Nathan Lane: The Producers is the story of a down on his luck producer named Max Bialystok, who has had flop after flop at one time in his life being very successful. And an accountant comes to go over his books and innocently suggests, after Max has said to him, asked him to hide. A couple of thousand dollars that was left over or missing from some production, his last production. He hypothesizes that if you raised a lot of money and you knew the show would be a flop, the accountant does this, Leo Bloom, if you raise all this money and was a flop, you could just pocket. What was not spent and and you could actually make more money with a flop than you could with a hit which? To max at that point in his life seems like the greatest idea He’s ever heard and all you have to do is find the worst Play ever written and the worst director and the worse actors put it on it’ll close in one night And then you go to Rio
Interviewer: So the number along comes the alley. That’s sort of an homage to Broadway history in a way. I mean, is it, but it also ridicules it. How does that number function in the show?
Nathan Lane: Along Came Bialy is sort of based on this real producer that Mel worked for who would let’s say date or romance these very old women who in those days when money was raised they were called angels and people, anyone, could throw in $100 here or there. I would think it was a much simpler time. And it wasn’t, you know, as it is today, but there are a lot of corporations involved. And sometimes it was one man raising money through a lot of people. And so this particular producer did sort of hook up with a lot little old ladies who would make a, who would the. Check out to cash and he would, I guess, spend some time with them in his office. And so the number along Cambiale is about Max’s having to travel into little old lady as he calls it, to raise the money for the show. And in various forms, he deals with all these women and gets their checks and eventually raises all the money. So that’s, I mean, how it functions in the show is it builds to the finale of the first act, which is that they’ve raised the money and they’re going to produce Springtime for Hitler, a neo-Nazi musical. In the courtroom. Yes, when Max is found, as they say, incredibly guilty, they ask him if he has anything to say on his own behalf. And he says, yes, Your Honor, I do. I admit for the last 20 years I’ve been a lying, double-crossing, two-faced, back-stabbing, despicable crook. But I had no choice. I was a Broadway producer.
Interviewer: What is your favorite moment of the show?
Nathan Lane: My favorite moment in the show, I can’t say that I have a favorite moment. I mean, there are many moments that I enjoy. I think my favorite scene, I suppose, is the opening scene with Matthew when they first meet, because it’s quite an extended scene for a musical. Yeah, but because there’s no song until the very end of the scene, and but it sort of sets up who they are and their backstory and their problems and neuroses, and then also sets up the whole premise of the show, which is, you know, if we put on a flop, a surefire flop, we could make a fortune. Because it’s just a wonderful, strange scene that is sort of taken from the movie and had to be rearranged and because certain things happen in the musical that don’t happen in the movie. And so it’s a challenging thing to pull off because it goes here, there, and everywhere. Not always organicky, organically organicky. Now, we’re not always organicky. Organically going here or there, there are interesting transitions to make. And it’s a challenge. But that’s probably my favorite scene in the show.
Interviewer: Is the producers, is that a traditional musical comedy? What kind of show is this?
