Remembering PBS Anchor Robert MacNeil

Sponsor

This message comes from NPR. Sponsor Hulu based on shocking true events, the new Hulu original series under the Bridge tells the story of a savage murder in a small town. Starring Riley Keough and Lily Gladstone, under the bridge is now streaming with new episodes Wednesdays only on Hulu. This is FRESH AIR. Im David B.

David Bianculli

And Cooley. Today on fresh air were going to remember two notable people who died last week, documentarian and author Eleanor Coppola and veteran tv news reporter and anchor Robert McNeil. We'll start with Robert MacNeil, who was 93 when he died last Friday. Robert MacNeil was born in Montreal in 1931, the son of a Royal Canadian Mountie. Though his early ambitions were to be an actor and a playwright, he changed gears while at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and became a journalist during his long and distinguished career.

MacNeill was in Germany when the Berlin Wall went up in the sixties and was there again when it was torn down in the nineties. He was in Dallas working for NBC the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated. In 1971, he joined PBS, covering the news in a way that offered more depth and less flash than the other us broadcast networks were doing at the time. He was still a relatively unknown entity, but at the time, so was PBS, with programs like Sesame Street, Mister Rogers neighborhood, and imported british dramas presented under the title Masterpiece Theater.

Eventually, these shows became very popular on public television, and so did McNeil, when he was paired with another journalist, Jim Lehrer, to anchor the networks primetime evening reruns of each day's coverage of the Senate Watergate hearings. The other networks rotated live coverage during the day, but PBS considered it a public service in the days before home video recorders to have the hearings available for viewing at night. Here's how Robert McNeil introduced that very first primetime program on May 17, 1973, offering context and substance all at once. Good evening from Washington. In a few moments, we're going to bring you the entire proceedings in the first day of the Senate Watergate hearings.

Sponsor

Hearings to bear the truth about the wide range of illegal, unethical, or improper activities established or still merely alleged surrounding the reelection of President Nixon last year. As the hearings progress, we shall see cross examination of men who were once among the most powerful in the land. As the select committee tries to answer the ultimate question, how high do the scandals reach? And was President Nixon himself involved? After Watergate ran its course, Robert McNeil used his newfound celebrity to launch the Robert McNeil report in 1975, a serious news program looking at a single issue in depth each day.

David Bianculli

Within a year, he reteamed with his Watergate co anchor, and the series was renamed the MacNeil Lehrer Report. That award winning program was expanded to an hour and retitled the MacNeil Lehrer Newshour in 1983. McNeil retired from the show in 1995, and Jim Lehrer went on to anchor the NewsHour solo until 2011. In 2020, Jim Lehrer died at the age of 85. The first time Terry gross spoke with Robert McNeil was in 1986.

She asked him about his early work as a news correspondent. You did foreign correspondent work pretty early on in your career and stuck with that for several years. What were the stories in which you most felt you were really covering history in the making, that you were there for what was to later be recognized as a great moment in history? Well, one was the Berlin Wall clearly. I don't think I had any doubt.

Sponsor

I mean, sometimes you just don't know, and for years later, you don't realize the significance of something. But the Berlin Wall clearly was. I was sent by NBC, and I went to Berlin, and I checked into the Kempinski hotel. I went out and had dinner, and then I was feeling tired, so I went to bed. And about three the next morning, the news desk in New York rang up and said, what's this about?

They're closing the border? East Germans have closed the border to East Germany. Of course, there was a lot of tension over Berlin that summer. So I don't know. I'll go and find out.

Dressed and got a taxi down to the Brandenburg gate just at dawn on a nice August day Sunday. And there were german guards putting up barbed wire across the Brandenburg gate and rolling huge cement flower pots into position as a kind of fence to block the traffic, which was the beginning of the building of the Berlin Wall. And I just knew that was a momentous thing. I mean, there had been all sorts of speculation that summer about something the Soviets or these Germans might do and whether it might provoke the west into something that could ultimately lead to war. And this was regarded as a major provocation.

And for the next few days, although the west ultimately did nothing, there was a sense in the air that very terrible things could happen, you know? And so that was a moment of history. Another was the cuban missile crisis. And I was whisked off to Washington to help in the Pentagon and the State Department coverage there. And then a few days later, because I had a canadian passport, they said, why don't you try and go to Cuba?

It was the result. I ended up there with a bunch of european journalists and one Japanese, and they had visas. I didn't. But we all got locked up in rooms in a hotel and were held there for nine days and observed what we could see of the cuban missile crisis going on out the windows. You were basically held under house arrest in a home?

Yeah. With armed guards outside the door and all that. What were you told? Nothing. How did you answer them?

