James L. Brooks: The Hollywood Interview

Filmmaker James L. Brooks.



JAMES L. BROOKS:
LAUGHTER THAT STINGS IN YOUR THROAT
By
Alex Simon

Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared in the December 1997/January 1998 issue of Venice Magazine.

Along with Norman Lear, James L. Brooks is arguably the single-most influential creator/producer of American television during the 1970's. A list of the hit TV shows he created and/or produced during the decade include Room 222, the seminal Mary Tyler Moore Show and all its spin-offs (Lou Grant, Rhoda, Phyllis), Taxi, The Associates, The Tracey Ullman Show, The Critic, Phenom, and The Simpsons. Brooks brought realism to the previously overstated world of television comedy. His characters were not cartoony buffoons created for the sole purpose of generating laughs. They had warts, were neurotic, lovable and maddeningly truthful, all the while delivering laughs out of real-life (and often heartbreaking) situations. These were not "sit-coms," but something entirely new. Brooks' fingerprints can now be seen in shows such as Seinfeld, Friends, Ally McBeal and numerous other shows from the 1980's and 90's.

James L. Brooks was born May 9, 1940 in North Bergen, New Jersey. He started out as a copyboy with CBS News in New York, eventually becoming a TV news writer. In 1965 he moved to Los Angeles to work for David L. Wolper's documentary company. Showing a growing interest in the entertainment aspect of television, he conceived the idea for the series Room 222 (1969-74). Forming a partnership with fellow writer Allan Burns (Rocky & Bullwinkle), he embarked on the big time by creating The Mary Tyler Moore Show and the string of other hits that followed.

Having conquered television, Brooks then set his sights on motion pictures, first writing the screenplay for the romantic comedy Starting Over (1979), then making an auspicious directorial debut with Terms of Endearment, which he adapted from Larry McMurtry's best-selling novel. The film won five Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Screenplay and Best Supporting Actor. He was again nominated for Best Picture and Best Screenplay Oscars for Broadcast News in 1987, a film he based on real-life experiences in the CBS newsroom. It was named Best Film and Brooks was honored as Best Director by the New York Film Critics. Brooks produced The War of the Roses in 1988, co-produced Big and served as executive producer on Bottle Rocket. He also executive produced Cameron Crowe's directorial debut Say Anything in 1989 and, most recently, produced Crowe's hit Jerry Maguire.

In 1990 Brooks produced and directed his first play, Brooklyn Laundry, a Los Angeles production starring Woody Harrelson, Glenn Close and Laura Dern and wrote and directed the feature I'll Do Anything in 1994 starring Nick Nolte, Albert Brooks and Julie Kavner.

Brooks' latest is sure to win a place in his "all-time best" category, As Good As It Gets, a biting comedy starring Jack Nicholson as the most un-P.C. of New Yorkers and as the people in his orbit whom he verbally abuses, Greg Kinnear, Helen Hunt and Cuba Gooding, Jr. As Good As It Gets, is full of the trademark Brooks humor: belly laughs that sting in your throat. It is funny, poignant and very truthful and contains some classic "Jack" moments that are sure to have a place in the actor's retrospective. TriStar Pictures releases the film December 25.

In person, James L. Brooks displays the same warmth, thoughtfulness and sense of humor that he imbues in his characters. Some words of wisdom from a man who helped to shape the perceptions and senses of humor of several generations...

Were you always a storyteller growing up?
James L. Brooks: I don't think I was a storyteller. I was a clown and clowned around, then I think I went through periods of isolation where I was very quiet. I was an early latchkey kid. My father was sort of in-and-out and my mother worked long hours, so there was no choice but for me to be alone in the apartment a lot.

Do you have any siblings?
I have an older sister who helped raise me.

So you were essentially an only child.
Yes, in a way. She was eight years older than I was.

Do you think that sense of isolation you mentioned helped you develop your creativity early on?
(laughs) Yes. It's the only good thing about being beaten up and being left alone: you get a chance to (be alone in your own head).

When did you really start writing a lot?
I think I started writing for fun when I was really young. Then I was on the high school newspaper. And for a while even in high school I'd send out short stories that wouldn't get published, but every once in a while I'd get a letter back from someone that was encouraging. It never occurred to me to make a living as a writer. It never entered my mind.

