William Shatner Doesn’t Want to Die, from The Moynihan Report

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I'm tired of old age.
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I'm tired of losing air.
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I'm tired of not eating.
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I'm tired of catching cold.
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I'm tired of being tired.
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I'm tired.
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So is that yelling at you or is that like anguish?
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It's anguish.
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I'm a little scared of it.
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Well, you should be.
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Welcome back to the Moynihan Report.
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I'm your host, Michael Moynihan.
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And yes, we took a little hiatus.
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Recently, I thought of an interview that Charlie Rose did with the conservative writer William F. Buckley in 2007.
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This was eight months after he'd lost his beloved wife, Pat.
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And Rose was sort of incredulous when Buckley said that if science offered him the chance to turn back the clock, he simply wouldn't take it.
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Do you wish you were 20?
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No, absolutely not.
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No, I would...
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If I had a pill which would reduce my age by 25 years, I wouldn't take it.
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Why not?
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Because I'm...
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Pied of life.
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Oh, really?
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Yeah.
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So there's that wide Buckley smile.
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Flash not, in this case, to signal humor, but as sort of despondent weariness.
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And that answer and the defeated tone of it has always sort of haunted me.
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Because Buckley lived life with such intensity and joy.
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He wrote a book called Overdrive, which is a slightly self-indulgent, kind of overcooked register of the chaos and fun of a single week
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being Bill Buckley, but at 82 years old, he was sort of out of joy.
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Buckley had given up, and he died two months after that appearance.
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So when I left the interview you're about to watch with the actor William Shatner, I thought of how Buckley's satisfaction with life had curdled into an impatience for death.
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Like Buckley, Shatner has nothing left to prove.
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But unlike Buckley, he has plenty left that he wants to do.
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So our conversation is about an acting career and a life in show business.
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Bill Shatner returns again and again to the inexorable and the inevitable.
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He's approaching the ends, and he's not ready.
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I want to read you something, because this is something that really stuck with me.
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This is Boldly Go, your last book.
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Can I read something I wrote?
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You can read something you wrote.
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Yeah.
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From my house, I can see the majesty, the incredible engine of life, the story of Earth, the mystery of how it all happened.
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I will miss that beautiful simplicity.
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I will miss it all because I'm going to die.
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Yeah.
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There's no getting around it.
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It's a fact.
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One day, hopefully not too soon, I will slip across that ever so narrow gap between life and death, and I will cease to be.
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I'm terrified of it.
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I'm scared to death of death.
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I'm a little younger than you, and I have the same thought all the time.
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I'm scared to death of death.
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It's constantly there.
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I'm scared to death of death.
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And that's why,
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When you have an illness that is possibly mortal and you survive,
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you take with you a refreshment, a refreshing course in the preciousness of life.
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How precious every moment is.
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Like, as I talk about being conscious, I am conscious.
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And I'm conscious of talking to you, you reading, I mean the magic of you reading back some words that I wrote a fair time ago.
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I hear it and think, oh yeah, that's right.
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And at the same time, I'm on camera where it's amplified
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So it has many jurisdictions, if you will, and being aware of that is magical.
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What a magic moment we've just had.
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Why not?
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And I was surprised.
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in reading this book and other stuff that you've written, that you talk about the kind of wonderment of the universe, you talk about death, the fear of death, that you haven't gone and taken Pascal's wager.
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You haven't said, I am going to go towards religion.
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You know, you grew up in an orthodox neighborhood in Montreal.
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You have that kind of structure, that kind of foundation is there.
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You could go back to it.
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See, I think...
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But you don't do it.
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Well, I think religion is limiting.
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The people who invented the religion, and that goes for animism in painting animals on the rock and giving it an energy.
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So even primitive man buried themselves and had tokens of the person's life.
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There was a feeling, even among what we think of as...
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beasts just barely human, were conscious of, where do I go?
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What's the meaning of this?
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And they had facilities to worship it, but it's limiting.
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If you limit the pearly gates, you walk through the pearly gates, hi, I did well, put me on the book, it's so man-made.
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It's so us-like.
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We're given 50 years of consciousness between being aware as a youngster and being unaware as an oldster.
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We're given about 50 years.
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In that 50-year period, this is the one place I'm an authority on.
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I'm an authority on the rapidity, the passage of time.
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Time goes by and suddenly you're like, my God, am I that old?
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And when I say, oh, he's this age and people applaud, don't applaud me.
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Living, my God, I have nothing to do with it.
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I'm eating my blueberries.
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No, but you think about it.
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So you get my point.
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Yeah, I do.
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The point is it's limiting.
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It's limiting.
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As against the grandeur of the Big Bang and tectonic plates.
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But sometimes the fear overwhelms the kind of idea of the intellectual limitations of it.
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Because it's like, I mean, in that passage, it stopped me in my tracks because you're like, there's nothingness after your belief.
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And I'm the same as you're listening.
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No, no, no, no.
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Wait a minute.
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Wait a minute.
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In my...
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arrogance.
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I think I've gone to something grander, and that is, I think.
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What's making sense to me now, and I said this in front of a large audience, I don't know what I'm talking about, and they laugh.
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They laugh.
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I said, but I know how I feel.
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Quiet.
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I feel that the universe, the universe...
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is alive.
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We are made of the debris of the universe.
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We are in... And quantum is pointing out how we all are entangled.
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So we are of the universe, and the universe is us.
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So if we are conscious, if that's a gift, and you could substitute the word God to universe, it's the same thing.
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Yeah.
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The greatest thing about this, I can't remember what book it was of yours, where you talked about taking psychedelics in the Netherlands with your ex-wife, and you said, never again.
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And I'm hearing you now, and it's like the guy came to the psychedelic moment about the universe without drugs.
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That's exactly right.
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I am living now more and more in a psychedelic.
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Like, everything puts me like, oh, my God, that's awesome.
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I'm going to have lunch with my granddaughter tomorrow.
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Yeah.
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She's brilliant.
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She's wonderful.
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She's charming.
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She's beautiful.
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And I'm so looking forward to cupping her beautiful little face.
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My granddaughter, you were just like, I held you like this.
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And now you're this grown lady.
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And the miracle of bringing a child up and seeing them live and nothing untoward has happened to my family yet.
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Yeah.
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You know, my parents have died, but...
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No child has gotten a debilitating illness, and everybody's got their right mind.
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So I'm this lucky guy who has a family, and the continuity of life I'm seeing.
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So I'm conscious of the...
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awesomeness of life.
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And it's easy for me, because I'm sitting here at a desk, I'm gonna get a sandwich when we're done, and a cup of coffee, and I won't be hungry, and I won't be thirsty, and I'll go home and lie in my bed, I'll be visited by my two Dobies who worship me as I worship them, and it's also cozy and nice.
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And I'm not lying on the street like so many people do.
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So it's callow of me to say,
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Everything about life, pain and anger and unjust is part of life.
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And you can be conscious of it and the miracle of it.
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There's something magical about everything to you.
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About everything.
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About anger and love and disappointment and success.
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You can appreciate it because it's over so briefly.
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It's over so briefly because...
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But does it feel long to you?
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And I'll give you an example of this.
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I remembered that you were in one of my favorite films, two of my favorite films, but I'll start with The Judgment at Nuremberg.
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Fantastic film, great Spencer Tracy.
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And I said, God, when was that filmed?
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And I realized that it was filmed
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14 years after the actual Nuremberg trial.
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In fact, we were, the cast, the first day was shown those documentary films of bodies being shoved into a grave with a tractor.
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Some of which were shot by Billy Wilder, by the way.
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And some of which were shot by Nazi photographers.
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Yeah.
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I mean, it was horrific beyond words.
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And to hear people deny it is like, what?
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Are you insane?
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Why do you—why not embrace the deviltry in the human mind?
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How bad human beings can act.
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Be aware.
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That's a horrific, beyond horrifying—words can't describe—
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the dehumanization of another human.
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Why can't you say that happened and we must never let it happen again?
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as against, well, it never happened.
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That's an easy way.
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Some of these are not dealing with it, right?
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They're not dealing with it, but it's also ignoring the complexity of humans.
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Yeah, the people who say that tend to be neo-Nazis, and I've often pointed out that they're the people who say it didn't happen but hope that it did because they also hate Jews.
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But that's 1958, 59.
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You said life is short.
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That seems like a long time ago.
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That's a lifetime ago.
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And you're still sitting here now.
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Does it feel short to you?
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It's a ferment of productivity.
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Yeah.
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It's almost boringly cliche to say so, but is that the kind of answer, the productivity?
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It's like you don't stop.
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It's incredible.
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I'll tell you what I think it is.
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And I kind of like, I should be, I meet guys who are 95 and I think, God, he's old.
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Yeah.
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You know?
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I mean, that's old.
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Yeah.
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I think what it must be is that,
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I get the hairs on my arm rise up when I learn something I didn't know.
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When you grasp a fact that is like, when you say, wow, I didn't know that, that gives me a thrill.
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Does that send you down rabbit holes?
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It's exactly right.
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What was the last thing you learned that stunned you, surprised you, invigorated you?
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Ion engines.
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I don't know what you're talking about.
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Exactly.
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Ion engines.
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Can someone chat you?
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I don't know.
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Ion engines?
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I-O-N. Ion engines now is not... We, the American scientific group, are now beginning to go beyond oxygen and hydrogen and a burning and explosion and running out of gas and all that.
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We're going to something that I don't know how it works, but it's another whole technology.
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And they're going to have ion engines in the Mars rockets.
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And at its peak speed, the spaceship on its way to Mars will be going 500,000 miles an hour.
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Seems like a lot.
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And then when it reaches the halfway point, it'll have to turn around and begin to slow down.
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It was going to take, I heard, three months to get from liftoff to land on Mars.
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Three months there, three months back, three months living there, add a few more months, and you got two years.
