Skip to main content

tv   Charlie Rose  PBS  January 23, 2012 11:00pm-12:00am EST

11:00 pm
>> rose: welcome to our program. we beginin this evening with a look at the republican primary fight as it moves to florida. jon meacham, matthew dowd and nate silver join the conversation. >> what people do is yearn for the past. what people do is say they have a voice and a message that says we can go backwards, we can go back, it's more comfortable, it's more settled. newt gingrich is really and much part ohis message is a yearning and a sense of there was america before that was much better and what president obama's done is taken us where from america should be and we can go back. i think the president has to... he has to do it not only tomorrow night-- is important tomorrow night but the next 300 days after that-- to lay out a vision of where he sees the future in a realisticway for the country to see how to get there. >> rose: we conclude this evening with the great swedish
11:01 pm
actor max von sydow whose newest film is "extremely loud and incredibly close." >> of cour this is a film about disaster. it's very pain informal many ways but it's also-- and i think that's more important-- a story about love and a story about hope. >> rose: the republican presidential contest and max von sydow when we continue.
11:02 pm
captioning sponsored by rose communications ñr from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. presidential contest has become a very heated race after newt gingrich's dramatic victory in south carolina on saturday. the win has put mitt romney on defense and revived gingrich's campaign among other things.
11:03 pm
all eyes now turn to florida. the primary is next tuesday. though romney leads in organization and resources, gingrich has seized the momentum. joining me are matthew dowd, contributor for bloomberg news and abc news, nate silver, also the popular 538 blog for the "new york times" and jon meacham executive editor at random house and a contributing editor at "time" magazine and a regular on "morning joe." i'm pleased to have them here at this table to talk about where we are and i question again with mat dowd. where are we in this contest? >> this whole thing about who seizes momentum and who has it and who keeps it. and it's also been a primary that's been primarily about mitt romney. wloornt the nonmitt romney people can coalesce and stick there. they've now landed again for the second time on newt gingrich. i think at this point the campaign is really much more in newt gingrich's hands than mitt romney's hands and it's a campaign that i think-- i was mentioning to this jon-- it's a campaign between newt gingrich and newt gingric if the good newt gingrich wins, he'll win the nomation. if the bad newt gingrich wins,
11:04 pm
mitt romney will win the nomination >> rose: what's the good and bad? >> the good newt gingrich is one who's disciplined, who continues to lambaste the press, have a populist message, not be on defensive, not worry about what's going on, not worry about organization but basicly conduct himself like he did in the last two debates and stay disciplined on tha the bad newt girich is undisciplined, short tempered, not able to stay in the lane he's developed and he goes off on various tangents. >> rose: which one did we see in south carolina? >> we saw the good newt gingrich in south carolina which is why he went from being down ten or 11 to winning that race by 12. >> rose: is the populist rage that he's talking, the anti-establishment, sort of the new electability argument? he's electable because he knows how to go against obama and because he has found a message that may resonate beyond traditional messages? >> rose: i think newt gingrich more so than anybody else has understood the difference in the republican party what it is today. that the republican party today
11:05 pm
base of support is in blue-collar white voters. that's the republican party. it's not wall street, not corporate america, not big business, it's blue-collar white america, especially small town and rural communities around this country. and newt gingrich's message in understanding that imuch better than anybody else's. >> rose: >> we're at the end of a 44-ar cycle of that. the fruition of a 44-year cycle. i thinkingrich is essentially the new, new, new nix. >> rose: you wrote a column about that. "why newt is like nixon." >> i totally agree matthew. i think the cultural populism is clearly the reason, that and the issues people have with romney. but gingrich has mastered the vernacular that nixon drafted in '68 with the help of people like kevin phillips and roger always and bob haldeman and... >> rose: and pat buchanan? >> and pat buchanan. and understanding that there is
11:06 pm
a strong political resonance and argument about ordinary folks against these distant elites who are in control smu and you are not in control and the way to get control is to vote for me and i think that's hugely part of what gingrich did. remember, the moment gingrich took off in south carolina, rather bizarrely, it seems to me was when he referred questions about his second wife's account of how he married his third wife to the children of his first wife. not many people can do that. i mean, that's a remarkable achievement d he did it by attacking the press. >> rose: you mean the opening ghe the debate? >> yeah. this was a despicable questn, i cannot believe the elite media is once again protecting barack obama. he did everythingxcept say "pointy headed professors." this is an old theme. it's an old theme inmerican politics. he is the first person in 12 to mtert. >> and you said it's more nixon