Were your stories mostly humorous?
Yeah. I always loved comedy and comedy writers.

Who were some of your favorite comedians growing up?
Oh gosh...As a kid I guess it was Sid Caesar. Jack Benny. I remember when we used to listen to Lenny Bruce. And (Mike) Nichols & (Elaine) May killed me beyond belief. I just couldn't believe they existed in the world.

I can see a lot of Nichols & May in your humor.
Really? I mean it's been a lifelong admiration, because I know them each now. I just always feel weird when I'm around either one of them...and don't ever burden them with the fact that I idolized them...And (if you listen to their material) it absolutely holds up today...Bob Newhart used to do albums like that. The first Bill Cosby album also had a big affect on me.

Initially you wanted to pursue a career in journalism, right?
Well, I wanted to pay my rent and then through my sister I got a job that you usually had to be a college graduate for, which was an usher and pageboy at CBS. They pulled on us to be occasional replacements if a copyboy was gone. I filled in for two weeks. And for that you had to be a college graduate from a good college. And the guy I filled in for never came back. So it was really just a great break for me. I mean, I was there for three years, thinking that I was going to be the oldest usher in the history of the world. Then once my foot was in the door, I became a union news writer. Then I left there, strangely, because I still haven't quite figured out how I got the guts to do it, to come out here and try writing documentaries for David L. Wolper. Then I got laid off there after about six months, newly married and now really out of work. I kept trying for any news job I could get, really fearing that I was going to wind up selling women's shoes, or something...Then I met Allan Burns at a party and he had a lot of shows that he'd created. And he was and is, a really warm, funny guy. Then Allan got me an in for a series called My Mother the Car, and I sold a story outline to them and once I did that, they called me in to re-write a script. And that's how I got into television writing.

How come your stay at Wolper was so short lived?
Well, they were cutting back, so I got laid off. The funniest story about that is that I would occasionally come back and do spot jobs for them. And at that time I had a tremendous phobia of insects. And the only job they had open was and write a National Geographic special about insects! (laughs) And I really needed the paycheck. So you had a movieola just stuck to your face and the most hideous close-ups of wasps and ants, eight hours a day for weeks, and it cured the phobia! It turned out to be aversion therapy.

What happened next?
Well, I wrote an episode of That Girl, then very shortly after that got to create Room 222.

Tell us about that.
Well, they said "Black schoolteacher" to me and that was very landmark at the time. It was the second series ever to have black leads. It's amazing, just amazing because I'm not crotchety, yet I'm the guy who did the second series ever with black leads, and I only missed the first by a few months. This was about 1969. Then I worked with a great guy named Gene Reynolds, who insisted that I do research. So I kept going back to Los Angeles High School and I found everything: The basis of some of the characters, the pilot story. And he kept sending me back, again and again and it was great because that became my pattern.

Was he a mentor for you in a way?
I wouldn't say that. I'd say he had ferocious integrity. He wasn't interested in pleasing networks or pleasing studios. He wanted it done right, like the way he did M*A*S*H. He set a great precedent, like a great editor would, which I also had the pleasure of working for at CBS news, a guy named John Merriman, who died in a plane crash. He was the first person of influence to work with me and sort of take an interest in me...I left Room 222 after a year, then Alan and I did The Mary Tyler Moore Show.

Tell us about the genesis of that.
Grant Tinker, who was the head of programming at the time, secretly was working for a CBS on-air commitment for his wife (Mary Tyler Moore) and said to Allan and I that we should become a team and do the show. And we loved her, of course. Everyone loved her from The Dick Van Dyke Show. I don't think there's been another woman who's had so many people have a crush on her at once.

And you set it in a newsroom because of your background?
Yeah, my life had been research for that, although we didn't do that right away. We had some bad ideas for it initially.

