tavis: if poitier is the first one, and you've said this before, if poitier is the first one who really, the first black actor who really turned you on in that way, did you decide when you got into acting that you wanted to be a dramatic actor? you've done the funny you've done it all at this point. but did you initially decide you wanted to be a dramatic actor? >> well, i just wanted to be an actor. it's better to be well-rounded. doing comedy is as easy as doing anything else. you're dependent totally on the material. i'm not a comedian. i don't make things funny if they're not funny. i don't invent funny stuff. but if the material has humor in it, then it's easy to play it. so no, i didn't, i don't think i set out to be a dramatic actor. just an actor. tavis: let me ask the inverse of a question i asked earlier, which is given how late, compared to others, you got started in the business, whether or not there is something, a role, that is to say, that you wish you had had a chance to play that you know you won't, given your chronological giftedness. >> interesting. yeah. yeah. there

. >> and sidney poitier called me and he had read his interview the other morning from los angeles, and he said it so excited me to read in words my theories about what i do. >> brown: another one was steven spielberg, he's talking about, a, thinking that he was going to spend his life making, working in television, and also the story with jaws and about how difficult it was to make. >> he was a young director, he had made sugarlab express and some television at universal. and sanek and brown engaged him to direct "jaws" ask they went up to martha's vineyard in april for six weeks. and he was there through september. he talked about the first prima donna actor he ever met, was this rubber shark that they had built, which was supposed to stand on its tail and smile if you wanted it to. and it never got to the surface. so they were working around that, and -- >> brown: and learned to work with actors later on. >> yes, and steven who thought he was going to have a great career, really there on martha's vineyard thought it was going to come to an en because his picture was going to be such