KLD: And I am Kamala Lopez-Dawson and we have the pleasure and the honor to be sitting here today with Leonard Nimoy who is an actor, writer, director, producer, singer, photographer, poet (laughing because of the long "list"), painter... just basically pretty much, he does just everything in the film business and in the arts. So, thank you so much for being with us today.

LN: My pleasure, thank you for having me.

KLD: We'd like to talk a little bit with you... you started acting when you were eight years old and you began directing later on in your career, is that correct?

LN: Ja. I started acting in a neighborhood-theatre in Boston, that was known as the Community Settlement House. I'm not sure whether it resembles a settlement house of today... probably a place where kids could go after school and during weekends... so I acted in short plays from the time I was eight until I was a teenager. When I was 17 I was cast by... to play in "Awake and sing"... my production was in 1948. Very much a play about my own generation. I was playing a character called "Ralphie". It was a 17 year old kid of a Jewish family in the Bronx and I was in a Jewish family in Boston. Very similar. Three generations living in one apartment and his struggles were my struggles and his concerns were my concerns, so found it was a state of grace that I could play my own story on the stage and I decided I want to be an actor and do this kind of work as a career.

...

Pasadena Playhouse was in a bad shape in the 40ies... so I went back studying seriously in 1958 with a teacher named Jeff Corey who was a very successful actor that has been blacklisted... became known as the best coaching teacher in Los Angeles. (In the army Leonard directed "A Streetcar Named Desire" ) I have a natural sense of how things will work on a stage and how the actors should function and I think I did o.k. In films its an entirely different story.

KLD: I was going to ask you that. Do you feel that in films you should be able to act and direct or do you advise against it?

LN: I'm not sure about the word "should". Clint Eastwood has done it extremely successfully. And so has Woody Allen in his own films. Those are the two best examples that come to mind. I think particularly Eastwood because Eastwood often takes on ambitious projects which he directs and acts in. And I admire the stamina. It takes an enormous stamina to do the job. If you know your persona and your character very well, as Eastwood does, it makes it easier. In my case, when I started directing films, which was never my intention by the way, I sort of backed into it, I was doing Spock in Star trek movies. And I had the additional burden of a two-hour make-up job... if I had to work as a director at 7 a.m. in the morning, I had to be in that chair at 5 a.m. to get my make-up on... (during this time people came in asking him out to show where he wanted this and that be put on the stage)... it's a heavy load... For a long time I took it (the offer to direct) as an insult on my acting. (laughing)

KLD: I think a lot of actors feel that way. Its something that I struggled with also. I think... For female actors, its critical. If you had the capacity to do other things you need to develop them (LN: Ja) because the business is unforgiving, is agist. You might find yourself successful in your twenties and thirties and then suddenly wake up and have absolutely no work to do. So, I think that actors generally make good directors and they should not look at it as if they were failing as an actor if they get to direct. And when you say, you backed into it, what do you mean by "you backed into it?"

LN: Well, I had done a little bit of directing... I was asked to act in an episode of T. J. Hooker with Bill Shatner and I said I will do that if you let me direct an episode because I wanted to explore that, it was an action show, to see what that felt like. (Talking about directing ST III and IV and Three Men and a Baby) I had a couple of big hits in a row... after directing about five, six films I had enough.

KLD: Why?

LN: My life had changed, my needs have changed, my interests have changed, I was extremely happy in my new personal life, and extremely restive to give up all that personal time to go away for weeks and months at a time onto locations and be away from the place I really wanted to be and the people I wanted to be with... And I certainly had had a tremendous amount of creative satisfaction over fifty years of acting and directing. And acting all over the world including Broadway a couple of times and even directed on Broadway once. A terrible failure, but I was there. (laughing)

KLD: What was the play?

LN: I directed a play called "The Apple Doesn't Fall". It was a supposed comedy which turned out not to be funny enough.

JM: I was going to ask you about comedy... Three Men and a Baby. Was it any different directing a comedy and what are the challenges?

LN: Well I think I have got a pretty good sense of humor and the Spock character had a very strong element of humor. And Star Trek IV has a strong element of humor. As a matter of fact going into Star trek IV I said that this thing has to lighten up... And I have done a lot of comedy on stage. I have done a number of plays which were flat-out comedies.

JM: I think that this is one of the things that makes you a great actor, that you have that sense of humor. And I think it comes through in a lot of the things you do and I think also with Bill Shatner. Both of you guys seem to be really willing to laugh at yourselves and bring your sense of humor right there – regardless what the role is. I think that's a great lesson for people.