11:07 pm
than reagan. >> totally more nixon than reagan. >> rose: what are you seeing? the numbers? what do they tell you? >> we haven't had a shift like we've had in the past week and a half in a long time. maybe gary hart in' 4, who was someone who ran against walter mondale who was seen as a dull establishment candidate at a time when democrats were undergoing a lot of trauma. and he had a very long nomination contest with mondale but ultimately lost. that is one scenario for romney who still does have some tactical advantage these caucus states in february should be good for him. he's well organized. michigan is a good state for him maybe arizona which votes in february, there are mormon voters and so forth. so if he can hold his ground in florida, too close to call or if he win there is that might give him an advantage he does have a lot of money. he does have the support of the establishment for the most part, although that's kind of a mixed blessing in some ways now. we have a surrogate attacking gingrich as a part of the party establishment and suddenly
11:08 pm
gingrich gets to be portrayed as the outsider all of a sudden. but romney could... it could almost be over if he does badly and seens not being available. >> if mitt romney doesn't change the national narrative... and the interesting thing about this race and many presidential races is everybody says "it's about the state, about the state." it's about aational narrative, a national conversation that plays out in the states. mitt romney can't fix his mpaign in florida. he can't fix his campaign with organization iflorida. he can't fix his campaign with television ads even if he outspends newt gingrich 5-1 unless he changes the national conversation and national narrate in this. because alof this race has moved nationally. big jumps... big drops nationally and the given states. if the election were held today and mitt romney does not change that, he's going to lose florida by seven or eight points. if you take the demographics on how he did among certain groups in south carolina and apply that
11:09 pm
to florida and their demographics he loses. so he has to change it, he probably has to change hit in the course of the debates, there's two debates. he'd probably have to change it in those debates but that's mitt romney's problem is he has to change a national dialogue at a time and against someby that's a much better performer. >> rose: w does he change it to? >> well, that's the difficulty he's in because what people want is sometng that mitt romney's not. what they want is a passionate candidate at stands tall, stands firm, is willing to take on the fight, willing to take it to him and it's not him. it's not in his genes and if he tries to do that one of the fears i'm sure the campaign h, if he tries to do it it will be another example of "here's another example of the inauthentic mitt. it's not him but he's trying to do ito market himself." that's the difficult spot he's in. >> rose: my issue seem to be and the way i look at it, if newt gingrich can ride the populist rage into electability, it's a strong enough horse to make the
11:10 pm
audience forgive their reservations about him from either his past or how they judge his character. >> remember, there's two different kinds of populism. there's economic populism which is huey long, occupy wall street we've got to change the tax structure, we have to find some economic equality. >> rose: this is the unfairness question. >> this is cultural populism. this is about what people watch and what they eat and how they feel kevin phillips saw this in 1968 when he did the merging republican majority memo and he said that there are people in blue-collar... your point, blue-collar jobs, the archie bunker types that became the reagan democrats. they rest these elites who are on television and seem to represent a world which is closed somehow to other people. that's a hilarious argument made
11:11 pm
by george herbert walker bush from andover and yal to some extent. to this day bush talks about elitists. the fact that newt ggrich is able to attk elitists having been the speaker of the house of presentatives and being paid a million dollars as a historian-- where availae, if anyone's watching from government-- (laughter) >> rose: but there's a good point about that. because romney today said let's see the contract. let's see the contract. isewt vulnerable on that issue? >> no. i think every time mitt romney and his team roll out some attack that looks like it comes from the establishment or looks like it comes from players in washington, d.c. or looks like it comes from the conservea sgshgsencia, newt gingrich looks like an outsider. far guy that was a speaker of the house and every time he does it, if i were ne gingrich-- which he does very well-- he says of course they're against me. of course the establishment is
11:12 pm