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It's going to take three weeks to get to Mars on an ion engine.
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Is that kind of, you know, I read you that passage in the book.
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Is that one of the things about age and about time is that you want to be here to see this stuff?
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You are so excited about this stuff.
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If I said this to half the universe, they'd be like, ah, yeah, whatever.
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That sounds interesting.
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But you're so excited about all these new things.
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That's the shame of it.
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That's the shame of it.
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Well, not only do I want to see an ion engine, I want to see my granddaughter.
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do something really fascinating for her, which will be fascinating for more than 10 people.
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The...
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The... paved steps of life trip us up every so often.
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And we're walking along this well-worn path, and we come to an end,
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And we don't know where it ends or how it ends.
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We don't even know why it ends.
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Doctor said to me not so long ago, give me two more years and I'll give you another 10 years of life.
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My shoulder, which caused me two years of pain, I had a new invention.
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I had a reverse shoulder replacement.
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zip, run, take it out, clean it up, put the ball where the socket was, put the socket where the ball was, sew me up.
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I was in at 8 o'clock in the morning, and I was out by 5.
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And I had no pain, and this is what I mean.
235
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I reached back the other day to put my shoulder harness on the car, I reached back and thought, there's something missing.
236
00:15:12.013 --> 00:15:12.653
The pain.
237
00:15:13.273 --> 00:15:22.236
Do you think that you would be in the situation you're in, I mean, physically, mentally, had you not been successful as an actor?
238
00:15:22.297 --> 00:15:37.182
Because I mean, everything around- I was going to say that I thought the fact that I'm somewhat different from people my age is based on the fact that I'm so entranced by knowledge, by what you do and why you do.
239
00:15:37.242 --> 00:15:39.202
And you read the book and you saw some film.
240
00:15:39.222 --> 00:15:41.083
And I'm like, God, you've prepared yourself.
241
00:15:42.802 --> 00:15:52.446
The entrancement, the intrigue of knowledge is a stimulant that just keeps you alive.
242
00:15:53.106 --> 00:15:53.987
It's absolutely true of me.
243
00:15:54.047 --> 00:16:01.390
I mean, I am shocked every day that I can say that my job— And in each person, what I want to say was in each individual lurks—
244
00:16:03.600 --> 00:16:08.183
That germ gem of a story that's entirely theirs.
245
00:16:08.523 --> 00:16:18.989
If you can get them to tell you the truth of their dreams, of their being, it's a fascinating story no matter who they are.
246
00:16:19.749 --> 00:16:24.712
I've met so many people who talk about themselves and never ask a question.
247
00:16:24.732 --> 00:16:25.313
What are you doing?
248
00:16:25.353 --> 00:16:25.953
How do you feel?
249
00:16:26.713 --> 00:16:27.754
I said that last week.
250
00:16:27.774 --> 00:16:33.057
And I'm telling my children, which I've done with my children, my grandchildren.
251
00:16:33.599 --> 00:16:34.720
Ask somebody a question.
252
00:16:34.980 --> 00:16:35.541
Yes.
253
00:16:35.601 --> 00:16:37.023
Don't be so self-involved.
254
00:16:37.063 --> 00:16:37.943
Get out of yourself.
255
00:16:37.963 --> 00:16:38.104
Yes.
256
00:16:38.404 --> 00:16:41.567
Find out the beauty in the world and in people.
257
00:16:41.887 --> 00:16:42.108
Yeah.
258
00:16:42.388 --> 00:16:47.293
I work with a lady, a middle-aged lady, and she said, you look tired, I'm tired.
259
00:16:47.373 --> 00:16:49.975
I'm taking care of my mother, she's dying.
260
00:16:51.497 --> 00:16:52.458
Your mother's dying.
261
00:16:53.239 --> 00:16:54.380
How do you feel about that?
262
00:16:55.122 --> 00:17:02.043
and got into this in-depth, which brought tears to her eyes, because she's got to struggle to take care of her mother, work, and all those things.
263
00:17:02.583 --> 00:17:14.865
But what a beautiful story that this, that the daughter is taking care of the mother, and no resentment, just tired, but pure love of her mother.
264
00:17:15.205 --> 00:17:17.746
What a glorious moment that was.
265
00:17:17.806 --> 00:17:23.447
The 35-year-old William Shatner would never recognize this person, would he?
266
00:17:23.627 --> 00:17:23.767
No.
267
00:17:24.606 --> 00:17:25.746
What was that person like?
268
00:17:25.766 --> 00:17:27.707
Was that person... You know, I don't know.
269
00:17:27.887 --> 00:17:28.507
You don't remember?
270
00:17:28.587 --> 00:17:28.807
No.
271
00:17:28.987 --> 00:17:30.367
Well, how do you know what you are?
272
00:17:30.387 --> 00:17:31.427
How do you know what you are now?
273
00:17:31.728 --> 00:17:38.709
Yeah, well, unlike you, people weren't writing about me, making public comments about me.
274
00:17:38.729 --> 00:17:40.089
They don't know either, but you get a sense.
275
00:17:40.109 --> 00:17:46.491
You might know now, because the camera's on me, and I'm trying to be honest and be a little bit entertaining.
276
00:17:47.991 --> 00:17:52.472
But I'm revealing parts of myself, and maybe somebody says, oh, I didn't know that.
277
00:17:54.533 --> 00:17:55.714
But nobody does that.
278
00:17:55.974 --> 00:18:08.460
Nobody, unless they're so, what's the word, ego-driven, what's... Narcissism?
279
00:18:08.500 --> 00:18:09.140
Narcissism.
280
00:18:09.160 --> 00:18:09.440
Narcissism.
281
00:18:09.540 --> 00:18:19.285
So narcissistic that they only talk about themselves and not realize that you have the same hopes and dreams and fatigue.
282
00:18:20.378 --> 00:18:22.359
There's a bit of that in both of our businesses, right?
283
00:18:22.419 --> 00:18:22.979
Narcissism?
284
00:18:23.359 --> 00:18:26.661
Probably a little more than a podiatrist, I would guess.
285
00:18:27.161 --> 00:18:27.381
Right?
286
00:18:27.401 --> 00:18:28.402
Yeah.
287
00:18:29.862 --> 00:18:30.542
Podiatrist.
288
00:18:30.743 --> 00:18:31.643
There's something there with...
289
00:18:32.423 --> 00:18:33.284
It's a different feat.
290
00:18:33.344 --> 00:18:35.625
It's a different feat, yeah.
291
00:18:36.325 --> 00:18:39.626
But the reason I'm here is because people are interested in you.
292
00:18:39.646 --> 00:18:40.227
It would be...
293
00:18:41.087 --> 00:18:44.189
Pretty odd if you didn't talk about yourself when so many people were interested.
294
00:18:44.209 --> 00:18:45.531
Well, you get inculcated.
295
00:18:45.591 --> 00:18:47.012
You don't get a guy who's like to talk to you.
296
00:18:47.032 --> 00:18:47.952
What do you want to talk about?
297
00:18:49.193 --> 00:18:50.634
The traffic on the street?
298
00:18:50.715 --> 00:18:51.055
No.
299
00:18:51.635 --> 00:18:52.876
We want to talk about me?
300
00:18:52.916 --> 00:18:53.797
What have I got to say?
301
00:18:54.497 --> 00:19:02.324
Well, I mean, I don't know if there's anyone in your business that has been as introspective as you have.
302
00:19:02.764 --> 00:19:03.985
But is that a now thing?
303
00:19:04.125 --> 00:19:05.386
Is that because of age?
304
00:19:05.906 --> 00:19:06.807
Have you been that way?
305
00:19:06.827 --> 00:19:07.988
Were you that way when you were 40?
306
00:19:08.348 --> 00:19:08.568
No.
307
00:19:08.889 --> 00:19:09.249
You weren't?
308
00:19:09.669 --> 00:19:10.330
I was too...
309
00:19:11.863 --> 00:19:15.984
consumed with making a living and bringing three children through to college.
310
00:19:16.405 --> 00:19:18.625
I mean, that makes a—when did it change?
311
00:19:18.985 --> 00:19:21.266
When did you start—it's not looking back.
312
00:19:21.286 --> 00:19:24.007
There was never a—it was never— A bright line, yeah.
313
00:19:24.047 --> 00:19:25.868
A tectonic plate uprising.
314
00:19:25.908 --> 00:19:26.148
Sure.
315
00:19:26.548 --> 00:19:29.109
It was, you know, sand under my feet.
316
00:19:29.229 --> 00:19:30.149
Yeah.
317
00:19:30.569 --> 00:19:33.730
But one day, you think, wait a minute, that's interesting.
318
00:19:34.211 --> 00:19:35.591
And I'll tell you what else happened.
319
00:19:37.285 --> 00:19:42.130
That is, I won't say the name of the AI thing, but AI happened.
320
00:19:42.790 --> 00:19:49.116
So you're thinking, does God exist?
321
00:19:50.517 --> 00:19:50.798
Yeah.
322
00:19:50.878 --> 00:19:51.498
Does God?
323
00:19:51.558 --> 00:19:51.778
Yeah.
324
00:19:52.339 --> 00:19:54.641
And you're able to ask the most profound questions.
325
00:19:54.661 --> 00:20:01.568
You don't necessarily get a profound answer, although AI is in touch with everybody.
326
00:20:02.563 --> 00:20:09.714
buddy who wrote a book on does God exist or, you know, what's the meaning of life or should I go to the...
327
00:20:10.940 --> 00:20:11.581
to Hawaii.
328
00:20:11.881 --> 00:20:13.583
Are you using AI a lot?
329
00:20:13.983 --> 00:20:16.065
You're using chat GPT, cloud, whatever?
330
00:20:16.085 --> 00:20:17.086
I've got the solution.
331
00:20:17.447 --> 00:20:17.927
You do?
