this.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
I think every drama is a comedy to me, and
that you know, you're putting real people in sometimes crazy situations,
and you know it's just how much stress and horror,
how much how serious we take those moments that will
either make it a comedy or make it a drama.
But I mean, sometimes my favorite comedy is are essentially
(10:42):
just dramas with less stress.
Speaker 4 (10:45):
That's a really interesting way to put it. Well, you
know what, this movie, even though I had stressful moments
for Bernard, for sure, it was a fun ang to
be able to watch and just like again be on
a fly on the wall for it. It's one of
my favorite of the years. So congrats on the film
and thanks so much. Man, have to take the time
to talk to you again. Of course, thank you well
joining me right now. You've seen this actress in so
many projects over the years as you. Incredible talent, incredible singer,
(11:09):
and she's bringing it to us again with the new
film Waltzing with Brando Tia. Thank you so much for
joining the show.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Bret.
Speaker 4 (11:19):
Well, look, I want to jump right into this movie
because and I mean this honestly, I've gotten to talk
to Billy, I've gotten to talk to John. This is
one of my favorite movies of the entire year. I
just loved being able to vibe with this film. Now
it's coming out, the people can see it now. How
do you feel about it finally getting out there to
the public.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
I'm so excited because you know, you do these little
movies and you hope that it does well, you hope
that it gets a theatrical release. To see it on
the big screen and to see the beauty of Tahiti
and all of our great work, I couldn't be more pleased.
We have a big screening on Monday at the man
Chinese here in Los Angeles. The historic theater where they
(12:04):
have the hands and footprints in front. So it's great
to have you know, Billy up on the big screen
at the at the big historic theater. And I've seen
my big mug in one really funny scene, so I'm
very excited. I love this scene.
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Yeah, the scene. The scene is great. And I want
to talk about obviously Madame Lee Royan and everything that
you did in this movie. But but Tahiti itself. What
a beautiful backdrop for this film. And I think I
mean obviously getting to shoot there made it even more
impactful and brought that authenticity. Talk to me about Tahiti.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
It's it's like another character in the film. You know,
you can't double it double anyplace else. For Tahiti, it's pristine.
The air is sultry. It's you know, just the heaviness
of the air. As soon as you get off the plane,
it's like you're in an oven, but like a moist sensual.
(13:00):
I mean, say, these gorgeous I want to go back there.
You don't even understand how beautiful it is. And that
was just Papeete and they got to go to you know,
Texiao and and Morea, which is even further flung. It
was a gift getting to be there.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
Yeah, it's it is like another character in the movie.
It really is, and you feel the essence of the film.
And you know what, I think what's so great about
this movie is that one of my favorite Quentin Tarantino
films is Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and this
reminds me of that in the sense of similar time period,
but also you feel like you're hanging out with all
the characters and you're just a fly on the wall
(13:35):
in these few years of trying to build this incredible
Xana do that that Brando is trying to do, and
it just feels like a fun hangout movie at times.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Yeah, it's uh, and it's what it's as well. Versus
as I am in Hollywood history, I didn't know most
of this stuff. You know, we all knew that Brando,
you know, declined his Academy Award and sent Satcheing up
there to shine a light on Native American uh, you
know issues. But he was the first ecologically minded, you know,
(14:09):
a person in the Western world. And uh, he was
so visionary making sure that there was water and that
it was clean and that you know that the the
first Ego Eco Lodge and now it's a huge business,
multi billion dollar business. And he was the first guy
and everybody thought he was a crackpot. So I loved
learning about that and about how he was trying to
(14:30):
figure out clean water sources, which is nudge nudge wing
when we know the scene, and to see what he
went through at the same time as The Godfather and
and it's it's it. I think people film siniists, you know,
people that love film will want to watch this movie
just for that to understand more about the man and
the myth and and that timeline. It is. It was
(14:52):
fun hanging out in this era.
Speaker 4 (14:54):
Yeah, yeah, you're right, because I think I had this,
you know, preconception of who Marlon Brando was, because he's
such a great mad actor and you think of him
in The Godfather and Superman and you think about the
Academy Award moment, but you don't realize that he was
kind of just a fun guy at times. He was
just fun and Billy brings the fun out of love.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Beautiful women, yes, yes, beautiful Island women, yes.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
Well, you know he had he had just such a
fun essence about him, and I think that that's What
Billy brought more than anything, is just figuring out who
this guy was from a completely different perspective than I
think anybody's ever talked about him in mm hmm.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
Yeah, it's the charm and the you know, the wink
in his eyes. I mean. I got to work with
Brando on a little movie up in Montreal many years ago,
and he was a little he was a character, you know,
he was a you know, kind of trouble maker, had
a funny sense of humor to him. So it's love.