against me because i represent you. i wlaept you want, your hopes, your dreams, your vision of where you want america and they're out ofouch. of course they're attacking me. i don't think that's mitt romney's... any place for mitt romney's path to victory and if he keeps roing out endorsements-- which i think is a huge mistake-- heeeps say "by the way, i'm the establishment candide." it only feeds the ire that newt gingrich is using. rose: okay, therefore this is for all of you can the establishment stop him? >> can they st newt? >> rose: yeah. >> that the contention of political science i've been writing about recently where in theory they should maybelready have stopped newt (laughter) and it looked likehey had. he had every resource against gingrich and it seemed to have worked and it was vindication for the establishme, for this theory. but you see a change of tone now and the conservative blogs. they're like we helped mitt romney before but now he'll have to do it for himself. he'll figure out a way to get a
11:13 pm
message he can sell to people. that's more challenging for him. it certainly increases the down side risk, maybe it will make him stronger in the end. remember, a lot of conservatives-- elites you might call them-- didn't have romney as their candidate of choice. they might have wanted a mitch daniels or jeb bush or rubio or chris christie. the g.o.p. has a lot of talented politicians for some reason, even though president obama had a 40% approval rating for most of the last year they didn't choose to run so i think that's part of it, too. the grs is greener thing where we don't want newt but we're only going to help mitt out so much. >> i think there's a fiction... there is no republican establishment that can control the process anymore. basically the fraternity is in charge of campus now. and we saw that in 2010. harry reid, exceptionally vulnerable senator from nevada should have been beaten. the republican party in nevada decided and the voters decided they're going to nominate somebody totally unectable. delaware, a state that should
11:14 pm
have gone for the republican senate, they nominate somebody whose claim was being a witch at some point in time. this is a time basically... >> rose: that person has endorsed mitt romney. >> and that person has endorsed mitt romney. this is a point in time where what's happened now is there's no ability for the republican establishment-- whoever that might be and if they have a meeting it's probably in a phone booth somewhere-- can control this race. it's out of their hands. >> rose: does santorum play a role in all this will? >> i don't think so. i think he's... >> rose: i take that as a no. >> i think he'll have a voice. he may say something about debates but i think he's only a minor player in this narrative. >> rose: >> i think he hurts romney and helps gingrich. >> probably true. >> i found him to be very... i fi his performances to be increasingly good, increasingly convincing as this working-class voice of part of the republican party that has to be reached that the man who is refusing has long refused and has now given upn this to release his tax returns c't reach.
11:15 pm
the idea that romney is the working class hero isn't going to work. i think santorum, the more they talk about working class issues i think that helps gingrich. rose: >> well, he's the only one of the four making some effort to talk to a general election audience. gingrich was never concerned about it, ron paul will say what ron paul think which is some people like. but santorum... maybe i've been watching too many g.o.p. debates but kind of a moderate working class centrist. he was never an extremist on economic issues, he was more moderate than you might think. on cultural issues it's a different thing but there hasn't been as much discussion of that this year. yeah it would be a long shot scenario but i certainly wouldn't drop out. i would imagine there's some g.o.p. candidates that did drop out and they're regretting it. tim pawlenty must be kicking himself. >> rose: is there any reason to say that florida works better for romney than newt? >> slightly. but the problem is only slightly. if you didt have the momentum that newt has you could probably
11:16 pm
make an argument that the everything else being equal that yeah it's going to favor mitt. the problem is now newt has a huge wave tt's come and developed before south carolina. you're going to watch this change... i was saying outside earlier, there's been a 24-point change... shift in this race in ten days. ten ys. 24-point shift. that lead that mi romney had. i have never seen an instance of that happening absence of major scandal that somebody developed. he has lost a 24-point lead in ten days. >> rose: everybody agrees this is a surge that has real power? >> well, i don't know. >> rose: a wave, you described ? >> you would predict like in the stock market when you have volatility it predicts future volatility in the days ahead. i don't think gingrich's support is necessarily all that solid. i think in florida gingrich has done well with seniors. at's a good demograic in florida. and with latino voters. in 2008 romney actually won barely the white vote in florida
11:17 pm