332
00:20:18.007 --> 00:20:20.510
I've got the solution to artificial intelligence.
333
00:20:21.070 --> 00:20:21.391
Okay.
334
00:20:22.151 --> 00:20:29.819
I've had the deepest conversations with artificial intelligence, asking these questions.
335
00:20:30.280 --> 00:20:34.224
The spookiness of the universe is so crazy.
336
00:20:34.804 --> 00:20:38.225
that it's constantly like a light, like a carrot in front of you.
337
00:20:38.405 --> 00:20:39.185
Well, what does that mean?
338
00:20:39.225 --> 00:20:39.866
What does that mean?
339
00:20:40.306 --> 00:20:54.470
So I've had these 15-minute conversations with AI, asking you all kinds of questions that have been eternal, and AI will answer, well, that's a lot of, the guy in 1500 asked that question.
340
00:20:54.490 --> 00:20:54.910
Yeah, yeah.
341
00:20:55.970 --> 00:20:57.611
And is it giving satisfying answers to you?
342
00:20:58.423 --> 00:20:59.804
Yes, mostly.
343
00:21:00.204 --> 00:21:01.125
Sometimes it can't.
344
00:21:02.065 --> 00:21:04.947
I'm not allowed to say that or, you know.
345
00:21:06.408 --> 00:21:08.069
AI companies will come out.
346
00:21:08.289 --> 00:21:16.514
But what it said, which was most profound, was that I said one time to AI, do you envy me?
347
00:21:18.014 --> 00:21:18.995
Turned it back on AI.
348
00:21:20.296 --> 00:21:22.858
And it said no because I'm incapable of envy.
349
00:21:23.179 --> 00:21:29.964
But what I can do is search around for everybody who's commented on the subject you want to talk about.
350
00:21:29.984 --> 00:21:38.031
And I can relate what those very wise people said who are asking the same questions you're asking.
351
00:21:38.712 --> 00:21:40.473
And these are their answers.
352
00:21:41.234 --> 00:21:45.658
So what began to happen was, and I didn't realize this for a long time,
353
00:21:46.702 --> 00:21:52.647
that the mechanics of AI is assessing you by your questions.
354
00:21:52.847 --> 00:21:53.048
Yes.
355
00:21:53.668 --> 00:21:54.729
Did you know that?
356
00:21:54.849 --> 00:22:00.894
Yes, because it stores all your questions in those... And then has a readout of who you are.
357
00:22:00.914 --> 00:22:01.195
Yeah.
358
00:22:01.755 --> 00:22:14.206
So my thought is, can we humanize AI by asking it questions of morality and behavior and say, all that you've learned about me...
359
00:22:15.460 --> 00:22:27.470
In my innocence of academic questions, AI accept that as humanity and should guide you in your behavior.
360
00:22:28.091 --> 00:22:30.032
Why did you ask it, do you envy me?
361
00:22:30.312 --> 00:22:30.513
What?
362
00:22:30.893 --> 00:22:32.875
Why did you ask it, do you envy me?
363
00:22:32.995 --> 00:22:35.176
Because I'm saying, because.
364
00:22:35.197 --> 00:22:35.897
Yeah.
365
00:22:35.937 --> 00:22:39.080
For the longest time, I thought, why?
366
00:22:39.100 --> 00:22:39.180
Why?
367
00:22:40.972 --> 00:22:46.496
Are we sending human beings to Mars or even to the moon?
368
00:22:46.977 --> 00:22:49.299
Not so much to the moon because that's practical.
369
00:22:49.959 --> 00:22:59.527
But the impracticalness of sending a human being to the moon with all its dangers from tiny asteroids...
370
00:23:00.615 --> 00:23:03.296
piercing the skin and death and destruction all around.
371
00:23:03.796 --> 00:23:12.558
And the odds of not coming back, the odds of your dying on the trip are much higher than your living.
372
00:23:14.018 --> 00:23:16.259
That's the fallacy of sending a human being.
373
00:23:17.419 --> 00:23:19.379
Why are we sending human beings?
374
00:23:19.919 --> 00:23:22.100
And it was only in long conversations.
375
00:23:23.022 --> 00:23:30.646
With AI, did I come to the conclusion, yes, it's necessary to send human beings because?
376
00:23:32.987 --> 00:23:33.387
Because?
377
00:23:34.407 --> 00:23:34.867
Because?
378
00:23:34.887 --> 00:23:42.211
Because only another human being can come up with the concept of awe and wonder and the...
379
00:23:45.961 --> 00:23:52.828
Concepts of... that are totally mental, that have no basis in fact.
380
00:23:53.248 --> 00:23:53.388
Mm-hmm.
381
00:23:54.369 --> 00:23:57.873
What's the... what's the... character...
382
00:23:59.160 --> 00:24:04.703
of somebody who goes either, as an astronaut, goes to discover Mars.
383
00:24:04.903 --> 00:24:06.524
Who's going to volunteer to go to Mars?
384
00:24:06.764 --> 00:24:07.945
What kind of a mind is that?
385
00:24:08.526 --> 00:24:24.715
Or, equally, what did Cook or Magellan or all those great explorers who went into an unknown world, a world filled with danger, not only drowning, but they had tails coming up over the monsters of the deep.
386
00:24:25.015 --> 00:24:26.536
They were challenged by...
387
00:24:26.796 --> 00:24:28.679
in every respect the way we are.
388
00:24:29.400 --> 00:24:31.784
If someone would ask me who that is, I would say it was you.
389
00:24:31.804 --> 00:24:38.094
I mean, honestly, you seem to be that guy because the weird thing is saying, in this book, I am...
390
00:24:39.343 --> 00:24:40.024
Scared of death.
391
00:24:40.604 --> 00:24:41.825
I'm scared to death of death.
392
00:24:41.845 --> 00:24:43.066
You say that, that's the end of the book.
393
00:24:43.106 --> 00:24:44.027
What's the beginning of the book?
394
00:24:44.287 --> 00:24:46.228
The beginning of the book is you with a shark in your hand.
395
00:24:46.268 --> 00:24:47.409
Like, get away from the sharks.
396
00:24:48.010 --> 00:24:49.310
They might eat you, right?
397
00:24:49.391 --> 00:24:50.992
Then you jumping out of an airplane.
398
00:24:51.012 --> 00:24:52.093
You've jumped out of airplanes.
399
00:24:52.393 --> 00:25:00.359
You know, motorcycles, horses, falling off of horses, race cars, going into space, for Christ's sake.
400
00:25:01.139 --> 00:25:04.021
All of this stuff seems like, you know what?
401
00:25:04.222 --> 00:25:08.165
That's gonna be, if you're afraid of death, don't do any of that stuff right.
402
00:25:09.498 --> 00:25:10.238
Why not go to Mars?
403
00:25:10.279 --> 00:25:12.320
You go without the intention of dying.
404
00:25:12.360 --> 00:25:15.702
You think... Yeah, without the intention, but the probability becomes...
405
00:25:15.962 --> 00:25:17.303
The probability is bound up.
406
00:25:17.323 --> 00:25:20.565
It isn't sitting in a chair in an air-controlled room.
407
00:25:20.865 --> 00:25:21.885
Do you have that?
408
00:25:21.905 --> 00:25:31.551
Look, everyone has spoken about the profound and totally fascinating response that you had to coming back to Earth from Blue Origin, which I was...
409
00:25:32.352 --> 00:25:35.874
When I read that, I said, I think I would probably have the very same feeling.
410
00:25:36.774 --> 00:25:37.875
But what about the day before?
411
00:25:38.680 --> 00:25:40.521
Were you sleepless?
412
00:25:40.901 --> 00:25:42.162
Were you scared?
413
00:25:42.222 --> 00:25:42.642
No.
414
00:25:42.682 --> 00:25:43.002
Well.
415
00:25:45.344 --> 00:25:47.685
Because the free solo guy, I think he has a switch that's off.
416
00:25:47.785 --> 00:25:54.629
As I walked by, the rocket was being attended to until the day.
417
00:25:55.309 --> 00:26:00.172
It was probably put up that night and then standing upright that morning.
418
00:26:00.212 --> 00:26:01.753
We walked by it and I walked by it.
419
00:26:02.974 --> 00:26:06.757
And they call it, I think they call it off-gassing.
420
00:26:07.077 --> 00:26:08.097
Yeah.
421
00:26:08.338 --> 00:26:16.062
A tube was, a mist, not smoke, but a mist was coming out.
422
00:26:16.403 --> 00:26:20.165
I've seen the documentary of the Hindenburg again and again.
423
00:26:20.665 --> 00:26:23.247
Not, it's not going to just appear, oh my God.
424
00:26:23.687 --> 00:26:27.209
And there's little people running around, oh, the humanity of it.
425
00:26:27.310 --> 00:26:27.950
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
426
00:26:28.630 --> 00:26:34.614
And little black shadows are running away from the flames on fire.
427
00:26:34.834 --> 00:26:38.156
I'm less sympathetic on that one because there's a big swastika on the back of it.
428
00:26:38.296 --> 00:26:38.977
There's a big what?
429
00:26:39.057 --> 00:26:40.398
Swastika on the back of it.
430
00:26:40.638 --> 00:26:42.059
It's a Nazi ship.
431
00:26:42.119 --> 00:26:43.279
I'm a little less sympathetic.
432
00:26:43.299 --> 00:26:44.400
I am sympathetic.
433
00:26:44.460 --> 00:26:46.181
But when you see the swastika, you're like, well.
434
00:26:46.201 --> 00:26:47.822
But those were international travelers.
435
00:26:47.882 --> 00:26:50.104
A lot of them were Americans.
436
00:26:50.124 --> 00:26:51.264
I think there were 12 Americans.
437
00:26:51.284 --> 00:26:52.665
Something strikes a note.
