INT: Talk about your days on the Hitchcock TV show [ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS] and how much support you got.

AH: Well the support on the Hitchcock show was just terrific. Joan Harrison, the Producer, and Norman Lloyd, the Associate Producer, just were very creative and caring, and felt that the Director should be the Director. They had a lot of the good casting ideas, and sometimes had the lead character already cast, but also, they felt that I should be doing something, which was not being done in television in those days. In those days you finished a show, and you didn't have anything to do with the editing. You just went on to the next show. And they would... yes, I would leave and an Editor would work, but they would try and arrange for me to come back and see one of the assemblies, third cut or whatever, and make my comments and work a little with him. And that was unusual. Although I must say on GUNSMOKE and RIFLEMAN and TELEPHONE TIME and NAKED CITY and ROUTE 66, the Producers were all very helpful, very supportive, and very open to the Director doing what the Director has to do, which is keep things as one vision. That's the way you have to do it. I'm saying that and thinking I also worked on the series THE BLUE AND THE GRAY. It was a series about the Confederacy. And the program that I did had to do, the episode had to do with a coward. And it was the story of the coward. And I wanted this kid I'd seen and liked, Robert Redford, to play the role. And the Producer said, "That's... no, no, this is a coward we're looking for." He wanted more of a Rick Moranis, a little man with glasses, you know. I said, "No, then it's easy to accept the coward. I wanted Mr. America that you don't expect to be a coward, so that you say anybody can be. It's not a question of physical." I finally won the argument and Redford did play it. That same Producer also fought me on the casting of the lieutenant in the army. I wanted Carroll O'Connor, and he felt he was too British. So but again Carroll played it, and we did do the episode, so there were other areas. But mostly very cooperative Producers who helped you in terms of doing your job and working with you in ways to keep within the budget but yet to do what we were trying to do.

INT: How did you make a transition from television then into theatrical films?

AH: To get from doing...One day I was working on a television show, and I've forgotten which one, but I got a call. It came over, the assistant said, "Your Agent is on the line and he has to speak to you right away, right away. You have to leave the set." Fortunately I wasn't shooting, but I did go over and go to the phone. Because I thought, "What? If he's saying leave the set, there must be some emergency." And he said, "Arthur, how would you feel about directing a film?" And I thought, "Well that's a pretty ridiculous question. Why is he asking me that?" And then I said, "Of course I would love that." And he said, "Well, would you be interested..." And as he spoke I realized he was sitting in the Producer's office and didn't want to give the feeling that I could be had for any price, so it went on that way. But from that came a meeting with Eddie Lewis [Edward Lewis], who was with Kirk Douglas at Bryna Productions, when Kirk had his company. And they offered me a film [THE CARELESS YEARS], and I read the script, and I liked it a lot, but I had reservations. And I thought, "Do I tell him about my reservations? Or do I pretend I really just love it? I don't want to lose the job," you know. And finally I went about it honestly and just told them just what my feelings were. And he said, "Those are my feelings, and I'm doing a rewrite, just on those items." And that became my first film.

INT: Can you talk about the making of that film [THE CARELESS YEARS] and how it was different from your television experience or similar?

AH: Working on film, I didn't find that different from working on television. Yes, you have more time, and you can do more interesting things. When you're on TV, by nature of the time constraints, by nature of the budget constraints, I've sometimes said, "It's a medium of compromise." And the trick is to know where you can compromise a little and not really hurt your story. But where you have to hang in, because it's important to the story. In a film, you don't have to face those problems because there is more time, and there is more money. But basically, you have the same thing in a TV, whether it be a half-hour or a TV film, or whether it's a major film. You're telling a story. You need something that conveys a story to the audience, and not just a story but that conveys it visually and dramatically. And that reaches your audience emotionally. I always say, "You have to make the audience see not just with their eyes but with their gut." That's the trick, and that's what you, the Director, have to do.