I love seeing that part of him in this film
through Billy.
Speaker 4 (15:55):
Well, talk about your relationship with Billy. Did y'all had
y'all worked together prior to this movie? How well did
y'all know one another?
Speaker 2 (16:02):
I'm known of for oh gosh, I don't know twenty
is it thirty years? Yeah, probably thirty years. But it's
we're both like actors that always, you know, we did
our stuff. We just kept working and we'd see each
other parties, and we knew each other socially and stuff
like that. But we had never worked together until this
And even now I still haven't work with him because
I worked with John Heater in my scene right, right,
So one of these days I'll work with Billy.
Speaker 4 (16:24):
But John, also, I feel like is so good in
this movie. This is maybe his best performance in several years,
and not saying that he hasn't done great work, but
this one he really brings it as Bernard, and it's
so fun to watch his character kind of try to
maneuver his way through the island of Tahiti.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
Well, and also it's just it's so wacky and zany,
all the stuff this poor guy had to deal with.
And it's true, it was like, if you think about
how wild and untouched Tahiti is now, think about when
these guys were doing their their you know, building, He
didn't know when he got off the plane who he
was dealing with. I mean, who's who? Is it true
what they're saying is, you know, how do I buy
(17:04):
this land? And it was it was a wild, wild West.
Speaker 4 (17:08):
Yeah, it was. And even even his first interaction with Brando,
he wasn't sure what kind of guy he was dealing
with because Brando was kind of a prankster. So it's
interesting to say that when you worked with him, you
kind of picked up on that sense of he was
a little bit of a troublemaker like to have some fun.
Did he Were you intimidated to be around him?
Speaker 2 (17:27):
Oh, certainly, I mean this is towards his later years,
and so he was he was. He was very large
and you know, unhealthy at that point, which was sad.
But I came on set and We're supposed to do
like a one page scene. I'm just an insurance adjuster
trying to give him his check. But he didn't give
me the paperwork that this was to give me, and
so we had this whole conversation with he goes, are
you an island girl? You look like an exotic? Are
(17:49):
you from Tahiti?
Speaker 4 (17:50):
Are you from what?
Speaker 2 (17:50):
I was like, what's going on here? I'm looking on
the other side, like the director like, okay, I'll just
stay improvising with him and see if it comes back
around to the dialogue in the scene that I memorized.
So we had this like a whole meandering, I don't know,
fifteen minute scene about what island I'm from, and that
his kids and his family and just so it got
(18:11):
cut from the film, but I had a blast. We
never got to the part where I give him the check.
He actually snatches the check out of my hand. He
sticks it in his shirt. He goes, now I have it.
How are you going to get it back? I'm like,
I don't know what to do?
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Well, you know, his unpredictability is another part of his charm,
right is you never know where we're going to get
from him, and you see that in this movie. Okay,
let me ask you this. More intimidating to work with
Brando or Connery?
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Brando definitely, because he's so well. Also because Sean Connery.
I got to be at a big table read with everybody,
Harvey Kaitel, Steve Bushami, the you know, Oscar nominee director,
all these amazing people, big room, Sean Connery, everybody's laughing, talking,
the doors open, been double doors open on the conference
(19:01):
room in walk Sean Connery and it looks around and
clash falls over the room. And then he says something
funny and then and everybody starts laughing, and then we
carried on. But it was, you know, that kind of
broke the eyes. I think he knows. Sean Connery knew
when he walked into a room that he comes in
with that legend energy and he has to he has
(19:22):
to just poke a hole in it. To release the tension.
So he was very very nice. I loved working with him.
Speaker 4 (19:28):
I'm sure, I'm sure he's got to work.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
With great Sean Connery.
Speaker 4 (19:31):
There he is, there, he is right there, Madame Leroy.
Talk about this. When you read this script and they
send it to you, it comes to you, however, however
it does and you read it, do you go immediately like, oh,
I'm all the way in. I want to do this
so bad.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
Oh yeah, with this one, definitely. And I also came
up with some other bits. That certain word that I
say in the scene. I added that in like, uh,
the mispronounce because I was reading it out loud, memorizing
the lines, and that pronunciation came out and I started
laughing because I thought it was hilarious. And I said
(20:09):
to the director, to Bill Fishman, I said, hey, is
it okay if I riff on this? And Bobby goes, yeah, yeah, sure,
And so I just go with it, and I was
cracking myself up. And I love that everybody loves it too,
because it was just one of those serendipitous moments where
you stumble upon something and it becomes comedy.
