Exclusive: 'Last Picture Show' Makes Encore

Nearly 30 Years After Its Release, Final Director's Cut Hits Big Screen

"Amazing."

Cloris Leachman to Steven Sato during the closing credits
of "The Last Picture Show"

When "The Last Picture Show" was released in 1971, America drew in a collective gasp.

Some thought that the picture, based on the novel by Larry McMurtry and directed by Peter Bogdanovich, was too risqué.

Others, including Orson Welles and Alfred Hitchcock, saw the black-and-white movie as a cinematic masterpiece.

The rest of Hollywood saw Oscars. "The Last Picture Show" garnered eight Academy Award nominations, including best picture, best director and best screenplay. It won two awards, both in the acting categories.

Veteran actor Ben Johnson (who died in 1996) walked away with an Academy Award for best supporting actor for his role as Sam the Lion.

The second Academy Award for the film went to actress Cloris Leachman. Her portrayal of a lonely coach's wife who finds love, only to lose it again, earned her the best supporting actress trophy.

Last week, "The Last Picture Show" hit the big screen again. This time, it was the final director's cut, according to director Peter Bogdanovich. I had the pleasure of attending the special screening at the famed Egyptian Theater in Hollywood with Leachman.

In addition to Johnson and Leachman, the film's cast included then-newcomers Timothy Bottoms, Jeff Bridges, Cybill Shepherd, Eileen Brennan and Ellen Burstyn.

Golden Girl
Leachman's bright laugh -- that famous cackle -- riddles the dark theater like a spray of bullets. I'm sitting next to her as she watches herself on the big screen.

The theater is packed, and the audience is riveted by the subtle, haunting and sometimes comic tale of the small fictitious town of Anarene, Texas.

Moments earlier, I had a private moment to talk to Leachman about the film.

The 74-year-old actress is everything that you could expect and more: charming, witty, gracious and a bit rambunctious.

To say that Leachman is a legend is an understatement. After winning an Academy Award, Leachman continued an outstanding acting career, including several television series ("The Mary Tyler Moore Show," "Phyllis," "The Facts of Life") and films ("Music of the Heart," "Hanging Up," "Beavis and Butt-head Do America.") She also racked up seven Emmy Awards. She won her latest Emmy in 1998 for her stellar guest role on "Promised Land." (Read more about Leachman)

I ask Leachman if the "Last Picture Show" character of Ruth Popper was uniquely interesting.

"I think anything can be run of the mill or uniquely interesting, depending on what specific things you do, given the circumstances," Leachman tells me.

And let's face it, Leachman has created her share of memorable and unique characters: some outlandish, like "High Anxiety's" Nurse Diesel, "Young Frankenstein's" Frau Blucher and the big-screen "Beverly Hillbillies'" Granny.

I ask her how she manages to make each character come to life.

"Hopefully, I try to be deeply or truly authentic, not just acting 'as if,'" she says

"The truth (for the character) comes from your feelings about your situation or the circumstances. When you really are reacting to the circumstances. If you really mean it, it communicates, don't you think?

Unscripted
"I had no idea about the rest of this picture. I hate to read scripts. I'm left-handed and right-brained and I read backwards," Leachman said of reading "The Last Picture Show" for the first time. "But Peter (Bogdanovich) had a reading at his house, and that helped.

"In fact, I just did a film and got to page 47," she said of a recent project. "And suddenly we were shooting, and I never got to read the rest. It's interesting what happens when you don't read the script.

"Also, with (characters), I start to digest them and I work so hard, and it's agonizing, I wear myself out."

Music of the Heart
"It hurts so much to see these lives," Leachman says of the characters in "The Last Picture Show".

Leachman also comments on the "rhythm" of the film.

"I love classical music. I grew up thinking that I'd be a classic pianist, but I had no facility. But," she says playfully, "I'm all heart.

"(As a music lover), I can see how this story is told. It's told so sure-handedly and so beautifully and so without conscious. Every little thread is pulled together so gracefully."

What did Leachman like most about the film?

"I would say people like Polly (Platt), Jeff, Cybill. Ellen Burstyn was a wonderful friend, Eileen Brennan was darling," Leachman tells me.

Waiting To Exhale
Leachman has the final scene in the film, and what a scene it is. She literally took my breath away.

The unrehearsed scene was shot in only one take, and although Leachman asked for a second, Bogdanovich refused. He later said that it was the scene that won her the Academy Award.

"We've got it," he told her at the time.

And she had.

The Buzz

Looking to advertise?

Information about our privacy policy, terms of use,
Entire Site © 2002, Internet Broadcasting Systems, Inc.