Terry Gross

Round you up and take you? Yeah, at gunpoint. They said, you're coming downtown. And we got under a truck and then we went into the hotel lobby and an cuban army officer said, you're going to be the guests of the cuban government. And I said, no, no, I'm NBC and I'm going to pay my own way and I don't want to be your guest.

Sponsor

Thank you. You're going to be the guest of the cuban government. So we were put in rooms and they cut off the phones. We were at one end of a corridor and they put two chairs outside and there were cuban soldiers with machine guns on their laps outside. And so while all the most fraught days of the cuban missile crisis were going on, we were on the 9th floor of the Capri hotel, able to look out over the harbor and see soviet ships and other things there, look down at the rather antiquated anti aircraft guns that the Cubans were jumping onto and wheeling around very rapidly every time some american reconnaissance planes flew over.

We didn't know whether it was going to be an american air raid, as there was some talk of or not. But eventually, after a lot of false attempts, once we knew that they weren't going to shoot us or do anything harmful to us, it was just boring and sometimes very amusing. When you first started to work for public television, it was through NPAC, the National Public affairs center for Television, which was basically attacked by the Nixon administration. And that's been revealed in detail through documents released through the Freedom of Information act. The great irony was that after nearly being run out of town by the Nixon White House in Sandy, Van Oker and I on the.

When we were doing this one year thing called Npact, which was an attempt to set up a kind of PBS news in Washington, a politically premature attempt, we came back, Sandy left, Jim Lehrer replaced Sandy, which is where I got to know him. And we came back and anchored, Jim and I, the public television continuous coverage of the Watergate hearings, which, of course, led to Nixon's downfall. Not that we had a sense of revenge doing that, but that those Watergate hearings, because commercial television never covered them in their entirety. And if you remember public television also, we rebroadcast them at night when everybody could watch. That brought an enormous audience to public television.

It doubled and trebled the memberships of prominent public television stations because people were so grateful for an opportunity to see these hearings. It also demonstrated to the public television system that journalists on public television could handle the most sensitive story and do it fairly and do interesting commentary on it and pungent analysis and do it in a responsible way. And our desire to do a nightly program grew out of that experience. Now, it is true that when we set up the what was first called the Robert McNeill report, later the MacNeil Lehrer report, one of my considerations was to demonstrate to the public television system and the constituent stations that we can do journalism that is fair, objective and balanced. And it has been.

That has been a particular thing of Jim's and mine. I mean, we are really obsessed by that, not out of a desire to pussyfoot or because we're afraid of anybody, but because it's needed in the nation's journalism. And we don't apologize for any of that. And I don't think it's because we're afraid to pull punches. We only have a couple of seconds left, but I'd like to know if it was really hard for you when you gave up smoking, knowing the kind of pressures and deadlines that you're under.

Was it really hard to do like Mark Twain? It's easy. I've done it many times. I've done it. Are you smoking again?

Not now. I did it again. As a matter of fact, it was the story of English that got me back to smoking again because I went back many times to Britain, and I always associate that. And the pubs, which I like very much with smoke is Daniel smoking? And I started again while I was over there as recently as this March, and I smoked for another month.

And then I thought, this is dumb. So at the end of March 1986, I gave it up again, and I've held so far. Well, good luck. Robert McNeil speaking to Terry Gross in 1986 after a break, a later interview with McNeil from 1995, when he was stepping down from the McNeil Lehrer Newshour. This is FRESH AIR.

Eleanor Coppola

This message comes from NPR sponsor betterhelp. What's the right amount of socializing for you? Maybe you thrive around people, or maybe you need more alone time. Therapy can help you figure out your boundaries, how to recharge and your social sweet spot so you can build a social life that doesn't drain your battery. Try therapy with better help.

It's entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible and suited to your schedule. Visit betterhelp.com NPR today to get 10% off your first month. This message comes from NPR sponsor Redfin. Redfin updates their listings every two minutes and gives personalized recommendations based on the homes that you like so you can find the home that's just right for you. You can favorite homes, share listings with others, and even schedule tours with a local Redfin agent, all in the app.

When you're ready to buy, an experienced local Redfin agent can guide you through the whole process, and they know how to help you win the right home at the right price. So download the Redfin app to get started today. This message comes from NPR sponsor Britbox. Discover powerful new series like three Little Birds and BAFTA winning drama time, starring Bella Ramsey, Tamara Lawrence and Jodie Whitaker. Stream the best of british tv only on BritBox.

Start a free trial@britbox.com dot support for NPR and the following message come from Coop Sleep. Everybody sleeps, but no two people sleep the same. Shouldn't your pillow be as unique as you are? Enter the adjustable pillow by Coop sleep goods. Each pillow contains removable memory foam filling so you can fine tune the amount of support for your ideal sleep.