Nathan Lane: What kind of show is The Producers? It is a Mel Brooks musical comedy. It is the new Mel Brooks Musical Comedy as it was built when we started. It’s Mel’s tribute to the kind of musical comedy that is rarely done except in revivals. But it’s his sort of fantasy of what it is and all, it’s all his vision, his music and lyrics and book and certainly, it’s a great story. I mean that’s, you always have to begin with that and it’s one of the great comic conceits of all time, which is these two sad men come together and in a sense it is a love story. It is a and Bancroft once said to me that so many of Mel’s movies and storytelling is about our father and son stories because his father I think either died or left when he was very young. And so it tends to pop up in a lot of his storytelling. And this again is sort of a father and sons story. You know, Max ultimately is a, is a. Alone in the world. He’s a sad man and rather desperate. And he finds a true friendship with this younger guy, this accountant, and so does the accountant. He finds something he hasn’t had before. And so that’s always, I think, is the heart of it, of what makes it work, too, aside from all the outrageous comedy. It’s a, it is a different, it’s a different. Kind of show, in a way, because it is slightly satiric, and yet it has a very big heart. It is an homage to all kinds of musicals, the whole musical comedy history. And it’s a combination of the staging and the construction of the show that makes it I think and And it certainly was a show that came along at just the right time. These things sort of go in cycles, you know. We had had a lot of, you now, for a while, it was all the British imports and they were very big spectacle musicals. And then the timing, I think, was just right. It was just, it came along and. It was something you could never predict and took us all by surprise, which was that there was a hunger for it, for us, for Matthew and I in those roles, which were certainly sort of definitively played already by Zero Must Al and Gene Wilder, but there was something about it, that idea that people liked and the fact that it was, it is a natural for a musical in many ways. It is a musical. In terms of the film, you know, there are musical numbers and it doesn’t take far to go to make it a full blown musical. And so it was something that I would never, we were all excited to be a part of it because of how we feel about Mel and that film, but the reaction from the audience was just only we hoped. They would like him. And we just didn’t want to screw up some, this sort of beloved cult film that everyone had great affection for. And then this thing happened that I really, I have no explanation for other than people really wanted that at that moment.
Interviewer: Do you think that it signals like a broader trend to return to traditional musical comedies?
Nathan Lane: I don’t know whether it paved the way for Hairspray or other shows. I mean, now there are a lot of musicals being based on successful films. But, you know, I think it’s, you never know. I mean I think, as I said, it goes in cycles and. You know, just the other day there was an article by Frank Rich about the new musical Carolina Changed by Tony Kushner and Janine Tesori, and he referred to the candy-coated camp of the producers and hairspray and the, you know, so already it’s sort of fallen out of favor. He’s talking about the more serious musical. And I just think it’s, you know, I mean, it’s just the nature of things, of people want something for a while, and now I’ve had enough dessert, I’d like to have an appetizer. I’d have a steak. You know, it just changes, and I don’t know whether it signals anything other than, you know. The things people change, and the culture changes, the timing is right for something, and something comes back that we used to like. We haven’t seen in a while, and it’s like welcoming back an old friend, and in a sense, I think that’s what would happen with the producers.
Interviewer: You think 9-11 sort of made people want those old friends around? I mean, what was it like performing in the weeks after?
Nathan Lane: Thank you very much.
Interviewer: Talked about how it was so therapeutic to go see you in the show, you know to be able to laugh again
Nathan Lane: I don’t know how therapeutic we were. I think, I mean, certainly I think it was an odd thing to have to go back and do the show after that happened. It was, but we were asked by the mayor to go you go back to work and we did and. And, but I don’t know whether, you know, all of that, you know, we have to go on or the terrorists will win. Cliché is, you know, I think we, we did our, we were just doing our jobs. And as we would have if nothing had happened. And, and, and I, hopefully if people came and, and it had, it, it made them not have to think about it for a while or it took their minds off of that. That was a benefit, but it wasn’t. I don’t know whether it was a direct, the reason why the show was a success or it did so well had any correlation to that. It was just, it all happened at the same time. But the show had been a success before then and it was not, you know, I mean I can’t think of myself as doing some noble work because of, you now, it was just people came. And it was shocking that, because a lot of shows were hurting initially, and eventually things got better, although some shows did close. But I think those shows were already sort of, you know, not doing well. But the night we went back, there was this huge line. So, you now, it was people. no matter what, they want to see something, they want to say it. So we certainly benefited from that.
Interviewer: Who were your great influences as you were sort of getting a start on Broadway?