LN: Let me tell you about a film you may not know about that I was involved in 1960. I acted in a play called "Deathwatch". Not a comedy (laughing). Not a comedy. This was a play written by a French writer, Jean Genet. Jean Genet was a notorious French author criminal. And he had written some very poetic, very beautiful material including material which was banned in the United States, very scatological stuff. And all of his works were banned here. And somehow somebody got the rights to produce this play in New York... Vic Morrow was a fellow classmate studying with Jeff Corey and went to act in it and secured the Westcoast-rights for the play and came here wanting to direct it. And he cast me... Very grim piece about the hierarchy of crime within the prison... There was not a laugh in this piece. There was no intentional laughter. And the play, because Genet was so umbuzzed about... the industry people flocked to see this play. They wanted to know Genet and what this material was all about and it cracked open my career, I began working steadily as an actor after that play was produced... I co-produced the film and Vic directed... And we had the original cast come back and act in it. And we made this film for a round $40,000 in cash and a budget of 68,000, the rest was all differed. It was a grim, dark movie. I spent a lot of time securing the rights. Genet was in France, his agent was in London, money was a problem… but I learned something about making an independent film... we went to the people making independent films at a the time... we were raising money in clusters of $300, $600, $1200... Distribution was a problem... we got a little money for a 16mm release... 20 years after they bought the film for a gay channel. And I learned a lot about what it takes to produce a film. And I learned – maybe this is the most important thing I have to say – that when you set out to make an independent film, you can get so caught up in the process of raising the money and the mechanics of bringing together a crew, and what kind of camera you gonna use…. You can get caught up in the physical elements of filmmaking that you can loose sight of the script and the performances. Is it worth all the effort to make this project? And if it isn't, scrap it and start again. Be sure that the film you are making is worth making. Because you get it made if you're really persistent. The question is: When you're done, are you're going to be happy with what you did because you accomplished it or because it is a terrific thing to show to the audiences? That's the mayor question. People don't care how long you took to raise the money, what camera you decided to use... they sit down to have an experience.

KLD: Did you feel people wanted to see the film?

LN: Very tough. Very tough, not cinematic at all. It feels like a filmed stage play. Very tough. We tried to break it open. We showed some external work... We showed the yard, and eventually we came down to the play. And it is very tough to sit through this piece of material. Very grim stuff. It's a very dedicated process and a very authentic process and very authentic to the play, but the question is: Do people want to see this movie? I think the answer is questionable.

KLD: Do you feel that the movies that are popular are reflecting what is going on in our society today? That kind of things we used to enjoy watching and the kind of things we are watching now.

LN: I don't think there is a general answer to that question. I think I'd be very selective when you talk about "does this film reflect our society and does that film not?" You see, you have to be very selective. I'm not going to give a general statement... "Burned Out" catches something of the zeitgeist in a brilliant way... I'm not an authority on what people should make except that I think that you have to be careful in trying to make something. You really have to believe in it and have a passion about rather than aim for success. Aiming for success can be an empty process. Aiming to entertain can be meaningful, aiming to get people to have an interesting experience can be meaningful, but trying to pinpoint for success can be dangerous.

KLD: It seems to me in the past decade that the film which are being made by the studios, the budgets are so large that the really sort of dictate, the element of mass marketing to the art that you can't even move forward on a project that's going to cost $200,000,000 until you have a very strong statistical backing for the facts its going to make its money back. And so it does sort of squeeze what the studios at least are bankrolling.

LN: Well, you're right. You know I am out of the filmmaking business for a number of years now, but I am reading about these films which cost $200 million. I am also reading about studios cancelling films... because they feel they are getting too expensive and some of the actors are getting too expensive. To put this in a context having to do with my experiences – as I told you the first film I was in about making was "Deathwatch" - we spent about $40,000. The films that I made for Paramount at Disney's in the eighties were budgeted between $13 and $25 million. "Three Men and a Baby" was around $ 40 or 50 million and rose up to 180. Star Trek IV, which was the second for me was, I think, around $220 million and did about 120. And today there are actors that are drawing as much money out of the budget or more than I was spending on an entire movie – on a single actor or actress. So I am not an address when it comes to dealing with these issues. As you say: There has to be an enormous amount of number crunching. Somewhere in the office someone has to say: That makes sense for us to invest in those $200 million. My sympathy goes out to the sort of filmmaker who is trying to make something meaningful, not to these crazy, industrial budgets. I can't relate to it.

KLD: That's why this part of the whole digital revolution is so important to the art-form.

LN: Ya.

KLD: Because without it most younger filmmakers won't be able to get anything made at all. And the other positive thing is that there are so many outlets. There is cable, there are so many stations on TV, that you can sell your movie to overseas and there is also this new internet- potential. You can sell your movies right of your own website. If you have somewhere created an audience for yourself.