Speaker 4 (20:28):
Gold Well and it's got to be freeing as an
actress to have a director who just allows that freedom,
you know, especially in a film like this where you
can just kind of riff and have fun and see
where it goes.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
It made it much more naturalistic. And I'm sure Billy
and John did the same thing. Sometimes words you know,
written on a page, when you say them, it doesn't
feel real coming out of your mouth. So it's great
that Bill's open to that sort of reinterpretation in your
own voice. Uh So, I love that he was open
to collaboration because it's basically a one standalone scene. It
(21:04):
could be just drop it off, here's the funny, and
then you continue on with the story. So he was.
He was willing to go with it a little further
than it even started out, as we made it crazy.
And then I loved it. When I walked into the house,
you see, I walk in front of some horns, and
that was quite by accident. He's framing up the shot
(21:25):
and I walk in and I stand at this place
and he goes, oh my gosh, a little bit to
the left, a little bit to the right, Oh yeah, perfect,
right there, and then he goes, wait till you see this,
So like my accent with that word and then this,
you know, the horns coming up. It's hilarious.
Speaker 4 (21:41):
I'm sure you can't wait to see that at the
Chinese theater, like with a whole crowd, because it's it's
one of the memorable moments, stand out parts of the
film obviously, and people will see it when they see
it and understand.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
I come on up, Brad, come to La.
Speaker 4 (21:54):
You know what, if I can come with.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
You, I'll be there.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
I can get you on the list.
Speaker 4 (21:59):
Okay, that's in the same row. Okay, I love it. Now.
You've just had such an incredible year. I mean a
billion dollars with Lilo and Stitch.
Speaker 2 (22:07):
Crazy in like a month. A billion dollars in like
a month. That's how fast people went to it again
and again and ye because we're so hungry for joy,
We're so hungry for connection and family and good vibes
and nostalgia because I did the original cartoon twenty three
years ago, so people want to fill their hearts. It's
it's such a difficult and scary and sad and divisive time,
(22:30):
no matter what side of the aisle you're on, and
I feel like we just need to pull together and
just hug each other and love each other through anything
that comes up, you know. But maybe it's Polyannish of me,
but that's the way I see it.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
You know.
Speaker 4 (22:42):
Well, No, I think that you're right, And I think
Lelo and Stitch does that. I think the brand of
this movie does that too, because you you just you
fall in love with this man and just the way
that he thinks and the way that he acts, and
like you said, the scenery that you're chewing on is beautiful.
Lelo and Stitch, what's a beautiful movie. And also just
you know, putting Hawaiian culture, Polynesian culture, you know, showing Tahiti.
(23:06):
It feels like it's become a more mainstream than ever before,
especially with Moana and what Dwayne in the Rock than
they're doing with the live action version. It just seems
to be like mainstream story now.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
Yeah. I love that we're bringing like yiloha spirit to
Tahitian yourana to the world because it's good vibes. There's
a reason why people dream of paradise and they see
Hawaii or Tahiti in their minds to eye. And I
am so fortunate, so blessed, so happy that I got
(23:40):
to go to the Philippines like Cebu, the Island, you know,
Hawaii and Tahiti in the past. You know, a couple
of years working on these movies. I just have to
pinch myself and go, how do I get so lucky?
Forty one years later in the.
Speaker 6 (23:53):
Business, it's still going, still going, from that grocery store
in Hawaii to all the way here now? Still don't
And if you know what the Last Resort I know
is coming out. I think sometime next year, I believe,
is the name of the movie.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Yeah, at the Last Result with Dazy Ridley and Alden
Aaron rech It's gonna be great. It's a rom com
and I get to play another you know, eccentric character.
I love playing the eccentric characters. It's fun.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
You know.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
It's a crazy aunt, the crazy mom, the whatever.
Speaker 4 (24:22):
Now, I will say this, and you've been generous with
your time. Walterson with Brando is a phenomenal film. But
I got to end on this. When when is it
going to happen? When are we going to do it?
Can we write it together? I want Aurella Hunter reboot.
I want this show to come back so much. I
loved this show. It's a guilty not even a guilty pleasure.
(24:42):
It's a pleasure pleasure of mine. It's one of the
shows that I put on when I'm feeling down and
I just want to pick me up if I just
want to watch it and binge it. You and Sidney,
Fox and Nigel and all the adventures love this show,
and I feel like it's a prime time for Sidney
to come back. She's got a gang of younger relic hunters. Yeah,
why don't we make this happen? We should make this happen.
(25:04):
I love this show.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
I know. I think so too. I can reach out
to the producers in Germany and France. I really agree.