Nathan Lane: Ah, well, the early influences for me were… Laurel and Hardy, I used to just love them. I loved watching them, and I watched a lot of them, and Jackie Gleason and Art Carney. You know, I use to listen to albums, to show albums and as a kid and sing along with them and run around the room lip syncing and. So, there were people like, you know, Rex Harrison. Now, I remember listening to My Fair Lady over and over to Rex Harrison and to Robert Preston and the Music Man. But stage performers, yeah, I’m trying to think of a, you know zero of course was, I never saw zero on stage, but I certainly. Any questions? Loved him, and certainly in the film, he gives quite a theatrical performance in the film, which was so unusual at the time. When I first saw it, I just thought, well, he doesn’t seem to care about, you know, that it’s such a huge performance. But that was sort of part of the fun of it, too. He didn’t seem to care. It was like he was going to go over and eat the camera. He just, he would have anything in that sense of danger. And anything could happen with him. That was part of it. I mean, it was written with him in mind. And yet the movie has a great heart, too. I mean the thing about him, even as grotesque as he could be, you totally believe his affection for Gene Wilder and his generosity to him as a performer, as well. He’s really a shared. Thing. It’s a wonderful relationship in the film and the warmth between them is very affecting and hopefully that’s something else we wanted to capture in the show, in the stage show.
Interviewer: You hear about performances that he gave on Broadway and he just held the audience in his hand and you have the same sort of power on stage. What is that like?
Nathan Lane: Well, I don’t know, I mean, that’s for other people to decide what power I have, but obviously it’s a flattering comparison and I’d like to think that I’ve kind of carried on a bit of that tradition of people like Zero or Burt Lahr or whoever who came before Bobby Clark and going way back. I mean, Zero was a brilliant dramatic actor, as well as a comedian, as a comic actor. I think part of it was he didn’t really think he would have loved to have just spent his life painting. In one sense, he was so facile and it came so easily to him, I think, in a way that he sort of was dismissive of it at times and which is why he could also be. You know, incorrigible and just, you know outrageous, and just making people laugh or, you know, ad-libbing or whatever he may be doing. There’s one, a story from Forum where he… Oh yes, there was a line, you know, Judy Garland was in the audience one night when he was doing funny things. It happened on the way to the forum. He had this line, they to the boat, I to the hills and you to your homes. He says at one point that once everything is taken care of, the kids, they do the boat, eye to the hill and you do your homes, that’s how the show will end, he So, and that night he said, they, they did the boat eye to hills and he pointed Did you read Cardiff and then he said you? Over the rainbow. Yeah. And Austin Peddleton always told me the story of he, during Fiddler, he said to him, Reptavia, I want to marry your daughter. And he pretended to faint. He had like a fake heart attack. And he fell on him. And they were, he’s on top of him on the, and they were sort of rolling around, you know, and then he landed on top of him and stayed there and the people were screaming with laughter and Austin said, It was zero, zero, I can’t breathe. Don’t talk to me now, I’m still in character. So he could be, you know, he was unpredictable, and it’s sort of what made him great, and although it could probably be a handful at times as well, but you know he was, there was nobody like him. He was, I don’t know, just one of those one of a kind performers that only come along so often.
Interviewer: Opening night on Broadway, what’s that like?
Nathan Lane: Well, opening night depends on the show.
Interviewer: Maybe if you could tell me, like, a show that was a disaster and then the producers.
Nathan Lane: Well, I’ve been in several disasters. There was Merlin, the magical musical for the entire family, starring Doug Henning. That, with the opening night, I don’t even remember the opening because we were in previews for months, for several months. When we finally opened, they thought it was a revival. Don’t get me started with the Merlin jokes. I do remember that one night there was a blizzard and there were a lot of animals in the show and they couldn’t make it in to do the show that there were critics in the house. There was a very small house because there was an enormous blizzard and a lot of the animals didn’t make in from New Jersey. They lived in New Jersey, the panther and the horses and I think some two geese. And so Doug went out and apologized to the audience and actually got very teary-eyed about how he’s sorry he couldn’t do the show. And then Cheetah and I sat in our dressing rooms and drank champagne, hoping the snow would stop and the show as well. But yeah, or The Wind in the Willows was another one that closed sort of over a weekend. So, you know, you kind of know right away if you go to the party and it starts to empty rather quickly. And then there’s, you now, great opening nights like Guys and Dolls or the Producers where it’s, it’s a wonderful celebration and everyone’s happy, that’s all. We’re just looking for a little acceptance.
