E-mail a friendFrank Oz
airdate June 19, 2007
Multitalented Frank Oz is a successful movie director and a veteran puppeteer. His feature credits include, Little Shop of Horrors and, his latest, Death at a Funeral. Born in England, Oz started his show biz career on Sesame Street and brought to life such Muppets' creations as Miss Piggy and Cookie Monster, and Yoda, one of the memorable characters in the Star Wars films. He broke into features with The Muppet Movie and, during his career, has earned multiple Emmy and Peabody Awards.
Frank Oz
Tavis: I'm pleased to welcome Frank Oz to this program. Along with Muppets creator Jim Henson, he helped launch some of the most enduring characters in television history - many of them right here on PBS, in fact, beginning with his work on "Sesame Street." Some of his notable characters include some of my favorites - the Cookie Monster, Grover, Fozzie Bear, Ms. Piggy, and also Yoda from "Star Wars."
He also enjoyed a successful career as a director, which includes his latest project, "Death at a Funeral." The movie hits theaters around the country later this summer. Here now a scene from "Death at a Funeral."
[Clip]
Tavis: So Frank Oz was razzing me while the clip was running, because I slipped up and said he enjoyed a successful career as a director.
Frank Oz: Past tense.
Tavis: Past tense.
Oz: Past tense.
Tavis: Which is not the case.
Oz: So you've destroyed my career immediately. (Laughter) I was just on the upswing, and then all of a sudden you just brought it right down.
Tavis: He is enjoying - make that I-N-G - a successful career as a director, and it's nice to have you on the program, sir.
Oz: Thank you, thank you.
Tavis: Tell me about "Death at a Funeral." And the title, of course, says it all - "Death at a Funeral."
Oz: Yeah, it's a comedy. It's a low-budget film, my first low-budget film, and I just had a ball doing it. And it's essentially about a guy who blackmails a family who's grieving. And they have to keep this secret that the blackmailer has quiet, and that's what it is, really.
Tavis: Tell me, to your point a moment ago, of this being your first low-budget film. Tell me how and/or why that is the case for a guy who is as accomplished as you are.
Oz: Well, all the films I've done have been big budget films, and I just wanted to get back to the heart of movie making, and what I really want to do is get back to just working with the actors and not the CG and all that stuff. And so I had the script and it just cracked me up and I was touched by it. And so it turns out it was only $10 million, and I went to London, and we had to do it - and it was great because I had to do things on the fly.
I had to live and die by decisions immediately, I couldn't get more money. So I wanted to be in that situation. I wanted to be in a situation where I couldn't get more money, I had to solve problems myself, and it was fantastic.
Tavis: Did that make you a better director or a more challenged director?
Oz: I can't tell you if it's a better director; that's for somebody else to say. I'm a more challenged director, and I like challenges. Then it was just a joy.
Tavis: What about the script made you crack up so much?
Oz: I don't know. I work from my gut. I read a script and I am a slave to my reactions. And it just cracked me up mainly because this guy Dean wrote very well, but he wrote a farce. And a farce has specific structure, and he knew that structure. And it just seduces you and carries you along until you're just totally into it and you're laughing.
Tavis: I'm trying to - I want to square what I have been taught with what you just shared with me, because you may have a better way of approaching life than I do. When you said you are a slave to your reactions, I have to juxtapose that against the advice that we are always given, to think before you act. Being a slave to your reactions can be different than thinking before you act. I'm not criticizing; I'm just asking -
Oz: Don't touch me.
Tavis: I'm sorry. (Laughter)
Oz: That was a bit too familiar, Tavis.
Tavis: I though we were friends.
Oz: Not really, no. Never have been. (Laughter)
Tavis: Is that a good way to build a career?
Oz: I don't build a career on one thing. We're complex human beings. I don't think it's one or the other. I think we're a myriad of emotions, a myriad of thoughts, and I think we switch from one moment to the next. I mean, while I answer these interviews today, I may wake up tomorrow morning, I'm thinking oh, jeez, I don't feel that way. I should have said that.
Tavis: So this thing could be a whole farce, this whole conversation.
Oz: (Laughter) We're all complex. We can't say, “Okay, well, think before you speak,” or, “Think before you feel,” or, “Feel before you speak.” It's just - we're part of the mud. We're just all in there. So I sometimes have to think before I speak. I have to write an email and don't push “send” right away. I've got to walk away for an hour, make sure that I believe [unintelligible], so I think about that and then I change things and I do it. But sometimes, I just do it. We all do different things.
Tavis: I pressed on that because I think that it's an organic way of approaching a particular project. Maybe that philosophy works best for creative projects, because if it doesn't hit you when you read it and you've got to talk yourself into it -
Oz: Well, I think that's true. I think that's true. My job is to keep my eye on the prize, which is make a movie that really entertains me. I don't know how to entertain other people; I've got to entertain me, and hopefully I'm as universal in my feelings as everybody else is, and they like what I like. But I have to - just exactly as you said, I have to feel something excited about it to carry me on for a year or nine months. It's got to - I've got to be excited about it. I can't be excited up here. I've got to be excited here.