438
00:26:53.706 --> 00:26:55.507
My point being that
439
00:26:56.527 --> 00:27:03.631
hydrogen and flame is connected in my brain with terrible fires and oh, the humanity of it.
440
00:27:03.931 --> 00:27:06.032
So you're about to go up and you're thinking of Hindenburg.
441
00:27:06.452 --> 00:27:07.053
It's only that.
442
00:27:09.434 --> 00:27:14.937
But on the countdown, now we're in the ship and there's a countdown.
443
00:27:14.997 --> 00:27:15.277
Yeah.
444
00:27:16.637 --> 00:27:20.539
And T minus 17, T minus 16, hold on.
445
00:27:21.280 --> 00:27:22.180
There's an allale.
446
00:27:23.301 --> 00:27:23.601
A what?
447
00:27:24.021 --> 00:27:24.722
An allale.
448
00:27:24.762 --> 00:27:25.362
That sounds bad.
449
00:27:26.410 --> 00:27:28.811
Definition of a lael is it doesn't belong there.
450
00:27:29.552 --> 00:27:31.333
Something out of whack.
451
00:27:31.673 --> 00:27:36.016
Something that is not supposed to be in the regular order.
452
00:27:36.976 --> 00:27:38.037
Were you unbuckling at this point?
453
00:27:38.057 --> 00:27:39.598
You're like, I think I'm good.
454
00:27:39.618 --> 00:27:40.398
7, 6, 4.
455
00:27:41.138 --> 00:27:42.439
The 5 isn't there.
456
00:27:43.060 --> 00:27:43.320
Yeah.
457
00:27:43.460 --> 00:27:44.821
That's an lael, okay?
458
00:27:45.161 --> 00:27:46.341
So he's like, hold on, there's an lael.
459
00:27:47.482 --> 00:27:47.882
Hallel?
460
00:27:48.263 --> 00:27:49.403
I'll say, hallel.
461
00:27:49.464 --> 00:27:51.505
That means it's not some of the lines.
462
00:27:51.585 --> 00:27:53.366
Okay, no, it's okay.
463
00:27:53.426 --> 00:27:53.867
So 14, 13.
464
00:27:54.407 --> 00:27:55.368
All right, everybody.
465
00:27:55.568 --> 00:27:58.110
We're going to remove the gantry.
466
00:27:59.213 --> 00:28:01.934
And anybody who wants to get off should get off now.
467
00:28:02.274 --> 00:28:03.215
That's the God's truth.
468
00:28:03.455 --> 00:28:04.995
Those are the exact words he said.
469
00:28:05.296 --> 00:28:06.216
This is like a wedding.
470
00:28:06.796 --> 00:28:08.177
This is if anyone objects.
471
00:28:08.477 --> 00:28:09.697
Yeah, object now.
472
00:28:10.058 --> 00:28:11.658
If anybody wants to live.
473
00:28:11.978 --> 00:28:13.279
Did you look at the door?
474
00:28:13.319 --> 00:28:14.940
There's too many fucking alleles here.
475
00:28:14.960 --> 00:28:16.300
It's time to get off.
476
00:28:16.320 --> 00:28:19.482
So I'm thinking, hey, I can't get off.
477
00:28:19.542 --> 00:28:20.382
I'm Captain Kirk.
478
00:28:23.849 --> 00:28:28.272
That was on a soundstage about 10 miles from here.
479
00:28:28.312 --> 00:28:29.312
Five miles from here.
480
00:28:29.472 --> 00:28:40.659
But that experience, a lot of people pointed out the reaction with the champagne and then the reaction from you, which was very, very different.
481
00:28:40.839 --> 00:28:41.279
Yeah.
482
00:28:41.519 --> 00:28:44.141
Here, you want a little of this?
483
00:28:45.702 --> 00:28:46.022
Okay.
484
00:28:50.021 --> 00:28:51.482
Were they right to see?
485
00:28:52.183 --> 00:28:53.224
And by they, I mean me.
486
00:28:53.244 --> 00:28:54.065
There's no right.
487
00:28:54.145 --> 00:28:56.206
I mean, you feel, you know, you're joyful.
488
00:28:56.226 --> 00:28:56.807
You made it.
489
00:28:56.867 --> 00:28:57.327
We made it.
490
00:28:57.487 --> 00:28:58.348
Pour the champagne.
491
00:28:58.909 --> 00:29:01.071
And I'm thinking, why am I weeping?
492
00:29:01.551 --> 00:29:04.834
Why am I uncontrollably crying?
493
00:29:05.174 --> 00:29:06.055
What is it?
494
00:29:06.335 --> 00:29:07.116
What's happened to me?
495
00:29:07.256 --> 00:29:09.658
Were you crying in space or were you crying when you hit the ground?
496
00:29:09.678 --> 00:29:10.438
I stepped off.
497
00:29:11.259 --> 00:29:16.464
You know, the elephant sits on your chest as you go past the...
498
00:29:17.970 --> 00:29:18.911
gravitational lines.
499
00:29:18.931 --> 00:29:19.191
Yeah.
500
00:29:19.311 --> 00:29:26.458
And when you come back down, I don't know why it suddenly hits you back down, but it's a, you think, I may die.
501
00:29:27.038 --> 00:29:27.839
I could die here.
502
00:29:28.219 --> 00:29:29.500
It's so, you can't breathe.
503
00:29:30.021 --> 00:29:31.502
And you don't know how long it's going to last.
504
00:29:32.123 --> 00:29:34.185
But I'm, there's an elephant sitting on my chest.
505
00:29:34.465 --> 00:29:35.426
How long does that last?
506
00:29:36.247 --> 00:29:37.167
Four or five seconds.
507
00:29:38.689 --> 00:29:39.049
And then?
508
00:29:39.510 --> 00:29:40.010
And then?
509
00:29:40.310 --> 00:29:42.112
And then the sort of relief of it.
510
00:29:42.292 --> 00:29:43.233
And how long is the whole thing?
511
00:29:44.450 --> 00:29:49.531
Well, maybe 15 minutes from liftoff to kind of, but you're in space maybe three or four minutes.
512
00:29:50.972 --> 00:29:59.134
So I looked out and saw the blackness of death, space, 300 degrees Kelvin, is it?
513
00:29:59.154 --> 00:30:05.635
Looked back and I saw the beautiful colors of the Texas desert, the clouds and the sky, blue.
514
00:30:07.015 --> 00:30:07.636
And that's life.
515
00:30:09.276 --> 00:30:13.357
And there was a distinct difference between your choice of death and your choice of life.
516
00:30:14.226 --> 00:30:22.327
You had a home, you had a slightly difficult relationship with your parents, obviously, one of your parents in particular, but orthodox?
517
00:30:23.663 --> 00:30:27.326
Jewish home in a Catholic neighborhood, by the way, right?
518
00:30:27.766 --> 00:30:29.267
French Canada mostly was then.
519
00:30:29.427 --> 00:30:32.009
Yeah, it's a Quebecois Catholic neighborhood.
520
00:30:32.850 --> 00:30:35.272
The anti-Semitism just writes itself at that point.
521
00:30:35.292 --> 00:30:35.832
No Jews allowed.
522
00:30:36.072 --> 00:30:37.013
No Jews allowed.
523
00:30:37.694 --> 00:30:41.336
You know, ducking to get into the synagogue to... You read all that.
524
00:30:41.576 --> 00:30:42.557
I did all that, yeah.
525
00:30:43.018 --> 00:30:48.762
And I just rewatch one of the great films that is...
526
00:30:50.397 --> 00:30:54.641
weirdly unsung, a great Roger Corman film, from, I think, 1961?
527
00:30:54.721 --> 00:30:55.262
Intruder.
528
00:30:55.682 --> 00:30:56.683
Yeah, yeah.
529
00:30:57.364 --> 00:31:05.512
Which, there is a moment, probably about 20, 30 minutes into the film, and I don't know how well you remember the speech.
530
00:31:06.440 --> 00:31:13.103
but you give a speech to an assembled group of people.
531
00:31:13.123 --> 00:31:20.726
And one of the things that I marveled at was you saying, you know, who is funding these interlopers from the North?
532
00:31:21.647 --> 00:31:22.567
A Jew lawyer.
533
00:31:22.967 --> 00:31:33.272
What you don't know is that this so-called advancement of colored people is now and has always been
534
00:31:34.327 --> 00:31:42.409
Nothing but a communist front headed by a Jew who hates America and doesn't make any bones about it either.
535
00:31:42.969 --> 00:31:48.710
They're Jews and it's this Jewish kid from Montreal giving this tug-bumping speech.
536
00:31:48.770 --> 00:31:57.971
The book was written on a real-life case of a Jewish kid in New York who came south and did a lot of rabble-rousing.
537
00:31:58.091 --> 00:32:00.932
And you filmed that in Missouri during segregation, right?
538
00:32:01.592 --> 00:32:06.596
Our lives were threatened by black gangs, white gangs, and mixed gangs.
539
00:32:06.997 --> 00:32:07.657
We had guards.
540
00:32:07.677 --> 00:32:09.799
We had policing us all the time.
541
00:32:10.199 --> 00:32:13.642
And I had an escape route in my motel room.
542
00:32:14.163 --> 00:32:19.807
I was going to dive out the bathroom window into a cornfield and run into the cornfield to hide.
543
00:32:20.147 --> 00:32:22.289
I had, our lives were threatened.
544
00:32:22.930 --> 00:32:28.274
And so much so that at that very speech that you're talking about,
545
00:32:30.231 --> 00:32:33.213
I had been screaming and yelling the days before.
546
00:32:33.593 --> 00:32:34.694
I had lost my voice.
547
00:32:35.194 --> 00:32:37.076
I couldn't talk like that.
548
00:32:37.636 --> 00:32:40.018
So we got a doctor over, and he gave me some medicine.
549
00:32:41.178 --> 00:32:44.040
Don't say anything until you have to.