Plus, Coop offers free shipping and a 100 night trial. Visit coopsleepgoods.com to try the adjustable pillow with over 50,005 star reviews. This is fresh aiR. Let's continue our tribute to journalist, author and tv news anchor Robert McNeil, who died last Friday at age 93. In 1995, Terry spoke with him again for an interview timed to the last day he was hosting his long running PBS news show, which was then celebrating its 20th anniversary.

David Bianculli

Terry called him up to wish him good luck and asked him about his decision to go. She wanted to know how many times he heard a little voice in his head saying, this is the right time. Oh, quite a lot. It occurred several times. We had one moment back during the when the Gulf war was about to happen, and it was early January 1991.

Robert McNeil

It looked as though Bush was about to go to war, and I was feverishly trying to finish my first novel. I was determined I was going to have a novel finish before I was 60 years old, and I was about to be 60 later that January. And my wife and I had arranged to go away to the Caribbean for two weeks where I could be 60 quietly and finish my novel. And so we had this meeting, and they started to say, well, you know, it looks like we're going to go to war. What are we going to do?

And I said, well, whatever you're going to do. Just remember that I'm planning to be away. And they all jumped on me, starting with Jim, and said, what kind of a goddamn journalist are you? You know, you're going to walk away during the biggest story of our time? And one after another, they all made the same point rather strongly.

And I said, okay, yeah, all right. So we stayed. I stayed. I didn't have to be 60, and we did the war, and it was obviously the right thing to do. And they were right.

But clearly a subversive little voice in me was saying, you know, your style. On television as a journalist has always been based on fairness and straightforwardness. You know, no prosecutorial posturing, no show off kind of stuff. Did you feel like your style has changed at all over the years, or. That has mine changed?

Terry Gross

Yeah. Or do you think that you found a style and found an approach and stuck with it? I think I found an approach and stuck with it. I said recently at a reception here that when I got back into broadcasting, having been five years at Reuters and never thought I'd be doing anything broadcasting again, I had early in my career, as you know, done some radioacting and some announcing, but I had no idea I was going to go back into broadcasting when NBC hired me in London. And I was lucky enough to spend several months, a couple of months with John Chancellor, who was the number two correspondent in London.

Robert McNeil

And I was hired as an editorial assistant, but also to do some broadcasting. And I had to choose a style, and there were many styles to choose from at the time. There was the kind of declaiming style of the news, and then there was the sing songy style of the news, you know. And then there was the sort of very clipped BBC style, and there was a CBC style that I knew, which was very self important. This is the CBC, you know.

And it was so refreshing to listen to Jack Chancellor, who, instead of intoning or declaiming or proclaiming or announcing the news like some kind of electronic town, crier simply told it to you conversationally. He was also very funny in a lot of his stuff, and I thought, that is the way I'd like to be. And so I started doing that in my first radio stuff for NBC from London. And then Chancellor got transferred to Moscow, and I got his job as the number two correspondent, and that sort of cemented it. So I chose a style, at least in terms of delivery, deliberately the most conversational way.

And it's interesting that that has now become pretty well the standard in american network television. There's very little bombastic style. Now, a few people still do it, but the old sing songy, the declaiming, the Moby tone, new styles, all those things, all the portentous styles have gone away largely. You know, your interviewing style on camera has always been as, you know, as fair and as dispassionate as possible so that the story is about the views being expressed and not about your views. You don't try to bait people or anything.

Sponsor

Yeah, but this. Well, there are two parts to that, Terry. One is that if you're going to be on a program every night, Jim and I, we discussed this way back at the very beginning. We don't have to make big demonstrations to make people aware of our presence. We're there night after night after night, and we are a medium through which viewers, gradually getting to know us better, judge the guests.

Robert McNeil

The purpose of the program is to let people hear what the guests have to say, to help the guests have to say it or help them say it, as well as challenging them so that they clarify and defend what they're saying. And we are criticized by some people as saying we're soft interviewers because we're so polite and they even will accuse us of, you know, of deferring to important officials we have on. I don't think we do that at all. I think the pointed, informed question and a persistent attempt to get an answer for it while couched in polite terms, is every bit as devastating to an individual as the, as the so called hard, you know, interviewing somebody like Perry Mason with a witness in the doc or F. Lee Bailey.

Interviewing Mark Fuhrman. Have you ever done anything that you consider to be wildly out of character, lose your cool, blow up, say something you regretted, become too emotionally involved? I, not since we've done this program. I did in the past. Once when I was at NBC, it was, it was election night, 1966, covering the governors.

I was referring to Spiro Agnew, who was running for governor of Maryland, and he, it's hard to remember that now, but he was the liberal candidate, the relatively more liberal candidate of two that year. The other guy was much more of a racist and so on. I said that what it might come down to was the votes in Montgomery County, Maryland, adjacent to Washington, where a lot of people who worked in Washington lived and was rather more liberal in its views. I said, for instance, David Brinkley lives there. And Brinkley swung around in his chair and said, how do you know how I voted?