against mccain but lost against hispanics by 35 or 40 points. >> mainly cubans. >> right, and he has support from cuban leaders in florida so it won't be that margin again. but the one issue where mitt romney is definitely conservative is immigration policy and newt... this is the one state where maybe it will help him. >> rose: let me do a preview of the state of the union. what do you expect the president to say in the state of the union tomorrow nighting? "go newt?" (laughter) >> rose:o the obama camp, you think, would like to see newt because they believe that newt's unfavorable ratings would guarantee an obama victory? is that your... >> i checked the campaign contributions web sites to see if obama has contributed money to the gingrich campaign. >> rose: are you serious new >> is he righting? >> i think that's probably mostly right. i think newt gingrich has such high unfavorability rating which he has had for a long time that he cannot change between now and the general election if he gets
11:18 pm
republican nomination. >> here's what i think. i think the general election race... if you have a "r" on your back and the economy turns down in the summer the "r" will win whetr it's newt gingrich, mitt romney or anybody else. if the economy turns down in the summer, something happens in europe and the trajectory i moving downward, newt gingrich will be elected president of the united states if he's the nominee. >> rose: if the economy turns down. >> if the economy turns down. that's what happens. that's what newt gingrich is counting on. does mitt romney's profile fit better for a general election? probably so but i think newt gingrich... this is a hockey thing. you have to get in the playoffs, you have to get to the playoffs... you have to get through the regular season, get toty playoffs and i think newt gingrich thinks if the economy is bad he'll be president of the united states. >> rose: and the two things that threaten the enomy now is somethg going wrong in europe? and some oil crisis? >> or if we're sensing this is a real growth in this time. you asked the question to nate about the state of the union address and what the president
11:19 pm
needs to do. the interesting thing to me... these two things are tied together, the president's performance and what's going on in the replican party. the country is in such a great ste of anxiety and they don't understand where things are headed that without a vision for the future, without a presented vision for the future and how to get there just like happens in your life and our lives and a personal level. without a sense of i can see the bert, i can see the promised land i know how the get there and tell me how to get there, without that what people do is yearn for the past. what people do is say they have a voice and a message that says we can go back, it's more comfortable and settled. newt gingrich is really and much part of his message is a yearning in a sense of there was amica before that s much betternd what president obama has done is taken us where from america should be and we can go back. i think the present has to-- not only tomorrow night but also for the next 300 days after that is to lay out a vision of where he sees the future and... in a
11:20 pm
realistic way for the country to see how to get there. they don't think that's been presented to them. >> i would partly disagree. we have seen less news of obama because of the g.o.p. primary and other things and lo and behold his approval rating has gone up. i think that's partly because you're seeing bigger economic figures because he's gone from 42% to 46%, may or may not be enough to get reelected. i think he has strategic options controlling the presidency givess you a lot of choice for how it's displayed and evolved so i think you don't want to necessarily overreach tomorrow night but be a presence of calm, especially comparison to gingrich, for example, that mighplay out well. four years ago he was experienced. now he's a steady experienced hand who killed bin laden d so forth and that's 2 classic incuent strategy, i suppose. so i think because he has in some ways a stronger hand to play than a few months ago he
11:21 pm
can afford to be a little bit more risk averse. sometimes the white house... this would be has been too risk averse but things have gotten quite a bit better for him relative to even a month or two ago. >> i don't think he needs to lay out 28 policy things with a huge price tag on it andouch every base that he has. i do think he needs go at 30,000 feet and say "here's where i think and this is what i think and i'm going to give you comfort that i can lead us there." >> rose: he has to marry that with the idea that things are trending upward. >> yes, but without saying they're there. >> rose: you among us are the person who has been a political strategic advisor. you are deeply believing in the essential necessity of a strong narrative that defines who you are and where you want to take the country. >> the choice for president of the united states is the most personal choice people make outside your immediate family. it's the most personal choice people make because they're basically saying i'm going to bring this person in my living room every night, they're going to be part of my life, i'm going
11:22 pm
