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00:00The End
00:30Hold on, T-Double.
01:00Hold on, T-Double.
01:30So long, T-Double.
01:32See ya.
01:34Take it easy.
01:36But take it.
01:38What's next?
01:40Now we can start strutting.
01:42One thing you gotta learn, kid.
01:44You gotta look and act like other people.
01:46You gotta look and act like other people.
01:48What's next?
01:50Now we can start strutting.
01:52One thing you gotta learn, kid.
01:54You gotta look and act like other people.
01:58Hell, when I first got to France
02:04and read
02:06the critiques of René,
02:08Godard, Truffaut,
02:10Romer,
02:12I didn't know who the hell they were talking about.
02:16But that's the way films should be.
02:18An artist should not moralize
02:20a person
02:22who has the audacity
02:24to make a film
02:26in the first place.
02:28He shouldn't ever consciously
02:30put his own neuroses on screen.
02:32Well, most of your heroes
02:34are pretty neurotic.
02:38My heroes are no more neurotic
02:40than the audience.
02:42Unless you can feel
02:44that a hero
02:46is just as fucked up as you are
02:48and that you would make the same mistakes
02:50you can have no satisfaction
02:54when he does commit
02:56a heroic act.
02:58Because then you can say,
03:00hell, I could have done that too.
03:02And that's the obligation of the filmmaker,
03:06of the theater worker
03:08to give a heightened sense of experience
03:10to the people
03:12who pay
03:14to come to see his work.
03:16from 1947 to 1962,
03:26Nicholas Ray directed some of the most richly
03:28personal work in American cinema.
03:30Yet in 1971,
03:32when he accepted a teaching post
03:34at Harper College in Binghamton, New York,
03:36he had not completed a film in nearly a decade.
03:38At Binghamton, Ray trained his students
03:40to be a working production unit,
03:42teaching them filmmaking
03:44by shooting a feature film
03:46as a collaborative creative effort
03:48under his supervision.
03:50Grow, not grow,
03:52the word didn't grow, but become us.
03:54You've just described it.
03:56All right, all right.
03:58All right, places, please.
04:00Places.
04:02Born age, take one.
04:04Action.
04:06Born in 1911,
04:08Nicholas Ray left his hometown
04:10of La Crosse, Wisconsin at 16
04:12to study under Frank Lloyd Wright.
04:14After a brief university career,
04:16Ray emigrated to New York City
04:18at the height of the Depression.
04:20There he became involved
04:22in the lively experimental theater
04:24of the 30s, working as an actor
04:26with such politically progressive groups
04:28as the Workers' Theater
04:30and the Federal Theater Project,
04:32which included the living newspaper.
04:34It was there that Ray learned
04:36the improvisational methods
04:38that he would employ in Hollywood
04:40and would still be using
04:42with his students in Binghamton
04:44more than 30 years later.
04:46It began on East 12th Street,
04:48not a few blocks from here.
04:50Led to my association
04:52with Kazan and Houseman,
04:54from whom I learned
04:56from whom I learned more
04:58than any other two people
05:00in the world.
05:02Of...
05:10I worked in a workers' theater.
05:14We graduated to Broadway.
05:16And somehow or other,
05:18one day Kazan said,
05:20come on, you've been spending enough time
05:22in radio, theater, television.
05:26I'm going out to Hollywood
05:27to make my first film.
05:30Come on along and help me.
05:36Houseman, same thing.
05:38I suppose I've collaborated
05:40with Houseman on more things
05:42than anybody else I've ever worked with.
05:44Nick had come to New York
05:47during the depths of the Depression
05:49when life was very strange,
05:52sort of rather desperate,
05:54and at the same time
05:56extremely hopeful
05:59and there was almost no limit
06:02to the dreams one could have
06:04because everything was so terrible
06:05that everything was dreams.
06:06Nick was himself
06:08a very vulnerable,
06:10very sensitive,
06:12almost too sensitive person
06:15in some ways,
06:16and in some ways
06:18very aggressive and assertive,
06:20in other ways extremely
06:22reticent and shy.