I think they tried to do with that show Librarian,
but it was not This had a joy to it
and the comic banter between Nigel and I. I think
it's hilarious. And we could also jump in and do
a relic hunt or two just for old times sake,
(25:27):
and it's like, oh my back, Oh I think I
stubbed my toe or I don't know whatever, you know,
I don't know by bresiitis or whatever. That would make
these funny jokes about all these things that are falling
apart on us, like don't you remember Sidney when we
used to do that. I'm like, yeah, I'm too tired.
Speaker 4 (25:46):
It would be great, but I feel like it's prime.
There's a lot of story that could be told with
Sidney Fox in twenty twenty five, twenty twenty six. I
would love to see it. But you know what, You've
been a good idea. You've been doing so much great work,
and I know you're going to continue to do it.
This movie is added to the great pantheon of your
career and it's really one of my favorite films of
the year. So thank you so much for taking the
(26:07):
time today.
Speaker 2 (26:08):
Thank you so much. My next step is writing, directing,
and producing this movie that I'm a starring in Hawaii.
It's a little small, indeed dramatic piece, and it's about time.
I've been doing this a long time, speaking other people's
words and telling other people's stories, and this is this
is an important story for me.
Speaker 4 (26:25):
And what is the story about.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
It's like the economic divide. It's like people that are
just falling off the bottom society in Hawaii and and
becoming homeless. It's not the feel good story of the
of the century, but it does turn around. It's it's
a really good, good script. So I'm looking for financing
out there, So tell everybody and wherever it.
Speaker 4 (26:45):
Is, Yeah, to spread the word. Yeah, I think that
would be amazing. Well, Tia again, thank you. Great to
speak to you as always, and I really appreciate your time.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
Thank you, Aloha and yao Runa, thanks.
Speaker 4 (27:00):
So much, dear, thank you, thank you so much. Have
a good one you two, bye bye bye all right.
Uh joining me right now is a man who I've
been a fan of for a very long time. I
followed his career throughout several projects. He actually holds a
distinction of being in two of my favorite ten favorite
films of all time, two of them on my top
ten list. And you know what, I think he just
(27:21):
added another one to it with Walton with Brando. He
is the one and only billy' zay and Billy, thank
you so much taking the time.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
Brad, thank you so much. What a pleasure. What were
those two? If I can let me try to guess,
go for it? Demon Knight?
Speaker 4 (27:33):
Demon Knight? Isn't there no no?
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Now? Interesting hold on the Phantom?
Speaker 4 (27:37):
The Phantom is one, yes, of course.
Speaker 5 (27:40):
And uh could be Zulander could be Titanic. I can't
quite tell.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
What Lander's on there.
Speaker 4 (27:45):
You know what Zuelander is on there? So is Back
to the Future what you're in as well?
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Oh my god, all right, so what were your two?
What were your two with?
Speaker 4 (27:52):
It was Back to the Future and The Phantom.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Without my prompting, those are fine films.
Speaker 4 (27:57):
Yes, you know what. I actually got to talk to
Simon Winsor, who direct to The Phantom, one time, and
he said it was a lovely experience, a beautiful film,
beautiful scenery that you all got to shoot in. And
he said you were always offset getting ready and getting
all pumped up before you had to be on camera.
Do you remember that?
Speaker 5 (28:12):
I do, because I didn't want to wear a muscle suit,
and boy, there was times I regretted that because I realized,
you know, it was a very unforgiving costume, nothing quite
to it, and it was about that big on a
hangar and nuts I got, you know, I thought, naturalist hero,
he needs to have Tarzan muscle, no rubber armor.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
That was tough.
Speaker 4 (28:34):
But you know what, that movie was so great and
your scenes would treat williams Or literally a treat to
watch the interplay between the two of you. He was
so charismatic and off the page in that movie.
Speaker 5 (28:46):
He was masterful, you know, on stage and screen. One
of my favorite actors. Rest his soul is beautiful man,
beautiful man, real real pleasure, real pleasure working with him.
Speaker 4 (28:57):
You Know. It's interesting to even bring up the Phantom,
because I think it kind of gets right into Waltzing
with Brando, because the Phantom, literally in the comic book pages,
had a duality about him, kit walker and then this
protector of a jungle. And when I was watching Waltzing
with Brando last night, loved the movie. By the way,
He's such a duality Debrando that I didn't I think
recognized before. He is this serious, great craftsman of an actor,
(29:19):
but also completely silly at times, a practical joker, a conservationist,
an environmentalist, a civil rights activist. There's a duality in
this guy.
Speaker 5 (29:29):
Wow, you're pretty good at this. You should host a show.
