movie. good oening. i'm tavis smiley. her latest movie is called "nightcrawler" and it takes us into the murky world of local television news where violence and crime win the ratings race. we're glad you joined us. our conversation with rene renee russeau coming upright now.>=

>> renee russeau and one of my all-time favorites, i was just telling her, k"the thomas crown affair" is one of my favorites. "nightcrawler, still, sadly, rules the air waves. the film was written and drekted

by her husband. first, a look at a scene from "nightcrawler" street vid i don't go fer just what she wants from the video. >> we find our viewers are more interested in urban crime, creeping into the suburbs. what that means is the victim, or victims, preferably well-off, white, injured a minority. accidents, planes, cars, busses. >> well, graphic. to capture the spirit of what we air and think of our newscast as a screaming woman running down the street. >> i understand. so while that clip was running,

a lot of great people in the film. and you were whispering to me that jam is on his game right now. >> he is on his game. >> !cwell, first of all, the pa is written so beautifully. and i thought oh, well, okay, who's going to be able to film this? he went above and beyond. and to watch him work was a beautiful thing. i've never -- it was like giving birth. i can tell that he had to walk this tight rope and use so many colors at once. he was charming and repulsive and so many things once. he killed that part. >> i'm just hoping no one ever refers to me as championing and repulsive. that's quite a duality. charming and repulsive. but that's what actors do, though. and you get paid to do that. there's another thing i want to

dig into here about that phrase he's on his game. as an actor, when do you know? >> well, gosh, that's really hard to describe. you know when you first learned to ride a bike and you realize oh, i'm okay. i'm on. i'm on. i'm going. that's what it's like. and you can feel, sometimes, it's like doing a talk show. it's like you hear yourself going, oh, okay, that sucked. well, you know you're having a conversation. i think you just know. it's sort of like surfing. sometimes you're good, sometimes you're not.

are there moments in your career when you look back and say i was on my game? >> i guess with "thet crown affair" i was on my game. >> yes, you were. >> he was probably the best i've ever worked with. he constantly busted me. he was on me all of the time and got me through that role. tin cup was great. i guess you have high moments and maybe others, e, not.

you just want to go back and sometimes reshoot a scene. >> i think where i'm going with this is to get to what it's like to be directed with dwour husband. so what kind of director do you work best with? what kind of direct'n is best for you? specifics.oc)ij i will come with my idea and then i need someone to be clear in what it is they want and we can marriage the two together. john mctiernen had me go see a madame before the film because he wanted me to sort of, you know, use my sexual energy. he said, look, renee, you lead with humor, not with sexual energy. i want to bring that out in you.

>> i said wow, he busted he. he can really see through me. if marilyn monroe walked through the door, you'd say okay, she's got it. >> do you stop? do you stop sometimes? >> well, thank you for stopping. i don't stop. oh, my gosh, i've never seen a film unless i have to go in to adr. but i don't watch after. i'm too critical. i don't think it would help me. but i have to see this film. it's my husband. it would be completely selfish if i didn't.

>> all right. so no w we've got to your husbad here. how did this project come to be that you were going to star in it for him? >> so danny came to me one day and said he had this great idea and it was in a world that hadn't really been shown beforen and that he was going to write a part for me. i thought, well, great. but listen, how many projects get off the ground? when he said i was going to direct it, i thought yes. inside, i went oh my gosh, okay, okay. and the ma teeshl is interesting. but i thought maybe it would be a hard sell. so, i mean, those were my feelings. two months later, he hands me the skript and i read it just cold. i thought it's a brilliant script, i felt.

i'm not always on his team. he'll show it to me and sometimes i go oh, that sucks. you know, i need to be a little more delicate. but i realize it was amazing. but the female needs a rewrite. he looked at me like i was crazy.4 and the truth is, not one word was changed. but i couldn't find her. i did not -- it took me a long time to discover, like, her motivation. i didn't get -- i'm not the kind of person that would step on people just to get where i wanted to be. but i have crossed boar boundaries when i've been afraid or december pratt. desperate. i had to find it in myself. so any moral boundaries, that would be out of fear and desperation. when i found that, i was good to go with nina. she's a desperate woman. could possibly lose her job, her health care, her, you know, her everything.