Interviewer: What do you think, what does Broadway mean to our culture today? Is it sort of as important as it ever was? I mean, it’s a big part of New York’s economy, but.
Nathan Lane: Um. I don’t know, it used to be terribly important and it’s where all the pop songs came from and people rushed to make movies out of musicals. But it’s sort of not that way anymore, it’s become very specialized and sometimes is a punch line, you know, the theater. It’s, and yet it’s still very, it is very important to the economy of New York in terms of tourism and, you know, it’s hard to, it just the way, there’s so many other choices, there are so many choices, and less expensive choices, in that it’s, you We have to train a new age. Theater goers. They have these kids’ night on Broadway and hopefully we’re sparking interest in the theater. To me it is the ultimate because it’s my favorite way of telling a story because you go from the beginning to the end in one fell swoop and they’re right And it goes back to the very basics of, you know, sitting around a campfire and telling a story and engaging people. And it’s that last human contact in terms of storytelling. And so that’s why I think it’s the most important and it’s most gratifying, I feel, as an actor. It’s the only way you feel like an actor, you now. Films, you, know, it’s great. It’s a whole different thing. And you. You know, you act in small increments, and if you get to act a scene, you know, you feel lucky, and the theater is about, in a sense, the actors are in control in telling the story, and no one can stop you, or no one can edit you, use a different take that you just sort of, that’s why, to me, it’s important, and you know it’s not… Unfortunately, you know, it used to, there used to be more political plays and people would look to the theater for some sort of viewpoint on social things. And occasionally they still do pop up, but it’s harder and harder because no one wants to take the risk of doing that in the commercial theater. It can happen in off-Broadway or in regional theater. But I’m And you know, yes, there’s been, you know we’ve been Disney-fied. We’ve been disney-fide and sometimes that’s good and sometimes it’s a little scary because it is very corporate and they, you now, but it brings people into the theaters but that’s a very specific form of theater. And so I don’t know, but the theater’s been dying forever. So, you know, I think it will still go on in some form or another, but what was the question?
Interviewer: As long as I believe. It’s supposed to be, it’s an American art form. What’s so American about it?
Nathan Lane: What does the Broadway musical say about America? Um, well… Yeah, I mean, if you go back to the origins of it, you know, I guess it started with operettas and then we sort of took that and then started musical comedy in a sense. And then the form, you now, grew with, I think, with probably with Showboat and then Oklahoma. The music, the song and the dance were a more integral part of the storytelling. And things could be more dramatic and it wasn’t just the leading man and the leading lady and the comic couple and the juvenile and the ingenue. It was, you know, different characters and… Yeah, I like jazz, you know, it is one of the true American art forms and it’s just hard to do. It’s hard to, you know, we did have sort of a golden age and every once in a while there’s something terrific comes along and you hope that Stephen Sondheim will write another musical. But, and it’s hard for the younger composers coming along, you now, to get things on. It’s a… I don’t know. I think that honestly, most of the youth market isn’t interested in Broadway. That’s for old, rich, white people and homosexuals. I don’t think they’re very interested at all. And so it’s a matter sometimes of getting them in to see something. You know, there have been shows that have appealed to them. The younger people, you know, rent and so forth, and they seem to be fond of Aida. And, you know, because it’s, I don’t know. I have no idea why, but it draws a certain market. And it’s a tricky thing. I don’t know. I came along when it was all over. I just did revivals of the shows from the golden age.
Interviewer: But some of those great shows like Guys and Dolls, what kind of message is that? What does it say about America? Just some adjectives.
Nathan Lane: Well, it’s, it, it…
Interviewer: What kind of people are we that we make these shows?
