MONDAY
E-mail a friendJohn Travolta
airdate December 5, 2005
Oprah calls John Travolta her 'dream guy.' After dropping out of high school in New Jersey to pursue acting, he made his Broadway debut in Rain and had his first taste of fame on the sitcom, Welcome Back, Kotter. He segued from TV to film stardom in Saturday Night Fever, a signature film of the late '70s. Following a self-imposed exile of several years, Travolta returned to the A-list in Pulp Fiction, which earned him a new generation of fans. He's also worked as a musician and released several albums.
John Travolta
Tavis: All this week, we're looking back at some of our favorite guests in conversations of this year. Tonight, John Travolta.
I'm fascinated, John, to hear you talk about how you do this for the love of the art, and how now at 50, you can choose projects that are really about the art for you. And I'm just trying to get inside your head here. I wonder when I saw you as Vinnie Barbarino back in the day, on "Welcome Back, Kotter" whether or not you really, at that point in time in your career, were concerned, were considering the art form, or were you just trying to find your way? When did you get to this place where it really was about the art? Or was it always about the art?
John Travolta: Always about the art. I started...
Tavis: Even with Vinnie Barbarino?
Travolta: Oh, before Vinnie Barbarino. Vinnie Barbarino was a stepping stone, and a wonderful one. I don't even deny that tie. It allowed me to forward into other projects. However, you'd have to understand my background, which is purely theatrical. My mother was a director and a drama teacher and a speech teacher and an English teacher.
Tavis: Poor John. (laughs)
Travolta: Yes, believe me. Sometimes.
Tavis: You got your knuckles cracked a few times, I guess.
Travolta: Yes, over things like accents. You know, we were always about the performance and the performance quality in our house. The routing in which a career takes, unfortunately, there's only so many opportunities. So prior to "Welcome Back, Kotter" I was on Broadway. I was off Broadway. I was in summer theater doing a myriad of types of theater.
Then I was offered two very important movies which were art films. One was "The Last Detail," with Jack Nicholson, that Randy Quaid got; but the second one was "Days of Heaven," and that was a pure art film. And so I started there. And then through wonderful but more commercial ventures, I was able to expand and explore, but it's always been there for me.
And never any different, and I've always tried to approach everything I've done with a kind of integrity, that was allowed in a collaborative form. Meaning, you know, you have to agree with someone else sometimes, it's not a self-serving or self-determined process, film making. It's collaborative effort. So you can't always just do your own thing.
Tavis: You can't always do your own thing. I suspect you're right about that. You would know much better than I do. But I'm fascinated by your use of the word integrity. If in fact your career has been one built around trying to make choices that had integrity in them, what sacrifices have you had to make along the way, to pass up things that you found lacking in integrity? What sacrifices did you make? You've done well, but I assume that...
Travolta: Well, they are not sacrifices, really, because that's how you feel at the moment. So you're not particularly suffering over something that feels wrong. You know, and even if they move to be a success at that moment that was what was real for you. Not to be an existentialist over this, but...
Tavis: I'm trying to hang with you.
Travolta: You know what I mean. If that was correct at the moment for whatever reasons, it was correct, so not to regret. I don't - I'm very proud of everything that's happened, really.
Tavis: You mentioned your mother and the household that you group in 50 years ago, 45 years ago. You are the youngest of six kids. I'm the eldest of 10. So I'm at the top, you're at the - well, I'm not at the top, but I'm the eldest.
Travolta: This is why we get along. The oldest and the youngest always get along.
Tavis: All right, see, I'm glad you said that, Mr. Travolta, 'cause I'm curious as to what you think in retrospect. Now you have got 50 years under your belt now. You have got some rear view mirror now. You got some behind - you can look back now. What do you think being the youngest did for you, or did to work against you?
Travolta: Not much to work against me, other than being a little naive to the world outside, because I was somewhat protected by my elders. But I think the positive is I learned, especially from my mother and the oldest sibling, my sister, Ellen. They were the trendsetters.
They were the people that were making it possible for us. They were pushing through and opening the waters for us to know that we could survive as artists in the world, and only that. Meaning not having to do other things, but what we had a passion to do. So I learned that from the eldest.
Tavis: I don't want to use the word encourage, I'm not going to say you were encouraged to drop out of school, but certainly you weren't fought on your decision to drop out of school.
Travolta: Father did fight me on it.
Tavis: Your father fought you on it.
Travolta: Mother didn't, interestingly enough, and she was the teacher. Isn't that interesting?
Tavis: That is very fascinating. Why do you think your mother didn't fight your wanting to drop out of school to pursue your art form?
Travolta: She understood that I was raring to go and that probably nothing was going to stop me at that point, and she sensed it. We were very well educated in our - I mean she wasn't worried about me finding my way, or making my way, because she knew I had enough education to make my way through the initial stages.
And she knew that I was very big on self-education, and had a passion for language and I had a passion for history and geography. And I had a passion for aviation. So she knew that - she made sure we were well read, and she made sure that we were above average in a lot of ways. So I think letting me go was not to worry her.
It was much more important for her to see - I think she may have, even in her early years, been oppressed a little bit about being in show business. Her father kind of clipped her wings when she had an opportunity to be in a studio contract once, and on a radio show in New York. And I think that she didn't want that to happen to me on any level. We always want for the next generation for them not to suffer what we suffered through. And I think in the 30's, show business was looked at differently than it was by the time I started as a child.
Tavis: That is our show for tonight. A reminder, you can catch me weekends on PRI, Public Radio International, check your local listings. See you back here next time on PBS. Until then, good night from LA, and as always, keep the faith.
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