And I said, this is on the air. I said, I didn't know how you voted, David. I just said that that scenario, which has rather more liberal voters than you lose there. He said, I thought the ballot in this country was meant to be secret, you know, and here you are. I said, I didn't say that.

Anyway, it went back and forth about. And he was partly kidding, but, and we had a laugh about it later and he apologized very nicely to me afterwards for getting mad at me, but it was kind of dumb for me to have said it. I mean, you, you want to keep that sort of stuff out of where somebody lives is no business of the audience. But I was a bit cocksure, I think. What's a funny story, a bit over pleased with myself.

Terry Gross

Do you worry at all that tomorrow morning, Saturday morning, the first day after you've left the McNeil era news hour, that you're gonna wake up and say, what have I done? I mean, you're on deadline all the time. Yeah, but adrenaline is like pumping away. Yeah, I know, but you can, you, you can, what is the word? Divert that adrenaline flow into writing books.

Robert McNeil

I certainly can. And I can get just as excited and driven writing a book as I can putting on a television program. And I'll tell you one neat thing about it. Yeah. You would appreciate this because the work you do is very much more yours than most of what we do in television.

Television is necessarily a highly collaborative business. It takes many people and many, and much negotiation and compromise, with many people contributing ideas and then modifying those ideas to put on a television program like ours. So each day is a series of tiny little negotiations and compromises. And this is in the best of shops like ours, where we all agree on the philosophy, where we all see eye to eye on the approach, and yet it just requires it. Well, do you think you can do this in 13 minutes?

I don't know. I suppose so. Maybe if you could give me twelve and a half, I could do it. Let's see here. Well, I think we're going to have to.

You know, it's 100 of those every day. And it is a blessed luxury to be sitting down by yourself writing a book when it is just yours. Well, let me say on behalf of many, many people, we will miss you and I wish you very good luck and thanks for all the years of broadcasts. And I look forward to more books, by the way. Well, thank you.

Now I can listen to you more. Oh, I knew there was going to be a big advantage.

Terry Gross

Thank you so much for talking with us. Thank you, Terry. News anchor, journalist and author Robert McNeil speaking to Terry Gross as he was retiring from the McNeil Lehrer News hour in 1995. He died last week at age 93. Finally, I'd just like to say to the audience how grateful I am to public television nationally and to all the 300 local stations you carry us for the opportunity you've given me to work in a manner I could be proud of when I went home every night.

Sponsor

But that applies equally to our viewers. Without you, no program. There are now some 5 million of you a night, and you express a loyalty to this program of a quality I've never experienced anywhere else. Thank you for understanding what we do. You'll find all the same values there on Monday night and in the years ahead.

Thanks and good night.

David Bianculli

After a break, we remember filmmaker and author Eleanor Coppola, who famously chronicled her husband, Francis Ford Coppola's frenetic filming of his epic war movie Apocalypse now. And I'll review HBO's the Jinx, part two, continuing the story of convicted murderer Robert Durst. I'm David B. And Cooley, and this is fresh air. There's a lot to stay on top of.

Automated Voice

On any given day. You might have to break things down into smaller pieces in order to keep up. That's why we're introducing the new consider this newsletter from NPR. Every weekday we sift through all the day's news and bring you one big story in an easily skimmable format so you become a mini expert on a major topic each day. Sign up for free@npr.org.

Consider this newsletter with more and more information coming at you all day, every day, it can be hard to know where to focus. The new consider this newsletter from NPR can be that focus. Every weekday afternoon, we take one of the days biggest stories and break it down in a simple skimmable format so you can get a better grasp of one important topic and what it means for you in a couple of minutes. Sign up for free@npr.org. Consider this newsletter from the campaigns to.

NPR Announcer

The conventions, from now through election day and beyond. The NPR Politics podcast has you covered as Joe Biden and Donald Trump square off again, we bring you the latest news from the trail and dive deep into each candidate's goals for a second term. Listen to the NPR Politics podcast every week day. This is FRESH AIR. I'm David Biancoli, professor of television studies at Rowan University.

David Bianculli

Eleanor Coppola, who died last Friday at age 87, became a filmmaker by request. Her husband, Francis Ford Coppola, who had become a major Hollywood figure thanks to his mega successful godfather movies asked her to chronicle the making of his new movie, Apocalypse now, not because it was going so smoothly, but because it wasnt. The result was the 1991 Showtime documentary hearts of a filmmakers Apocalypse, a hauntingly honest look at a film and filmmaker lost in the jungle. Just like the storys protagonist, there were many times Francis Coppola was sure he could not make a movie out of his increasingly incoherent footage. What I have to admit is that I dont know what im doing.

