Tom: Tonight’s first guest
This Sunday he stars in a brand new CBS movie,
Richard: It’s really good to be here. I’ve been watching you for a long time. Tom: Oh, you’re kind; you’re kind. I told you before we started, I’m one of the few that saw you and Mary Tyler Moore in “Holly Go Lightly”, based upon “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”, back in the sixties, a Broadway show, it went through Philadelphia on the way to Broadway. And, as you said to me, one of the toughest periods in your life, huh?
Richard: It was tough. When we were in Philadelphia and Boston, it was fun, I was having a good time, but, then we began to sense that the show was not what it should have been, and it got into re-writes and all that stuff, and we closed a couple of weeks. Edward Aulby took it over, and then, I didn’t have as much to do in his version which was a very heavy, very tense, dark show by that time and we played four previews in New York and the audiences hated it so much… Tom: Really? Richard: Well, he made it into a kind of Sondheim musical, I mean, very dark, and nobody was ready for that then. This was, what, nineteen…? Tom: Sixty-seven. Richard: Sixty-seven, yeah. And they just hooted us off the stage. It was heartbreaking. It’s the first experience of failure I ever had ‘cause I was so lucky with Kildare and everything…  Richard: …at the beginning of my career, that I didn’t know anything about failure and boy, that really… Tom: But it wasn’t your fault, my friend.
Richard: No, it wasn’t my fault. Tom: You know, you had a bad show and a bad book. And it was nowhere near as bad, when I was on radio I was talking with Darren McGravin, the actor, one night and an old Broadway player called up from New York. And McGavin had told stories of shows that he had done that were not successful. And this fellow said, he said,”You know, in my case, when the curtain went up for the second act on opening night, there was nobody there.” [Both Laugh]. So, four previews was the run of the century to him. Richard: Yeah, well, we were packed ‘cause in New York, the New Yorkers smell death. You know, they smell blood, and we were just packed to the rafters… Tom: I know. Richard: …for these dreadful shows. Oh, boy. Tom: I read a story, who’s the fellow who wrote for The Times, Frank Rich, in the NY Times… Richard: Yep. Tom: …said that closing night, an early closing for a musical is the biggest night on Broadway. Everybody comes because they know it’s never gonna be done again. Every song gets an encore. Richard (smiling): Yes, yes. Tom: Let me ask you about your military career. Richard(laughs): Ha, ha!
Tom: You spent some time in Korea, after the hostilities ended. Richard: Yes, I had a deferment for college, all through college, and then, of course, they draft you instantly when you get out, and I was sent to Korea after the war, thank god—I wouldn’t have lasted two minutes in a war. And if anybody was ever not suited for the military, it was me. I just didn’t, I had no idea of sports, I don’t know, I just didn’t know anything about that kind of stuff. And, I luckily was made a company clerk in Korea, but it was a very, very complicated job; a very hard job. But unfortunately, I have always suspected I’m just slightly dyslexic—that I don’t know my left from my right, so marching and all that stuff… Tom: Oh sure, column left, column right… Richard: I didn’t know what I was doing, but, I was a good clerk; I was a good company clerk. And my company commander wanted me to be promoted like, uh, as, suited my efforts.  Richard: Yeah, yeah, and the E5 is either a sargeant—it’s a rank—it’s either a staff sergeant or a clerical sort of thing. And the clericals had all been taken up, so, he made me a staff sergeant and it was pretty amazing… Tom: Oh, so now, you’re a boss. Richard: Yeah, so, now I’m kinda like a boss, and whenever we’d have a gathering, uh, they’d ask me to march troops and stuff back and I didn’t know how to do it. Y’know, “Column left…Harch!” and you’ve gotta say “Harch” on the correct foot… Tom: Right. Richard (smiling): …well, I didn’t know what the correct foot was, so, these guys would all be falling down laughing, and I was really embarrassed. I was not a great soldier. Tom: So, when you came home from military duty, how long before you began your acting? I know that your first job as an actor, you had a small part on ‘Gunsmoke’ as I recall. Richard: Yep, right. Tom: So, time home from military till you finally got your break in entertainment… Richard: Well, it was only about a year and a half; I was studying with Jeff Corey and I was studying with singing and dancing, and all this stuff that I thought I needed, and, um, I suddenly started getting some little parts in television—enough to pay my rent, which was sixty dollars a month… Tom: Oh, you’re kidding. Richard: Two bucks a day. I had an apartment at Western and Santa Monica, your most, famous, wonderful, glamorous area—ha! And, uh… Tom: Well I’ll bet back then it was a pretty good area. Richard: No, it wasn’t, it wasn’t, but it was fine; I loved it because I had my own place—it was fine with me. Um, but, I was making just enough to kinda get by, and then the Kildare thing came up. First, I did a pilot at MGM. Do you wanna hear how I got that?