AH: But I'm just thinking back to television and an incident that happened that really says what is a Director do, because I did the pilot for THE ADDAMS FAMILY. And on the day when we were filming it, I did one scene, and I rehearsed something, I rehearsed a scene, and then blocked and staged the scene that we just rehearsed. And when the cameraman was lighting, I got into discussion offstage with Al Simon, who was the head of Filmways [Filmways, Inc.], whose film it was; Herb Browar [Herbert W. Browar], who was the production head; Marty Ransohoff [Martin Ransohoff], who was chairman of the board of Filmways; David Levy, whose project THE ADDAMS FAMILY was; he came up with the idea and organized it. Nat Perrin, who was the Writer/Producer; Harve Bennett, who was the ABC representative; I think there may have been one more, and me. And we were discussing the little girl's character and changes that could work or could... We were not arguing or disturbed by something. We were just all trying to see was there something we could do to improve, and we were discussing it, and discussing it, and thinking of things, and going on. And then they called me about 15 minutes later back to the set. I went on the set and finally got a shot, you know, that made me happy on the master of the scene I was doing. Then I did the coverage of the scene, you know, the various angles that I had to do. Then laid out the next major shot, and while the Cinematographer was lighting, I went back off. The discussion was still going on. And I thought, "Ah. That's what a Director is." See, the Director has to get in there and do it. You could talk about it, but somebody has to do it, and that's what the Director has to do. And that's why people sometimes say, "Oh, you like to direct, 'cause you like to be the boss." And I say, "No. I love it because it's a group activity." It's the coming together of all these creative juices, and they flow into the pot and out comes this new little entity, a movie. And that's what I love about it.

AH: Yes, by nature of the way a film is made, the Director has to be the boss. Because the Director's the only one in touch with every aspect of the film. That doesn't say the Director's smarter than the Writer or smarter than the Producer. But that's the way films are made. And you can only have one vision. If you're gonna have 12 different visions, you're not gonna tell a very good story. And so to that extent, you are the boss. You have to have a vision, and you have to hold that vision. Now, the hard part of directing is, of course, what shall I say, the human relations aspect. You know, each person you work with is different. And you have to figure out, "How do I work with them?" How do I work... And I'm not just talking the Actors. I'm talking about your Cinematographer, your Production Designer, props, dolly grip, everybody. You have to work with them. You have to create that atmosphere where they can do their best work. And where they want to do their best work. And that's, I think, the hardest part of directing, is making those decisions, and it was harder of course in television because you have less time. And you've got to quickly decide how to handle each Actor or what to do in that. And so that's very, very important, to give--well particularly in terms of Actors, to give them the security to feel that they can do this, to give them that... well, the feeling that you know what you're doing and giving them the feeling that they can do what you want them to do. [INT: That's good.] And that carries over whether you're in half-hour, whether you're in hour, whether you're in film. Whatever you're in.

INT: You said you did the pilot for THE ADDAMS FAMILY. Did you do other pilots as well?

AH: Yes, I did. I did other pilots. In fact, before THE ADDAMS FAMILY, Leonard Stern was doing a series called, he was planning I'M DICKENS, HE'S FENSTER. And he was talking to various friends of his about...and he said to Betty Chaplin, who was the Script Supervisor. He said he's looking for... he didn't want a comedy Director. He wanted a good Director with a good comedy sense. And I had directed one of the BUS STOP episodes with James Whitmore that she was the Script Supervisor on. And she said, "You know, we had a guy about three weeks ago you might like," and mentioned my name, and he looked me up, and I met with him. And he liked me. And I did that pilot, and it sold, and suddenly I was a comedy Director. I hadn't done comedy up to that point. My interests were in drama basically. And it just sort of went on from there. So you never know where your job will come from, like not my first film, but my second, which was a couple of years down the line, but which is really the beginning of my motion picture career. When I did the MIRACLE OF THE WHITE STALLIONS for Disney [Walt Disney Pictures], came about through AJ Carothers, the Writer of the particular MIRACLE OF THE WHITE STALLIONS because he suggested to Disney [Walt Disney] that he should get me as the Director 'cause I had directed a couple of the half-hour shows that he'd written, and he loved my work. And Walt said, "No, no." He wanted somebody more experienced, and he was going to go with somebody who had done a few films and things. And he did speak to some other Directors, and he was not happy. And finally he said, "Who was that kid you mentioned?" And I met with him. And about 20 minutes into our meeting, I realized I was doing the film. And indeed he just said--he also was very good creatively. He said, "You know the Disney framework, the kind of film. But within that, you do whatever you want." And indeed he was very supportive.