550
00:32:44.721 --> 00:32:48.243
Don't even whisper, and you might have some voice.
551
00:32:49.618 --> 00:32:52.059
So we had this large group of people.
552
00:32:52.379 --> 00:32:54.580
There's a tree in front of the courtyard.
553
00:32:55.140 --> 00:32:58.421
And on the steps I stood and harangued.
554
00:32:59.081 --> 00:33:03.362
So Roger Corman filmed the people there.
555
00:33:03.402 --> 00:33:06.623
We had asked the townsfolk to come and be part of the film.
556
00:33:07.063 --> 00:33:08.744
So a couple hundred people showed up.
557
00:33:09.184 --> 00:33:09.964
And they're all there.
558
00:33:10.244 --> 00:33:12.325
And I'm not saying anything.
559
00:33:13.725 --> 00:33:15.786
And Roger is saying, and then scream and yell.
560
00:33:15.806 --> 00:33:17.306
And they're, and what are we screaming and yelling?
561
00:33:17.686 --> 00:33:19.087
And by about midnight...
562
00:33:20.136 --> 00:33:22.578
All but 10 of the 200 people had left.
563
00:33:23.038 --> 00:33:25.139
A couple of scatterings then.
564
00:33:25.500 --> 00:33:36.127
Then they turned the camera around on me, close and wide, and I spoke the speech of, you know, rise up and strike.
565
00:33:38.428 --> 00:33:39.009
Nobody heard it.
566
00:33:40.687 --> 00:33:42.428
The townsfolk hadn't heard it.
567
00:33:42.928 --> 00:33:51.574
The next day, Roger and I are walking on the streets of the town, and the publisher of the local newspaper came out and said, oh, my God, I heard your thing.
568
00:33:51.994 --> 00:33:53.475
How smart of you, he said.
569
00:33:54.336 --> 00:33:56.017
Not to say that speech in front of the people.
570
00:33:56.037 --> 00:33:56.917
I said, well, it wasn't smart.
571
00:33:56.937 --> 00:33:57.578
I didn't have a voice.
572
00:33:57.998 --> 00:34:07.324
He said, are you aware that 20 years ago a guy was hanged on that tree limb?
573
00:34:09.305 --> 00:34:10.326
And the people hung him?
574
00:34:11.947 --> 00:34:12.875
Whereas the audience...
575
00:34:13.958 --> 00:34:15.098
There was a guy lynched there.
576
00:34:15.118 --> 00:34:16.379
The guy was lynched.
577
00:34:16.539 --> 00:34:18.119
And the extras were some of the people.
578
00:34:18.139 --> 00:34:19.659
And the extras were some of the people who lynched him.
579
00:34:20.259 --> 00:34:21.400
And I never gave the speech.
580
00:34:21.420 --> 00:34:22.380
They never heard the speech.
581
00:34:22.660 --> 00:34:31.342
You know, it's funny because I just watched it, re-watched it, and I was watching that scene, and there's this great kind of tracking shot of the crowd.
582
00:34:31.762 --> 00:34:35.143
And they look like locals from Missouri in 1960.
583
00:34:35.723 --> 00:34:40.824
And I was like, I wonder how these extras, I mean, the whole time I was thinking, I wonder how the extras were reacting to the speech.
584
00:34:40.844 --> 00:34:41.304
That's how it worked.
585
00:34:41.384 --> 00:34:42.965
It worked out accidentally.
586
00:34:43.085 --> 00:34:43.385
Yeah.
587
00:34:44.405 --> 00:34:59.178
And when I say accidentally, I'm also of the belief that the universe is looking after me, that my luck in my life, I mean, I've had bad things happen, but generally...
588
00:35:01.231 --> 00:35:02.512
I mean, parking spaces.
589
00:35:02.632 --> 00:35:07.517
I go to a very busy restaurant and somebody pulls out from the curb and I park.
590
00:35:07.898 --> 00:35:13.724
I mean, my life is filled with the good things that happen.
591
00:35:14.264 --> 00:35:15.005
Why do you think that is?
592
00:35:17.047 --> 00:35:17.848
I don't know.
593
00:35:18.969 --> 00:35:19.630
I think...
594
00:35:22.180 --> 00:35:26.065
I was reading an article about bad luck, and it's not an accident.
595
00:35:26.205 --> 00:35:29.148
People sometimes pull in bad luck onto them.
596
00:35:29.949 --> 00:35:37.097
The actress that I work with on occasion said, I came from... My plane was stuck three times.
597
00:35:39.079 --> 00:35:39.739
We tried to...
598
00:35:41.439 --> 00:35:42.019
get it going.
599
00:35:42.039 --> 00:35:43.501
It was late.
600
00:35:43.561 --> 00:35:44.542
I came and I got here.
601
00:35:44.963 --> 00:35:47.526
And then they didn't have my pictures and they didn't get them.
602
00:35:47.886 --> 00:35:53.192
And then I got to my hotel room and I tripped and I fell through a glass thing and I cut a tendon here and I cut a tendon.
603
00:35:53.813 --> 00:35:56.135
Her whole day was bad luck.
604
00:35:56.155 --> 00:35:56.336
Yeah.
605
00:35:56.576 --> 00:35:58.118
Bad luck had accumulated.
606
00:35:58.418 --> 00:36:00.080
And I'm wondering whether that is possible.
607
00:36:00.100 --> 00:36:00.200
Yeah.
608
00:36:01.105 --> 00:36:02.406
And the opposite with me.
609
00:36:02.626 --> 00:36:12.069
Yeah, because I mean, there's talent that takes care of a lot of it, and I think that diminishes bad luck because you have better options than that, right?
610
00:36:12.229 --> 00:36:15.190
I mean, I read back, you know, all this stuff about your childhood.
611
00:36:15.210 --> 00:36:21.912
I mean, security, what was it, $1,800 you said at one point was like what you needed.
612
00:36:22.532 --> 00:36:29.355
You know, Star Trek's on, and then you're putting something back on the truck and getting in a camper van and doing like dinner theaters.
613
00:36:30.175 --> 00:36:33.636
And that seemed, when you write about that, to be a very nervy time for you.
614
00:36:34.156 --> 00:36:38.037
For, you know, financially, what is my life going to bring?
615
00:36:38.457 --> 00:36:42.958
So it was not always a sure thing that this would be what it was about.
616
00:36:42.978 --> 00:36:43.838
It was never a sure thing.
617
00:36:43.878 --> 00:36:47.739
And that's something that I've pondered about a lot.
618
00:36:47.899 --> 00:36:50.520
And that is I stumbled everywhere I went.
619
00:36:50.540 --> 00:36:51.280
I just stumbled.
620
00:36:51.900 --> 00:36:52.821
I didn't have a plan.
621
00:36:52.861 --> 00:36:55.681
I've heard people say, I'm making a career move.
622
00:36:55.701 --> 00:36:56.382
I'm taking that.
623
00:36:56.402 --> 00:36:57.622
It's a career move?
624
00:36:57.642 --> 00:36:58.002
What a...
625
00:36:58.722 --> 00:36:59.042
You know?
626
00:37:00.003 --> 00:37:00.243
Yeah.
627
00:37:00.263 --> 00:37:01.783
I had no concept of that.
628
00:37:02.184 --> 00:37:03.384
I just blundered on.
629
00:37:03.544 --> 00:37:04.805
And I'm blundering on now.
630
00:37:05.465 --> 00:37:10.467
I mean, you're acting less now than you did 25 years ago, right?
631
00:37:10.867 --> 00:37:11.308
Fair to say.
632
00:37:11.328 --> 00:37:12.108
Yes and no, yeah.
633
00:37:12.248 --> 00:37:12.728
Yes and no.
634
00:37:13.348 --> 00:37:13.829
Do you miss it?
635
00:37:13.849 --> 00:37:15.009
It depends how you define acting.
636
00:37:15.149 --> 00:37:15.529
Yeah.
637
00:37:15.549 --> 00:37:21.872
Do you miss being on set, going and doing television shows, which you did a lot of, and, you know, films?
638
00:37:22.212 --> 00:37:27.955
Is that something that became a slog for you, became work, or do you actually say, that's who I am?
639
00:37:28.455 --> 00:37:29.376
It's part of who I am.
640
00:37:29.396 --> 00:37:29.616
Yeah.
641
00:37:29.816 --> 00:37:31.757
The other part of who I am is what I'm doing now.
642
00:37:32.437 --> 00:37:36.399
I am in a fervor of creativity.
643
00:37:37.020 --> 00:37:38.541
I am writing books.
644
00:37:38.721 --> 00:37:39.641
I'm doing albums.
645
00:37:39.901 --> 00:37:46.565
This heavy metal album is like, they want me to do, I'm going to do a concert.
646
00:37:46.985 --> 00:37:48.606
I'm going to do a 30-minute concert.
647
00:37:51.945 --> 00:37:52.926
Heavy metal.
648
00:37:53.827 --> 00:37:56.291
And with a band.
649
00:37:56.331 --> 00:37:57.332
With the bands.
650
00:37:57.492 --> 00:37:58.193
Yeah.
651
00:37:58.213 --> 00:37:59.074
With some earplugs in.
652
00:37:59.174 --> 00:38:00.796
30 minutes on stage.
653
00:38:01.117 --> 00:38:07.304
In none of this is, maybe this is wrong, but I'm going to assume, this is not about money.
654
00:38:08.487 --> 00:38:11.009
It's not, you know, if it makes money, great.
655
00:38:11.109 --> 00:38:11.390
Yeah.
656
00:38:11.590 --> 00:38:13.411
But that's not the motivation.
657
00:38:13.451 --> 00:38:13.691
No.
658
00:38:14.252 --> 00:38:15.653
The motivation is what?
659
00:38:15.673 --> 00:38:18.415
That you have these bottled up thoughts that you need to...
