INT: So, the guy who goes form place to place doesn’t get much opportunity to bring his or her own people, talk about becoming part of an existing shooting company, what challenges that presents?
GS: Usually happens is everybody is preset. If you are lucky you come across people you know and work with. And come across people who are good. There are other times when you come on the set when you don't know people at all and its like starting over. I like to get a shot of looking at what that set is about in advance. I might go to observe, just for what's there, what they are doing. What needs to be comfortable. Where the good vibe is. Where you want to go to, get problems resolved. So I will go and watch. Even if I went there just for a couple of hours, go back another day. That way I know. I kinda miss the days where you could be more instrumental in hiring the people. [INT: I think I want to go back and underline the thing you said, there is no way you can underestimate the importance of being there in advance, just watching.] Absolutely. In spite of everything I like the business of making a show. Half hour or movie, I like to be there. I remember DANNY DEVITO was an old friend who invited me onto WAR OF THE ROSES. I was struck by it, amazed by what was going on. Even if I knew the things that were happening I still loved it. new ways of looking at it. Something you haven't thought of. And he gave me the script. Gave me a copy in advance so I knew exactly what I was shooting, and came up with my own thoughts then discovered a different way. Getting there in advance, it's your right and its a necessity. It's only going to help you. Never hurt you.

INT: So let's go to the list of questions that sometimes they ask the contestants in the Ms. America pageant, what's the worst thing about Gary Shimokawa?
GS: Mostly I'm late. You know that better than anyone. As a matter of fact, one of the funniest times was when I was ADing on GOLDEN GIRLS. They always knew I was late. I used to say I don't have to be at the secondary reading. What the production supervisor and script coordinator used to do was get me my paper and coffee, sit me in my chair. I was like a director on my own. I would walk in on the middle of a reading where everything was set down for me. I've tried to improve that, I'm not nearly as late as I used to be. Haven't been late in recent shows.

INT: What's the best thing about Gary Shimokawa?
GS: I think I adapt. I'm not cluttered with a definitive approach. Even if I have one I don't let it take over what may happen on the show. If there are different ways of doing things I can adapt or I can say to somebody what if we did it this way without getting in someone's face. I asked some of the same questions that JOHN always taught me to ask. I don't demand from everybody in the same manner that he would have demanded, but I think that's a good thing for me. I try to have a good time. If I'm not having a good time nobody else is. [INT: I think you bring a tremendous spirit to every project.]

INT: Not to embarrass you, but is JOHN RICH, is he the mentor, number one guy in your career in terms of influence and what to do?
GS: Yeah, I think of JOHN often. I think it has everything to do with that he started my career, and that he was that good. That combination makes me think of him often. As I told my wife, there are some times everyday that triggers something, or I see somebody who has undoubtedly an hysterical JOHN RICH story. That part of it is good. I remember PAUL BOGART, because he had a different way of looking at it, it was much more filmic. He was the first person that ever showed me how something could be done in a different way. I've worked with other directors before but they were close to JOHN. PAUL showed me a different way, made me much more conscious. The lenses made me understand it more. My entire career, it's not been one in which I went to a library and learned every aspect of what it is. If you ask me in the middle of a shoot, I couldn't tell you that it was this specific thing, but I could tell you what I liked. I learned by doing more than from everything else. [INT: You also are one of the guys on the set who can understand the chemistry on the film as well as how to use it.]

INT: Worst experience ever?
GS: I did a show called NORMAL LIFE with the ZAPPA kids. I was only AD'ing. I directed one episode. GREG ANTONATCHI was writing, producing and directing. And the ZAPPA kids, that was an awful experience. MOON UNIT and DWEEZIL. Not a good experience. BRILLSTEIN sold the idea, CINDY WILLIAMS played mother. She was fine, the kids were just out there. Not really actors, I thought MOON UNIT had a chance, I don't think anything came of it. DWEEZIL loves music. He improvised, could do the new show, THE OSBOURNES, he could do that show he was in that vein. That wasn't good. FISH was interesting, not the best even though I liked working for DANNY, but ABE and FLORENCE never got along. The way you had to do that show, you had all these kids to rehearse in a certain period of time. You rehearsed the adults a separate time. ABE's comments to me when we would rehearse was it was good for me, I don't know what it was for FLORENCE STANLEY. Terrific actress. She would be fuming. All he cared about was what was comfortable for him. Sitting in the chair was comfortable. Played a hound dog character, needed everything to happen around him. That was hard. We took the kids from 8 to 7:30, meal break, shoot the adults at 9, 9:30, finish at 3 or 4 because DANNY wanted coverage. Because they knew that was the style, getting there was also a style into itself. I finished that show, then went over to watch BARNEY MILLER shoot because they were still shooting. The script was still coming in. [INT: They were always shooting, it was the only open all night show.]

INT: Best experience?
GS: There are two of them, ALL IN THE FAMILY, GOLDEN GIRLS. Best experience. Most fun. Lot of laughs. ALL IN THE FAMILY because of what the show said, how It made people think. We talked about it a number of which ways, with each other. It's really interesting stories, things that happened to people, the racism was out there for you to get angry at, talk about, to remember. There was never an independent remark that was not counted by someone else. That was in the design, very important. Archie was not going to say those things without a response. As stupid as it sounds when there is a response to it it points it up more. Always made sure there was another side to it.