What were some of those?
She was going to be an assistant to a gossip columnist for a while...I forget. There was another one that was probably worse, as if that wasn't bad enough. But at that time, it was very strange...her last series she and her husband had had twin beds and the serendipity...there were programming people at CBS who really hated the show, and we were in danger. Grant had been asked by CBS to fire us and he refused, which we were unaware of for years. And then there was a guy named Bob Wood, who was president of the network, who took a bunch of top 20 shows and canceled them, like The Beverly Hillbillies, and then put on shows like All In the Family, saw our pilot and responded to us. Took us out of a death time period and gave us a good one to nurture us...and so this business guy really revolutionized television. He'd never been that involved in programming before, but he did it. And we were the beneficiaries of this man passing through at the same time we were. And that's the luck of the draw, because later on, Taxi got canceled because the wrong guy in the chair came along at the wrong time...and also the woman's movement was just starting at this time, which matched our agenda for the show and the wave just carried us.

The thing I remember about Mary Tyler Moore that I'd never seen in any show up to that time, was that the characters were neurotic and realistic, which I'd never seen in a TV comedy before. Even Dick Van Dyke was essentially made up of characitures.
Yes, I guess that's true. That's true...This guy John Merriman I mentioned, who was the basis for the Lou Grant character, very hard-boiled...This is a true John Merriman story and a perfect Lou Grant story. It was a freezing cold night. I was living in New Jersey, working odd hours. For me it was a subway ride, a walk, and a bus through the tunnel to get home. I was a copyboy. John was an editor. We were working at 52nd and Madison Avenue. John lived in the 70's. The bus terminal was in the 40's. I didn't make enough at the time to afford a cab. So the snow is coming down in the wee hours of the morning. And he says "Can I give you a lift in the cab?" And I said, "Well isn't it out of your way?" He thought for a moment and said "Yeah, I guess it is," and closes the door to the cab and takes off! (laughs) And I was just crushed because it meant I had to walk all the way to the subway in the middle of this snow storm!...But the thing that was not revolutionary, but evolutionary about the show was the idea of work as family, colleagues as family, which was my life because that's where my family always came from, because I didn't have much of a family. And also the two arenas of home and work were new, especially for a woman. Here's the funny thing: there was no company. We were two young writers and we hired the accountants, we hired the business apparatus...we didn't know anybody and we were given the keys to the asylum and just took it for granted. It was amazing! We hired everybody! It never happened to me again and it never will. It still flabbergasts me. So typically at the end, we were going off voluntarily after seven years and there was a lot of heat around our last show, and everybody had these speeches and moments except for Mary. And she came to us and said she'd like to have a final speech too, and the speech we wrote for her was about work as family, and that's how we went off. I think that was true of Taxi also in a blue collar way. Now I think that's no longer true anymore. It's a lot harder with people moving and people working over computers. Something else is happening.

Technology has made us a much more isolated society, hasn't it?
Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

Let's talk about Terms of Endearment. I understand that took years to get made.
About four years, yeah. It was after about two years of trying to get it made and every studio saying they didn't think it would work, then Michael Eisner said he'd give me $7.5 million to make it, which wasn't a bad budget then. When we budgeted it out, we realized it wouldn't work, not to shoot on location. Because I couldn't see doing it without doing it as a location picture. I was brand new to everything. It was intimidating enough that I, who had never been to Texas, was adapting the great Texas writer (Larry McMurtry). I knew I had to go hang and spend time there and shoot there, as well as in Nebraska and New York. I just knew the last place to shoot it was Los Angeles. And I just kept on trying. Then MTM invested a million dollars. Then NBC agreed to buy it before it was made for television airing. It was four years of asking people for money, which was tough because from my background asking people for money rings bells anyway...It was a tough shoot because of the personalities involved. Then I went two days over after three weeks and things got really ugly...Eisner came down to the location and I showed him a chunk of what we'd shot and he said "Watch what you spend, but keep going." So it was tough. I was learning on the job and it was pretty scary...I haven't had too many electric moments in my life, and they don't mean anything except that you experience them. They don't create a changed universe, or anything. But the last shot of Terms of Endearment, because we'd been through some very rough times in the weeks before, I was strapped to the front of a car as we got the shot of Emma arriving in New York. And we were in Brooklyn when we went over the bridge and got the shot, then we rode back. And it was on that ride back that I knew I'd finished the movie and I felt like my head was gonna come off! And then it was amazing because we were looking at the statue of Liberty and...I had finished. I had finished. I'll never forget that.