LN: Well, this is big stuff. When we made "Deathwatch" in order to show the film, someone, usually me, had to carry the large heavy cans of about 50 pounds on the reels, with the films inside, rent a projection house, which was very costly, and get people to come to that place to sit down for the hour and a half or the two hours and watch your movie. It was not easy and it was not fun. Today the means of showing work is so much more accessible and therefore it is a lot easier for filmmakers to get people to have a look at their work what they have done. You sit down at your computer and have a click and go down to such and such and so and so and take a look at a three minute piece. And they can sample your film. Believe me, it's come a long, long way for filmmakers.
So I envy the filmmakers, I envy that because I was the one who flew in airplanes and carried the stuff through the airport to a taxi and to a screening room hoping people showed up in the snow and rain and wherever in New York trying to get an audience for the movie. I have a website for my photography. If people want to have a look at my work, I say: Go to leonardnimoyphotography.com click on photography and you'll see my work. Take them some place or send them something- bang, bang we are in a different age. And I think it is very exciting for filmmakers to be able to do that.

KLD: So, tell us a little bit about photography because this is something you are moving to at this moment.

LN: Photography has always been a passion, I started working with cameras and film when I was about 13. I still have an image I shot with a bellows Kodak camera. You opened it up, and pull out the bellows and I built my first enlarger in the middle of a lunchbox for light housing and many times considered changing careers going into camera-work, photography-work. Worked in labs, worked in studios, shot pictures of children to make a living and to support a family. In 1970 I studied intensely, heavily in UCLA because I was thinking about changing careers. After I have been in three seasons of Star Trek and two in Mission: Impossible I thought maybe I have had enough of that and I was thriving on photography. But following commercialized photographers around I realized I didn't want to do that. I wanted to do fine art photography. A subject matter that I choose. I didn't want to do photography on demand. Now, in the last 10, 12 years, that's what I do. I do my own photography. And I have had shows around the country and my work is in several museums. I do it because I love it amongst other things because first it's a form of expression, and, but terribly important to me: I can do it whenever and wherever I choose. So, it does not take me away from the places I want to be or people I want to be with.

JM: I don't know what it was like when you came to Hollywood, but you came from a family that did not have any actors and maybe that did not have that environment. How did you as a young person know that you wanted to be an actor? How did you make that happen? Because I am sure that there are a lot of people out there that have that same kind of desire.

LN: Well, as I said before: I had this intense identification with this character in the play "Awake and Sing"... And I really felt that I had found a calling. I remember, and I had been in other plays around, that this particular character, in this play, really spoke to me. And I remember that morning after we gave our last performance, I walked from our apartment to the theatre which was only four or five blocks away, to pick up my wardrobe, my clothes, and walking back from the theatre to my home, I felt I as walking in the wrong direction. I really had that sense that I was walking away from where I should be walking to. I should be walking to the theatre and not to the apartment. And I used to get a magazine called "Theatre Arts" and "Theatre Arts" always carried adverts for the Pasadena Playhouse. Boston used to be a try-out town for Broadway. Plays often started in Boston before they went to New York. And there was a play called "The Big Knife"... with actors from "Awake and Sing". So I contacted them, I called hotels, I found a man named Edward Brodbarry (?), who had a good career as an actor, and I told him who I was and that I wanted to be an actor. How shall I go? And he suggested to go to California, study, get small parts... you build a career. And I took that advice... And I came out here and I just persisted. This is something I had to do. And I always believed that my acting career would be based on theatre work. I never saw myself as a film comedian, I would be a character actor. And I felt in order to do that I had to work in a theatre to develop my craft and to be received as a useful actor in films. And that's exactly that way it happened."
 

JM: I want to ask you about Spock. Did this enable you to do more? Was it stereotype to you. What kind of experience was that?

LN: Both, both. Was I typecast? Absolutely. So was Clint Eastwood, so was John Wayne, so was Gary Cooper, so was Terry Grand, name actresses – everybody was typecast if you are a successful person in films, chances are that you are typecast. Studios are uncomfortable if you step out of a character... John Wayne tried to step out and it was a disaster when he tried to play something other as he was playing successfully. I am not John Wayne. But I was useful portraying a certain kind of Person. Usually cerebral, usually thoughtful, I can play attorneys, I can play advocates of various kinds, teachers or whatever... In my early years when I was in my late teen or early twenties I played a lot of gangsters and nasty people. I was the guy who'd beat up the good guys or try to. But gradually I would grow into this professorial kind of casting. So, for me typecasting was not really a burden. It became useful because when you're typecast means studios know you. They know how to use you without problem. If they know how to use you chances are you find a niche for yourself. Under that heading "he or she is that kind of a person" he or she is useful in that role. After that Spock character I never again had to be concerned about what my next job would be. There always was work available. I had 15 years of worrying how I was going to support a family. I always had to do other work. Finally teaching. Before that I was driving taxis, I was working in pet shops I was delivering newspapers, I was selling life insurances, I was doing all kinds of jobs to supplement the acting income. But after Spock I never had to do anything that I didn't want to do, I had work available in theatre, films and television – always. As much as I could handle. In the United States and in other countries. I had a great ride. I had a great ride, no complaints about that.