AH: You see, even in those days, I wasn't doing the post-production. Now this is on a film [MIRACLE OF THE WHITE STALLIONS], 1962. It's still... I hadn't grown into that... he should be doing the whole film nor did we have the right as we say. But after the film, one day I was having lunch with Walt [Walt Disney], and he said, "You picked a good day, Arthur, we're mixing your picture. Do you want to see it?" And I said, "Gee, fine." And I went over to the mix with him. And they were mixing a scene where I had Robert Taylor and Curd Jürgens in a stable, and I'd had the camera sort of dollying, leading them, sort of almost U-turn in the stable, then through a little hallway, and then into another piece of the stable like U-shaped. It was a very involved sort of shot to give a certain feel. And when we finished that shot, I knew the sound had had a lot of problems, and in those days what we used to do, we did wild tracks, when you knew there were... if an airplane had gone over or something, you would do a piece of the scene over and over a few times, just for audio. And I did about three wild tracks of the scene. And so now I'm sitting in the mix, and they have used one of the wild tracks totally. And I felt it hurt Curd Jürgens' performance. And I thought this was his best scene, and I thought, "We're not being fair to him," and so I spoke up and I said, "Why are you using the whole thing?" They said, "Well there are noises and that." I said, "Well, why don't you just put in the wild track where the noises are?" "Well," they said, "That's hard." I said, "Come on." And I kept arguing with them, and finally I said, "Look, you guys say you can change a syllable. You can do this and that. You can sure put in those pieces and that." And Walt had to leave. He went to a meeting. And I stayed and argued with them and finally got them. I worked with them, and we just put the wild tracks in in the places we had to and improved that performance quite a bit. But the point I was getting at was that Walt phoned down from his office and he said to them, "If that's what the kid wants, that's what you do." So he was very supportive of the Director. [INT: That's great to hear.] Yeah. [INT: I'm glad to hear that. And so even at that time in feature films it wasn't common for the Director to be very involved in post-production?] It wasn't that common, no. I must say, it wasn't that common at that time for the Director to be involved in post-production, but from that time on, I certainly was involved from, as we say, right through to the very end on every other film that I've worked on. [INT: That's great. It was a good lesson for you. See your contribution right there at the mix.]

INT: Going back to very early in your life, what was the first movie you saw that made an impression on you?

AH: I've often tried to think back to... I loved movies. I would go...I know every Saturday morning I would certainly be at the movies, or Saturday afternoon, at the Gem Theatre or the Dreamland [Dreamland Theater], because they were the ones where you could get in for a dime and sometimes for a nickel. And I know that the first shows I saw were Westerns. I would see Tom Mix and Hoot Gibson and Ken Maynard. That group. I've often wondered, I can't remember the first, other than Western, that affected me. I do remember being affected by Capra's [Frank Capra] IT'S A WONDERFUL WORLD. [INT: IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE.] WONDEFUL LIFE, I mean. Yeah. And later on GREAT EXPECTATIONS from David Lean. You know, a lot. But I did see so many, and they just amazed me and bowled me over. And what's funny is that I never thought about working in the movies. It didn't turn me on in that sense. I was impressed, and I was impressed with Directors. That's interesting, probably, because I thought, "Somebody's putting this all together. Somebody's overseeing this." And I realized that that's what the Director was doing. [INT: When did you think about the Director in that way? Or when did you start to think about becoming a Director? I know in the radios, the early radio days, that's what you were doing, but did you have--] Despite my sort of amazement and realization of what a Director does and the contributions that they were making to the film, I never thought about being a Director. I never thought about working in films. It really wasn't 'til I stepped up in those radio days and walked into the headquarters of the CBC [Canadian Broadcasting Corporation] and said, "Who do I see about a job?" I still don't know what made me say, "I want to be a Director." [INT: That's great.]

