INT: You were learning editing. That was the issue. For the first time.
JR: Oh boy. Snipping, snipping, pulling things together, [INT: Taking out pauses.] taking out pauses, taking out vocalized grunts. Yeah, and sometimes taking out full paragraphs or readjusting. I mean, we were fond of saying, later on, well this is after I became much more proficient at film editing. I said "If I had been a Republican, Richard Nixon would still be a President [of the United States of America]." Because I could make him--or the other way around--it's so easy to say, instead of "I am not a crook," take out the not. We used to do that all the time. [INT: [laughs]] And it would be convincing. Some people didn't understand editing, certainly at that time. In any event, we took this tape to NBC and they played it, and the cadre of defectives met and said, "We like the tape very much, but there's something wrong with it." And I said, "Yes? What is it?" They said, "Well," I swear, they used the same language McGraw had used. They said, "Well, there's no tension because the guy is locked up, and it doesn't make much sense to call the show WANTED because the guy is no longer wanted. Wouldn't it be better if it were a man who were loose?" And Walter--and here, do you want to talk about learning? He said, "That's a wonderful idea." I had learned my first network speak, [INT: Great.] and we got the commitment to do thirteen weeks and we did Willie Sutton as the first guy who’s loose. And I was assigned--now, I have jumped in the hierarchy because we had multiple shows we were doing; they had another--Tommy O'Brian was doing something in another city, and I was sent to Philadelphia to interview the warden at the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia where Willie Sutton had escaped--from which Willie Sutton had escaped. [INT: Okay.] And with great trepidation, I said, "What am I doing here?" You know, I mean I'm twenty-four years old, twenty-five, something like that, and I'm going to this medieval fortress. This was a place that was built in 1825. A dungeon. Huge, massive stonework place. And I went through all the--what do you call it? The intermediary steps of signing in, clanging doors, and all of that. Finally into the bowels of the prison where the warden, Cornelius J. Burke was--and in my mind I was thinking, "What will the warden of this place look like?" And I had in mind some giant, bald headed, Louis Bredvold type of guy, only tougher. Big man. And frightening, 'cause this was not a nice place. The smell of it was incredible. It was just awful. Fear was in the air, I mean it was just--and I was terrified. But I did have an NBC press card with my name on it. My god, how about that. So I presented my card, and I came into the office and there was the warden Burke. Do you ‘member an Actor called Jimmy Gleason? [INT: Sure.] He was the size of a jockey, yeah, about five foot two. That was our warden. [INT: Wow.] The warden of this incredible place was sitting there at his desk with a pork pie hat, his feet on his desk and he was wearing loafers, penny loafers, yellow socks, and he was a dandy of a certain type. And it took me awhile to almost refocus my head and to be--you wanna know where does casting begin? That's what the idea of casting against type began to get into my mind. I didn't know it at the time, of course, but many years later when I was looking for a certain type of person--in fact, I remember particularly in ALL IN THE FAMILY, we needed an undertaker. We were killing--for the first time, we were doing death on a comedy. A non-favored uncle had died in the attic, that Archie hated, and we had to bury him. And for the undertaker, instead of getting the same lugubrious guy, I cast--oh, what a wonderful little Actor he was. Little Actor. I mean, I cast that warden as the undertaker, and he was Whitehead, the funeral Director [played by Jack Grimes].

INT: This is fascinating because now you've learned, it's interesting, you've learned editing. [JR: Yeah, well, very in core editing, yeah.] Right. And now you're suddenly getting the idea of casting; of the issue of, what do I have in mind before [JR: Before.] and what really is there and they oftentimes are totally different things.