My goodness, what a great distillation. Now, he was certainly
full of complexities and contradictions, And what we really wanted
to do was kind of reclaim the legacy from the
trauma that befell him at the end of his life
and really shine a light on where he was just
the tip of the spear of activism. There were no
(29:51):
Hollywood activists at the time. The man really walked the
walk for civil rights, indigenous rights, and the little known
fact that he championed environmental rights as early as nineteen
sixty nine, that wasn't really a thing. You know, incredible
and a very a kind of an entertaining and fun
(30:12):
telling of his relationship with his architect while they're trying
to figure out how to you know, it's like these
interesting buddies trying to figure out how to bring power
and water to his island without fossil fuels at the time,
which was kind of unheard.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
It was pretty wild early solar and you know, yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:32):
And an innovator, you know, and just the idea of
his throwing ideas out there of like, hey, let's electric eels.
Let's see what can we do with electric heels. And
I love the moment in the film where there's the
eels in the pond and then you see the lights
start to flicker and John Heater's character almost looks off
like did he figure this out? Yeah, Brando really figure
it out. But you know, with movies like this, when
(30:54):
you portray such a well known figure. I go back
to wa Keane Phoenix as Johnny Cash, or you been
recently Austin Butler as Elvis.
Speaker 5 (31:03):
You can go to Jamie as you know. I mean,
that's the that's the bar right there, man.
Speaker 4 (31:09):
You know, yeah, Jamie is ras killer right.
Speaker 5 (31:12):
You know. All of those performances were stellar.
Speaker 4 (31:16):
But even like Michelle Williams when she took on Marilyn Monroe,
some of these are less about impression and more about essence.
I felt like they all embodied an essence of the person,
not trying to do a one to one impression. Because
Brando has such a unique and distinct way of speaking
and carrying himself, maybe one of the most impressioned individuals
(31:39):
of his era. I'm sure that it was sometimes difficult
to not want to slip into that impression, but I
felt like you really embodied an essence of him.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
Thank you. That was the objective. Really.
Speaker 5 (31:50):
There's lots of people do great impressions of him, and
that was the last thing I really wanted to do,
and it just seemed more organic to connect with the
similarities we shared as an on ramp. In terms of process.
I don't really think he was that much of a
method actor. I think he really liked improvisation, and I
(32:11):
think he liked being blindsided and kept off balance and
certainly not knowing his lines, which I could relate to
in some ways. I kind of like being a little loose,
you know, on those two, much to the chagrin of
some of my coaster as I imagine. However, sorry, however
the it was it to approach him, I had to
(32:39):
approach him as if and ask the question is, how
would Marlin do this?
Speaker 1 (32:42):
And that was.
Speaker 5 (32:46):
To not I don't think he'd give a heck, you
know what I mean. It was such an important undertaking
that I had to resist the reverence and the the
otherness of of simply, you know, worshiping at the temple
of Brando, as every actor does. So I had to
just do away with all that and just be the
(33:07):
guy in flow the way he does, you know what
I mean?
Speaker 4 (33:11):
Yeah, No, And that came across and even to me
one of the beautiful things about this portrayal of Brando.
And again I found myself when I was watching this movie,
I found myself just wanting to be in his presence.
It was a fun movie to watch. Whereas some of
these you know, biopics and look and sometimes they have
to tell the whole story of an individual and that
goes through dark and tumultuous times. What I loved about
(33:33):
this film it was actually an enjoyable experience to just
sit there and watch him in his you know, Tahiti
mansion and embodying the essence of that island, and even
seeing the poetry of the person when he says to
John Heater's character, when you say something to the effect
of the island is to kiss the lips of God
or something along those lines. The poetry of the person.
(33:54):
I just found out that I wanted to hang out
with him. I'm sure that you wanted to hang out
with this I did.
Speaker 5 (33:59):
Indeed, that was you know, It's my favorite takeaway from
people who see the film is, you know, we as
a producer of the project, I really wanted to you know,
provide it, and we collectively wanted to make an offering
that really differentiates from a lot of movies, which inevitably
are filled with levels of trauma or vengeance or familiar
tropes and structures right in any genre, this one just
(34:22):
floats along in such a refreshing way. It's almost like
a relief. You know, we want people to go back
to the cinema. September nineteenth. By the way, when we open,
please do go see it in cinema because the cinematography
is lovely. We shot in Tahiti on His Island, on
Morea and Papie Ede, and it's really, like you say,
it's like you go on vacation with this really funny,
(34:46):
slightly dysfunctional and quite functional family of friends and co workers,
and you feel like you went on holiday. And that's
really what we wanted to do was create an oasis
of sorts or a vacation, you know, cinemas as a
retreat for a minute, just to kind of just drop
(35:07):
the shoulders and ease the mind and learn stuff you
didn't really ever, you couldn't imagine went down while serving
up these incredibly familiar kind of sacred spaces like scenes
from The Godfather, scenes from Last Tango, interviews with Johnny
Carson and Cabot that we've you know, meticulously and painstakingly
(35:30):
recreated in order to earn this complete departure into seeing
the man in his absolutely most relaxed and humorous and
joyful self.