06:24And that combination is very good
06:26for a director with actors.
06:28particularly his real talent
06:31lay in what he could do
06:33with very young
06:34and tender
06:35and sensitive
06:36and insecure people
06:37like Cathy O'Donnell
06:39Farley Granger.
06:53Hello, hello.
06:54Do you do the marrying?
06:58That's my business.
06:59I have a $30 wedding
07:00which gives it completely
07:01according to the ceremony
07:02on records.
07:03I have a $20...
07:04What will you just marry us?
07:05That'll be $20.
07:06Tilly, Herman.
07:08Who are they?
07:09A sister and her husband.
07:11Witnesses.
07:12We have to have them?
07:13Oh, yeah.
07:14First you gotta sign your names.
07:16Over here.
07:18If you'll, uh,
07:25just sign the register.
07:27I'll rent your ring for a dollar,
07:37or sell you one for five.
07:40I'll buy one.
07:42Um...
07:43This one'll do it.
07:44Uh...
07:45This one will do it.
07:46Uh...
07:47Uh...
07:48Uh...
07:49Rent your ring for a dollar,
07:50or sell you one for five.
07:52I'll buy one.
07:53Uh...
07:54This one'll do it.
07:55Uh...
07:56This one'll do it.
07:57By virtue of the power vested in me,
07:59I can't afford this one.
08:00...
08:01Uh...
08:02...
08:03Uh...
08:04Uh...
08:05Uh...
08:06Uh...
08:07Uh...
08:08...
08:09Uh...
08:10Uh...
08:11Uh...
08:12Uh...
08:13Uh...
08:15Uh...
08:16Uh...
08:17Uh...
08:18Uh...
08:20Uh...
08:21Uh...
08:22Uh...
08:23Uh...
08:24Uh...
08:25Uh...
08:26in me, I hereby perform this wedding ceremony. Do you, Catherine, take this man, Arthur,
08:31as your lawful wedded husband, to love, honor, and cherish henceforth?
08:34I do.
08:35Do you, Arthur, take this woman, Catherine, as your lawful wedded wife, to love, honor,
08:39and cherish henceforth?
08:40I do.
08:41Well, put the ring on her finger.
08:47By virtue of the power vested in me, I now pronounce your husband and wife.
08:56Your tipper means a dollar.
09:05Wish all the health, happiness, and wealth in the world.
09:09Herman, you got a cold.
09:12I'm sorry, I have.
09:15That'll be twenty dollars, plus five for the ring.
09:18Of course.
09:24You don't think much of my way of marrying people, do you?
09:27I sure don't.
09:28Well, me neither.
09:29I'm giving folks what they want.
09:31My way of thinking, folks ought to have what they want.
09:34As long as they can pay for it.
09:37Nick has always made almost all his best pictures, actually,
09:40have been about people whom society was oppressing and society was crushing,
09:47and who were almost doomed to be defeated by society.
09:51Well, Nick himself is not altogether outside that category.
09:56In 1962, having become one of the highest paid American directors,
10:01Nicholas Ray dropped out of the film industry,
10:04plagued by personal problems and discouraged by the compromises of commercial movie making.
10:09For Ray, the sixties were a long, murky period,
10:13marred by a stream of unrealized projects and by failing health.
10:16In 1969, he returned to the United States after a ten-year absence
10:21to make a film about the Chicago conspiracy trial.
10:25What was it that captured your attention with the conspiracy trial?
10:30Well, it was the greatest circus of bigotry I'd ever heard,
10:35directed against young people who were the,
10:40now the 32 and 33-year-old equivalents of James Dean,
10:44who wrote pamphlets that were of such sophomoric and collegiate humor,
10:53like the stuff you write before homecoming games,
10:56which were taken seriously by the court.
10:59One day, Lee Weiner came to me and asked if I were a friend of Groucho Marx's,
11:07and I said, yes.