JR: All different. [INT: Yeah.] It's against type. In fact, when I did my first Western, which was GUNSMOKE, I needed a heavy. And Lynn Stalmaster, who's a very good casting Director [INT: Great.], brought in guys who were ten feet tall with Southern or Western accents, and I kept saying, "You know, I've seen these guys. They're very nice," but it's amazing how you got me into this story. The association is pure. I said, "I would like somebody different that has never been on TV as a western heavy before." They said, "Well, what are you talking about? For example?" I said, "I don't know. Somebody--an Actor from New York." "New York?! You want to cast a New Yorker in a western?" Well here's where reading comes in handy. I said, "Lynn [Lynn Stalmaster], not everybody in the west spoke with a confederate accent." I said, "They came from New York--Billy the Kid was born in Brooklyn. Matt Masterson died in Brooklyn in 1923. There were trains that went back and forth." I said, "Besides the slums were probably the areas that developed the gun fighters. All of, you know, the negative types that couldn't make it in the streets of New York or Philadelphia wherever, went west, and they became the bad boys of the west." I said, "So yeah, I would like somebody who's a brooding-looking guy that has never done a western before." And a guy came in who was just off the train and he read and he was wonderful. [INT: Wow.] And I cast him and the only thing I did, I said to this guy, I said, "Do you ride a horse?" He said, "Oh no, never been on a horse." And I thought about it and I said, "Well, let me think." There's one scene where he has to sit on a horse, but he's not riding and he's holding up a stagecoach. I said, "That's all you'll have to do." "Oh, thank god." So he did his--it was a three-day show in 1957, this was. Black and white GUNSMOKE and this Actor was wonderful. Brooding. Terrible. A monstrous heavy. He was wonderful. He insisted on doing his own stunts. A lot of guy's from New York did that. [Laughs] I had to abuse them, disabuse them of that notion, I said, "Don't do this. It's not a good idea. We have stunt people that are very good at it." He did his work. He was great. We came to the last shot, which was sitting on a horse. So he said, "Gee, I don't know about this." I said, "Look. Don't be nervous." I said, "We'll get this." So he got on the horse. Now the horse is a western trained, western horse, western film horse. And as soon as he got on the horse, the horse looked around and said, "I think there's somebody Jewish sitting up here." [INT: [laughs]] Well, you know, he was trembling. His knees were transmitting, and the horse got skittish. Now what a cowboy close-up, you know, through the pommel. And the horse was--I said, "Get a wrangler." So they got a wrangler who was below camera and he's stroking the legs of the beast and holding him. "Alright, take 5, take 6." More struggle, and he's now sweating. I said, "Look, it's okay. You've done a wonderful job. Take it easy." I now have two wranglers below camera. Four and a half. And take ten, take eleven. Now there's 4 wranglers below camera, one on each leg, and stroking the animal, people--guy wags at the group and says, "Get 'em up, god damn ladder." I said, "Will you shut up?" And he's nervous. I said, "Look. You have been terrific. Don't worry. We'll get this." And about take fourteen, one of the wranglers says, in a bad stage whisper, "And this kid calls himself an Actor." Well, we got it, of course, and he was wonderful. That Actor was Pernell Roberts. His first western. And I said to him, "Look, Pernell [Pernell Roberts], you're out here from New York, you've done a wonderful job. The only thing you've got to learn is that, look, I'm directing westerns 'cause there's no other work around here." For five years I was a western Director." I said, "That's the only work available. Go take riding lessons." And the next time I saw him, I was directing BONANZA and he was terrific. [INT: He was a Mr. man on a horse now.]

INT: Now, I'm going back to the show, to WANTED, and to the transition now--'cause you're still on radio here. When--?
JR: Yes. Oh no, wait. I still have to finish the warden Burke. So, [INT: Yeah, we're in with the warden, the Jimmy Gleason with the yellow socks.] Jimmy Gleason. Oh god. [INT: It’s also rather cool, which is something else really clear about you right now. You have a really sharp memory. Your memory is not only for names, but it's also visual. So that's also part--'cause you described for us just now--I mean, I walked through that prison with you; the smell of that prison; the feel of that prison, the look of this guy.] Yeah, that’s interesting. [INT: That's all part of--if you will, if you think about it, you see, retain, a vision.] Interesting. Yeah. [INT: Not everybody does.] Well, I said to the warden, I said, "Look, if you don't mind to get a kind of ambient sound that Willie [Willie Sutton] would’ve experienced, can we go sit in the cell from which Willie [Willie Sutton] escaped?" It was just a thought, you know? And he said, "Yeah, sure." So we went down to the side and I remember walking through the corridors and Willie's [Willie Sutton] cell was at the end of a cellblock, ground level. They didn't have two tiered cells at that time. And there was an inmate in there and the warden said, "Get out of there!" I mean, it was startling. And this poor guy just scuttled. Now this little warden was nobody to fool with. Oh geez, it scared the pants off me. Oh, I had my engineer with me who had this sixty-pound portable tape recorder. So the first thing I noticed