Tavis: You're the first person I've ever asked this question of, but not the first person to sit in this chair over years and say to me, “I make something, I hope it will appeal to everybody else, I hope I'm universal enough that what I think works will work for them.” What makes you think that? What makes you think that -
Oz: I don't. I don't know. Every movie, I don't know. Maybe I'm - I'll be damned if I know.
Tavis: If folk don't respond, does that mean you're out of touch and that you're -
Oz: Yeah, I would think so. If they don't laugh when I laugh, then I'm out of touch. And if I'm out of touch a lot, then I should be out of the business.
Tavis: (Laughs) And you will be.
Oz: And I will be. And I was a moment ago. (Laughter)
Tavis: Because you enjoyed a successful career.
Oz: I did at one time before the show. (Laughter) Yeah, that's - people have asked me, "What is the target audience?" Or "How do you make a British movie with British people compared to Americans?" I don't know. How do you target an audience? How does - when I was - and they try and target 17-year-olds, and I guess they're doing a good job, but I know when I was 17, I didn't know what I wanted.
So how do they know what I want? I can't target, I can't give you British or American humor. All I can do is what makes me laugh, and what makes me feel, and then hope for the best.
Tavis: Is there a difference between the two, and if so, what is it? British and American humor?
Oz: I'll be damned if I know. You can go ahead and say British humor is more upper crust, and then I can show you Benny Hill. And I can give you the reverse of America. I'll be damned if I know.
Tavis: What is it about the Muppets that worked so well?
Oz: I have no idea.
Tavis: Oh, come on, man. (Laughter) This interview's a waste of my time. Frank Oz don't know jack.
Oz: I don't know a damn thing. My opinion? They were good characters. They were good, but they were hip and they weren't namby-pamby. They weren't, like, goody two-shoes good. They were still irreverent, anarchic. And we as performers, when I used to perform, we actually cared for each other. There's a lot of affection there.
So even though the characters are fighting, you know there's affection within that fight. And beyond that, I think there's - each character that I do or Jim Henson did or the other guys still do, they're aspects of ourselves, and they're aspects of you. If you don't have those aspects, you can't be touched. And I think that irreverent, anarchic - the familiarity and mirroring your own self, I think part of those things. But truthfully, I don't know.
Tavis: I'm going to find something you know, so I'm going to ask [unintelligible].
Oz: I don't know a damn thing.
Tavis: I'll ask another question.
Oz: Why did you invite me here?
Tavis: I don't know why.
Oz: And don't point at me, either, okay?
Tavis: I'm sorry. I can't touch you, I can't point - let me settle my hands here. (Laughter) I can't touch this guy; I can't point at this guy -
Oz: And don't sit on your hands, whatever you do.
Tavis: I can't sit on my (laughter) -
Oz: Because that's really creepy.
Tavis: Okay. (Laughter) I'll just keep my hands clasped, like, right here in front of me. How do you decide what voice to put on the character? Because that voice makes the Muppets -
Oz: Well, when I did the characters, which I haven't done them for years, I never thought about the voice. It was never - never thought for a second. If one thinks about a voice, then you're a voice person, and I was not a voice person.
Tavis: But they're all different voices, though. Piggy does not sound like Fozzie Bear.
Oz: But I never approached it as a voice. I approached it as a character. And if one gets the character in your heart, then the voice appears. It's just like build it and they will come. It's not up here; it just comes as you build a character. And that's how I used to do it. I'm not saying everybody does it. That's how I used to do it.
Tavis: Now, I'm going to ask you something that you do know.
Oz: I thought I knew that.
Tavis: Well, that was good. This will be better.
Oz: I'm being judged?
Tavis: I'm trying to give you a chance to increase your performance here. Get your batting average up.
Oz: So it's been pretty bad so far.
Tavis: You've known less than you have known. But that's -
Oz: Okay. Why is the crew holding up a card?
Tavis: (Laughs) He's telling me I got two minutes to ask you a question, that's why he's holding that card up. So in the two minutes I have left, we always ask this question of our guest off air, but because you have had such a phenomenal career, I thought I'd ask this question of you on air. Give me some good advice. Give me some of the best advice you have ever received. Something you have learned, some advice you've been given in this business that we [unintelligible] -
Oz: In the business, not in life. In this business.
Tavis: In life, in life. Life, the business.
Oz: Well, my dad always said you had to take the bad with the good. No one's perfect. And that helped me a lot. But I think in the business, one of the best advice I've ever had was when I left for New York from Oakland, California, where I grew up, a friend of mine said, who passed away now, she said, "When you get to New York, the talented people are a dime a dozen," she said. "What matters is the opportunities you take." And that stuck with me.
Tavis: Frank Oz knows something. (Laughter) And that was really good advice. Thank you. I would shake your hand, but I can't touch you. So I'll just say thanks for coming on.
Oz: Thank you very much.
Tavis: Okay.
Oz: And it's been an ambiguous pleasure.
Tavis: The movie, "Death at a Funeral," directed by one Frank Oz. Go check it out. An honor to have you here, sir.
Oz: Thanks very much.
Tavis: That's our show for tonight (laughs).
Back to June 19, 2007