INT: When and how did you... let's see. Did you have... I mean you talked about Capra [Frank Capra] and David Lean, did you have filmmakers that you admired in your early days in the...

AH: In my early days of viewing, I would say that the Directors that I was aware of, so I guess they're the ones who impressed me the most, or maybe I saw more of their films, were Frank Capra, Billy Wilder, and David Lean. Those were the three I remember then. And then later on Fred Zinnemann, and then it just sort of kept spreading. But in my youth and my young days, Lean has always been the one who impressed me with a small film like BRIEF ENCOUNTER or HOBSON'S CHOICE. And then to be shaken out of my seat by GREAT EXPECTATIONS and then going on obviously to LAWRENCE OF ARABIA and those wonderful films. But to be able to do such a variety of films, ah.

INT: And that's what's amazing about your filmography as well, that you've done such a variety of films: Comedy, drama, social satire.

AH: But yeah, I've worked in a lot of genres. I've worked in the suspense genre and straight drama and comedy and a lot in what I call black comedy, and Westerns, and it's just...I've done everything except... because I've done special effects, but I'm not into the future, let's say that. I've not been comfortable. I've been asked to do films. I don't want to mention the title, that were to do with space and that, and I said, "I can do it, and it'll come together and every..." But I said, "I don't think I would put in that little spark, that extra that makes it different and gives it an excitement," whereas I feel more so that way if I do what I call a black comedy or dramedy like AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY [THE AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY], or HOSPITAL [THE HOSPITAL], the Paddy Chayefsky films. But there, of course, you have, well like AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY, which happens to be my favorite film of any that I've done, and it's also the favorite of Julie Andrews and James Garner who played the lead, and James Coburn, and Marty Ransohoff [Martin Ransohoff], the Producer. And it was one of Paddy's two favorites. To this day, we still... it's our favorite film, all of us. And I get upset sometimes to think I made that in 1964, and I haven't made one since that gives me that same satisfaction. But then I think about it and think that what you saw on the screen was a first draft. Paddy Chayefsky was like the only genius I ever worked with. Just unbelievable what that man, you know, could do. He could write a character that could speak for a page and a half, and you don't notice it's a page and a half, because it's so wonderfully written. And with EMILY [THE AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY], if we changed six lines, it was a lot. And the trick in the directing is to keep that line between the humor and the reality, to keep it very real, but to keep you laughing too. The black... And also it was the first of the really antiheroes. It was, a coward was the hero, because it was anti the glorification of war. And so the coward didn't want to go to war. What it was saying was, yes there are times when you have to go to war. You have to defend yourself. But don't make it seem so wonderful. Don't create heroes and make it so glorious that kids grow up wanting to have wars so they can be heroes. And that's a very important statement to make. [INT: It was a controversial film at the time.] It was a very controversial film, because a lot of people said it was anti-American, which it wasn't. I say it was just anti the glorification of war. As I say, it said sometimes you have to go to war to defend yourself, Just don't make it seem so wonderful that the kids want to have wars.

INT: What would you say are the essential qualities of a Director?

AH: I think if a new young student, or a new young Director was asking me, "What do I need to be a Director?" I think I would say, “Passion. It better be the only thing you want to do. If I said to you, ‘Is that what you want to do most in the world?’ And you said, ‘Yes, that's what I want to do most in the world,’ I'd say, ‘That's not enough. It better be the only thing you want to do,’ because there's so many trials and tribulations, so many difficulties. You need that passion.” Then of course you need the knowledge of what does a Director do. For instance, I say to young people when they say they want to be a Director, I say, "Have you ever made a film?" And if they say, “No,” I don't dismiss them, but I semi-dismiss them, because I think if they haven't had enough interest to go out and buy a little camera or wash dishes and get some money to rent a little camera, create a 10 minute film with their friends, they don't have enough of that passion and enough knowledge about it. You need that passion. You need that knowledge. You need respect. Respect for your profession. It's not a game. You're in an artistic activity. And you have to respect directing. And in the same sense you have to respect the other creative people. You have to respect the Actors and what they do. The Writer and what he or she does. Each area requires something special, and that's something that you have to respect. And I think you have to be in good physical shape. Because it's tough, you really are, when you're filming, you're around the clock. And your mind and your body are going. It just...You wonder when you'll ever get some sleep, you know, you're just sort of going all the time. And I think those are... And I hate to say this, but you need luck. You got to keep knocking on doors. Well I guess you have to believe in yourself, and believe in yourself so much that you will keep trying. Trying. Knocking on doors. Making little films. Keeping at it, and one day one of those doors is going to open. And when it does you better be good, because they're not going to open that often.