Speaker 4 (35:40):
Yeah, yeah, I love the intersects of Dick Cabot how
the movie starts off, and Johnny Carson. I mean, and
it's even great to have that Johnny Carson footage, some
of which his early sixties footage was erased and lost,
but that Brando interview lives on YouTube and I've seen
it several times as a big admirer of Johnny, and
I wanted to ask you this. The relationship that you
and John have, or your characters have in the film
(36:03):
is a unique relationship that an artist and an architect
have with each other, this bond to try to bring
a vision to life. And John I actually got to
spend some time with about a year ago. We were
backstage at an event, and all I wanted to ask
him about was this movie. We weren't talking about Napoleon Dynamite.
We're actually talking about Walton with Brando and The Phantom
of all things Basy. But there's a particular scene where
(36:27):
John heaters characters trying to get over on Marlon Brando
and play a practical joke on him, and then it
seems as though he gets him, but Brando's always a
step ahead, and it's kind of a beautiful metaphor to
what he was throughout the movie is always kind of
a step ahead of not just his friends in playing
practical jokes, but trying to innovate in islands and like
(36:50):
you said, trying to figure out how to power things
without water. Did you find him to be an innovator
when you were kind of researching and always a step
ahead of people?
Speaker 5 (37:01):
He was, you know, certainly mercurial, a trickster, a practical
joker like you know, and his family, who really loved
the film, you know, recognized that, oh my god, no
one's really seen that side of daddy, you know, is
the message we get.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
That was him, and that was you know, very reassuring
and emboldening. What blew me away was we shared a.
Speaker 5 (37:22):
Similar love of the sciences and leveraging the curious access
celebrity affords to either heads of state and captains of industry,
but really to scientists who might have unique solutions to problems.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
And that was just a thing I dug doing and would.
Speaker 5 (37:41):
Bring white paper to the un and slide, you know,
slide some answers through. It was just you know, an
interesting way to kind of apply. And then when I
learned that he was you know, speed dialing folks at NASA.
I work with some folks at JPL. I live in Pasadena,
work with some guys at Caltech. It's my happy place. Oddly,
(38:03):
I just really like being with engineers and being the
artist at the table. I had no idea this was
part of his mo and I thought, Okay, we're on
the right path here at least, and some of his
discoveries what he's spearheaded is being used today on the island.
I mean, he achieves his dream in such a unique
way where the Brando itself is this kind of living
(38:27):
lab where they invite other people to come and study
the processes of something called swack saltwater air conditioning, which
he coined, having you know, bringing cold.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
Water off of a reef through PBC.
Speaker 5 (38:40):
Pipes up to you know, villas and workers housing, you know,
without using a diesel engine.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
No one's ever done that. Attribute that to Marlon Brando.
Speaker 5 (38:49):
It's crazy, you know the fact that they do high
speed composting, that they turned they had no plastic on
the island and they turned glass bottles back into sand.
Came to reshure the title erosion on the beaches. It's
like the most insane and brilliant closed loop process that
we should all be following. I mean, it's really quite
(39:11):
brilliant how they find the balance there and honor the place,
and you know, the film fundamentally is a love letter
to Tihiti, to the people of Tahiti, and really to
Marlon Brando and to reclaim this incredible legacy for stuff
he's really not known for.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (39:26):
Yeah, And that's what I loved about the film is
I kind of felt like I learned more about who
he was as a person, not so much the caricature
that we know as Jo l or Vito Corleone or
what have you, what many people associate with him. There's
a particular moment in the film I wanted to ask
what your take was it when you read it in
the script. Was when there's the bee and he takes
(39:48):
to be off and puts it on his tongue and
the little girl thinks that, you know, he's eating the
bee or what have you, and then it floats away,
and that was the whole scene. What did that mean
to you about Brando? What do you think it says
about him?
Speaker 5 (39:58):
That stems from from two stories? So a lot of this,
you know, we ended up doing a lot of research
with some of his assistants and his family. While we
were developing the script further, Bill Fishman, the writer directed
at a tremendous job adapting a fairly sterile account based
on the memoirs by Bernard Judge, who John Heater plays
and turning it into a very appealing, almost comedic buddy picture.
(40:22):
And then we started going deeper into the stories through
the research and found that was a combination of two stories.