as I walked into Willie's [Willie Sutton] cell was that there was fresh plaster on the wall. Well, he had dug a tunnel. It was a ninety-nine foot tunnel. They did it--it took over a year. They had dug this tunnel and he and about 7 other guys had escaped. The other guys were captured the same day; Willie [Willie Sutton] got away. Willie and Fred Tenuto [Fred Frederick Tenuto] had gotten away. Tenuto [Fred Frederick Tenuto] is interesting; he comes back into the story later because he killed the man who had identified Willie [Willie Sutton]--what got Willie [Willie Sutton] captured ultimately later on. Geez, that's an interesting memory. And Tenuto [Fred Frederick Tenuto] also works in my story as to how I got into television. [INT: Really? Okay.] Well he was one of my warden guys sometime later, [INT: Got it.] and I followed him to South Philadelphia where a bartender had said, "You don't want to talk to me, get out of here. He's living around here. You know, he's very dangerous." And I got out of there pretty quickly, 'cause he--

INT: With all these people that you interviewed, these were not the kind of people--I mean in your own experience, you've been a college person, [JR: Oh yeah.] you've been in--yes there'd been the war experience, which we haven't talked about, but there've the university environment. Now you're going after people who are criminals-- [JR: No, not criminals, but--] No, no, no, but people who knew people who were. And the question is, were you discovering--this is a strange question to ask, but were you now saying if--A Director's responsibility is to understand something about human nature. Well, the way you understand it is by being with humans to find out who they are, what they do, what motivates them. Were you now being exposed to a group of people that you probably would’ve never met and never knew anything about?
JR: Oh, clearly, clearly. Although some of them are very high place people, like governors of states and well, the warden was my first interview. Subsequently, I had girlfriends of ordered criminals; mothers. That was difficult. Certainly a lot of police. And then there's casual people who would find things on the street or be involved in somehow. Anyway, we sat down on this--there's a cot, two cots. Wasn’t it? Yeah. And holding the microphone between us, but making eye contact with the warden, I said, "The only thing I would like to do, warden, is state your name at the beginning, and at the end, just say something about Willie [William Sutton] having disappeared from this penitentiary." [INT: Right.] He said, "Yeah, I've got you." Now he had--I could almost do his voice. Would you like--? [INT: Do it. Are you kidding, would I like?] Well, I mean because I'm not an Actor, but-- [INT: Go on, go on!] But as we started and I'm holding the microphone and, this never happened after that, but this was a test of fire and brimstone in a way, because he started it the following way: He said, "This is Cornelius Burke [Cornelius J. Burke], the warden at the Eastern State Penitentiary. I once spent a day visiting at the Federal Penitentiary at Alcatraz." And I thought, "Where in the world is he going?” but okay. And I nodded in encouragement. Go on. He said, "At that time, there was about four thousand five hundred of the most dangerous and vicious federal prisoners we've got in this country. Here at the Eastern State Penitentiary, we got a population of five thousand six hundred and fifty two. And every one of those guys is just as dangerous and just as vicious as anybody they got in Alcatraz." He was--well, I almost came apart. I mean it was like, geez, don't laugh. Well, it was very funny [INT: Of course.], and tragic at the same time. Here he is in competition with the federal pen. But I'm biting my lip until the blood came; literally, my tongue. I wouldn't show him the lip, but I was fearful, fearful that I would break up. And I glanced at my Engineer who was stuffing a handkerchief in his mouth. [INT: [laughs]] And the warden was in his own world. And he was an Actor because he modulated and after he'd said, "We have this huge population, and among those men at one time was Willie Sutton [William Sutton], who has since left us." Now that was his pause. I mean, that wistful thought about--here's this newly patched tunnel. He's since left us? [INT: Great. Great.] Geez. I tell you, I was choking. But [gestures], keep it going. And then he went on. He said a few other things. Oh, one of the things that I'd asked him to incorporate because as we sat down and I had mentioned I wanted the ambiance of the cell, and I expected to hear footsteps, clanging doors. It's like, you remember GANG BUSTERS? [INT: Sure.] Schwarzkopf's [Norman Schwarzkopf] father [Colonel H. Norman Schwarzkopf Sr.] used to, you know, the general--his father used to narrate GANG BUSTERS and they had that shuffling feet and the clanging doors. And I figured that's what you hear at a penitentiary. What I heard was Dixieland music. And I said to the warden, prior to the taping, I said, "What is that--Where's that coming from?" It was loud, and pretty good. He said, "It's the prison band. They're rehearsing." Another lesson: sound can play a very big part in your drama but it isn't necessarily the sound you're conceiving. The truth is much more interesting. And I said, "Would you work that in at some point?" which he did. You know, he said, "By the way, the sound--the music you're hearing is our prison band. They're pretty good." A comment like that. But then he went on and he talked about Willie [William Sutton] and he said, again, with a nice piece of Actor-y modulation, "Now all the time Willie [William Sutton] was here, he never gave us no trouble, but we knew he was thinkin'..." [INT: [laughs]. I mean, you know, how could you improve on this performance? [INT: Great.] He said, "We knew he wanted to get out of this place other than the right way. And by the right way I mean going through them gates." Well, you couldn't have had a more melodramatic tag. I mean it's right out of a bad B movie, which he had seen, obviously. "Going out of them gates." Well, when I got to the hotel and played it back, I used almost every inch of it, because it was perfect tape. And we used it on the air and it was a wonderful thing--and then we went on to the next fellow, whatever it was, and got that going. Okay, so--