Unknown

How do you account for the discrepancy between what you feel about it and what everybody else? Because they see the magic of what has happened before. I'm saying, hey, it's not gonna happen. I don't have any performances. The script doesn't make sense.

Francis Ford Coppola

I have no ending. I'm like a voice crying out, saying, please, it's not working. Somebody get me off this. And nobody listens to me. Everyone says, yes.

Well, Francis works best in a crisis. I'm saying, this is one crisis I'm not gonna pull myself out of. I'm making a bad movie, so why should I go ahead? I'd rather. I'm gonna be bankrupt anyway.

Why can't I just have the courage to say it's no good? Eleanor Coppola's later works include documentaries about two of her daughter Sofia Coppola's movies, the Virgin Suicides and Marie Antoinette. She also created an art installation called Circle of Memory, remembering her son Giancarlo Coppola, who died instantly in a tragic boating accident in 1986 at age 22. Eleanor Coppola was born Eleanor Jesse Neal in Los Angeles in 1936. She was an assistant art director on the film Dementia 13 when she met and soon married its director, Francis Ford Coppola.

David Bianculli

Terry spoke with Eleanor Coppola in 1992 and asked her what it felt like to be in the middle of a phony war. Well, I found it really exhilarating, you know, it's like the most incredible 4 July kind of light show with these enormous explosions, and the earth shook like an earthquake. They were huge, particularly the napalm attack. And the scene with Colonel Kilgore, Robert Duvall, was just a powerful event to be there. Your whole body felt the concussion and this enormous, you know, whatever it was, 10,000 gallons of fuel was lit and exploded in the jungle.

Unknown

And I really found it extraordinary. And I think sometimes that even annoyed Francis, that he was trying to get his work done and everybody else was kind of at a light show. One of the stories that the movie gets into the documentary on the making of Apocalypse now is how Francis Coppola used helicopters from the philippine army, because the United States army wouldn't cooperate with the making of a movie about Vietnam. But the government kept wanting the helicopters back to fight a civil war against communist insurgents. Tell us some of the ways that kept disrupting the shooting of Apocalypse now.

It was a very disruptive situation because the army would send out their helicopters in whatever pilots they wanted to send out, and the pilots would be different every day. So they hadn't rehearsed. They didn't realize what it was like to fly in through filming situations. And they would. Sometimes they'd fly too high and they wouldn't be in the camera shot, or they.

They just wouldn't realize what was involved in really, you know, performing for the camera, so to speak. So they would lose many, many, many shots because the pilots wouldn't be flying in the right place to be seen in the camera. And then the next day, by the time they finally learned how to do it, the next day, they'd send different pilots. And then very frequently, they would call the planes away. They'd be all set up for a shot.

Everyone would be out there on the location shooting, and they would get some radio communication that four of the helicopters had to leave for military reasons. Or some days all of the helicopters, or some days they would be out there ready to work and expecting eight helicopters to be provided, and only two would show up. So it was a very difficult part of the production, and it cost tens and tens of thousands of dollars in lost footage and waiting for the helicopters to come that never came. And there were guards at your house because Marcos was afraid that rebels would kidnap you and Francis Coppola for publicity. Yes.

They had some idea that if Francis would be kidnapped for some political reasons by the insurgents, that it would create an international incident and bring attention to the Philippines and unwanted attention, so that they provided us right from the beginning with guards, personal bodyguards. I actually felt more concerned, finally, that the guards might cause some accident. They got very casual about their weapons. You know, our main bodyguard had just would stick his pistol in his belt of his blue jeans, and he'd get it out and show the kids how it worked. And he had a trunk full of shotguns and other, I don't know, other guns and things in the trunk of the car.

And it just seemed like I was really in more danger of some accident from the bodyguards than I really was in danger from insurgents. I could see how that would not be very reassuring. No. And I'm there with three children and the casualness of the weapons that the guards had was really a concern to me. When Marlon Brando arrived on the set to play Kurtz, Francis Kopler didn't realize that Brando was going to be as heavy as he was.

Terry Gross

How did that affect the way the role was conceived? Well, when Francis realized that he was not slimmed down and able to play the Green Beret, that he was originally committed to the part. For that, Francis had to decide what to do in the situation. First idea was to play Marlin as an indulging, mango eating over, just overindulging himself here in the jungle in this situation, and just play him sort of overweight and his uniform not really fitting properly and just go with that whole kind of look. And Marlon did not want to do that.

Unknown

He just was unwilling to do that. So then Francis was really at a loss. What could he do then if he wouldn't do that? So the two of them sat down for days talking about what part he could play and how they could resolve the ending of this movie. And they at one point, came up with this very theatrical, larger than life personage that you see just emerging from the darkness and the light.