One that happened in a pool with a bee that
he put on his tongue. And the line that I
say they're hard workers comes from a friend of mine,
actress Leslie Bega, who grew up with his daughter Cheyenne,
and had witnessed a line of ants crawling over his
(40:45):
foot and continuing and she said to him, Marlin, there's
ants on your feet, like there's ants on your feet,
and he didn't want to move his foot.
Speaker 1 (40:52):
He said, well, they're hard workers, Like who am I
to interrupt their flow? That was just like that.
Speaker 5 (40:58):
I said, we have to put that in the movie.
And that little girl was actually my daughter Donavazzay who
plays who plays Sabrina John's daughter, which was Bill's idea
not mine to put her in. So I was very
grateful for that suggestion, and she did a tremendous job.
Speaker 4 (41:15):
Yeah, and it was a beautiful moment and a beautiful scene.
And what you just explained there, to me is also
comes through with what Brando says, even when he's talking
about acting, He's like, I'm a craftsman. I'm no different
than anybody else. This is a job everyone. It almost
looks like in his mind, in the ecosystem, in the world,
in Hollywood, wherever it might be, everybody has their job
(41:36):
to do. And I'm not bigger than any other active
nature or act of any other craft or what have you.
That definitely came through in the movie as well, which
I absolutely love. And to me too, John does such
a wonderful job in this movie. And I know you're
known for Blades of Glory, He's known for Napoleon Dynamite.
But there's something sometimes about a comic when they come
(41:57):
into a work that has a little bit more drama
into it. Did they know how to play that drama
almost sometimes better than your traditional dramatic actor.
Speaker 5 (42:07):
I agree completely. I think comedians make some of my
favorite you know, do some of my favorite work. And
in drama or like they they you have to understand
levels of tragedy to find true humor.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
I think Jim Carrey finds it.
Speaker 5 (42:21):
Kristin Wigg is one of my favorite actresses, dramatic or otherwise.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
Like what an improvisational genius. Anyone who's that quick.
Speaker 4 (42:29):
And on it.
Speaker 5 (42:31):
Is just you know, Bill Hater, you know, like you
look at these performances and you just go, they do
great work. And John found such nuance and a great onboard.
I just I really loved working with him. We had
such a great dynamic and we mind you know, something
(42:52):
that really happens in a funny kind of working relationship,
not not with the actors, but in the characters where
it's like that blur between our you're my employer, you're
my friend, you're my employer. How fickle that place can be. Yeah,
and how you know the proximity of genius is sometimes
you fancy you know, I'm the brando of architecture. He
(43:12):
probably thought got way over his skis, you.
Speaker 1 (43:15):
Know, completely ate it, you know, And it's these are these.
Speaker 5 (43:19):
Very subtle and human foibles that come with mixing those
extremes in a cocktail and giving it the space to
to blend and percolate and overpower it.
Speaker 1 (43:33):
That was really what was a lot of fun to
to explore and not just push plot, do you know
what I mean?
Speaker 5 (43:44):
Yeah, like drive a movie on character an objective. We
have a very clear objective. There is a there is
a hurdle or threat and time and money being it.
But the rest was just to kind of luxuriate in
the human condition and how it manages, which is somehow,
I think more familiar to all of our stories because
(44:04):
we're not all, you know, cracking codes and saving well
maybe you're saving the world in this movie.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
In a slow motion you know process. It's certainly not
Red Wire, Green Wire. But you know, although today we're
kind of at that level.
Speaker 5 (44:19):
The fact he end the foresight to see realize that
ticking bomb of climate change, yeah back then, and how
it really faced those atolls, they were the front lines
of rising sea levels, and you know, I just I
marvel at his foresight.
Speaker 4 (44:35):
You know, And what you just said, and I want
to be respectful of your time. So just a couple
more questions if you don't mind, but what you just
said in this movie, yes, there's obviously objective there's obviously plot,
there's obviously things to set up and further the scenes.
But there was a movie that popped in my head
when I was watching it, which was one of my favorites,
Once upon a Time in Hollywood with Quentin Tarantino. What
(44:56):
I love about that movie is it's not so much
of about plot as it is living with these characters
over this three day period and in your case, several
year period in this movie, but just it being around
them a hang It's almost a hang yeah way, and
that definitely comes through in this movie. Tahiti is such
an incredible character in the film too. But when we talk,
(45:18):
you mentioned Jim Carrey. One of my great favorite Jim
Carrey movies. One of his great performances is when he
portrayed Andy Kaufman and On the Moon incredible, incredible, and
the documentary about that movie is also equally incredible. Agreed,
talking to Andy Kaufman's daughter as Andy Kaufman and bringing
some sort of peace to her soul with her father.