11:08He said, do you suppose we could get Groucho as an expert witness for us?
11:16And so we'll try.
11:18And he said, somebody has to explain our sense of humor,
11:26and he's the only man in the United States that we know of
11:29who can explain our sense of humor.
11:31And to see Dave Dellinger, the oldest of the group,
11:39and a Quaker pacifist,
11:46be the only one to put his body in front of Bobby Seale
11:51to protect him from the blows of the police.
11:54There's so many things.
11:59I'll make it someday.
12:01After we finish this one, maybe.
12:04And the next one.
12:09Hey, you bums! Look at them!
12:12Hey, look at that bunch of...
12:15Look at those magnificent bastards in there.
12:17Hey, get a shot of those cats in there.
12:18Well, I was talking to Howard Hughes.
12:22Oh, get in the window, you schmuck.
12:25Hey, get in the window.
12:27Yeah, yeah.
12:29And he says you're a bastard.
12:31I think you got your pancake on over there.
12:33He says you're a bastard.
12:35Nick came and virtually changed the whole cinema department,
12:39the whole idea of filmmaking.
12:41And I think he has a huge amount of insight into everybody
12:44he's known for a while.
12:47And he uses, he employs those insights
12:54for characters in a film, even.
12:58He's a con artist.
13:00And he knows how to manipulate people,
13:03if that's an acceptable word.
13:05But that's part of the talent of a director.
13:08He's always wanted to be cherished by young people.
13:12And he scorns his own generation,
13:16which has rejected him, apparently.
13:20And he just likes working with young people.
13:23As far as his role in the film,
13:25which is an essential part of the whole film,
13:28he's...
13:30as a character, I guess he's something like
13:33the parole officer in Rebel,
13:35always caring for young people.
13:37And he's been like a father to us and a counselor
13:41and a teacher at the same time.
13:43Ray's unconventional teaching methods
13:45demanded intensive involvement from his students,
13:48leading them to adopt a communal living arrangement
13:50that brought down continual harassment
13:52from conservative university authorities.
13:54Eventually, the group was forced to move to a farm
13:57just outside of town.
13:59Gradually, under Ray's direction,
14:01teacher and students alike
14:03attempted to develop an original approach to filmmaking
14:07that would express in a new way
14:10the process of self-discovery
14:12that has always been one of Nick Ray's central themes.
14:15Look, I like this quality on...
14:17I like this quality on here
14:19better than I like the correction one.
14:21Which one is that?
14:23The overexposed one.
14:25Why do you like that one better?
14:27Because I like it better.
14:28I like it better.
14:32Look, this is dull.
14:34One of the many aesthetic characters in the world.
14:37Look at this.
14:38I know what shot it is.
14:40I know what shot it is.
14:41Well, this is dull as hell, you know?
14:44How did Bogart take to playing the part of the writer
14:48in In a Lonely Place, which is rather a departure for him?
14:50Well, I had taken the gun away from his hand for the first time
14:56and knocked on any door.
14:59And the second time,
15:04he was ready for it.
15:08A little bit more ready for it.
15:09And he obviously loved it.
15:14It's one of his favorite films.
15:16But it was a very personal story.
15:20A very personal story.
15:24The last part of it,
15:27I had written with Andrew Solt
15:29and Bundy and Solt had headed east.
15:40In the meantime, I had separated from my wife, Gloria Graham,
15:44who was playing opposite Bogey.
15:49And if I had let the producer Bobby Lord or Bogey know that,
15:53you know, they would have gone crazy.
15:56Or Harry Cohn would have gone crazy.
15:58And so I said,
16:00Well, look, I'm having trouble with the third act.
16:02Make an apartment for me out of a couple dressing rooms.
16:07Because I don't want to drive to Malibu every night.
16:10And I want to get down and get on stage and work at night.
16:19Which I did.
16:20And Gloria behaved beautifully.
16:21Nobody knew that we were separated.