AH: But you do need luck along the way. It's like I was saying. When I went to the front desk of the CBC [Canadian Broadcasting Corporation] in radio days and said, "Who do I see about a job?" If she hadn't told me to phone Mr. Doyle and had sent me to the personnel office, I might still be sitting, waiting my turn. If I hadn't mentioned to Palmer the masters in psychology, maybe he would never have taken me to the supervisor of public affairs. If Betty Chaplin hadn't mentioned me to Leonard Stern in comedy terms. Or when Marty Ransohoff [Martin Ransohoff] was about to do WHEELER DEALERS, he thought, "I'm going to give a television Director a try. I'm going to get somebody who's basically out of TV." And they went to Eddie Rissien [Edward L. Rissien], who was, I forget which network, I think NBC, but it may have been ABC. He had been head of programming. And they said, "Who are the best TV Directors?" And he would only name me. So they said, "Okay, well we'll meet with him." And they met with me, and I did WHEELER DEALERS for them, and it was... When I'd completed that, I saw the script for AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY [THE AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY]. And I read it, and it's the only time that I ever really went after a project. I was just so--fell in love with it, and Marty kept saying, "You're not ready, kid. You're not ready, kid." And he went to half a dozen Directors who turned it down. Anti-American or they didn't like it. And then finally William Wyler was going to do it, and William Holden was going to play in it. And that went on, and then suddenly Wyler got something else, and he went to that. Anyway, it got to the point where Marty came to me and said, "Okay kid, you can do it." And I became the Director, and William Holden said, "I'm not working with a new kid," and he left the picture. And Garner [James Garner] was to play the Coburn [James Coburn] role, and we thought, "He'd be very good in the Holden role." And we moved him to the Holden role, and I brought in Coburn to play his role. You know, and it just grew from there. And that really, that made me a Director in the sense of believing in myself.

AH: It's easy for me to say, "You have to believe in yourself." We're all insecure. You can't help it if you're creative. It's just...that's part of creat--I have a phrase I use. I say, "If I said that every creative person I know is insecure, I'd be doing a disservice to very few people." Now, that's true of painters. It's true of musicians, you know, composers. It's true of writers, sculptors, whatever. Actors. You know, the creativity, because if you build a table or a chair, it's there. That's it. It follows the rules. It's done. You can say, "I did it." If you're an Actor, let's say, and this goes a lot when you're working with Actors. He finishes and says, "Yeah, I did... did I do great? I think I did great." And they need the Director to tell them they did good. They need people to tell them, and we're the same. We the Director, we think, "Yeah, I made a... did I make a great movie? Did I make a... yeah." You need everybody to tell you. The hardest part for the Director is that here you are insecure, now you have to believe in yourself enough to give security to a lot of insecure Actors that you're working with, because on the set you are daddy or mommy. You have to give them the security, the feeling that they can accomplish this and obviously, umpteen different ways.

INT: You are a father. Is it similar, do you think, to being a father [referring to being a Director]?

AH: I think it's very similar to being a father. That you have to slap them on the wrist. You have to pat them on the back. You have to create climate. You have to open doors for them. You have to give Actors ways to find their character or make them do things that they never realized they could do. And you have to find ways to bring those things out of them. And usually it's because they're afraid to bring them out. They're there, and your job is to create that atmosphere or sneak it out of them. But it's... I say, when you're equally insecure, we need that too. That's why I love a creative Producer who can pat me on the back and can slap my wr--