she's lonely. she's older. where is she going? . and i think that that desperation was a thing that i needed for her to sort of -- for a you will of her little, unsavory behavior to come out. >> so she gigive us a good descn of who nina is. describe the film for those of us wondering what this nightcrawler is. >> well, i had no idea, but there's a whole group of people who go out and film everything from accidents and murders, set et cetera and(t sell them to th news station because they get great ratings. i like to drive around late because i love los angeles at night. now i'm looking for nightcrawlers. but it sells. and we watch it. it seems to somehow interest us, you know.

and i've been asked to articulate -- i would say why does it? and i don't have a good answer. i think for me -- am i often? am i off topic? >> no, no, i'm with you. >> but that is the gist. in how they sell sort of fear, really, to the new stations and we, as viewerins watch this. >> so that's what sells. that's the answer. >> and it's -- and it's -- and then why, you know. i think human beings are brave in a way. we wake up every morning knowing that the abyss can end up under our feet. maybe the reason the 405 is backed up for an accident is we drive by and that's that terror

that we are always with, i think. we can't be constantly thinking about it. but there is a reality to it and it's like how is that person dealing with this tragedy or that tragedy. for me, maybe that's why. >> your relationship between her character, your character, nx ina and jake is? >> interesting. >> yaeah, that's one word for i. complicated. >> let me cut around. i e when i'm watching this, i originally bet that you were not going to cross that line. i'm not giving the movie away, but i thought as i'm watching, she is not going to do this. she is not going to do this. >> exactly.

that's what a lot of people thought. ened you know what i said to danny? i don't think i would do this. i don't think i would do this. and i have -- >> none of us wants to think that we would do this. >> right? and that's it. and i think for me, and the audience, i would hope that people would look at nina and think would i do that? it's a hard world out there right now. it's interesting because i've had discussions with women and men. it's not always age specific or gender specific, but sometimes women understand her pliegt better than say maybe men. less than older women who are facing some of these issues. but, yeah, know no, you're i think there are people in the audience saying wow, i did that. i think fear and desperation, i think you do things you wouldn't ordinarily do if you're under that kind of pressure. >> what have you learned? i asked you to share confidences

or tell you something that your husband doesn't -- >> but what have you learned, though? i wrestled with this w567ing the film myself. this film has -- you did a great job on it. the film raises a lot of questions: it doesn't always answer them, but it raises a lot of questions. and i love that about the film. but one of the questions it raises is how we frame in our looifrin looi lives and how we figure out what the answers are to these moral canon drums. how you face these moral decisions in your life. what a good e good question. i think in order to live with yourself, you have to justify it somehow. and i have not always been able to justify it.

and that can leave you really in a -- really feeling about yourselves. so for me, i've come to a point in mysi life where usually in a moral boundaries i've come across, i've been afraid. that's not an excuse, but i can sit quietly and go reneea, you're terrified right now. i wish i weren't, but i'm doing something i wouldn't otherwise do just out of fear of loss. so i think, for me, as i get older, instead of just beating myself up, i'm livering in denial. [ laughter ] >> denial is a good -- >> yeah, sometimes. as they say, it's not just a river in egypt. dee denial. >> so i'm trying to give myself

a break and i'm saying, oh, renee, cam down. >> one of the thinks that i thought about again, after watching this film, i've been on this book tour for about the last year in the life of dr. king. it's a story about dr. king that most americans goent know and some issues he faced starting with will hether or not hefrs g to come out against the vietnam war. and he uses this line in the text and i found myself wrestling with this again, back to watching your film. he said there's some evil in the best of us and some good in the worst of us.xl so that we are not human and divine, we're just human. so m call for human. woe're fallible. we make mistakes. the same i wrestle with watching this film. if i had been nina, and, again, i goent want to give the movie

away, if i had made that decision, how would i have lived with myself after that. put another way, how do you not beat yourself up for that decision if you think you had no other choice. >> exactly. i think it's different for every person. i think, for 34rksnina, she daus or sonsed crossed that boundary and it wasn't a slippery slope. after all, i'm not asking jake too much. i don't want to know too much. and thank god i can hold onto my apartment and there's some hope and i think there was real excitement for her. i mean, i guess. i hi e think that -- i know that slippery voep. and i know that, you know, you can almost justify things. and you're right.