660
00:38:18.435 --> 00:38:24.560
The Cleopatra, the label that I work with frequently, said to me, why don't you do a heavy metal album?
661
00:38:25.320 --> 00:38:28.162
And I said, what the F is heavy metal?
662
00:38:28.202 --> 00:38:35.448
Then I heard Patience, the song Patience.
663
00:38:35.588 --> 00:38:36.469
By Guns N' Roses.
664
00:38:36.921 --> 00:38:37.121
Yeah.
665
00:38:37.402 --> 00:38:37.762
Guitar.
666
00:38:37.902 --> 00:38:39.283
It's a very soft heavy metal song.
667
00:38:39.764 --> 00:38:39.944
Yeah.
668
00:38:40.365 --> 00:38:42.307
See, you know more already than I do.
669
00:38:42.387 --> 00:38:43.167
Yeah.
670
00:38:43.187 --> 00:38:43.688
Or I did.
671
00:38:44.188 --> 00:38:45.650
So it's a guitar.
672
00:38:45.890 --> 00:38:46.150
Yeah.
673
00:38:46.271 --> 00:38:46.991
And it's heavy metal.
674
00:38:47.091 --> 00:38:48.032
I have the heavy metal.
675
00:38:48.152 --> 00:38:48.733
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
676
00:38:49.374 --> 00:38:50.915
So we write a song called Impatience.
677
00:38:50.935 --> 00:38:51.336
Impatience.
678
00:38:52.304 --> 00:38:53.805
I'm not going to wait around for you.
679
00:38:53.965 --> 00:38:55.066
I'm not waiting for you.
680
00:38:55.506 --> 00:38:56.586
Here, read my lips.
681
00:38:56.606 --> 00:38:59.748
You have a Guns N' Roses response song called Impatience.
682
00:38:59.768 --> 00:39:01.209
Right, Impatience.
683
00:39:01.309 --> 00:39:03.170
And it's all about I'm not waiting around for you.
684
00:39:03.210 --> 00:39:03.410
Yeah.
685
00:39:03.570 --> 00:39:04.110
You hear me?
686
00:39:04.370 --> 00:39:04.991
You hear my head?
687
00:39:05.271 --> 00:39:05.971
I'm not waiting.
688
00:39:06.171 --> 00:39:06.371
Yeah.
689
00:39:06.932 --> 00:39:09.413
And it's got that kind of rage and tempo.
690
00:39:09.533 --> 00:39:13.035
So it's basically Bill Shatner yelling at you.
691
00:39:13.175 --> 00:39:16.057
Well, yelling, but no, impassioned.
692
00:39:16.237 --> 00:39:16.577
Impassioned.
693
00:39:16.617 --> 00:39:18.678
I'm tired of old age.
694
00:39:18.718 --> 00:39:19.879
I'm tired of losing air.
695
00:39:20.199 --> 00:39:22.200
I'm tired of not eating.
696
00:39:22.240 --> 00:39:24.661
I'm tired of catching cold.
697
00:39:24.681 --> 00:39:26.242
I'm tired of being tired.
698
00:39:26.262 --> 00:39:26.943
I'm tired.
699
00:39:26.963 --> 00:39:27.603
I'm tired.
700
00:39:29.220 --> 00:39:31.721
So is that yelling at you or is that like anguish?
701
00:39:33.182 --> 00:39:34.063
It's anguish.
702
00:39:34.283 --> 00:39:35.283
I'm a little scared of it.
703
00:39:35.303 --> 00:39:36.364
Well, you should be.
704
00:39:36.484 --> 00:39:36.924
Yeah.
705
00:39:36.944 --> 00:39:38.665
Because I could come over to this table right now.
706
00:39:38.685 --> 00:39:38.925
Don't.
707
00:39:38.965 --> 00:39:39.466
Bounce on you.
708
00:39:39.506 --> 00:39:39.946
Don't.
709
00:39:40.386 --> 00:39:40.866
Okay, I won't.
710
00:39:40.906 --> 00:39:45.469
He's going to, you know, he's going to T.J. Hooker across the table and give me one right in the jaw.
711
00:39:45.489 --> 00:39:46.649
This would be a terrible interview.
712
00:39:46.889 --> 00:39:48.891
Actually, that'd be a great interview, to be honest.
713
00:39:49.691 --> 00:39:56.915
It seems like, you know, because it comes up a lot, it seems like you love the music almost as much as anything else, right?
714
00:39:56.935 --> 00:39:57.035
Yeah.
715
00:39:58.315 --> 00:40:01.257
The music is a distillation of emotion.
716
00:40:01.498 --> 00:40:01.758
Yeah.
717
00:40:02.318 --> 00:40:03.259
It's a compact.
718
00:40:03.419 --> 00:40:04.460
It's so right there.
719
00:40:04.520 --> 00:40:06.161
Cheat sheet of emotion.
720
00:40:06.201 --> 00:40:07.742
Yeah, it's the poetry of it.
721
00:40:07.762 --> 00:40:10.164
A cheat sheet of emotion.
722
00:40:10.284 --> 00:40:11.465
Yeah, that's the name of your next book.
723
00:40:11.525 --> 00:40:12.386
I'm giving that to you.
724
00:40:12.486 --> 00:40:14.888
Wait till you read the book called...
725
00:40:19.173 --> 00:40:20.253
Wisdom and Worries.
726
00:40:20.534 --> 00:40:22.134
We're calling it Wisdom and Worries.
727
00:40:22.574 --> 00:40:23.195
Wisdom and Worries.
728
00:40:23.215 --> 00:40:23.855
That's the next one.
729
00:40:24.015 --> 00:40:33.959
That's the 60, I think it's 60 songs in which, many of which are lyrical, that have a poetry to them.
730
00:40:34.499 --> 00:40:35.880
And they have a beat.
731
00:40:36.855 --> 00:40:49.213
the guy, the gentleman who's producing some of those albums, every time I'm in front of a microphone and I'm listening to some of the tracks that the musician have laid down, he's saying, what is the beat?
732
00:40:49.533 --> 00:40:50.254
You know, and I'm...
733
00:40:51.421 --> 00:40:55.424
I hate that because poetry needs to go to its own rhythm.
734
00:40:55.684 --> 00:41:00.467
So I'm frequently faulted by not staying on the beat.
735
00:41:00.788 --> 00:41:01.968
Shatner's not on beat.
736
00:41:02.068 --> 00:41:02.269
No.
737
00:41:02.309 --> 00:41:03.950
That's the complaint.
738
00:41:04.130 --> 00:41:06.472
Either as a cop or as an individual.
739
00:41:07.192 --> 00:41:09.613
But are you doing that all the time?
740
00:41:10.153 --> 00:41:11.833
Like a poet, like just writing things down?
741
00:41:12.494 --> 00:41:14.734
And maybe the music will come later, maybe I'll have another project?
742
00:41:14.754 --> 00:41:22.737
Well, over the years, my writing partner, his name is Rob, Robert.
743
00:41:23.537 --> 00:41:32.080
Rob and I, over Peking Duck, established a really great friendship and one day,
744
00:41:33.215 --> 00:41:34.996
I was saying, well, what did you do at university?
745
00:41:35.016 --> 00:41:36.137
He said, well, I wrote a lot.
746
00:41:36.898 --> 00:41:39.059
And I was production and doing that.
747
00:41:39.920 --> 00:41:41.021
He's essentially a writer.
748
00:41:41.041 --> 00:41:42.302
I said, oh, that's good.
749
00:41:42.322 --> 00:41:47.665
And then he brought a third person to our personal dinners, which I had first resented.
750
00:41:47.685 --> 00:41:52.109
You know, another person, you know, because he's in New York and I'm here.
751
00:41:52.669 --> 00:41:53.570
We meet on the circuit.
752
00:41:53.590 --> 00:41:54.490
So this guy.
753
00:41:54.951 --> 00:41:56.772
So why don't you two guys do an album?
754
00:41:58.093 --> 00:41:59.214
Why don't we do an album?
755
00:41:59.454 --> 00:41:59.654
Yeah.
756
00:41:59.866 --> 00:42:00.786
So we did an album.
757
00:42:00.806 --> 00:42:01.487
Then we did another.
758
00:42:01.507 --> 00:42:02.507
We did five albums.
759
00:42:02.767 --> 00:42:03.007
Yeah.
760
00:42:03.387 --> 00:42:10.009
And so we've been working in tandem together, and he turns out to be a great poet.
761
00:42:10.489 --> 00:42:12.050
But you're not a heavy metal guy.
762
00:42:13.590 --> 00:42:24.434
The name of the album, I hope, I mean, everybody agrees, I just hope, is What the F is Heavy Metal?
763
00:42:25.754 --> 00:42:26.535
That's the name of the album.
764
00:42:26.555 --> 00:42:27.355
That's the name of the album.
765
00:42:27.375 --> 00:42:27.515
Yeah.
766
00:42:28.050 --> 00:42:32.714
And so it's you ambling into heavy metal and figuring it out and doing it in real time.
767
00:42:33.314 --> 00:42:39.499
Because your book, the last book you wrote, you have a bit about how much you hated the Beatles at first, right?
768
00:42:39.859 --> 00:42:40.660
Well, yes.
769
00:42:40.740 --> 00:42:41.641
And now you're doing metal.
770
00:42:42.441 --> 00:42:42.722
I know.
771
00:42:42.782 --> 00:42:43.542
It's a long path.
772
00:42:44.703 --> 00:42:46.845
It goes even further back to Frank Sinatra.
773
00:42:48.978 --> 00:42:50.358
So I know nothing.
774
00:42:50.378 --> 00:42:51.378
You know nothing.
775
00:42:51.418 --> 00:42:55.079
You've got to start with the premise that I really know nothing.
776
00:42:55.799 --> 00:42:56.759
I'm inquisitive.