16:24And...
16:28I just couldn't believe the ending that Bundy and I had written.
16:32I shot it because it was my obligation to do it.
16:36Then I kicked everybody off stage except Bogart, Art Smith, and Gloria.
16:41And we improvised the ending as it is now.
16:45The original ending we had written so that it was all tied up
16:48into a very neat package of Frank Lovejoy coming in and arresting him
16:54as he was writing the last lines, having killed Gloria.
16:58And I said, What shit?
17:00I can't.
17:01I can't do it.
17:02I just can't do it.
17:04Romances don't have to end that way.
17:07Marriages don't have to end that way.
17:09They don't have to end in violence, for Christ's sake, you know.
17:12And let the audience find out and make up its own mind about
17:18what's going to happen to Bogie when he goes outside of the apartment area.
17:26Which was the first apartment I lived in in Hollywood, by the way.
17:28This was a very personal film.
17:36Bogart plays a neurotic screenwriter with a violent temper
17:40who was unjustly suspected of murder.
17:42The police investigation places an intolerable strain
17:45on his relationship with Gloria Graham.
17:49Right there.
17:51The moment we see them together and talking,
17:53right after my rap for the detective.
17:54Working within the studio system, Ray, like other directors,
18:00often had to relinquish control of a picture
18:02at the vital stage of editing.
18:07Can we mix the speaker over this?
18:09Right.
18:10Which take is this?
18:25This is like take four or something.
18:27Listen to take six.
18:29If there is one.
18:30Yes.
18:32And also, I want to put back in, because in seeing the
18:37the assembly in Boston,
18:40it struck me that we have no resolution to this at all.
18:46And we must have that jump, that jump of Leslie into Doug's arms.
18:51Pull it out.
18:53Why don't you do the tape of them?
18:55Oh yeah.
18:57How did you approach your cutting in Hollywood?
19:00But I would cut every night after shooting.
19:03As you want.
19:05I'll usually have a rough cut in the film within a week after I finish.
19:08But this is different, this is a method of teaching.
19:21That we have come out of the film is, we hope, a very lucky accident.
19:27Now, crescendo, right from here.
19:38Before that.
19:39This part comes in before that.
19:41Now, let's listen to another take if you can.
19:44Okay.
19:46Because I have one which is almost on the nose.
19:49Crescendo begins while we're on their backs.
19:52While we're on their backs.
19:53Right, right there.
19:54I'll cut two bars, I think that will, uh...
19:57No, the two bars will bring you into the la-la-la-la.
20:00How have you organized your students' work on this production?
20:03Following a rotation system with somebody being on one sequence,
20:08somebody else being on another sequence.
20:11And finding that a person who may be emotionally involved in one sequence
20:20may not be doing as good an editing job as somebody else might do.
20:24Take him off, put him onto something else.
20:28Do you find you...
20:29Can you get a consistent rhythm to the picture with...
20:31That's my final job.
20:34Everything that goes through here now goes through me.
20:41Finally, there can only be the...
20:44Finally, there must be the director.
20:46Whenever you're ready, Luke.
20:47Yeah, okay.
20:4816, you're ready.
20:50Turn up the lights, please.
20:51When the young French critics first began to develop the auteur theory,
20:55the concept of the director as the central creative force in the making of a film was a new one.
21:00No other American director attracted more sustained enthusiasm
21:03from Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, and their colleagues than Nicolas Ray.
21:08I think what attracted us was that there was something European for this man in Hollywood, in fact.
21:16And what there was European?
21:17It was perhaps the fragility, the vulnerability of the main characters.
21:21Even though they were working with some vedettes like John Wayne or Fred Bogart,
21:27these masculine characters were not macho or Sterling Hayden.
21:32There was this great sensitivity.
21:35And especially in the treatment, I must say, of the sentimental stories
21:40that gave an impression of a very large reality.
21:42At an age where the cinema of Hollywood was not easily personal or autobiographical,
21:46we always had the impression that the stories of love in the films of Nicolas Ray were real.