JM: I also wonder about the show "In Search Of" that was a big, very popular show with me when I was younger. Was that something you were interested in, the different kinds of investigations?

LN: How the typecasting worked on them? I think they thought I would be useful on the setting and I think it worked very well. We did 7 years "In Search Of", I was always interested in the material, sure. The paranormal, the archaeological issues, I was interested in the paranormal, in the ESP, and I was interested in the sticks and bonds, but it was a great job amongst other things because they would come to me and put me on work wherever I was, we would find a way to get my pieces done, it always seems that I was on various locations, but I was rarely on the real location. 90% of the work was done when I was in Los Angeles or New York. They would come to me with the camera crew. We would do 5 different shows in the city of New York in one day. We would do the camera stuff and then I would go to the studio to do the inauguration. They adjusted the work to my schedule. So wherever I was we could do the shows. They were fun and they were sometimes informative. It was always intriguing. They were very well produced, Meyersberg and the people and I consider it a very lucky way to work 'cause I was interested in the material and I could do it on my own time and my own schedule.

JM: As an artist you do so many different things. Do you think that people should do many different things or do you think they should focus on one and then move to another and then...

LN: Laughing. Laughing. I am always on... if you are a creative person, which I guess I am, you are always looking for ways to express yourself, to express your creativity. You have an idea, you want to execute it. So now I execute my idea through photography. For a while a did a lot of other things. I wrote poetry, I did some photographs, I did musicals, I toured as Sherlock Holmes in the Royal Shakespeare Production around the country, I did a one-man-show about Vincent van Gogh, I did 150 performances, I wrote it and directed it myself, I did 150 performances and eventually taped it for ... Network, I am like a kid in a candy store when it comes to do things. Doesn't mean that everybody has to do what I am doing or I did. Some people are totally happy just being an actor or just being a writer, or just being a poet or just being a photographer. I tend to be a little greedy (Laughing) and try a lot of different things, you know? I don't necessarily succeed in all of them all of the time, but that's o.k., I get my kicks doing what I do.

KLD: I know that your house is very beautiful. Did you design the décor?

LN: The taste is my wife and the designer, friend of hers, she has used to do the décor.

KLD: And the art?

LN: We're collecting contemporary art and she is the driving force, my wife is the driving force. I love what we have and we usually totally agree on whatever we buy. Most of it is something that she sees and thinks we should look into. And then she'll introduce me to it and I'll say I get it or I don't. And if I don't get it chances are we don't buy it. But in most cases if it's something that she really appreciates, I get it, I understand why we should really own that piece. And we are very pleased with our collection. The stuff feeds us. It's living stuff on the walls and on the floors and what have you. It's alive, it's not dead art, it's living art, it is alive, it has energy and it feeds us constantly. And if a piece of art stops feeding us, chances are it's time to let it go.

JM: I like that. I think we're gonna end at this point and I wonna thank Leonard for taking his time here with us. We are at a section here, which is called film mates, which are just little pieces of advice for the people out there. Both share what has become important for them out of what Leonard has shared, Joe Marshall said he learned to surround yourself with things that stimulate you and Kamala Lopez-Dawson said that she fought against being typecast and now learned to embrace it...

LN: If you characterize yourself as an instrument in an orchestra: What instrument am I? Am I a violin or a tuba? Am I a drum, am I a trumpet, am I a flute? And if you are decided to be a flute, why complain about not getting parts to play a drum? (Laughing) No, I don't want to play a flute, I want to play the drum. No, you would be a great flute player, you are wonderful as a flute player. That's the general idea. We are all instruments. And our instrument is what we are born with, what we grew up with, and I think it is a loss... yes, within the range of what we became doing. We all want to be comedians, we want to move to different characters and not play the same character over and over again. Absolutely. I agree with that. But if you understand that you'll be within your own range, you'll understand that there are opportunities to play different kinds of people. They are based on what you are I think you can benefit from them. And if you gonna ask me about filmmaking, I always remember a piece of advice somebody gave me when I was struggling raising the money and bringing together the crew and what have you and somebody said to me: making a film is like eating an elephant. You can't do it all in one day. But: If you take a bite off that elephant every day, eventually the elephant would disappear.

Both are laughing and say thanks to Leonard.