Richard: A friend of mine in high school—actually it wasn’t a friend, it was just a vague acquaintance—was an executive at Warner’s; he became that while I was in the army, and he saw my picture in the players guide one day and thought,”Oh, I wonder what he’s like now” and called me in for an interview and they put me in a western pilot called ‘The Paradise Kid’. And I was the son of a rich western kind of rancher; got in a lot of trouble. Well, that was when westerns were just really on their way out… Tom: Beginning their descent, sure. Richard: Yeah, yeah. And it didn’t sell, but, when Kildare was being cast, about a year later, they pulled this old pilot out of the vaults, and said, “Hmm..maybe him”. Tom: Yeah. Richard: And they had been looking all over town and hadn’t found what they wanted, and, they decided, I was what, for some reason, I was what they wanted. Tom: Well, and at that point, when Kildare came along, as I read today, a man named Raymond Massey, the legendary actor, became very important in your career. I believe you had worked with him on an Alfred Hitchcock…  Tom: Right. Richard: And we got on great; we really liked each other, and he had approval—he was cast as Dr. Gillespie first—of whoever would play Dr. Kildare, and, so, because he knew me, he said, “Okay”. And that was really a great stroke of luck. Tom: Y’know, I never knew Raymond Massey, but I read about him, y’know, during his career…was he a tough guy? I don’t mean temperamental, but, I mean, was he demanding on himself, and demanding of fellow actors? A perfectionist. Richard: He was extremely demanding of himself because he had great pride in his acting, and—he was a wonderful actor. He was tough; if he didn’t like you, forget it… Tom: If he didn’t like you, he didn’t like you—right. Richard: If he didn’t like you…and his wife was the same way. She was one of the first female corporate lawyers in history. She did all his contracts and everything. He made a fortune on Kildare—I didn’t—he did. But, uh, if he didn’t like you…for instance, there was a technical advisor/doctor for a while—a female—and he didn’t like being told what to do by females, anyway… Tom: Oh, really? Richard: I don’t think so. And, he hated her and made her life absolute hell. We got on great. And I got on very well with Dorothy also, so, we were a kinda…it was a kind of second family for me. They were just wonderful to me. Tom: And Kildare had a good run—it ran five or six years as I recall… Richard: Five years, yes, five years. Tom: Top ten program, all through its run. And, then, from what I’ve read, you became friends with Massey, he would have you to his house for lunch, and you met Sir Cedric Hardwicke one day. Richard: Yeah, yeah. And people like Jack Hawkins, and people like that would come for lunch sometimes and he would invite me over. And I’d just sit there and listen to these great stories, like a little mouse in the corner. And Cedric Hardwicke looked up across the lunch table once and he said,”You know, the problem with you, is that you are a star before you know how to act”. Tom: Oh, dear. Richard: But, he meant it in a very kindly way—he was really saying, ‘Go get your basic training’, and I really took that to heart and shortly after that, went to England. Well, a year after, or two years after to, uh, get some experience in Rep. Tom: How tough is it, y’know, with Dr. Kildare, you’re the talk of the town, you’re the toast of television, then, all of a sudden, that series ends, and, for an actor, don’t you really have to start all over again? Richard: Yes, in a couple of ways. First of all, I was elated—I had gotten…five years of anything is a long time and I had gotten rather bored with the show, so, I was really happy when it was finished—for three weeks—and then I plunged into depression thinking,”My god, what am I gonna do”, y’know I don’t have my security blanket anymore. And there was the second problem of breaking away…You’ve been in peoples’ living rooms for five years and you’re a member of the family. Tom: That’s right. Richard: So, it’s like a black hole—the gravity is tremendous to stay the same, and I wanted to do all kinds of stuff. I wanted to work in the theatre, I wanted to do Shakespeare, I wanted to do everything…and so I had a hunch that if I went to England and sort of started over again, that that might be the thing to do. I thought I’d do Rep, I thought I’d do…all that stuff. Tom: And when you were Kildare, what about publicity and public stories and the press, and paparazzi, and…what was it like back then? I mean, we’ve gone through this episode with Princess Diana, and we’re now focusing on the behaviour of photographers. What was the publicity mill like back then?
Richard: Well, even in the early sixties, there was still a little class left. There was still some sense of good manners. There was still some sense of privacy. All that stuff, that civilized people, I think, really should pay attention to. It’s broken down now to the point where you’re just fair game for anything, for absolutely anything. Tom: But back then, would they make up stories? Richard: Back then, there were the fan magazines instead of the tabloids, there were fan magazines and they tended to be…more kind. But they were voracious for material, and I was working all the time—I didn’t have time to live this fascinating life they wanted to write about. So, we used to just make it up. There was one writer named Marcia Borie, and we used to sit, maybe a couple times a month over lunch at the MGM commissary, and make up stuff. Tom: Oh, really. Richard: Yeah, there was this one about this…when I was in the army, I was on R&R in Japan and I made up this…well, I actually did meet a very charming Japanese girl at that time, but we blossomed it into almost getting married and… Tom: Oh, a huge love affair, right?
Richard: Yeah, a huge love affair and meeting her family, and they hated me because I was a caucasion, and at that time, that wouldn’t have worked… Tom: And it was so difficult for Richard because he loved her so much. Richard: Yes, and I loved her so much and was heartbroken and all that stuff, yeah. |