INT: It's interesting now, here's this experience that you're having, which is essentially the experience of if you will be documentary experience. [JR: Right.] This is not the narrative dramatic experience. This is not doing a play by Shakespeare or--this is now very much, you are still motivating, changing, and editing. [JR: Yeah, that’s right.] All that's happening, but this is all out of what people who--who people really are. Now where's the transition for you, again, from?
JR: Well, I don't know, but I just remembered a fellow I interviewed in Cleveland [for WANTED] who found the body of his neighbor. [INT: Right.] He said, "I’d heard this noise," he said "and I went over to the kitchen--I started pushing on the kitchen door from the back, and something was holding it. And I pushed and pushed and it was Johnny's body. He was, about the time I got in there, Johnny was taking his last gurgle." Now you can't write that line. "His last gurgle?" I guess he meant gurgle. [INT: I shouldn't laugh, but still.] I mean--well, in a way, you have to laugh, but you can't, because this is a human being talk about his friend dying. [INT: Yeah.] And it struck me as being extraordinary. So when you talk about meeting different types, I mean that was a type. The warden at Canyon City Penitentiary--this is much later of course--who was so proud of his execution process he offered to have me watch an execution. And I said, "No. I'd just as soon not, thank you." He says, "It's interesting. We've got a gas chamber now." He said, "We used to hang them, but sometimes it was kind of messy. We'd have to hit the guy with a sledgehammer to finish it." I said--I mean I was almost sick. [INT: Yeah, yeah.] Almost sick. But this--matter-of-fact, this is their life. Or the assistant warden in Salem, Oregon, much later, where they had an old wing and a new wing. And I’d visited the old wing, which looked like a dungeon, what prisoners shared space. Then the new wing, which is one of those modern, multi-tiered penitentiaries we're all used to seeing nowadays. And I said, "Boy, I'll bet you the inmates fight to get into this new wing where it's only one man to a cell." And he looked at me pityingly. He said, "You don't know much about boy pumpers, do you?" I said, "Boy pumpers?" Now this is 1950. I didn’t even know what--I had no idea what he was talking about. Homosexual. Boy pumpers. They want to be together. They don't want to be in single cells. I learned a new word to my dismay. I had no idea what he was talking about at the time, but jeez. [INT: What an education you were getting.] What an education, clearly. Or in Philadelphia when I had 2 detectives assigned to me when I was chasing Fred Tenuto [Frederick Tenuto] [laughs]. When they heard that I wanted to go into 10th and Watkins, which is South Philadelphia, the sergeant said, "I can't send one of my boys in there. That's too tough a neighborhood." Police sergeant. And 1 guy volunteered. He said, "I'll go with you." And when we went into the bar, the place cleared out the back. I mean, 'cause he went in with his hands up. He said, "It's not a pinch. Everybody be quiet." But guys were escaping out the back door. My Engineer told him 'cause he was out front. But my 2 detectives that were assigned on that case, they weren't there that day would--now if you wrote this, you'd say, "Come on, re-write that line." Their names were Dennis McGuirk [unverified] and Patrick Mccolgan [unverified]. Detectives. [INT: Right.] 24th precinct, Philadelphia, who also taught me something about police practices; they were very proud to show me their interrogation room. They said, "You like the mirror?" I said, "Yes, it's probably a one-way mirror." "Oh, you figured that out, huh?" [Laughs] [INT: Laughs] Oh yeah. He said, "Well, the guys we have in there don't know that." [INT: Great.] So he said, "Let me show you what we've got back here." So he showed me, took me in the back and there was Bell and Howell camera set up. I said, "Geez, boy that's a state of the art, expensive stuff." I said, "The city buy this?" He said, “Nah, it was kind of appropriated from somebody's hold-up." A little mumble. "But we're putting it to good use." [INT: Great.] Okay. Tick [motions]. Another tick [motions]. A character piece that you can't find in books. Or the police in Pontiac, Michigan, when I came in there, they said, "Get the hell out of town. We don't want to talk to you." The police! I said, "I'm chasing--" "Yeah, we know who you're chasing. We don't want you around here." Okay. [INT: Did you ever figure out why?] Oh sure, they were on payoff. [INT: Got it. Now go back to--] Greasy Thumbed Gulick [Jake "Greasy Thumb" Guzik]. [INT: Greasy Thumb Gulick [Jake "Greasy Thumb" Guzik]?] That was one of the guys--

INT: Now making a transition, though, you're still now into sound. And you're into documentary.