21:58I've said once, and I'm ready to say today,
22:01I've said once, that a film like Johnny Guitar
22:05has more importance in my life than that of Nicolas Ray.
22:08It's a film for which I was taken care of since I saw it.
22:11But I was criticized when I saw it.
22:13And I wrote it, and I wrote it, and I wrote it, and I wrote it,
22:17and we started it like that, like that, a correspondence with Nicolas Ray.
22:20But I talked about it about Johnny Guitar,
22:22which is a film, actually,
22:23which has a very great importance in my life.
22:25I don't know why, because I found it very strong, very profound,
22:29on the relations of women and women.
22:32And I think that it's the only film,
22:34it's the only film in which I've seen traiter a theme
22:38which is very interesting, in a certain stage of relationships,
22:40which is the friendship.
22:42The friendship of people who loved themselves,
22:44who don't like themselves, who see themselves again.
22:46And I think that no film has treated it as well as Johnny Guitar.
22:49As their concept of the film evolved,
23:05Ray and his students continually revised their scenario,
23:08endlessly reshooting sequences.
23:12By this time, they've been working together for nearly two years.
23:14As the project's shortage of funds grew critical,
23:28production would cease intermittently for want of cash to buy film stock.
23:32Ray fell ill that winter, and suffered from bouts of despair.
23:35The company would work when it could, from noon throughout the night until dawn in bitter cold,
23:54functioning on a few hours sleep, snatched between takes.
23:59Action!
24:00I don't think that I could have gotten, or I could ever get such a good acting teacher.
24:11I think he's the greatest teacher of acting in the world.
24:15I'm really excited by that.
24:17And the reason that I still work on the film,
24:20because I've wanted to leave, you know, now for, since May,
24:24is because, um, this relationship that I have with Nick is still very exciting.
24:32The energy is still very high.
24:37You don't even take time with me anymore.
24:39Play your part or else get your ass off the set.
24:42My concentration is on him in this angle, and I don't want your personal hostility,
24:47or whatever the hell you are feeling to take a part in the film.
24:53At this point, not at all.
24:56Not at all, at all, at all, Leslie.
25:07My personal hostility is not involved in the film.
25:10It's not involved when I walk from there to there.
25:13So I don't know what you're talking about.
25:15Well, then, honey, you haven't learned anything about acting.
25:20If that's, if that's, you know, your judgment.
25:23Right.
25:24Keep it.
25:27But I remain immune to it.
25:29If I know what I know.
25:31You sure know your immunity, you know.
25:34Yes.
25:36I, I will not try to convince you.
25:40I will not try to convince you.
25:43All you, all you can do is just cut ass out.
25:50If I waited for you four hours tonight, that meant that I didn't wait for you.
25:52You didn't wait for me for four hours.
25:53I did fucking two.
25:55I beg your pardon.
25:57I beg your pardon.
25:58Tell me when you waited for four hours for me.
26:04From 8.15 till 12.
26:068.15 you called?
26:07That's right.
26:09Who did you talk to?
26:11Judy.
26:12So how did you wait for me?
26:16Because she's part of the crew.
26:18I thought there's some kind of communication.
26:30We waited for you, for Christ's sake.
26:32Well, how was I going to get over here?
26:35Somebody was going to come after you when you called.
26:37But they didn't.
26:38And I called and no one came.
26:39And you were going on to campus.
26:40I was not.
26:41You said, don't go on campus.
26:43I did not go on campus.
26:45Because then it would take even an hour.
26:47You're talking bullshit.
26:48I am not.
26:49You're talking petty bullshit.
26:51I am not.
26:52Four hours is a lot of time.
26:53You want to talk about the part?
26:54I'll talk about the part.
26:56I will not talk about petty bullshit.
26:57It's not petty bullshit.
26:58It's a matter of time.
26:59That's all.
27:02And if time is of the essence in this film,
27:04then it's not petty.