And you never really fully see him as a reality. He's much more of a sort of archetypical, mythical figure. And that was sort of a new approach for Brando because he was known for his great reality, the grittiness of his realness, his performances, so that he struggled with that, too. And the two of them had real head to head go there, trying to resolve the ending of the film. A lot of Marlon Brando's part was improvised.

Terry Gross

There's some really interesting footage in hearts of darkness of Brando improvising. Would you describe a little bit the process that he and Francis Coppola used to improvise the part? Well, they would come up with some actual lines and some of the dialogue that Marlon was to say. But the way Marlin works is he has to find a reality. So he would then put those lines into kind of a.

Unknown

Just a sort of free form, improvising and talking as he went along through the part. So they had definitely points that he was supposed to make, and he then kind of created around those points and kind of gives it that reality. Because one of the things he does, he, for instance, would, like, write a line on his hand or put it on a piece of tape on one of the props nearby so that he sort of has to look for that line and sort of give it that little edge of struggle that just like we have in our own conversation. I don't know exactly what line I'm going to say next. And it gives my, you know, voice a kind of edgy reality, because I'm sort of fishing for what the next line is going to be.

And he does that. It's part of his technique to not learn his lines and just spit them out slickly, but to really just have to have that little edge of reaching for them. It sounds from the footage you shot that one of the techniques that they used to improvise was that Francis Coppola would ask Marlon, Brenda questions off camera, and then Brenda would have to respond to the questions, and the camera would be rolling as he responded. Yes, that's right. Why are we in Vietnam?

David Bianculli

It's our time to grab this moment in history.

It's our time to. Teach.

I can't think of any more dialogue today. Dennis Hopper played the part of a really drugged out american journalist in Vietnam. When he was cast in this role, he already had the reputation for being genuinely drugged out and burned out. And there's some terrific footage in the documentary of him and Francis Coppola talking together and trying to work out what the part's going to be. And Coppola wants to know how come he doesn't know his lines yet.

Terry Gross

Why did Coppola even bring on Dennis Hopper? I'm a really big fan of Hopper's asking this question, but he was in such bad shape then. You know, you wonder, why would you ask for this kind of trouble? Well, I don't think Francis actually realized he was in that kind of shape. He thought he was a really good actor, and he had a lot of admiration for him.

Unknown

And he was cast in a role, a green Beret role. And when he really got out there, Francis realized there's no way that he could play this Green Beret. And he had to then sort of invent a part for him because he thought he was very talented and there must be some way to use his gifts. And so Francis has the great ability to make the part fit the actor rather than the other way around. If the actor comes and can't play the part as written, he rewrites the part.

And he certainly did that in Dennis case and tried to somehow utilize the character that he was, because that was one of the issues in the Vietnam war, is the use of drugs and the availability of drugs. And in fact, there in the Philippines, because of where we were there in Asia, there were drugs available, and cheaply, things that aren't available just here while everybody's home in Los Angeles. So that there was experimentation among the people who were out there. And Dennis, of course, was just really far out at that moment. In fact, he looks back at that period and is pretty astounded himself, I think.

Francis Ford Coppola

Why did you say that to him in the scene? Cool. Something clever like that, when he knows, who are you? Why don't you say, who are you? Because I haven't learned my lines yet.

I know you've had them for five days. The other thing I like to say is that with glasses in there, these glasses, I can't see anything through them. But, like, you know, every crack represents a life I've saved. You know what I mean? You represent a life I've saved.

You all out in the scene. I do. But you see, the director. You know, the directors is, you don't know your lines. And then, like, well, if you know your lines, then you can forget them.

Cause, you know, more or less. I see. But that's what I'm trying to do. I forget those lines. But it's no fair to forget them if you never knew them.

Terry Gross

My guest is Eleanor Coppola, and we're talking about the making of Apocalypse now. Are you still on the set now when your husband makes a movie, or do you prefer to be off of it? Well, up until through Godfather three, the whole family went to the locations with Francis on all of his films. We lived there. We put our kids in school there.

Unknown

We lived our life in the, you know, like a circus family, going with the productions wherever they went. And it's just been in the last year that my daughter has left home, and she's 20 now. And our lives have changed to a certain extent, so that I don't have to be there with the children, making a family home on a location. And Frances is shooting now in Los Angeles. It's the first time that I haven't really been there on quite a regular basis.

I've had the freedom to come and go and maintain some of the threads of my own life. How does it feel? Well, it's a new experience. It's a new freedom. And after 28 years of living your life one way, it's quite an adjustment to shift.