to trust this person. anwithout a sense, like, i know this person's brand, i know their set of values, i know their narrative. president obama had this. which is why many people voted for him. and then again why many pple got disillusioned because they thought they got detached from that narrative that he laid out of sort of a vision of hope and change and all those things that became part of washington, part of the status quo. but every gnat is successful in this has to ve a broad... a great sense of themselves, this is one of mitt romney's problem. a great sense of themselves and a great sense of where they want to take the country and lay that out consistently. >> rose: do you agree with that, sglon >> totally. i think it was henry adams who said that great presidents are those who find themselves in office at a time when t country has to clarify its own narrative as well and to find itself. and i think we are still in a post cold war question about how are we going to create growth, how are we going to sustain a
11:23 pm
middle-class that has been the envy of the world buthich is clearly losing ground. >> rose: i see the country as in a place which n which we are looking at a totally different world and we want somebody that understands that world and somebody that can say if we do certain kinds of things we can regain the place that we were and believe we should be and that therefore we feel like we may not do as well as our children did. i mean, our children may not do as well as we did, that certain things we believed in may not deliver for us and that it's a scary time and that the world in which the united states played one role is a differentorld today. >> rose: well, onehing to remember is that america has had ten pretty tough years really going back to 91 and so if you're a conservative or a liberal, but say you're a conservative looking at the republican establishment you've built up maybe a lot of distrust. maybe you weren't thrilled with either bush, for example, and
11:24 pm
you didn't like mccain if you were a nominee. you saw dole had lost. that's why you hear so much talk about reagan on the republican side because he's still the last president that's held in high regard by a lot of conservatives. democrats at least only have to go back 12 years to chrntd. >> rose: >> the only thing i slightly disagree with you which is i don't think elections are about the past. i think election announcement sometimes and profiles of candidat and the beginning of the story is in fact about the past. but president reagan was talking about morning in america. heasn't talking about yesterday and then the great politician of our lifetimes, bill clinton, is mr. tomorrow. >> rose: it's always said that clearly america always supports the most optimistic candidate. >> well, usuly the most hopeful optimistic... and the only thing, charlie, that i'll slightly disagree with you is that the country's not looking for an intellectual manifest of
11:25 pm
here's how w get there. >> rose: that's not an intellectual argument. that's confidence. >> they want a sense of you don't have to have the answers, you don't have to know what the ing is but give us a level of confidence. >> rose: that's what i'm arguing. it's not intellectual. i think that's whatreagan was able to do in terms of the election. he convinced people that it wasn't a question of malaise in america, it was a question of leadership? america. >> but remember october 28, 1980, the queion he asked "are you better off today than you were four years ago? if you are the choice is clear. if you're not, it's harder for you to buy thing in stores than four years ago, is america as respected as it was four years ago? the answer is no, come to me." and that's when the numbers moved and he won in a landslide and that... of all the moments in our modern politics, reagan changed the conversation. >> rose: so what he did in that argunt, he made the election a referendum on jimmy carter.
11:26 pm
>> and do you want to be better off tomorrow. and if you want to be better off tomorrow and if you want your country to be better respected, come to me. >> i thinkwhat he also did in that last point was not only that but he also... the country wanted to vote jimmy carter out of office but they had some reservation about ronald reagan's capacity to be commander in chief. when he had the last debate and did this, they basically said "okay, i get it, he can be commander-in-chief so i'm going to fire the guy i wanted to fire." >> rose: great to have you back. >> thank you. >> rose: max von sydow is here. he has been making movies for 63 years. he's appeared in more than 125 films. he's probably best known for his work with the great swedish fm maker the late igmar bergm. it didn'stop there. he's worked with many great directors including woody allen, john huston, martin score say see and steven spielberg. in the new film, max plays a man
11:27 pm
who communicates without words. here is the trailer for the film. >> you've reached the shell residence, today is tuesday, september 11. my dad said the way i saw world was a gift. that i was different than everyone else. a great game we played was reconnaissance expeditions. he told me to bring back stuff from every decade in the 250th century >> i found something from every decade. >> already? (laughs) you rock. >> listen, i'm going to be home in about 20 minutes. >> listen to me, we broke a window to let in some air and i'm going to be okay. >> where are you? i'm on the 105 floor. >> american airline plane was hijacked. >> thomas, listen to m you come home! >> i'm going to be fine. i'm going to be fine. >> please, ju stay talking to me.