27:16Do you have any questions about this?
27:18No, I just went from there to there.
27:29So, I'm not sure.
27:30Yeah.
27:32That's the actual same film but it is.
27:36For what you feel.
27:37Alright.
27:39Alright.
27:40Even the reluctant.
27:44Yeah.
27:45Let her walk.
27:46I don't want to...
27:47Alright?
27:48I don't want to feel any kind of reluctant at all.
27:50You should.
27:52You should.
27:55It's for the scene.
27:57Because you want to do that thing for him.
28:01To show him.
28:04So it's with reluctance you give them to her.
28:07And that is, this is the only moment of heroic action in the film.
28:15All right, ready for picture, please.
28:19Ready.
28:20That's okay.
28:22Roll them.
28:23Sound on.
28:24Camera on.
28:24Speed.
28:25Action.
28:33All right, now.
28:35Turn that way again.
28:49Sorry.
28:50I like this very much.
28:58I just want to see the other kind of graciousness coming to you.
29:03I want to extend the moment a little longer.
29:14Because what may take a moment or just a second in the thought is the kind of miracle we film where you can extend that thought into 30 seconds, 40 seconds.
29:36Now we want to extend it to eight seconds.
29:39Now we want to extend it to eight seconds.
29:48The move was good.
29:50So I think it's the move first.
29:51All right.
29:52All right.
29:52All right.
29:58So I think it's the move first and then the...
30:01Okay, darling, you...
30:02Okay, darling.
30:03You do it.
30:05You do it.
30:16Leslie!
30:17Ah.
30:19Wonderful.
30:21Thanks.
30:21I try not to direct them until just before the scene, which is part of what the hassle was about last night.
30:28But when a person has the stink of the gallows about her, then you're bound to run into the same thing that you might run into with a Tallulah bank head or a...
30:46Well, hell, I've only had two fights with actors in my life, really.
30:56And you use what is of their essence at the moment.
31:03Because that is their easiest reference point.
31:06And you have to be aware of that and how to agitate it, how to make it work for you in the scene.
31:14And what their immediate concern is.
31:18He showed me, about a year ago, little bits of the Bingham film.
31:22And some of them were...
31:23I couldn't tell what the whole film was like at all.
31:25I mean, there wasn't enough of it.
31:26But I saw a couple of sequences that were quite amazing.
31:30And really reminded me of Nick's kind of talent, which he was showing in the days when he was making Rebel Without a Cause.
31:40And those extremely passionate and vital pictures about the young.
31:47How did you get the part in Rebel?
31:48Well, Nick made a lot of tests of different girls.
31:54I think there were about 50 of us.
31:56And it sort of narrowed down.
31:57There were 50 to begin with.
31:58And the second day, it was down to 10.
32:00And the third day, I think, it was down to 5 or 6.
32:04But the big problem was that I had really, up to that point, only played children.
32:09And although I was 15, the last thing I did was in pigtails or something.
32:13And so I was finding it difficult to convince.
32:16And Nick was also finding it difficult to convince the studio that I was out of pigtails.
32:20So one day, I came on an interview with a boyfriend who had a cut on his face.
32:25And Nick said, where did he get that?
32:28And I said, drag racing.
32:30And then shortly afterward, I was actually in a bad car accident with Dennis Hopper,
32:36in which Dennis was driving too fast.
32:38We were all thrown from the car and brought to the hospital.
32:41And I was sort of semi-conscious.
32:44And the police were called.
32:46And they were asking me my parents' phone number.
32:49And I kept saying, it's Nick Ray.
32:51Call Nick Ray.
32:52And the number is, so forth and so forth, the number of the Chateau Marmont.
32:55And I just kept repeating that.
32:57And so that's who they did call.
32:58And Nick sent his doctor down to the hospital.
33:01And then he came down.
33:02And I said, Nick, they called me a goddamn juvenile delinquent.
33:05Now do I get the part.
33:07And you got it.
