Bob Sirott has
always been a great interviewer, and when we both worked at WLS, there were
several times he got interview opportunities with big stars. On those
occasions, I inevitably became a parasite on Bob Sirott’s body — hovering
around to get an interview for my show too. One night Bob was taping an
interview with Sylvester Stallone, with the idea of editing it, and playing it
on the air the next day.
Again, this was at
the height of Sly’s popularity — the film “Rocky” had made him one of the
biggest stars in the country — so I asked Bob if I could get Sly live on the
air with me after Sirott finished his interview. Bob graciously agreed.
My Stallone interview went pretty well, but I didn’t really think it was extraordinary or special. The whole thing only lasted about seven minutes. So imagine my surprise a few weeks later, when a record label released it on an album. The A side had my entire interview with Sylvester Stallone. On the B-side, my interview questions were cut out, so anyone could pretend like they were interviewing Stallone. It came with a script. I have no idea why this done. The interview wasn’t that great — I’m sure Bob’s interview was ten times better. No one ever asked me if they could use it, they just did.
The next time I latched
onto Bob’s show was the day he had Mel Brooks in the studio. You have to
understand; to me Mel Brooks is the be all and end all. He is my comedy hero. I
watched Bob’s entire interview, just drooling at a chance to talk to him on my
show too.
When the interview
ended, I made my move.
“Please, just stay
another ten minutes,” I begged.
“Sure,” Mel
responded. “What the heck.”
And he did, and I
loved every second of it. A few weeks later I even got a thank you letter in
the mail from Mel Brooks. I still have that letter framed in my office, so I
can tell you what it says, word for word.
Dated April 18,
1978 on 20th Century Fox letterhead, it says:
“Dear John, it was very
fun to use up the first ten minutes of your show
when we were in
Chicago. You are a bearded pussycat. Please tender
my best regards to
nervous Jews and others at your site of broadcasting.
All the best, Mel Brooks.”
***
I’ll always treasure my interview with Mel Brooks in the 1970s, but during the WJMK years, I got the chance to interview him twice more. One time I had a chance to do a very lengthy interview with both Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner when they did The 2000 Year Old Man in the Year 2000. I must have talked to them for 40 minutes. The highlight for me was when I asked him a question about Blazing Saddles.
“You know the line
about the Dr. Gillespie killings?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Mel
answered.
“That’s a
reference to Lionel Barrymore as Dr. Gillespie in the Dr. Kildare movies,
right?”
He paused, and
said: “You know what? Every once in a while I run into a kindred spirit. You’re
the only one that has ever asked me that question, and the answer is yes!”
To me, that was
like John Lennon telling a Beatlemaniac that he was the only person in the
world who ever understood a Beatles record. I was in heaven. Of course, just to
show you never to take yourself too seriously, when I told that story on the
air, I got calls from people who pointed out other jokes in that movie that I
completely missed.
“John, what about
the Laurel and Hardy handshake?”
“Yeah? What about
it?”
“Laurel and Hardy!”
“Oooooh. Laurel
and Hardy. Right.”
My final time with
Mel was when The Producers played in Chicago before it made its
run on Broadway. Mel held a press conference, and I was one of the press
members that attended. When it was my turn, I asked: “When was the first time
you thought that Nazis were funny?”
“It was when I saw
the shape of their helmets,” he responded.
The next day in
the Sun-Times, that was the headline. Then, a few
weeks later when Matthew Broderick did his interview for 60 Minutes
just before it hit
Broadway, he brought it up too. “You know,” he said, “the first time Mel
realized Nazis were funny was when he saw the shapes of their helmets.”
Happy to contribute.