JR: Oh, okay, yeah. So, here we go with all these wanted guys. And the biggest problem we had was that someone would get caught before we were on the air. [Laughs] And we sweated that out because it took 2 or 3 weeks to get the stuff together. [INT: Great.] Now, we had first applied to J. Edgar Hoover for FBI help and he said, "We don't want any part of you guys." And we said, "Okay, screw you. We'll go to state police, local police," which we did. After we had 3 guys caught in a--it's a thirteen week series. We had 3 guys caught while I was still on the road, because of our show! [INT: Wow.] And we had acknowledgement from the police or from whoever that yes, the show engendered these particular-- one guy got killed. A criminal. In a shoot-out in Cleveland, when the police captain had told me, "You're wasting your time. He's obviously--we know he's in Mexico." He was in Cleveland and they found him because, as they said, the switchboard lit up and they had all kinds of leads, some of which were, you know, cranks, but they followed every lead and we caught three men. Now Hoover [J. Edgar Hoover] was on the phone saying, "Can we get in on it?" [INT: Wow.] And McGraw [Walter McGraw] said, "No, we're doing fine. Thank you." But it began to teach me something about my own life because I was due in--with my west coast sound engineer had gone to Hollywood to pick him up because I was doing shows in Washington, Oregon, Idaho. [INT: Same shows, now? We're talking about WANTED?] Still WANTED. And I was due--we had been in Albuquerque and I missed the plane. So that we got to Denver late and we got to the Brown Palace Hotel where we’re scheduled, our rooms were gone. So, but they said we could accommodate you on a subsidiary hotel; some fleabag down the street. So we got in. Now we had always a rule: that I was--wherever I got to a new location I would call Peggy McGraw and Walter McGraw and tell them where I was, ‘cause there was some concern always that I’d be out there. [INT: Sure.] So I telephoned them and I said, "Listen, I'm not at the Brown Palace." And they said, "Yeah, we know. You're at the such and such hotel." They knew where I was. I said, "How did you know that?" He said, "We were worried." They called one of Hoover's [J. Edgar Hoover] guy’s and they said, "Well, your boy Johnny [John Rich] has missed the plane in Albuquerque and he is just checking into the such and such hotel." I said, "You mean they're watching me?" He said, "They're looking for leads." [Laughs] ‘Cause I would generate leads [INT: Yeah, sure.] on my own and the police would always say to me, I'd say, "How come I found this woman?" There was a woman in a--living in a forest, actually, near--somewhere in upper Michigan. And I said, "How can I have found this people and you--?" He said, "Look, you're working on one case. We have fifty homicides." I said, "Oh, okay, you're right, you're right." I began to learn something about police work. And the other thing I learned with McGuirk [Dennis McGuirk [unverified]] and Patrick [Patrick Mccolgan [unverified]] was that every time we took ‘em to dinner, which of course they loved, 'cause I was on an expense account, we'd go to the finest restaurants, but they would always sit with their--facing the door and I would always have my back to the front door. And it struck me one day. I said, "You know, you guys always take those positions." And they said, "Well, we have to ‘cause we want to sweep the room with our eyes. We've got to see what's going on. And we've got to keep our gun arm clear in case of trouble." I said, "My god, what happens if there's a shoot-out? What do I do?" He said, "Duck!" [INT: [laughs] You're learning quick.] Oh, I leanred--you know, to this day, I sit in restaurants with my back to the wall. It's mafia. Anyway, finally. [INT: We're gonna get to an image. We're gonna get to an image.] It came here right now. At the end of the thirteen weeks, we'd caught now 4 people in a thirteen week-- and NBC was deliriously happy. Big ratings. And they said, "We want you to do this on television." I said, "Are you kidding?" I said, "With film speed the way it is? The lights that have to be done." I said, "I'm escaping with my life going in with the one guy with a microphone and a tape recorder. I've been in danger 2 or 3 times." I said, "No. There's no way I'm doing this on tape."