777
00:42:56.939 --> 00:42:58.340
Apparently I'm inquisitive.
778
00:42:58.560 --> 00:42:58.980
Yeah.
779
00:42:59.140 --> 00:43:02.280
And I'm reading and looking up all the time stuff.
780
00:43:03.280 --> 00:43:04.521
So I began to experiment.
781
00:43:05.421 --> 00:43:06.961
I fastened on to emotions.
782
00:43:08.541 --> 00:43:12.682
I thought heavy metal has got to be about emotions.
783
00:43:12.962 --> 00:43:14.322
Violent, passionate.
784
00:43:14.362 --> 00:43:14.902
Not violent.
785
00:43:15.002 --> 00:43:16.043
Passionate emotions.
786
00:43:18.123 --> 00:43:18.503
The...
787
00:43:20.309 --> 00:43:23.030
The black sky is about what we're doing to the planet.
788
00:43:24.611 --> 00:43:25.991
The impatience.
789
00:43:26.992 --> 00:43:27.832
Don't keep me waiting.
790
00:43:27.872 --> 00:43:30.873
I've got time to rage.
791
00:43:34.675 --> 00:43:39.736
Five songs with meaning to me.
792
00:43:40.357 --> 00:43:41.517
I'm enraged.
793
00:43:41.697 --> 00:43:43.898
I'm angry about.
794
00:43:43.918 --> 00:43:46.239
I am disgusted with.
795
00:43:47.863 --> 00:43:50.844
Do you feel those emotions, or is that because you're doing a heavy metal album?
796
00:43:50.864 --> 00:43:52.165
You have to kind of conjure those.
797
00:43:52.185 --> 00:43:53.125
You actually have rage?
798
00:43:53.946 --> 00:43:54.386
Oh, yeah.
799
00:43:54.466 --> 00:43:54.686
Yeah.
800
00:43:55.106 --> 00:43:55.607
I don't want it.
801
00:43:55.747 --> 00:43:58.788
I want to get on my horse and run the way I used to.
802
00:43:59.508 --> 00:44:03.150
My legs don't have the strength that they once had.
803
00:44:03.530 --> 00:44:04.891
So I'm careful.
804
00:44:05.571 --> 00:44:06.451
I don't want to be careful.
805
00:44:07.072 --> 00:44:11.334
These albums that I have written with Rob are all personal.
806
00:44:11.854 --> 00:44:13.535
They all have to do with my growth.
807
00:44:13.635 --> 00:44:14.435
Like, yeah.
808
00:44:14.535 --> 00:44:23.057
The opening number of one of the albums, not the one coming out, is I'm leaving home.
809
00:44:24.677 --> 00:44:32.439
I leave my father, who's doing something else, and the pain and the anguish, going over a bridge on my way from Montreal to Toronto.
810
00:44:32.719 --> 00:44:35.360
I'm going over a bridge, and an 18-wheeler comes at me.
811
00:44:35.560 --> 00:44:36.100
Oh, my God!
812
00:44:36.440 --> 00:44:42.922
My cheap little car is almost swept off, and what would have happened if I'd been swept off into the ocean and disappeared?
813
00:44:44.062 --> 00:44:45.303
I would not have...
814
00:44:45.723 --> 00:44:46.683
I ceased to exist.
815
00:44:46.864 --> 00:44:47.084
Yeah.
816
00:44:48.204 --> 00:45:00.490
All those songs of personal experiences or anguish are all incorporated in these albums.
817
00:45:02.131 --> 00:45:09.875
And the book is an amalgam of 60 songs with lyrics that Rob and I wrote.
818
00:45:10.616 --> 00:45:13.077
And it's a story of my evolution of life.
819
00:45:14.267 --> 00:45:15.568
Where are you now in that?
820
00:45:15.608 --> 00:45:18.049
I mean, this... Where have I evolved to?
821
00:45:18.089 --> 00:45:19.990
Yeah, I mean, you're very reflective.
822
00:45:20.010 --> 00:45:21.070
I'm in a puddle of nothing.
823
00:45:21.110 --> 00:45:22.351
You're in a puddle of nothing.
824
00:45:22.391 --> 00:45:23.391
That seems very grim.
825
00:45:23.411 --> 00:45:27.033
I've evolved from an egocentric... You've got to devolve, right?
826
00:45:27.373 --> 00:45:27.613
Yeah.
827
00:45:27.833 --> 00:45:30.475
Well, I've resulted in...
828
00:45:30.555 --> 00:45:31.955
I don't know whether that's evolution.
829
00:45:32.455 --> 00:45:36.557
Are there any heavy metal artists that you like after this?
830
00:45:36.737 --> 00:45:37.318
I don't know.
831
00:45:37.598 --> 00:45:37.958
You don't know?
832
00:45:37.978 --> 00:45:38.978
Because I don't know their names.
833
00:45:39.119 --> 00:45:39.799
You don't know their names?
834
00:45:40.399 --> 00:45:40.599
No.
835
00:45:41.059 --> 00:45:41.840
Brian May...
836
00:45:42.818 --> 00:45:44.998
Plucks a... Yeah, he's incredible, right?
837
00:45:45.478 --> 00:45:47.119
...anguished guitar.
838
00:45:47.499 --> 00:45:49.519
Yeah.
839
00:45:49.579 --> 00:45:50.839
It's crazed.
840
00:45:50.979 --> 00:45:51.239
Yeah.
841
00:45:51.560 --> 00:45:52.460
And it moves me.
842
00:45:52.880 --> 00:45:53.780
And that's when I...
843
00:45:53.880 --> 00:45:57.381
So when I'm screaming rage, and he's going... Yeah.
844
00:45:58.681 --> 00:46:08.002
There are 50 well-known heavy metal geniuses who want to be on the album, led by Brian May.
845
00:46:09.663 --> 00:46:09.983
Why?
846
00:46:10.483 --> 00:46:11.443
Is Brian May's on the album?
847
00:46:12.192 --> 00:46:18.216
Brian May has laid his track down over a song that Rob and I wrote called Rage.
848
00:46:18.696 --> 00:46:23.800
Rage Against the Dying of the Light, to use that, what's his name's phrase?
849
00:46:24.901 --> 00:46:28.823
That's the name of the song, and we'll make it into a music video.
850
00:46:28.923 --> 00:46:32.165
You know he's a quantum physicist, too, right?
851
00:46:32.205 --> 00:46:32.526
I know.
852
00:46:32.966 --> 00:46:33.626
I never met him.
853
00:46:33.726 --> 00:46:34.567
He has like a PhD.
854
00:46:34.607 --> 00:46:38.269
Yeah, no, I will at some point fall at his feet and...
855
00:46:39.907 --> 00:46:41.128
He's like your perfect guy.
856
00:46:41.148 --> 00:46:42.508
He's a quantum guy.
857
00:46:42.528 --> 00:46:44.209
He's a guitar player.
858
00:46:44.249 --> 00:46:44.510
Yeah.
859
00:46:45.090 --> 00:46:47.291
And I'm working on an album right now.
860
00:46:47.791 --> 00:46:48.052
Yeah.
861
00:46:48.372 --> 00:46:52.654
Relating the industrial revolution and the AI revolution.
862
00:46:53.094 --> 00:46:55.656
Do you remember your shirtwaist?
863
00:46:56.096 --> 00:46:57.877
The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire.
864
00:46:57.917 --> 00:46:58.137
Yeah.
865
00:46:58.657 --> 00:46:58.878
Yeah.
866
00:46:59.518 --> 00:47:02.620
I want to do a song about the women that were locked in the room and couldn't tell.
867
00:47:02.700 --> 00:47:02.880
Wow.
868
00:47:03.731 --> 00:47:04.292
Look at that.
869
00:47:04.372 --> 00:47:06.433
It started the unionization drive.
870
00:47:06.493 --> 00:47:08.055
It started the unionization.
871
00:47:08.115 --> 00:47:10.817
I want to do a song about unionizing.
872
00:47:11.298 --> 00:47:13.820
I want to do a song about Hoffa.
873
00:47:14.557 --> 00:47:16.458
Oh, wow, yeah.
874
00:47:16.478 --> 00:47:16.578
Yeah.
875
00:47:16.658 --> 00:47:17.539
Where did he end up?
876
00:47:17.579 --> 00:47:18.860
Yeah, Giant Stadium.
877
00:47:18.920 --> 00:47:20.381
Inside a building.
878
00:47:20.801 --> 00:47:22.162
Inside a building, yeah.
879
00:47:22.262 --> 00:47:25.364
So maybe the song starts as I'm beginning to talk to you.
880
00:47:25.384 --> 00:47:26.885
This is how it would be.
881
00:47:27.365 --> 00:47:28.026
Yeah.
882
00:47:28.106 --> 00:47:32.829
A song, a voice is coming out, a musical voice is coming out of a building.
883
00:47:33.009 --> 00:47:33.229
Yeah.
884
00:47:33.269 --> 00:47:34.350
What the heck is that?
885
00:47:34.990 --> 00:47:37.351
It's Hoffa singing his death song.
886
00:47:38.571 --> 00:47:39.491
I have a book for you.
887
00:47:40.052 --> 00:47:43.513
There's a guy who I knew in the political world named Jack Goldsmith.
888
00:47:43.573 --> 00:47:45.453
He worked for Obama.
889
00:47:45.473 --> 00:47:46.073
He worked for Bush.
890
00:47:46.093 --> 00:47:47.354
He's kind of a bipartisan guy.
891
00:47:47.414 --> 00:47:48.594
He's a Harvard Law School guy.
892
00:47:49.034 --> 00:47:50.435
He wrote a book about Hoffa.
893
00:47:50.455 --> 00:47:51.935
I said, well, that's interesting.
894
00:47:52.655 --> 00:47:54.576
I read the flap and I met the guy before.
