we are joined tonight by hallie foote, horton foote's daughter. welcome back to "theater talk." >> thank you, thank you. >> you were last here a few years ago with your father. >> 2008, i believe, towards the end of his life. >> riedel: one of the last interviews that he did >> yes, it was. >> the legendary, brilliantly talented lois smith, making her first appearance on "theater talk." we've been trying to get you for years. and i must say, a dear, dear, dear friend of mine, the great betty buckley. >> thanks, michael. >> in a rip-roaring performance as the meanest woman on the new york stage. >> haskins: u are literally tearing up the scenery. >> riedel: you are literally smashing everything in sight. hallie, give us a sense, for people who haven't seen the play, what it's about and where it fits in your father's canon of work, when he began to work on this play. >> well, my father started working on this play in the mid-60's, and the play actually takes place in 1965. michael wilson, who's our director, he's great at researching things, and he

horton against a white candidate. imagine the outcry you'd hear. racism. it's tough when the shoe is on the other foot and we're seeing subtleties now. but joe madison, new yorker reports the willie horton ad creator of that ad, he tricked tv stations into approving the ad by creating two versions of it. quote from the article, the first which he submitted for review lacked the mug shot. once the ad had been approved, he replaced it with a version containing a photo of horton. doesn't this prove that he knew how toxic this was? >> absolutely. because as you know, a photograph says a thousand words. i mean, you are 100% correct. and what jimmy just described when he gave the scenario about the white democrat, black democrat is what is called transference. and this is what we see now. you see it with the tea party. you see it in cable news shows and that's where i will call you what i am before you call me that. it's called transference. it's an old debate technique. and the difference today, of course, is that now we have a few things. one, big money financing these ads or similar ads, two, you've got