How much of Broadcast News was autobiographical?
None, really. What happened was I had finished Terms and had been very lucky with the way it turned out and I was casting about and a friend of mine invited me to go to the political conventions in '84, and it was like I was doing research for something that didn't yet exist. I was hanging out with and meeting people...and I remember the lunch where I got the basic story of the nature of a romantic triangle between these journalists that I had met there. And I started to meet a new kind of woman. I felt so much that we as a society and everybody I knew and me were going through fundamental changes and I wondered whether our way we looked at romance was changing and that the girl was changing. I thought there was a new kind of heroine out there and that was the story. Even though you're doing fiction, there's always a story to cover if you can find it. So the character of Jane came out of four women that I met, all different ages...I just really think for me if you can be somewhat dumb about part of what you're doing it's a good thing because it gives you an innocence because it gives you humility to a certain degree. And the thing that always happens with romantic triangles is that you always know she's gonna go with guy a). I mean, Ralph Bellamy built a career on being guy b). So I thought, what if I was open to her winding up with either guy? So I was. I told all the actors that. I shot it in continuity so I could change the ending and I was really looking for the picture to inform me which way to go.

So you really didn't know who she was going to wind up with until the end of the shoot?
Right. And at the end of the road I couldn't put her with either guy.

Tell us about I'll Do Anything, which I hear was originally shot as a musical.
I wanted to do a Hollywood story. At the time it seemed to me, and it turned out to be a real miscalculation, to get the truth about Hollywood, the form had to be larger than life, a musical. I did a lot of strange things on that. Because of my background I went for actors on it and not singers. I'm in love with actors. I had great musical people, the best. I had Twyla Tharp as my choreographer. Prince as my songwriter. Sinead O'Connor did one song, a beautiful song. And I went to work...and it was the first time I fell in love with my leading lady, who was this six year-old, magical child. And her mother was great...part of the movie was based on my experience with my own two daughters...and I sort of became a surrogate dad...I had all these other people around me that I loved, and it was great. And then we went to our first preview. And it was a disaster. We had walkouts...it was awful. Then the worst thing of all happened someone who saw it told somebody who told somebody who told the Los Angeles Times about what had happened, and then they came after the story. So now here I was trying to fix the film, now I actually have the major home town newspaper publish what had happened, and kill us dead in the water. And they made a story of my odyssey, came to my next preview and it was just horrendous. So eventually I pared down the music, took almost all of it out. And you can speculate on a lot of things about why the picture didn't work. I'm a guy who started out in one form and changed it to another, but the movie played and people laughed, because I saw it with an audience. But it utterly failed commercially and I felt like I had let down a lot of people. I don't want to say too much more about this because I might make a documentary on the experience and I don't want to steal my own thunder.

Is it hard not to take it personally when something like that happens?
I think it's my job to take it personally. When I ask people to join me and come work with me, who else is responsible? But I haven't seen the movie in a long time and I still think it's a good movie.

Tell us about the genesis of As Good As It Gets.
There was a script I thought was terrific called Old Friends, written by Mark Andrus and I was going to produce it. And whenever I'm producing I support the voice of the writer. But to my way of thinking when I decided to direct it, it had such wonderful people in it, it needed you to suspend disbelief. And Andrus' writing is so earnest and lovely that you do. And my style when directing is that I really don't know how to get people to suspend disbelief. I need people to believe it. So I said I'd do a three week polish on it. Well a year later I'm pouring my heart and soul into this thing. Mark had spent at least a year pouring his heart and soul into it, had been through all the studio wars with it...so what you see in the final product is a collaboration between two writers who didn't necessarily work on it at the same time, but years apart. And that was the genesis of the picture. There were changes made and the emphasis was changed but it's the product, really, of a very unusual writing team. And again there was trouble getting the money and getting it on track...

How long did it take to get it off the ground?
Over a year to get it all together. Again, at first I didn't know how to do it. I didn't understand the tone of it. I was open on that and it was an exploration. There were a lot of late ideas in it. It was a late idea to make Jack's character chemically ill. It was a late idea to put the emphasis on he and the girl. It's very hard to explore what to do with a picture at a certain budget. There is another type of budget where you can just say "We know what we want to do and it's this (snaps fingers)!" And for me, because I'm a responsible person, you start to feel very weird if you're out there playing with someone else's money without a clear idea of what you're doing with it. But, like most things, it worked out in the end. It just took that little extra time of exploration.