Nathan Lane: That we make these shows. Yeah, this is a heavy question. I don’t, it’s just a little entertainment for a Saturday night. You know, there are times when the musical can, if you wouldn’t, all of those things come together. It only happens, it doesn’t happen that often. It’s like a, it’ a miracle when it happens. When you get something like Gypsy and in Guys and Dolls, It was Frank Lasser and Abe Burroughs. They were geniuses, I mean there isn’t anything, there isn’t an ounce of fat in that show. Every single thing and every number is great, it works. And I don’t know, that’s just the gods smiling down on you and they just were so in sync and it seemed all to be coming from one person. They were both, the book is as witty as the songs are. And uh… And it’s a kind of, I mean, that particular show is a kind of idealized version of New York, you know, that starts with Damon Runyon. It’s called, you now, called a musical fable, Guys and Dolls. But I don’t know. There is a, I guess, an arrogance, a brashness, a sense of humor. Which is very New York and Jewish, and that’s a part of the musical. I don’t know what it says about the country.
Interviewer: So what’s so gay about Broadway?
Nathan Lane: What’s so gay about Broadway? I don’t know, but there wouldn’t be a Broadway without the gays. It wouldn’t happen. There’d be no costumes. There’d no dancing, no singing. I wouldn’t be here. I don’t know. I think it’s, look, it’s part of New York. Look, New York is filled with people who have escaped from other towns, and many of them are gay. And many of the have fled either to New York or Los Angeles to come to the big city. And part of coming to the city is, has to be, is the theater. And there’s always been, I think, also more freedom in the theater to be yourself. There’s no, there isn’t that homophobia that there actually is in Hollywood. You know, there’s plenty of homophobia in Hollywood, even among gay studio executives. But in the theater, nobody gives a fuck, you know, because we outnumber most of the other people. We outnumber the heterosexuals very often, or at least it’s 50-50. It’s true. And most of the great love songs were written by gay men. It’s all, you know, it is a huge part of the theater. It’s also why it has sometimes become a punch line, you know. You know, an interest in the theater or Broadway or, you know the Tony Awards itself is. You know, it’s why you’ll hear that as a punchline on Will and Grace very often, you know. But, because there’s some truth in it, but it’s, but yeah. You go back to, you now, Cole Porter and. You know, Larry Hart, and it goes on, and on, and on through Sondheim, and you know it’s…
Interviewer: When you saw the Akasha photo, was that groundbreaking? Did that seem groundbreaking to you at the time when you saw it?
Nathan Lane: Oh, don’t ask me about La Cage aux Faux. No, I didn’t think it was groundbreaking. I mean, maybe it was ground breaking for some people. And, you know, and it’s, yeah, it was, it’s a lovely show. And, and if, and you know it, no it wasn’t groundbreaking for me. The scene, the movie, the French film was, the original French film is great. It was fabulous. I remember seeing that. And loving that, and it was wonderful, those two men.
Interviewer: How about just some adjectives to describe the Broadway musical when it’s at its best? Doing this opening of our series with all the big stars and.
Nathan Lane: When it’s at its best.
Interviewer: Or, you know, whatever, whatever you think.
Nathan Lane: Orgasmic, the Overture to Gypsy, that’s when you’re proud to be in the theater. That’s when, you think, it just doesn’t get any better than this. This is, it’s just starts and you go, you get that, well, it’s, you know, at least for some people, you get the goosebumps, that thing that June Allison talked In the Glenn Miller story, that little tickle on the back of her neck, that something great is about to happen, you know. When it combines all those things, all the things that make the theater great in terms of character and storytelling and. Making people laugh or cry or whatever. And, and then when things just get to be too much, they sing and dance about it as well. And when all of that can work and you can make people believe that. You know, one of the things I hate about, you know, people talking about movie musicals is that you can’t. You can’t, no one will be able to suspend their disbelief when people start to sing. And I always think that’s bullshit. I always that’s because you don’t have very good people doing it. You don’t get the right people. You don’t actually get people who know how to do it. If you did, people would believe it. They, I certainly believed, you know, the old musicals. Why wouldn’t, why, oh, people just can’t accept that convention anymore. And I think that bullshit. You know, Chicago was fabulous. You know, but it made, you know, and this, the idea, the notion that it all took place in her head. Okay, it made some, it may, you know it’s like they were afraid they might become gay by watching it. Wait a minute, they’re actually singing and dancing. I think I want to do that too. You know it, it’s, like, ridiculous. You know the, of course people will accept it if it’s done well. And in that case it was done brilliantly, you now. Whether it was happening in her hand or not, They were still singing.