But let me ask you this, do you feel that
(45:41):
after wrapping on this and being so intimately intertwined with
Brando that there is now a spirit or a bit
of his essence. That's kind of embedded into you in
a similar way that Jim had with Andy.
Speaker 1 (45:53):
I hope. So yeah.
Speaker 5 (45:54):
I mean, you know, it's a nice jacket to wear,
you know what I mean, that's comfortable leather.
Speaker 1 (45:59):
I don't want to give it back.
Speaker 4 (46:02):
Yes, I can see it too. My final thing, and again,
this movie is phenomenal. I really do appreciate your time.
One of my favorite movies I've seen this entire year.
And I'm not just saying that. I really enjoy the
film so much.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
Wow, thank you.
Speaker 4 (46:15):
If I can go back to the future for one
moment with you, yes, one can go back. Can we
go back forty years ago? Famously, that movie originally starred
Eric Stultz and then was reash Out with Michael J.
Speaker 1 (46:27):
Fox.
Speaker 4 (46:28):
But that was a huge film, the biggest movie of
that year. Young in your career. What did that movie
mean to you to be on that set and around
those people and to experience the Hollywood system of changing
a lead and reshooting and doing all that craziness.
Speaker 5 (46:42):
Rand I'm so glad you asked that. You know, I
came to Hollywood with I had a family of actors.
My parents run stage. My sister is an actress Lisa
singer songwriter as well, and actually scored a movie I
directed which is coming out after this called The Interior
Hallway Night.
Speaker 1 (46:58):
Look for that. I think you're gonna like that too.
Speaker 5 (47:03):
But I wanted to be a filmmaker growing up, and
I was crewing on commercials when I was sixteen, and
I wanted to go to film school, but it was
in my dna being an actor.
Speaker 1 (47:12):
It was part of my you know, it was a
go to. It was easy, and it was there genetically
or what have you.
Speaker 5 (47:19):
What I was exposed to in terms of the theater arts,
and there weren't a lot of young filmmakers.
Speaker 1 (47:26):
At that time.
Speaker 5 (47:27):
It was a guild system back in the eighties when
I started. So being an actor made sense to start
because it was such a big teen movement, a lot
of teen movies, and that was where I could probably
get to the ground zero between camera and director and
really observe and learn there as opposed to the mailroom
or you know, hall and stuff like you know, delivering
(47:51):
editing machines like I was in Chicago.
Speaker 1 (47:53):
So I entered as an actor.
Speaker 5 (47:57):
Luckily got this job after two weeks of being in Hollow,
which was insane and worked for over six months because
we got to do it twice. YEA, I got a
do over and I got to work with the great
Eric Stoltz, which I had the privilege of doing again
in Memphis bell an awesome actor and got to work
with him, and they got to work with Michael j
and that rest of that incredible cast. But it was
(48:19):
being on set at Universal Studios every day, driving on
a lot in a completely immersive nineteen fifties set, which
to me was synonymous with cinema, you know, like historic,
nostalgic and running around her in all the breaks, terrorizing
the tour buses and cruising around to you know, it
(48:42):
was a kid in a candy store and all of
us would we would just that was the best film
school you could ever ask for.
Speaker 4 (48:49):
It was, it was.
Speaker 5 (48:51):
It was an incredible It was a baptism by fire,
you know what I mean, Like it was you hit
the ground running. And I also observing on part two
when we came back, you know, watching Steven Spielberg and
Robertson Mechis and Dian Coudney like.
Speaker 1 (49:09):
Craft or.
Speaker 5 (49:12):
Explore and demonstrate these new tool sets like motion control,
robotic cameras the first time that was being demonstrated for them.
Speaker 1 (49:21):
I'm I'm sitting there watching.
Speaker 5 (49:23):
I'd go to set every time, even I wasn't filming,
I'd show up, use my past just to watch the
making of all of it to learn.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
And they were very generous about it.
Speaker 5 (49:31):
But it was that it was an complete, you know,
educational experience with the masters of the craft.
Speaker 4 (49:38):
With the masters of the craft. Well, I'm so glad
that I asked that question, and I really appreciate you
taking time today. I think that you're going to be
in my city, Houston soon, maybe for the movie. I
would love to come and shake your hand.
Speaker 5 (49:49):
If that's the case, I will buy you a cocktail
or beverage of choice, sir.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
It would be my pleasure, aigo.
Speaker 4 (49:55):
It would be my honor, mister Zay, and I really
do appreciate it. Congratulations on the film. Sensational in it.
The film is sensational and I hope the world goes
and sees it.
Speaker 1 (50:04):
Oh, I thank you, mister Gilmore.
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