33:07And I got it.
33:09No director that I'd ever worked with had ever improvised.
33:13And Nick's bungalow at the Chateau Marmont, where he lived, was the, the set was built from that.
33:23So that when we rehearsed, we really rehearsed as though in a set.
33:26And we improvised most of the scenes.
33:28Could you tell us something about the relationship between Nick Ray and Jimmy Dean?
33:36Well, they obviously had become very close.
33:39Because before the film started, they sort of hung around together.
33:42And as you mentioned, went to New York.
33:44And so that Jimmy trusted Nick a great deal.
33:47And I think Nick was very fatherly towards Jimmy.
33:52I mean, he was to Sal and to myself as well.
33:54But I think Nick just absolutely understood Jimmy.
33:59They were just completely in tune and personality.
34:02I guess maybe Jimmy reminded Nick of himself a great deal.
34:06So that there was never any friction as there was between Jimmy and other directors that he worked with.
34:11And it was just a wonderful blend.
34:15And Nick brought out this feeling of trust in Jimmy.
34:18But working with Jimmy was...
34:20You know, like a real, real joy.
34:28But I had the advantage of his having worked with Kazan.
34:37And where he at least had a method of beginning.
34:44I developed the method a little bit more.
34:49Because Kazan and I had matriculated at about the same time in the theater.
34:55And he had taught me a lot.
34:58I think I'm...
35:00I think the nicest thing Gaj ever said to me was...
35:03How did you get that spontaneous performance out of Jimmy?
35:08But method changes with damn near every actor.
35:11And I honored his imagination more than almost anything else.
35:17Dean was the only one in the cast who had any real comprehension of method or of the school of theater in which I had grown up.
35:25And you couldn't use the word improvise.
35:35If you used the word improvise with people like Anduran or Jim Backus or Virginia Brissac,
35:44They'd say, oh, this, oh, this artsy school, hmm?
35:51And, and, uh...
35:54So you'd...
35:56I'd use old vaudevillian terms.
35:58The director has to be able to work with everybody from every...
36:02Every school, you know?
36:05No cast is ever made up of really the same people, the same background.
36:12So you have to use all the techniques you've ever learned,
36:17whether it's what you've learned from a vaudevillian or from an old leading man like Fuller Mellish
36:23who came over with Henry Irving and Minnie Madden Fisk or, or, uh, burlesque people like Red Buttons or, or, uh, Phil Silvers or, uh, uh...
36:39Or from miners or shrimp fishermen or, uh...
36:44Or your own peers as you grow up in the theater.
36:53It's, uh, a Cary Grant, for instance, is a,
36:56as a fellow like Duke Ellington has in, in his trunk
37:03so many tunes.
37:06Well, Cary Grant has so many notes of sunsets,
37:11so many jokes,
37:12so many things that he's collected
37:14and remained collecting every single year of his life, you know?
37:18That, that, his, his, his memory, his effective memory
37:22is always implemented by
37:25an, uh, an easy reference, you know?
37:29He has them in the trunk.
37:31He doesn't have to refer to them because
37:32the compartments of the brain have them,
37:35but having written them down, having noted them,
37:37having taken the, the, uh, the visual memory of, like, that tree
37:45between those two little shacks there
37:48being something which he
37:51might remember in the scene
37:54say, why don't we use that?
37:59After Rebel Without a Cause,
38:01Nicholas Ray continued to produce some extraordinary work.
38:04Although he was one of Hollywood's most respected directors,
38:07Ray still suffered studio interference
38:09that baudelarized his conception on several films
38:12and he began to work abroad.
38:14Thereafter, he drifted from one project to another
38:16through the Byzantine complications
38:18of independent production
38:19and multinational financing.
38:22Compromises were still required,
38:24but Ray did enjoy a measure of autonomy
38:26beyond that generally accorded him in Hollywood.
38:29Then, in 1960,
38:31he was drawn into the world
38:33of blockbuster spectacles.