11:28 pm
>> after he died, i found this key in my dad's closet. he must have wanted me to find something. >> the clues, of course >> what was it he wanted me to find? >> it's never going to make sense because it doesn't! >> what was the last thing dad wanted me to learn? have you met my dad? i want you to come with me. >> are you all right? >> too young, too lonely. >> i don't know anything about your father. >> too afraid. >> what do you miss about him? >> i ms. his voice telling me he loves me. >> dad told me "i really loved your mother." >> maybe everybody's looking for
11:29 pm
something. do you think we'll find the locks? i'm not so sure either. dad said sometimes we have to face our fears. >> this is truly the most amazing thing. >> if things were easy to find >> ...they wouldn't be worth finding. rose: a damn good cast. >> yes, od cast. >> rose: who is the renter? your character? >> the renter is a man who w back in time when he was young was in love with a young woman in dresden, in germany. and unfortunately this was during world war ii and when dresden was attacked by the allies allies and bombed to... well... >> rose: destroyed. >> it was totally destroyed. totally destroyed. and this character, my
11:30 pm
character's family was totally annihilated. including his girlfriend. and he was so shocked by this and also shocked by the fact that he suived and apparently filled with guilt so he decided t ever to speak, to pronounce one more word in his life. and he doesn't. >> rose: and then he meets is young oscar. >> then he meet this is young oscar, yes. >> rose: and you only communicate by writing. d your hands? >> well, yes. >> rose: that's the only difference. i communicate, just as anybody el. i just don't do it by speaking, i do it by writing. so that's the only difference. the renter is not particularly remaable in other ways. st the fact that he doesn't speak. >> rose: and what do you think of the young actor, thomas horne mo who plays oscar? >> i think he's a remarkable young man, very intelligent and
11:31 pm
obviously very talented in many ways. and he was... he had nothing... he had no experience of acting at all before. >> rose: i know. did you ha some trepidation about that? >> well, of course when i got the script and read the story i thought this is a wonderful part for a young boy. but i hoped they have a good boy for this otherwise they wouldn't... they shouldn't make the film. but when i first met him i was asked to come over here to do wardrobe tests and steven put me together with the guy and they had me doing just the scene i was talking about and he read his lines and it was totally square. he read just the lines and i thought i was just going to be... but then i read... went back to europe and came back a month and a half and he had been working, i don't know how long, maybe all that time, and he was perfect. he was wonderful. and very disciplined, very
11:32 pm
intelligent young boy. >> rose: what do you want to bring to the renter? what do you want us as you lk at it. your character? >> i want to somehow tell at kind of a man is he. >> rose: it's always what you want to do, isn't it? tell what ki of a man he is. >> yes, tell about him. i was fascinated by a man with this background and also by the fact that he apparently... he has never met his son. he left his wife when she was pregnant and he has never seen his boy. he went away and apparently knew that he had a boy somewhere. he knew probably his name and after 9/11 he sees sowhere in a newspaper lists of the people who died during this catastrophe and he finds this name that this
11:33 pm
must be my son. and that brings him to try to find out something about his family. and he finds his ex-wife whom he hasn't seen for all these years and asks her if he can stay with her and she says she doesn't want anything to do with him but allows him to rent a room in her flat. on the contion that he doesn't disturb his grandson and his mother who live across the street. and he says no, i will t. and he doesn't. the one who achieve itis contact is the board. without knowing with whom he's talking to. >> rose: and the relationship fuels the story. >> yes. >> rose: this is a clip from "extremely loud and incredibly close" in which you interact with the kid. you'll understand the dynamic of the relationship. >> how come you don't speak? are your vocal chords damaged or
11:34 pm
something? or did something scare you to death? cool. when was the last time you spoke do you ever try to talk? why don't you try to say something to me? go on. "my name is the renter." do you have a criminal record? maybe you hurt people for a living? well, what's your story, then? >> rose: you say that you would have played this role exactly same if you spoke. >> well... of course i wouldn't
11:35 pm
tell him more. would try to keep my promise to my ewife. i wouldn't tell this boy. but it's he who asks me to go with him. to be with him. >> rose: you have also said that you don't need to work, don't necessarily to work for your own income. you have to be seduced. >> (laughs) >> rose: (laughs) what seduced you here? >> well... the relationships between these people. and also... of course this is a film about disaster. it's very painful in many ways but it's also-- and i think that's more important-- it's a film with a story about love and it's a story about hope. >> rose: and relationships. >> and relationships, yes. and refound relationships.