And I'm excited. I'm very excited about the future. And also, there's probably part of me grieving for the unity of the family and the structure and sort of being told where we're going to be next rather than having to have the freedom to make those choices myself. So it's mixed, but I'm excited about my freedom, so to speak. There's an entry in your journals where you say that people, you know, when you write a check or give a credit card, people always want to know, oh, are you related to Francis Coppola?

Terry Gross

And when they find out that you're married, they're always a little bit flustered. And you say you sometimes wonder, what did they expect to see? Do they expect Francis Coppola's wife to be a Playboy bunny? Do you feel that way a lot. That people have this expectation that any famous director is going to have this young, sex pot type wife fashion model?

Unknown

Yes. You know, it does seem to sort of be the cliche of, you know, what the film director's wife or partner is going to look like and be like. And somehow, though, over the years, I've sort of gotten the impression that people have sort of come to the realization that Francis has the same wife. Oftentimes he introduces me as his first wife. You know, that, you know, we have been together all these years.

It's actually going to be 29 years next week. And yet, recently, I've done some interviews, and I realize that the person interviewing me says, oh, I didn't realize you were still married. And so I guess that my kind of low key, laid back, willing to be kind of invisible in the shadow of things has really, in a certain sense, not fully given a picture of what our life is like. But we are very much a family and a married couple. And I guess it does come as a surprise to some people who see the typical Hollywood family as one of many marriages and kids that are mixed up.

I'm really very satisfied and pleased that our kids are solid and centered and creative and haven't really taken any blows from the way our life has been lived. And they've been able to actually gain from all the travel and the experiences, and it's enriched them, I think. And I really feel that it was all worth everything to have my kids turn out in a solid, centered way. I have one question that I realize might be too personal, so let me ask it, and feel free to tell me it's too personal or that it's whatever. Okay.

Terry Gross

You have a son who was killed in an accident, and I was wondering if his death, in a way, made it even more important for the family to stay together. Well, when there is a death in the family, it creates a complete crisis within the family. And actually, the statistics are that 92% of marriages break up when there's a death of a child. It is a time of perhaps the most extreme crisis. And knowing that I sought help and the family really went through their crisis all together.

Unknown

And I think that we've come out the other side with even a deeper closeness. Well, I thank you so much for talking with us. Well, thank you. It's really a pleasure to have an opportunity to talk to you. Eleanor Coppola, speaking to Terry Gross in 1992.

David Bianculli

The filmmaker and author died last Friday at age 87. Coming up, I review HBO's the Jinx Part two, Andrew Jarecki's new sequel to his documentary about the then suspected and now convicted multiple murderer Robert Durst. This is FRESH AIR.

NPR Announcer

Every weekday, NPR's best political reporters come to you on the NPR Politics podcast to explain the big news coming out of Washington, the campaign trail and beyond. We don't just want to tell you what happened. We tell you why it matters. Join the NPR Politics podcast every single afternoon to understand the world through political eyes. At planet money, we take you to the furthest reaches of the global economy, from the currency black market markets of.

Sponsor

Buenos Aires to the caribbean island where. No one owns property, to the giant. Underground caves where the US government stored. A national cheese supply. Cheese cave.

David Bianculli

Listen to the Planet Money podcast from NPR.

The economy can sometimes feel like a big, scary wilderness filled with jargon and unreadable charts. The Planet Money podcast is here to help. We love spreadsheets. Yeah. Let us be your guide to the global economy.

Sponsor

We brought snacks. Is that trail mix? It's actually gorp. That's planet money. From NPR.

David Bianculli

This is FRESH AIR. I'm tv critic David B. And Cooley. Ten years ago, this american life presented a podcast called Serial, examining the facts and loose ends involving a cold murder case. Nine years ago, HBO followed with a tv the the life and deaths of Robert Durst.

Together, those two wildly popular programs helped ignite the true crime documentary and podcast Craze, a genre that itself became so imitated that it was spoofed by Hulu's only murders in the building. The Jinks recounted the story of Robert Durst, a wealthy man suspected over many decades of the murders of several people. The documentary series was made with Durst cooperation, specifically several on camera interviews with filmmaker Andrew Jarecki. The final episode climaxed with some stunning remarks made by Durst while he was alone and talking to himself, still wearing a hot mic. Durst was arrested the night before HBO televised the final episode of the Jinx and later was convicted of murder and died in prison in 2022.

This Sunday, Jerrecki returns to HBO with a sequel documentary series, the Jynx Part two, which also will stream on Max. I highly recommend you see the original Jynx first. If you haven't, it's available on most streaming sites, but it's not required. The Jynx Part two is amazing right from the start because filmmaker Jureki never stopped filming in the original series. It was the accidental recording of Robert Durst muttering to himself in a bathroom after Jureki confronted him with a damning piece of physical evidence that helped lead to the wealthy mans arrest.