INT: Did you feel, while you were doing it, that you were a part of the company that either at that moment or eventually would take its place among the top shows in television?
GS: I knew it was something important. I knew that it was doing extremely well. there were times where we were getting forty rating, 60 shares. Come on, you look at that and say my God, we were number one for four or five weeks, go into reruns and still be number one. Talking about it the next day. Can you hear that show. It's that kind of thing. I was quizzed by people who said how do you feel about the racial statements being Japanese American, I say I don't feel badly at all. Every time he says "Jap" there is somebody else saying Archie come on. What's wrong with that remark, what's wrong with looking at that narrow perspective.

INT: I bet if you would talk to most students in television, if you asked them to pick their top five situation comedies of all times, ALL IN THE FAMILY would be on every list?
GS: Certainly most every writer I've ever talked to says that. Just people in general. It's interesting, they are discovering it all over again with TV LAND and on CBS who are replaying it on Sundays. [INT: It's a great show cycle. you see the MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW, MASH all the time on the FX channel. TAXI will recycle, NEWHART, people do, the audiences discover them all over again. That you cant talk to much about the importance of that show and how it liberated television from that FATHER KNOWS BEST box that so many situation comedies were in. In some cases it set the stage for dramatic stages as well in terms of subject matter] I absolutely think so. You look at the subject matter on the first show I did, a show in which the issue of the day was hijacking. Kind of come full circle. There was a big thing. Someone did a man on the street interview, got him on television, his suggestion was to give every man woman and child a gun as they board the plane. Outrageous but then now you look at it and you say pilots are going now. Going back to it, I said it before that the subject matter was so interesting you knew there could be a reaction from the audience. You want to hear that reaction. I said to you off-screen, there was an episode where the swastika was painted on his door, a guy from the JDL, Hebrew defense league. He was offering protection. In the course of the day it turned out that the JDL guy was closer to Archie than mike. Mike disagreed with him because it was an eye for an eye, played by GREG SIERRA. One of the first things he did. At the end he leaves, discovering they are not Jewish, believing what he believes. At the very end of the episode they have this dialogue, then there is a humongous explosion, they dart out to the door, and we cut to the door. They blew up PAUL. That was the end of the episode. There was no tag. NORMAN came out and asked what they thought. Screaming and yelling from both sides. Younger people loved it. Older people said will there be a tag? Not on this show, well then that is shameful. There has to be a tag. You can't leave it ending that way. Fighting for words to be said, there was an episode where Archie says God damn it for the first time in television. In order to get that by, CBS insisted there not be any other profanity in the whole show. There was a moment in which there is a heat wave in New York, Mike is criticizing Nixon for Watergate, talking about it. Hot and clammy. I've had enough of this Watergate God damn it. Then proceeds to explain in perfectly legitimate words. Don't show their ignorance. He laid it all back on Edith.

INT: So what do we talk about that we haven't talked about?
GS: I guess our camera person said about how we hire crew and stuff. The last time I really, actually I hired the crew on USA HIGH when they did that for PETER ENGEL, MALIBU, those two shows. A director for hire, unless you are doing one of the earlier shows where the producer asks who do you like, for the most part the show is going to decide that. Editing wise they are going to decide that. When I did the show in Virginia, I put the crew together from top to bottom. I did have an ad who I trusted, also was an editor, I needed somebody who could do both. I needed to teach an editor there. Make sure he was up with the machinery and had a sense of comedy. I brought HENRY CHAN out to be my ad, that was fun. Big change often times in the editing today. I started editing when you were an AD. We did the show, spent a good three days in editing. ALL IN THE FAMILY, Monday and Tuesday no reading, I was in editing. The next day, my first day seeing the show in the middle of it, I might go to Sweeney, sweeten the show by myself with the directors notes. Come back with a sweet version. If I had to make corrections I would go back in.

INT: Well that job has basically been taken over by producers. So many different kinds, supervising producers, UMP, postproduction supervisor?
GS: The more it gets compartmentalized, the less each individual learns. [INT: I think that has been one of the problems the guild has faced. I know we faced it in the last situation that the associate director doesn't get as much exposure to post as they once did.] Oftentimes they have no involvement in post. In GOLDEN GIRLS when I AD'd, I was there with the director 5 days a week. They had a post person and that person was made editor so they wouldn't have to do that. Even though I liked being on the set that was one of the things that hurt. Directors cut was seen way director wanted.

INT: It's interesting in a multi-camera world now, so many producers give notes directly to editors, script supervisors, or some assistant and that gets combined in the directors cut that they send. The advent of slaving all four cameras, the directors cut in multi-camera is barely a guide anymore which is kind of a problem?
GS: No it is. unless you were the sole guy on the show, could design the shooting so there is no question. those circumstances just don't present themselves very often. I remember JOHN, we used to go to HAL COLLINS right after rehearsal to edit. we ended up spending the evening there JOHN would rewrite the section with the editing. I think that there are a lot of younger ADs who want to be directors who miss a little bit by not being in post. post is an important place to spend your time.

INT: Any other suggestions for young men who are foolish enough to think they want to be directors?
GS: Don’t think you know everything go out of your way to work past the hours you are paid for. Because the hours spent beyond the hours paid for are hours that are going to help your career, those are the educational hours. Then you know there is something there. That's when you find out. If there is any advice, in almost any profession, you have to spend the hours to learn and absorb. Never short change yourself so when you decide not to do it you can literally say vie gone as far as I can go. And be on time.

INT: Anything else?
GS: That’s it. I'll think of a thing when I ask you questions next time. Thank you. [Cut print. ]