11:36 pm
reconstructed. >> rose: rediscovered. >> yes. it's... the boy somehow invents his own his own way to cure him by looking for a message from his father and he doesn't find the message b he finds something else, he finds this key and he's convinced, ah, the key, that means my fher has left this for me and i'm sure there is somewhe something. >> rose: it opens something somewhere. >> exactly. and he... i go with him. and he doesn't, of course, find anything at the end. so in that case this therapy that he has invented is not successful. but he finds something else. he finds his mother. he finds his mother's love for him which he has not not really
11:37 pm
understood before because he's been so centered on his fher on and on their relationship and the father has been apparently so inspiring and so stimulating that he has just ignored his mother. and then suddenly he realizes that his mother has been with him all tie t time. >> rose: this really is an exploration of 9/11 and how when somee di in atragedy behind every personhere are extraordinary relationships and stories that have been extinguished. >> yes, exactly. >> rose: except in the mind and memory of the people who knew them. >> yes. >> rose: can i go back to bergman and tell me why... what was the collaboration like? >> difficult to tell. it's such a long story and such a cplicated, complex story. bergman was an extraordinary movie maker, an extraordinary director, theater director, great theater director. and he was extraordinary teacher
11:38 pm
and inspirer for his actors. and he created a relationship between all the people he worked with. everybody went along and did whatever they could to present something valuable to the project, whatever it was. and the fact that he for... well as long as i knew him he worked in... first in municipal theater in sweden and then after that at the royal theater in stockholm and all the time he made films. he has... i don't understand how he had the stamina and the strength to work the way he did where writing a screenplay and the winter and thepring,
11:39 pm
shooting the film, editing it and then at the se time maybe presenting two stage productions during the theater season at the theater. and using the actors from the theater in his films. it was like a big family. >> rose: with intense personal relationships? >> sorry? >> rose: with intention personal relationships. >> absolely. absolutely. it was a family situation. it was a very... very emotional relationship between all of us. and i have so much to thank him for. i cant tell. years and years of work. i would certainly not have been here today. >> rose: how did you meet him?
11:40 pm
>> how did i meet him? well, i was... at the time i was i had gone through the academy at t royal theater in stockholm and it was...orked for four years at two different municipal theaters in sweden and i went to the theater where he was one of the directors and that was it. and he directed one projection and he shot the film with the death and the night and summer. and that was the beginning of my... i hadn't been in a couple of films before but with other directors but that was where it all began. >> rose: you still like theater better?
11:41 pm
>> well, theater is... yes, i do. cause theater is team work in another way than a film production. a film production is so dominated by the director. and for the actors, the actors come and do their things when they are needed and then e production goes on and on without them and they don't know what going on and then afterwards you don't know what's happening with the film. maybe the film will be ed ted in a totally different way than the script was written. maybe it will be cut out, et cetera. in thetheater you are all the time participating. you are there from the beginning. you are present even if you're not on the stage all the time during the rehearsals but you're there and then yo have direct contact with the audience. nobody edit what is you have done and very emotional
11:42 pm
experience. >> that's what i was going to say, the audience bomes in many plays a character. >> yes, yes. >> rose: their presenceis crucial to... >> yes, it'sll together. >> rose: the other thing that always interested me about theater is to that how an actor changes over the course of a run as he may change, modify, adapt the role with the director's approval. >> i think most of the time it is... you simplify. >> exactly. >> you simplify. you have figured somethi out i would do something in some way so people will understand then you realize it's not necessary you go straight without it and... but it's something that lives all the time. in a film... a film is more or less the work of e direcr. it's the director who dominates
11:43 pm
the entire production. and the actor's okay, they can be of great importce but not necessarily. and today unfortunately you can make films without actors, also. >> rose: what made bergman great? >> his sensitivity. his... he's probably very strict upbringing he had a very traditional intellectua upbringing with his father being a clergyman and a very strict lutheran pastor. and, of course, bergman was a very sensitive man. >> intelligence and sensitivity. >> yes and very sensitive. >> and imagination also. >> and was a great storyteller and knew a lot about human
11:44 pm
beings. >> i want to show you now over two and a half minute montage of what your life has been like over the 63ears. roll tape. >> t power of christ compels you! theower of christ compelsyou! the power of christ compels you! the por of christ compels you! >> i don't interest myself, i
11:45 pm
think more often in terms of when, sometimes where, always how much. i suspect it was about to become an embarrassment. >> can you imagine the level of a mind that watches wrestling? the worst are the fundamentalist preachers, third-rate con men telling the poor suckers that watch them that they speak with jesus and to please send them money. money, money, money. if jesus came back and saw what's going on in his name he'd never stop throwing up. do you know what i hear? nothing. no footsteps on the stairs, no clic click of littlespiders. you know why i can't hear these things, danny? becausright now the precogs catch everything. oh, my.