The jinx part two swoops right back in, using phone wire taps recorded by prosecutors, interviews with investigators, and even conversations with witnesses on both sides at the trial, some cooperative, some hostile. The jinx part two starts its behind the scenes narrative just as the original jinx is days away from premiering on HBO. Jerrecki, being driven in a car with a colleague, discusses a phone call hed gotten from Dursts attorney. Jerreckis crew is filming the conversation in the car, leading us seamlessly into this sequel. So I just heard from Bob's lawyer, who has been pressing, you know, to see the finished episodes, and he was sort of saying, we're curious about whether you come to the conclusion that he's guilty or he's not guilty.

Francis Ford Coppola

But obviously there's a concern that there could be a prosecution as a result of this, and we are very keen to see it as soon as possible. I mean, I said to him, well, I know for sure that, let me show you one, you know, episode one tomorrow or whatever. And he said, well, then I might as well just wait for Sunday. Events are captured in real time, revealing themselves like elements in a thriller. Halfway through the run of the original jinx, Bob Durst, watching from home, is feeling kind of cocky.

David Bianculli

But then, because of a spelling error in his handwriting that seems to connect him to an anonymous note sent to police after one murder, he shifts gears. FBI agents and Los Angeles district attorneys track him, withdrawing large sums of money, then fleeing before the final episode. But as the jinx part two shows, he's cleverly tracked down in a New Orleans hotel and captured. Please hold while we attempt to connect your call.

Francis Ford Coppola

Steve. Steve, it's Bob. I was arrested in New Orleans this afternoon.

Robert McNeil

By who? By your album.

David Bianculli

La Deputy District Attorney John Lewin is the first to interrogate Bob Hurst. It was filmed and recorded, so we see it in the jinx part two, but Lewin asks Durst a question about the original film. Obviously you're aware of the jinx. Yeah. And what made you do?

I don't get it. What made you talk to them?

Robert McNeil

Still sort of putting that together in my own mind. What follows is a story with as many twists, turns and shockers as the original. Jureki is as good an interviewer as he is a director. And what he gets out of his conversations with people from Bob's friends and lovers to his investigators and prosecutors, is unexpected and sometimes is almost laughably candid. As it turns out, there's a great story to be told in the continued telling of the Robert Durst story, and there are some lessons to be learned, too.

David Bianculli

Don't commit murder. If you do commit murder, don't cooperate with a documentary filmmaker. And if you do kill someone and talk about it on camera, learn how to spell on the next fresh air minority rule, we talk with Ari Berman, who writes, the founding fathers created political institutions within a system that concentrated power in the hands of an elite, propertied white male minority. We'll talk about the compromises made by the founding fathers and how they're reflected in today's politics. Join us.

Fresh Air's executive producer is Danny Miller. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey Bentham, with additional engineering support by Joyce Lieberman and Julian Herzfeld. Our interviews and reviews are produced and edited by Amy Sallett, Phyllis Myers, Ann Marie Baldonado, Sam Brigger, Lauren Krenzel, Theresa Madden, Thea Challoner, Susan Yakundi, and Joel Wolfram. Our digital media producers is Molly Seavey Nessper for Terry Gross and Tanya Moseley. I'm David B.

And Cooley.

Unknown

It's been a minute is a culture show you don't want to miss. Every week, we help you see the culture angle behind the headlines, the forces behind the trends, and the thinkers behind. The next big thing. Tune in for the sharp cultural analysis and captivating interviews. Listen now to the it's been a.

Minute for podcast from NPR.

Terry Gross

On the Ted Radio hour. In the middle school cafeteria, Ty Teshiro always sat with his equally nerdy buddies. The socially awkward kids who were the. Furthest thing from cool, and he often. Wondered, why am I so socially awkward?

Francis Ford Coppola

And what am I going to do about that? Now Ty is a psychologist and expert on awkwardness, and he has some answers. That's on the Ted radio hour from NPR. On the TEd Radio hour, when a. City wants to be more walkable, they call urban planner Jeff Speck.

David Bianculli

Interestingly, I work in a lot of. Red cities, Grand Rapids, Oklahoma City, where. The local business leaders are saying, geez. How can we become more walkable so. That we become more desirable ideas for.

Eleanor Coppola

A more walkable world. That's on the Ted radio hour from NPR.

Remembering PBS Anchor Robert MacNeil

Primary Topic

Episode Summary

Main Takeaways

Episode Chapters

1: Introduction and Overview

2: Early Life and Career Beginnings

3: Key Historical Coverage

4: The Watergate Hearings

5: Legacy and Impact

Actionable Advice

About This Episode

People

Companies

Books

Guest Name(s):

Content Warnings:

Transcript