INT: Now how did you know at all about--'cause you knew sound equipment now, but how did you know anything about, you know, the film equipment and all the rest of that stuff?
JR: Well, I could watch television when I was in hotel rooms. I mean, I could see what was going on. [INT: Right. Right.] Black and white, poor grainy images. I said, “This film is”--especially on news shows or documentaries. I said, "I see what's going on." By the way, do you remember Edward Murrow and Fred Friendly [Fred W. Friendly]? [INT: Of course.] Fred Friendly [Fred W. Friendly] came into my editing room one day at NBC. He said, "What are you doing?" And I was showing how to splice tape. And that's where they get--after that, they went into HEAR AND NOW and ultimately SEE IT NOW. But I remember Friendly [Fred W. Friendly] said, "Hey, that's great. Let me see that again." [INT: Great.] You know, so-- [INT: You trained one of the masters.] I contributed somehow. Well, not training, he was very bright on his own. Anyway, they wanted TV and I said, "There's no way, and I would recommend not doing it because it's too dangerous. It's just too public--" I said, by the way we were paying these people; people who gave us a tape, I would give them anywhere from fifty to a hundred dollars--some of them; the more dangerous, the higher. Governors of states got a dollar. Wardens got a dollar. Police people got 5 dollars, ten dolla. That sort of thing. Okay. So--[INT: NBC wants it on film and you're saying no--] NBC wants it on tape and I've just finished a successful radio show and I said, "But, I'll tell you what. What I'd really like to do is get into this new business of television." And they said, "Well, what do you wanna do?" I said, "Well, I'd like to be a Director." And they laughed! They said, "You can't just be a Director. What are you talking about?" Well I said, "I'm kind of a Director in radio. Why not?" They said, "Well, you have to train to be a Director. We can't just make Directors." I said, "Well, how do you--what's the path?" They said, "Well, first you have to be a Stage Manager." I said, "Well I can do that." They said, "You don't wanna do that." And at that time, I was making about two fifty [250] a week; pretty good money. [INT: Really?] They said, "Stage Managers get eighty dollars a week. And they work long weeks." I said, "I'm young enough. I'll do that." They said, "You're serious?" I said, "Yeah.” I said, “Get me an interview." And they got me an interview and I became a Stage Manager. [INT: Now why did you change your mind? Why didn't you just stay in radio? Why did you even--?] Because I could see it coming. TV was--I mean, Miltie [Milton Berle played Uncle Miltie on TEXACO STAR THEATRE and the BUICK-BERLE SHOW] they were all coming. THE SHOW OF SHOWS [YOUR SHOW OF SHOWS]. My god, Caesar [Sid Caesar]. I could see, really, the handwriting on the wall, which, by the way, biblical scholars, is "Mene, Mene, Tekel Upharsin." [INT: --Pharsin, yeah.] Now weight in the balance and found wanting. Little biblical knowledge. [INT: Actually, I didn't even know there was a translation to "Mene, Mene, Tekel Upharsin."] It is a translation. [INT: No, no. I didn't know there was a translation.] Oh yeah, there was. [INT: Which is?] It's “though art faith--”, "weighed in the balance and found wanting". It's “the handwriting on the wall.” "Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting." [INT: Great.] Yeah. It's like, "Radix malorum est cupiditas" [INT: Which is?] The love of money is the root of all evil. It's also translated. I guess it depends on your Bible, I mean if you get the Vulgated, I don't think it's there-- [INT: Well, in fact, you only have "Mene, Mene, Tekel u-Pharsin," that's it. You will not get--] No, I have it in the King James-- [INT: No, no that's why I was asking.] It's interesting. I love the bible as a foundation of literature. You can't do without it. [INT: All the stories. In fact, I remember 1 of my teachers in high school said, "Next to your bed there are two books. There is a--Greek mythology and the bible. And if you have those, then you have the basis for all the stories you're gonna deal with--] It's true. I'm just finishing Dershowitz's [Alan Dershowitz] book, THE GENESIS OF JUSTICE. [INT: Right.] Very interesting. All the interpretations of-- [INT: He's a nice, challenging writer.]