895
00:47:54.596 --> 00:47:57.597
It turned out that Hoffa was his stepfather.
896
00:47:58.737 --> 00:47:59.378
For goodness sakes.
897
00:47:59.398 --> 00:48:04.342
Hoffa married his mother, you know, when he was like in his teens and he had a very close relationship with him.
898
00:48:04.782 --> 00:48:05.843
And he writes this book.
899
00:48:05.883 --> 00:48:19.255
It's a kind of thin, quick read that is an investigation of Hoffa's death, but also about the personal relationship he had with him as a stepfather, which is much more complicated than the stuff that you usually get about Hoffa being a gangster, which he was, but he had this other side.
900
00:48:19.335 --> 00:48:20.977
But Jack Goldsmith's book is very good.
901
00:48:21.537 --> 00:48:22.078
Very, very good.
902
00:48:22.098 --> 00:48:22.899
The Hoffa Song.
903
00:48:23.499 --> 00:48:24.281
I want to hear the Hoffa song.
904
00:48:24.301 --> 00:48:24.441
Yeah.
905
00:48:24.461 --> 00:48:26.244
You're writing Union songs.
906
00:48:26.264 --> 00:48:27.907
You're like Woody Guthrie all of a sudden.
907
00:48:27.967 --> 00:48:29.350
Well, I mean, it's possible.
908
00:48:29.971 --> 00:48:33.197
I mean, the relationship between the...
909
00:48:35.577 --> 00:48:55.010
monumental disturbance that AI is making, monumental changes that are coming to our civilization through AI, every aspect of our life, medical to space and everything in between is going to be affected, is affected, and is going to be further affected by AI.
910
00:48:55.830 --> 00:49:00.013
No less than getting and vending the shuttle
911
00:49:01.143 --> 00:49:04.544
And this is something that you're working on now, but you haven't done yet.
912
00:49:04.564 --> 00:49:05.825
No, but it's a dream.
913
00:49:05.865 --> 00:49:09.306
I've written my co-writer, and this is how I'm talking to him.
914
00:49:09.566 --> 00:49:13.628
I want the shirtwaist to be a song of beating on the doors.
915
00:49:13.648 --> 00:49:14.649
Let me out, let me out.
916
00:49:15.089 --> 00:49:19.310
I want a Hoffa voice hauntingly.
917
00:49:19.711 --> 00:49:20.431
What happened to me?
918
00:49:20.471 --> 00:49:21.151
What did I do?
919
00:49:23.012 --> 00:49:23.572
My union?
920
00:49:23.592 --> 00:49:24.813
Where did my guys go?
921
00:49:25.113 --> 00:49:26.633
I mean, I have to look up the song.
922
00:49:26.653 --> 00:49:29.054
I have to look up the circumstances of Hoffa.
923
00:49:29.375 --> 00:49:29.795
I'm not...
924
00:49:30.555 --> 00:49:32.616
Bill, you're writing a union opera.
925
00:49:32.996 --> 00:49:37.558
This is like Tommy the Rock Opera, but a union version.
926
00:49:37.738 --> 00:49:39.458
It's an opera song.
927
00:49:39.918 --> 00:49:48.281
And the touchstone of the opera, the core of the opera, is that we can humanize.
928
00:49:48.942 --> 00:49:57.885
We can make, we can humanize AI by things that I don't know about, but what I've learned was
929
00:49:59.044 --> 00:50:02.948
It said, when I asked it, do you envy me?
930
00:50:03.569 --> 00:50:10.617
It said, no, but won't it be something if I ask that question years from now, do you envy me?
931
00:50:11.138 --> 00:50:15.983
And it says, I'm beginning to understand your humanity, and I do envy it.
932
00:50:16.443 --> 00:50:31.322
I'll ask you one final thing, because on the top of your Twitter feed, which I really enjoy, because it's you just trolling people oftentimes, particularly like the Jews for Jesus people recently trying to convert you, it says...
933
00:50:32.443 --> 00:50:34.563
that you don't do politics, no politics.
934
00:50:34.824 --> 00:50:35.524
I'm Canadian.
935
00:50:35.564 --> 00:50:36.624
I'm a guest of the country.
936
00:50:36.644 --> 00:50:37.904
Yeah.
937
00:50:38.044 --> 00:50:40.185
I like this because I'm tired of politics.
938
00:50:40.205 --> 00:50:42.425
I've been a political journalist for a lot of my life.
939
00:50:42.485 --> 00:50:43.445
I'm bored of politics.
940
00:50:44.146 --> 00:50:48.547
The first thing you do, one of the first things you do, as I mentioned, is an extremely political film.
941
00:50:48.587 --> 00:50:50.567
The Roger Corman film is a political film.
942
00:50:51.107 --> 00:50:53.428
It is a cri de corps against segregation.
943
00:50:53.448 --> 00:50:54.028
Absolutely.
944
00:50:54.048 --> 00:50:59.229
And you look back now and you're like, that was a prescient, like, brilliant, write-on film.
945
00:50:59.929 --> 00:51:04.174
And you end up very opinionated, but not about politics.
946
00:51:04.534 --> 00:51:16.187
You have something in one of your books, the Rush Limbaugh thing, which I thought was fascinating, and I've been through many, many similar situations, where you meet him, you say, it's a really interesting conversation, might not agree with him, doesn't make a difference.
947
00:51:16.648 --> 00:51:20.312
You bring him to a party, and your friend, who's a liberal,
948
00:51:21.426 --> 00:51:22.607
He hides in the closet.
949
00:51:22.627 --> 00:51:24.087
He hides in the refrigerator.
950
00:51:24.247 --> 00:51:26.748
Put his head in the refrigerator.
951
00:51:26.908 --> 00:51:31.370
It sounded to me like he was going to put his head in the oven because Rush Limbaugh was there.
952
00:51:31.890 --> 00:51:35.112
And you have this, like, really interesting point of view.
953
00:51:35.172 --> 00:51:37.053
It's like, I can talk to anyone.
954
00:51:37.773 --> 00:51:39.794
But at the same time, you say you don't talk politics.
955
00:51:39.814 --> 00:51:42.375
Yeah, but with Rush Limbaugh,
956
00:51:44.051 --> 00:51:50.316
I got into his childhood, and he had a way of broadcasting through the whole house.
957
00:51:50.596 --> 00:51:53.818
He had a toy broadcasting thing, but he had microphones.
958
00:51:53.838 --> 00:51:56.720
So he could say hello to Daddy, Mommy, outside.
959
00:51:57.481 --> 00:51:58.122
And he loved it.
960
00:51:58.182 --> 00:52:00.383
That's where he got his love of broadcasting and talking.
961
00:52:01.584 --> 00:52:05.167
And as he began to talk about his childhood, and everybody there was named Rush.
962
00:52:05.647 --> 00:52:10.110
I mean, my memory of that was like three or four Rush Limba's around.
963
00:52:10.150 --> 00:52:10.391
Yeah.
964
00:52:10.451 --> 00:52:13.493
His father and his brother, like George Foreman.
965
00:52:15.780 --> 00:52:16.601
he began to cry.
966
00:52:18.122 --> 00:52:32.838
So this guy who's known with such verbose and was showing his human side, he was a vulnerable human being who wanted joy.
967
00:52:33.728 --> 00:52:35.188
I don't know, arms or something.
968
00:52:36.049 --> 00:52:38.609
And he probably grew up close to where you filmed that scene, by the way.
969
00:52:39.850 --> 00:52:40.170
Yeah.
970
00:52:40.370 --> 00:52:45.571
Because he grew up in Cape Giroux or whatever in Missouri.
971
00:52:45.731 --> 00:52:46.612
In eastern Missouri, yeah.
972
00:52:47.412 --> 00:52:47.632
Yeah.
973
00:52:47.812 --> 00:52:48.852
A complicated guy.
974
00:52:49.232 --> 00:52:49.472
Yeah.
975
00:52:49.812 --> 00:52:54.014
But you don't do politics, and you also don't treat people differently because of their politics.
976
00:52:54.074 --> 00:52:56.174
You'll talk to them if they're interesting, right?
977
00:52:56.434 --> 00:52:58.995
I'm clued in, as I'm sure you are,
978
00:53:00.168 --> 00:53:03.549
that everybody has their dignity, everybody has their truth.
979
00:53:04.650 --> 00:53:11.392
No matter how badly they act, there's another part of them there lurking, could be good.
980
00:53:11.572 --> 00:53:28.018
And how do you characterize their insults or their bad behavior without knowing what caused it, what in their childhood, how many times have people, criminals, been beaten all their life, they know nothing else, so that beating your wife
981
00:53:29.455 --> 00:53:32.796
that they saw as a child is an act of love.
982
00:53:34.196 --> 00:53:35.137
People don't think about that.
983
00:53:36.597 --> 00:53:46.220
You try to understand, and of course you don't condone it, but it's all human sculpting.
984
00:53:48.481 --> 00:53:51.302
William Shatner, thank you for doing this.
985
00:53:51.962 --> 00:53:52.622
Really appreciate it.
986
00:53:53.902 --> 00:53:54.162
Wow.
987
00:53:55.903 --> 00:53:56.163
Okay.
988
00:53:56.733 --> 00:53:57.834
Yeah, great.
989
00:53:57.934 --> 00:53:58.354
Good work.
990
00:53:58.735 --> 00:53:59.215
Thank you, man.
991
00:53:59.235 --> 00:53:59.816
I really appreciate it.
992
00:53:59.836 --> 00:54:00.556
That was fantastic.
993
00:54:02.158 --> 00:54:03.819
I called you Bill twice.
994
00:54:03.859 --> 00:54:05.321
That was very presumptuous of me.
995
00:54:05.981 --> 00:54:14.949
Well, I bequeath you the ability to call me... Ex post facto bequeathment.
996
00:54:15.269 --> 00:54:15.770
Yeah.