Interviewer: So why does it matter? Why does this art form matter so much to us?
Nathan Lane: Why does it matter?
Interviewer: Ha ha!
Nathan Lane: Well, it doesn’t matter to everybody. It’s like opera. I, you know, I’m like, I become just a moron when it comes to opera. I just go, I just stupid. I just don’t, you now, I appreciate, oh, it’s beautiful music and the, what, the singing, you, you know the beautiful singing and it’s great, but it’s like, you might as well give me an ambient. I’m just, I can’t, I, just can’t. It’s not that I’m not attacking it or being judgmental. It just doesn’t get me, you know. Well, there’s that line from in the Lisbon Traviata as the what I was playing, an opera fanatic. And he would say how much he hated musical comedy. And he has this one line where he says, why settle for the sound of music when you can see dialog of the Carmelites? Well, you know, it’s sort of the opposite for me. You know, I don’t know why, you now, musical comedy are the two greatest words in the English language. But when it works, it, you, know, there’s nothing better. And there’s, but there’s not harder in the world to pull off.
Interviewer: There’s two cardinal rules in producing that you, your character and the producer’s mentions. We had Mel Brooks say the first. Could you give us the second?
Nathan Lane: If I give you the second rule, it’ll blow out the microphone.
Interviewer: He’s going to be ready for it.
Nathan Lane: No, never put your own money in the show. That is taboo. Ha, ha, ha. Get it?
Interviewer: Which subject for movies and for musicals.
Nathan Lane: Well, there’s just the, I guess the inherent drama of will you get the show on or let’s put on a show. They are, if it’s about actors or whatever, they’re theatrical characters and I guess and I guess because we like to feed. We feed on ourselves. They’re fun stories, stories about actors and show business.
Interviewer: When you first set your sights on Broadway early in your career, what did that mean to you to be on Broadway? What was the goal that was drawing you?
Nathan Lane: I don’t, the goal, well Broadway was the goal. That was always the goal for me. That’s what I was taken to by my oldest brother at a very early age. I was take to the theater and so that’s what intrigued me the most. I loved movies but I, you know, I didn’t see myself up on a movie screen, but I could see myself up on the stage. And so. Yeah, I, you know, initially it was just, the idea was, I don’t know, it’s the whole ritual of it all, I suppose, you now, people sitting in the dark and the curtain going up and telling them a story. That fascinated me. And
Interviewer: Is there something sacred about the theater to you at all? You talked about how it’s sort of people around a campfire. It’s a very sort of elemental human thing to do.
Nathan Lane: Is there something sacred about the theater? Well, there is, yes, but it’s a private thing. It’s nothing I’d want to talk about with you. The theater is sacred, but it sounds corny to talk about it or, you know, it’s great when I get letters from kids who, although I fear. They say I’ve been a huge influence or they, because of me, they want to go into the theater. But, you know, it’s, they’re obviously, they’re still out there, people. It is, it is that thing. I don’t know, there’s a connection. And the reason it happens is because they, usually, because they saw, they went to the theater and they were struck by it. They were, it was that, it it is that human connection that you, that you can, I mean, that you don’t quite get in them with a movie. I mean, you can get emotionally involved with a film, but it’s easier to stand outside of it because they’re not really there. But if you do get caught up in the theater, it’s, I don’t know, there is something palpable that it’s just unique to the theater and I don’t know that I get, you know, when I think of something sacred about the theater. You know, I think about the Luntz, you now, these people who were. They were obsessed with the theater. They lived and breathed and ate the theater, and it was, that was their lives were built totally around the theater