INT: So, why did you also--television, you saw, since you literally were in these rooms seeing. But why, say, Director? Why not say Producer--?
JR: Because I was a Director at this point. I was directing people--I mean, remember, I used the McGraw [Walter McGraw, NBC Director] technique. I would say to somebody, "Leave out that portion about the such-and-such and put in the thing where you found this." [INT: Now were you calling yourself a Director at that moment in radio at the moment? Were you saying, "I'm a--"] Producer. I was a field Producer. [INT: So that's what I'm saying. Why choose this word? Why choose that as--] Because I didn't have the guts to say "I'm a Producer." That looked too heavenly for me, in a sense. [INT: Okay.] But Director was kind of a logical thing ‘cause I was directing people. [INT: Had you met other Directors? Either in radio or in television?] No, only McGraw [Walter McGraw]. McGraw [Walter McGraw] was a Director and Garrison [Garnet Garrison] had been a radio Director, so that was in my mind in a sense--I guess that was it. No, I knew nobody else. Stage Manager. Well, that Stage Manager crew of about twenty-five of us--[INT: Now where were you? NBC?] NBC, New York. Arthur Penn, Paul Bogart, Dominick Dunne who became the-- he was one of them. Jack Shea. I mean, I can't--there was another Penn. Maurie [Maurice Daniel Penn] and Leo Penn. [INT: Leo [Leo Penn], sure.] I mean, what a group.

INT: Now out of curiosity--let me stop for just a second--these guys who you just mentioned who all became eminent people in their field. Obviously, Dominick [Dominick Dunne] is a Writer, but everyone else became an eminent Director in his own way. Did they come from a variety--if you were just to sort of to take a half a second to say, "Well, I know how I got here. I, you know, was working in radio at NBC with this show, I wanted to move onto television and this was the first entrance." If we looked at, let's say Arthur [Arthur Penn] or Leo [Leo Penn], would you say that it was similar or was everybody coming from totally different--
JR: All over the place. But Arthur [Arthur Penn], of course, became one of my best friends. He had been at Black Mountain where I think he'd been directing plays. Jack [Jack Shea] had been at Fordham [Fordham University], where he'd been involved in some kind of play production. Kirk Browning was in music. Dominick [Dominick Dunne] was just rich. He came from a wealthy background, I guess. [INT: But this was, if you will--I’m gonna interrupt you for a second--But this was the school, in essence, was to be a Stage Manager at first at NBC.] Yes. [INT: That was your training ground. That was the school.] That was the training ground. And I was assigned almost instantly to every show that was going on. [INT: What were the shows in those days?] Well, I would drop in on things like HOWDY DOODY. [INT: Right.] I met for the first time Eva Marie Sainte and ONE MAN'S FAMILY. Eva Marie Sainte and a wonderful Actor. THE ODD COUOPLE--Help me. [INT: Jack--] No. The other one. [INT: Now you've got me now. You've got Jack Lemmon, and--] Not Jack Lemmon. Jack Klugman. [INT: Oh, oh from the-- Tony--] Tony Randall. So Tony Randall and Eva Marie Sainte were the juvenile's of ONE MAN'S FAMILY and I was Stage Manager, pointing my finger. I did KRAFT TELEVISION THEATRE. I learned a lot from that. [INT: Now that was-- they were dramas, right?] Oh yeah, complete drama. Yeah, I was Stage Manager and very effective. They were done by the outside agency people. Stanley Quinn and Maury Holland were alternate Directors and they were very elaborate shows and these were very elaborate Directors. [INT: Now were these Directors, Directors coming out of theater? Those two men?] I think they came out of theater originally and they were agency people who knew something. [INT: And when you say agency, what are you speaking to?] Advertising agencies. [INT: Got it.] The whole process was owned and operated by--I can't remember the name of the agency. Dancer Fitzgerald Sample, I don't know who else was there. [INT: And these were people who would put the ads on during the time of this particular show?] No, no. Not just that, but the agency itself had hired these Directors to do this program. [INT: So in those days--] By the way, Jack Lemmon was one of those early Actors. [INT: Wow. Those days, the agency, I mean somebody representing--this