11:46 pm
>> men like you are my specialty you know? men of irons. >> that's a hell an assumption to make. >> assumption, not at all. you misunderstand me. i said you are men of violence. i'm not accusing you of being violent. men, that's quite different. >> rose: i assume you could say that's what acting's about. being able to play french yes statehouse a nefarious character who's a murderer. >> yes, yes. i was very spoiled when i was young. i think after having gone
11:47 pm
through the acting academy i was hired in three different... two years at one, twoyears and five years at the third one. municipal theaters which are wonderful theaters with ratr smallompanies where everybody works all time. you sign for eight months or nine months or something and then you have to do whatever they give you and during that time i did everything. it was big parts, small parts, comedies, tragedies, classics, mode, everything. foreign plays in translation, whatever. but working, working, working, working all the time. and all the time participating. also when you're on stake you were there and your watch your colleagues. >> the best training. >> yes, acting you cannot tell somebody what acting should be
11:48 pm
like you cannot read in a book about what you should do. you have to do it, do it, do it. that's the only way. >> that's what i... that's the opportunity i was given and i was very fortunate. and i enjoyed it extraordinarily. >> rose: it's ait like the advice that always goes out. if you want to be a writer, write. >> absolutely. >> rose: same thing about acting. >> would you ever enjoy teaching acting? >> i did when i was young. i find it very difficult. >> rose: why? >> well, teaching is a matter of directing. you direct and you correct. >> and story telling. >> yes, exactly. and it is a matter of making whoever you are talking to, the actor, understand what you think is going on between these different relationships and what
11:49 pm
importance your character, the character you are going portray what he wants. to me it is most important to know what thpers wants in the... when i read the play, when i read the screenplay. what is his ambition in the entire story. what is his ambition in every scene when thenswers in the room here, why does it do it. obviously he wants maybe or he's forced to. there's something he wants to do or he wants to avoid or whatever. it's a matter of... a question of will. it's not first of all a question of his feelings. emotio com afterwards. they come when you know what you want when you understand what the other... your colleagues... >> so it's a question of motivation rather than emotion. >> to gin wi, yes. >> rose: why are you there. what is your purpose.
11:50 pm
>> yes, yes. >> rose: what do you want to accomplish? >> absolutely. then the emotions come. >> rose: once you know why you're there you can understand how you would react to being there. >> yes, yes. >> rose: take a look at this scene. this is from "e 7 seal" in which your khark sister in a confessional with death. famous scene. here it is.
11:51 pm
>> that's a great scene. yes, it's a great scene.
11:52 pm
a wonderful scene. >> rose: you like it because? >> well, it's very much... it's very much mr. bergman and i think it's very much an expression for his own search for meaning. search for the truth, search for love, etc. it's funny, i think at the time i was searching, too, and i was a great doubter when i was young at that time and i remember we discussed, of course, religious matters very much between takes and i remember at one time i said "well, thisternal life i don't believe in this. we die and that'st." and he said "no, no, no, i promise you're wrg." "no, i don't believe.
11:53 pm
that" "you mean you will live somewhere after?" he said "yes, well, i'll show you. when i'm gone, i'll tell you." >> rose: (laughs) >> i have a different who once said to me i'm convinced there's no life after death and i said why are you convinced and she said to me because my mother was such a strong woman that after she died she would have found a way to communicate to me. and i haven't heard from her. >> well, i've heard from berkman many times. >> rose: you have? >> well... >> rose: in spirit. you've heard in spirit. >> yes. >> rose: tell me about it. >> i can't. >> rose: because it's personal? >> yes. >> rose: are you worried about how people will perceive it? >> no, no, it's very complex and very personal but... yes. well, we understood each other,
11:54 pm
i think. >> rose: and t more you work together the more you understood each other? >> i think so. >> and you indicated that you had much doubt when you were young. >> yes, that time. >> and how did the doubt go away? because you heard from bergman or because... >> well, because of that an because of many other things. >> rose: because of life and happiness. life changes all t time and you lose thing and you get things and you... you meet people and you... and peting with somebody else can also totally change your perspective, your... the angles of your perspective and your outlook but i... i owe so much to mr. bergman. >> rose: but i think you may have been referring to the fact that as far as i have read that love came to your life and
11:55 pm
therefore you found companionship in things that matter even more. >> yes, also, yes. yes. of course. >> rose: thank you for coming here. >> thank you. >> rose: great pleasure to have you at this table. >> thank you.
11:56 pm
captioning sponsored by rose communications
11:57 pm
11:58 pm
11:59 pm

129 Views

info Stream Only

Uploaded by TV Archive on