38:35Although he brought his immense visual talent
38:37and some original conceptions
38:38to the rather inflated material,
38:41Nicholas Ray seemed glaringly out of place
38:43overseeing the massive technology
38:45and impersonal logistics
38:47of a king of kings
38:49or a 55 days at Peking.
38:51Uh, why did he get discouraged?
38:54Uh, this is the terrible evil,
38:56I think, of the Hollywood system.
38:58I think you, uh, end up,
39:01because you do get screwed occasionally
39:03by studios,
39:04you do get frustrated,
39:06uh, they do mess up your work
39:08and make it more difficult for you to work
39:10or they did in those days
39:11when the studios really existed.
39:12They don't really exist anymore
39:14in that sense.
39:15Um, I think Nick, uh,
39:17was probably much more vulnerable
39:19than other people.
39:20Everybody has this,
39:21but whereas a man like Kazan,
39:23uh, was able,
39:24who's tough as nails,
39:26was able to take it in stride,
39:27I think Nick finally was, uh,
39:30partially destroyed by it
39:31and became almost perverse
39:33in his, uh,
39:35in his resistance,
39:36in his, uh, uh,
39:38almost being prepared
39:39to be screwed
39:40before, uh,
39:42anticipating the screwings
39:43before they actually occurred.
39:45Now that is not rare.
39:46That happens to many directors
39:49and many people
39:49who work in the business.
39:51It affected Nick
39:51more than other people.
39:53Most, uh,
39:55film courses
39:56or film classes
39:57um,
40:00uh,
40:01concentrate on,
40:03you know,
40:06getting rid of the responsibilities
40:08of the students
40:09as quickly as possible
40:10by putting them off
40:11in corners
40:11and shooting 8mm films
40:13which they can do
40:15all by themselves
40:15and, uh,
40:19present for a senior thesis.
40:21Therefore the emphasis
40:23is on a kind of static camera
40:25with a, uh,
40:29with cute ideas
40:32or masturbatory ideas
40:33or date-making ideas
40:36or anything except the, uh,
40:40relationship with other human beings.
40:43And film is a collective art.
40:46It's an eclectic art.
40:47It's a collective art.
40:49And, uh,
40:50and it's
40:53of,
40:56by its own nature
40:57become the most
40:57communicative art
40:59that we have in the world.
41:02And the only two
41:03great ambassadors
41:04we've ever had
41:05from the United States
41:06have been jazz and film.
41:09And
41:10that doesn't come
41:11from sitting off
41:12in a corner.
41:12For all his hardships,
41:24Nicholas Ray remains
41:25both intransigent
41:26and optimistic,
41:27facing an uncertain future
41:28determined to make films
41:30in his own way.
41:32In a sense,
41:33each project he undertakes
41:34might be likened
41:35to the blind run
41:36in Rebel Without a Cause
41:37as a slightly mad test
41:39of courage
41:39that leads him up to
41:41and perhaps over
41:41the edge of disaster.
41:44While Ray did find
41:45in Binghamton momentarily
41:46a kind of community
41:47and collective endeavor
41:47for which he had long
41:49been searching,
41:50in the end,
41:51Nick Ray knows
41:52that he must drive
41:53his blind run alone.
41:55As he has often remarked,
41:56the working title
41:57of every film he has ever made
41:58has been
41:59I'm a Stranger Here Myself.
42:01The low camera
42:05on this
42:05It might be good
42:18emotionally
42:18for you to take
42:19the low camera.
42:25If she's putting
42:27the blankets on Tom.
42:28Yeah, go ahead.
42:34That you tip up to her.
42:37What do you mean?
42:38I take a camera that's...
42:39That's the low camera.
42:41As the blankets come on to her.
42:43You should live 75 here.
42:47And you tip up to her.
42:51I think it's emotionally
42:53a good thing.
42:54All right.
42:55Okay.
42:55It looks very beautiful to me.
43:04That's a wrap.
43:06All right.
43:15All right.