we're not perfect and it has helped me not to judge people. >> i finally got to a point in my life now where i will not say in any conversation what i would never do. i took that out of my voe cab lake e laer. i will never say anymore what i will not do. >> that's me. i put myself right there. i think that's really important. i you said thunderstand that. i understand the whole judgment deal. i get that. >> as director of this, i think danny did a really, really good job of putting on film what l.a.

night life is like. i think he nailed that. >> i do, too. there is a raw -- i don't know what other word to use but spirit. it's different from anywhere else i've ever been. it is a wilderness, in some ways. you feel that. >> when you were kbroing up here, is this what you always wanted to do? we know you're a wond earlful model, brilliant model. as a matter of fact, how did thatp+ happen? i love the story about how this -- so i -- i was a high school dropout. i was going to a rolling stones concert and my manager, who is my manager today, jop crosby. >> all of these years later?

same guy? >> he was like a father figure to me. i wasn't raised with a dad and i wouldn't have had the confidence to think i could be a model or actress. he got out and handed me a card and said have your mom call me. and so my mom did and we sent some pictures toi?:cg chilene f- and i lived at her house for a while. she sent me out of stuff and it sort of worked for me. so i was lucky. i didn't have an education and that worked. >> why did you drop out of high school? >> i was bullied. i wore a body cast. i had scoliosis and i couldn't handle it. i really couldn't handle it. it's hard to be in a classroom and know you're a geek and

you're shoving your bra with toilet paper because you're trying to fit in. i would be starting the beginning of the year with hope and i would hearc, jolly green giant because i think i wore green tights to school and i was really toll.e and i couldn't concentrate. i just couldn't stay focused. every time i read the story, i -- it just does not equate. >> no no, i mean, no. i was fortunate. i was fortunate to have something in my life where i could make some money and, yeah, i mean, it's a transition. but you know what, you're always sort of -- i think,for me, i'm aum wurmg e always in that body cast.

so, no, it wasn't easy. i know it's not easy for a lot of kids in school. but, you know, it is a trade-off. i really do have empathy for people. >> see, that's the key thing, though, renee. finding your way to that compassion, that's the hard part. i meet so many people, and, again, as you said a moment ago, we're all the sum total of our life's experiences. and i meet so many people who you can clearly see had some issues when they were a child at 40 or 50 that they ain't got passed yet. when kids pick on you at such a young age, that's hard for people to break out of. they grow up with that in them and it's hard for them to find their way to ever being an empathetic, come passionate

individual. >> it will be with me forever. if i have to go to a talk show and dress up, it's instead of hey, i have to dress up and it's great. it's not that. you can have all of the therapy. all of the prayer. that will be with me forever. and i live with it and it's okay.x if i can help someone, i don't feel so bad.! you have to talk. there are nice things that can come out of it. you can sort of help people.

>>. >> this film, as i saw it, raises a lot of questions. >> is there a message that you hope exists in this film? squl i dhi more it's the question. i think it's a good conversation. i don't know if there's an answer to it. i really don't. i don't have a good answer for you on that. >> in many ways, it's a dabber inindictment of our society? >> no, it is. >> all ayosz america. >> it is. and what are we doing? how do we deal with that? >> when

>> oh, thank you. >> the film is "nightcrawler." interesting film that i think you will be in conversation as renee and i have been tonight. always great e glad to have you on the show. >> good to see you. >> thank you so much. >> you're so smart. >> thank you so much. >> that's our show for tonight. thanks for watching. and, as always, keep the faith. >> for more information on today's show, visit tavis smiley at pbs.org. >> hi, i'm rñtavis smiley, joine next time with john secada about his memoirs. we'll see you then.

next on kqed "newsroom" -- dynasty on display. the bay area celebrates another world series win for the unstoppable san francisco giants. and down to the finish line, what's at stake in next week's election? will california be the first to have drug testing for doctors? will berkley be the first in the nation to tax soda? plus, competitive races, including a state assembly seat representing san francisco. >> david and other people in city hall have rolled out the corporate red carpet for people like air b & b. companies like google so every low-income kid -- >> let's not monopolize. ♪