Said Al Pacino, quoted in "The Interview/Al Pacino Is Still Going Big" (NYT).
I'm quoting from the recording. The transcript is edited down a bit and it misses some of the feeling. I thought the interviewer, David Marchese, rushed by some of the best material Pacino seemed to want to hand him. For example, when Pacino spoke of the beautiful, sad dog becoming aware, Marchese intruded with "You're such a softy," categorizing Pacino's feeling as shallow sentimentality as opposed to some more subtle existentialism.
And one of the topics was Pacino's nearly dying of of Covid. On that topic, Pacino quoted Hamlet — "The undiscovered country from whose bourn, no traveler returns." Marchese tried to turn that into the question of the "consolation" of leaving a "body of work" behind. Pacino ignored the question. He said "having children is a consolation."
And then: "It’s natural, I guess, to have a different view of death as you get older. It’s just the way it is. I didn’t ask for it. Just comes, like a lot of things just come." And Marchese broke the mood with the somewhat insulting: "I don’t want to linger in morbidity." And Pacino seemed a bit insulted: "I don’t find this morbid, man."
He wanted to linger! So did I. I wanted to hear how Pacino's view of death had changed in the years running up to 84. Earlier he'd come out with the line "Everything to me is time." I wanted Marchese to stop at that door and open it!
There's always the memoir — "Sonny Boy" (commission earned).
Am I too hard on David Marchese? Maybe he's prized for an ability to deliver what NYT readers want. A dog finding its way back to some kind of awareness is not a productive line of thought. No Al Pacino movies will be cited in any sort of answer, and who looks to Al Pacino for insight on aging, death, and time?
Here's a NYT piece from last March: "What David Marchese Learned Talking to the World’s Most Interesting People." Excerpt:
You’ve described the Lou Reed interview that you did for Spin in 2008 as a turning point. It was a contentious one. He didn’t like a bunch of the questions you were asking, and as a rock star, it was his prerogative to just, in some cases, not even say a word, just sit silently. What is it that you learned from that interview? The main thing I learned is that even if the interview, as it’s happening, feels as if it’s going badly, it can mean that I’m doing my job well, because I am eliciting a nonstock response from someone. And also that an unpleasant personal experience in the moment can make for a compelling read after the moment. But you know, a funny thing that happened in that interview that I remember: The interview was happening over lunch at a restaurant in the West Village. And Lou Reed ordered a salad with shaved Parmesan, and the waiter brought the salad over with what looked to me like a piece of shaved Parmesan. And Reed looks at the waiter with, like, a dead-eyed stare on his face and says, You call that shaved Parmesan?
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11 comments:
That was hilarious- Marchese was expecting Pacino to provide the narrative that Marchese wanted about COVID and mortality and Pacino refused to do so requiring a change of subject.
Boy, Pacino sounds a lot like Trump was my other impression.
"Marchese was expecting Pacino to provide the narrative that Marchese wanted about COVID and mortality."
The question Marchese asked was "Did that experience have any metaphysical ripples?"
The answer he got from Pacino was: "It actually did. I didn’t see the white light or anything. There’s nothing there. As Hamlet says, “To be or not to be”; “The undiscovered country from whose bourn, no traveler returns.” And he says two words: “no more.” It was no more. You’re gone. I’d never thought about it in my life. But you know actors: It sounds good to say I died once. What is it when there’s no more?"
And that's where Marchese bothered me by trying to lighten it up and get back to film. He asked, "But you have this body of work that people will be going back to. Is that consolation at all?"
Notice that Pacino had not shown himself in need of consolation. He was meditating on "no more" in the context of "Hamlet."
You are giving Marchese too much credit- Pacino wasn't playing along nicely and thus the need to change the subject.
Yes he wanted waxing metaphysical, and he wasn't having that,
Pacino has a camper?
Am I too hard on David Marchese?
No. Interviews used to be structured to find out what the subject of the interview thinks, not about what the interviewer thinks the subject should think.
I guess David Marchese has a pretty good job, overall, but a big part of it seems to be making every celebrity he interviews look smart by comparison.
I thought the beginning quotes was Trump talking. Sure reads just like him.
Shoulda read this before I wrote- Yessir, sure thought that was Trump speaking at a rally.
In the last 25 years the interviewing quality of journalists has decayed noticeably. Most journos are in Podcast Mode where they must be part of the conversation, rather than just asking a well formed question then sitting back to let the subject answer at length
I assume he means his on-set trailer. I prefer the notion of him traveling the country in a motor home, though.
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