is a business representing product.] That's right. [INT: Actually had control of--] Complete control of the entire production; the only thing they didn't have control of was the below-the-line. They would bring in a package and the network would assign us, Stage Manager, all the Camera Operators, and-- [INT: So you, the below line people, that came from the network. In other words, the staff that could produce this thing came from the network. But the creative talent--] Creative talent. [INT: Directors and Actors.] And Actors. They were all--[INT: Would be determined by the agency.] They would rehearse outside in rehearsal halls with tape and so on, and they'd come in with a day of rehearsal and the next day of shooting, live. Obviously live. And Maury Holland, one of my great mentors--you asked earlier. [INT: Yes, yes.] Not in the sense of being a positive mentor, but he used to have--forgive me, Maury [Maury Holland], I have to tell that story, but he was the kind of Director who loved to shoot through apertures. You know, a picture would flap open. There'd be a camera. You'd take away a wall or part of a wall and the camera would be in the fireplace and you'd have to get a relief camera, obviously, so you wouldn't see this. You know, and there’d be--but he was addicted to it, so he had, in a sense, a four-wall set, but you had to be in perfect sync and knowing what camera you were on at all time. Maury [Maury Holland] got lost one day. It was very sad. But I remember standing behind a set, obviously. And I had my book, I was a very careful Stage Manager. Knowing what camera would be on at a particular time when I would either open or close a wall, fireplace, a safe, whatever. Tommy [Tommy Nolan, Name unverifiable.] was my chief carpenter. I can't remember his last name. Tommy Nolan. Boy! [INT: Really, really, really?] That's a long time ago. Tommy Nolan was a young chief carpenter. Very good. He was terrific. And he would be next to me and I have my book and I would hear, you know, they're coming up to a shot, and I said okay. They would take a shot and I would say, "Okay, Tommy [Tommy Nolan]. Open the wall." And it was on a tip jack and he opened the wall and I’m looking at my monitor, and I said, "Gee, somehow they punched up a Jeep monitor." You remember that word? A Jeep monitor was a local feed. It was not on the air. [INT: Right.] We used that all the time in rehearsal. I said, "Why would they have a Jeep monitor [non-switchable TV viewing monitor that feeds a picture from one camera; used during pre-production rehearsals of live TV]on the air at this time?" I said, "We're on the air. Live." But I could see behind the Actors are working, but the wall is open and I could see Tommy [Tommy Nolan] and I could see into the next set, there's a guy sitting on a boom and he's eating an apple. All this took place in a fraction of a second, of course. [INT: Right, right, right.] And I realized suddenly we're on the air with an open set. And I said, as quietly as I could--Now, remember, I'm out of sight, and I'm looking at the monitor, and I said to the monitor, "Tommy [Tommy Nolan], close the wall." And on television, I could see Tommy [Tommy Nolan] say, "Close the wall?" [INT: [Laughs]] I said, "Yeah." Tommy [Tommy Nolan] had a shrug and closed the wall. [INT: Great.] And then I heard from the control room, it was Maury [Maury Holland] [Fake cries]. Somebody said, "Maury [Maury Holland], are you alright?" [Fake cries] "You work and you slave for a whole week and you rehearse. You get on the wrong camera." And he said, "Tommy [Tommy Nolan], we're on three." He said, "I don't care which you’re on. I'll take anything." [INT: [Laughs.]] The man went into a fit of confusion. And I just said, "He got on the wrong camera," which is what happened. It's life. Life in live television.

INT: Now, here's a question. What were your responsibilities as a Stage Manager in those days? What were you supposed to do?
JR: Oh. Complete efficiency and adoration. You had to bow down to these Directors. They were in charge. [INT: And they were asking you to do what, though?] Well just to throw cues, to control the set, to open the walls when necessary, on the right cue. It happened that I was right, you know. It didn't help the matter any, but Maury [Maury Holland] later confessed that he’d--and the TD [Technical Director] told me--he punched the wrong camera.