Speaker 1: Hey, everyone, thanks for grabbing a bye with me on
Speaker 1: Table for two. We're back at the Tower Bar, and
Speaker 1: I'm so excited about our lunch today. This time around,
Speaker 1: we're sitting down with a man who's one of a kind.
Speaker 1: He's stylish, charming, and his work spands multiple generations.
Speaker 2: He's been in huge movies, from.
Speaker 1: The Fly to Jurassic Park to his work with Wes Anderson.
Speaker 1: He also happens to be an amazing jazz musician.
Speaker 3: If you throw yourself on the mercy of the server,
Speaker 3: they might be helpful. I'll take it a cucumber gimlet
Speaker 3: with fresh line club soda muddled cucumber. Wait a minute,
Speaker 3: come on, I love poetry, menu poetry.
Speaker 1: That's right, we're having lunch with mister Jeff Goboom. This
Speaker 1: is my first time meeting him, and I know it's
Speaker 1: going to be a blast. So pull up a chair,
Speaker 1: ground a glass of rose, and I hope you enjoy.
Speaker 2: You're saying secret fries, secret fries. I heard secret, secret,
Speaker 2: secret five.
Speaker 4: That's what you're saying. Yeah, well, this is the second
Speaker 4: time I'm a color me gobsmacked.
Speaker 1: I'm Bruce Bozzi and this is my podcast Table for two.
Speaker 2: If you pulled up a chair.
Speaker 5: Today we are here at the Tower Bar with the incomparable,
Speaker 5: the amazing Jeff Goldblum.
Speaker 2: Hello, sir, Hello sir.
Speaker 5: So like you got to New York from Pittsburgh in
Speaker 5: the early seventies, what was the line that took you
Speaker 5: to New York?
Speaker 2: I know you studied at the Neighborhood Playoffs.
Speaker 5: Which I did a summer program there in nineteen eighty five.
Speaker 4: I didn't you know.
Speaker 5: That Gary was the dance guy who Gary and called
Speaker 5: him Showtime Gary. They did like they would just do
Speaker 5: like a two month program. You guys did the two
Speaker 5: year program.
Speaker 2: Did you do the two year program?
Speaker 4: I'll tell you all about it.
Speaker 3: Yes, we But I left after a little bit into
Speaker 3: the second year. You had to get invited back into
Speaker 3: the second year. I graduated high school in seventy I
Speaker 3: went right there, and but in between the first and
Speaker 3: second year it was Sandy Meisner still teaching before his
Speaker 3: lay injectomy. Also, wow, that's a big deal. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: I know. He was great. And between the two years,
Speaker 3: I fell into a production of Two Gentlemen of Verona, the.
Speaker 4: Musical version, and that's what happened.
Speaker 3: And then I went back to the second years, invited
Speaker 3: back and then left in order to do Joe Mapp
Speaker 3: invited me to do the Broadway show.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and this is like kind of a huge deal.
Speaker 5: So you're like a young guy, you want to be
Speaker 5: an actor, you come to New York. Within the second
Speaker 5: year of your hitting Broadway.
Speaker 2: It's one of Tony, not.
Speaker 4: Me, But yes, the show Tony.
Speaker 3: It was the biggest tip at the Shakes New York
Speaker 3: Shakespeare Festival.
Speaker 2: Whatever in nineteen seventy four.
Speaker 4: In nineteen seventy four was the Tony winning was.
Speaker 2: The show on nineteen seventy three.
Speaker 3: I'll bet it was earlier than that, because I let
Speaker 3: me see, it was so seventy one.
Speaker 4: I must have joined the cast.
Speaker 3: At the Della Courte that's where we did it originally,
Speaker 3: and it was with Rabul and Julia, you know, and
Speaker 3: some other great people, and then it went to the
Speaker 3: Saint James Theater that next year. It must have been
Speaker 3: seventy two ish, I think, And so probably up that
Speaker 3: year for Tony. So I'm guessing seventy two seventy three
Speaker 3: or something wherever it fell. But yeah, it was miraculous
Speaker 3: the way I seemed to encounter show.
Speaker 4: The show Business early on, Yeah, you know, I'd.
Speaker 3: Never I didn't audition for that show like the one
Speaker 3: person who never even sang or danced, and I wound
Speaker 3: up in the chorus. And then it was in a
Speaker 3: year on Broadway and understated one of the bigger parts
Speaker 3: and went on once. And then the first I never
Speaker 3: the first movie I ever auditioned for right around that time.
Speaker 4: Was Oh no, I know what happened. If you're interested
Speaker 4: the right I left.
Speaker 3: The show after a year hanging on every ward, I
Speaker 3: was like, oh yeah, I left. I left the Neighborhood
Speaker 3: Playhouse early in the second year. I went, I need
Speaker 3: to finish that program because it's the two year Meisner program.
Speaker 3: Is the is the program which I felt deprived of.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much, well, dear listener, we've just been
Speaker 3: thank you so much, so much that that that clink
Speaker 3: is because summer's police plastic going on there.
Speaker 2: What it's just I guess because of all the ice
Speaker 2: you hear that.
Speaker 4: But it's not a bad class. But they're very festive
Speaker 4: looking and the color coordinated. Mine is a little bit.
Speaker 5: Light greenish, like the mind's a little.
Speaker 4: Like like the Wizard of Oz might.
Speaker 2: Going to be talking about Thank.
Speaker 4: You so much. Okay, I'm gonna you've tasted yours.
Speaker 2: I tasted.
Speaker 4: Do you want to taste mine?
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, you could taste mine. Do you do drink well?
Speaker 4: Like a very like?
Speaker 2: I mean very?
Speaker 4: I love mine. If you come to the sun, it's
Speaker 4: very refreshing.
Speaker 2: It's great.
Speaker 4: Now, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: That's like water, but much more entertaining than one it is.
Speaker 3: It's not too sugary.
Speaker 4: I think.
Speaker 3: Now here's the now you know it's it's what do
Speaker 3: you say?
Speaker 4: It's what?
Speaker 2: It's? You know?
Speaker 3: It's adorned with a cucumber slice. Oh and they're the
Speaker 3: muddled ones inside.
Speaker 2: And yeah, yeah you can see them all smash here bottom.
Speaker 3: I must tell you not that you're interested in this
Speaker 3: either A cucumber. I like all vegetables, but cucumber. If
Speaker 3: I had to have a raw cucumber, not so interested.
Speaker 3: And sometimes I order a salad and say leave the cucumbers.
Speaker 3: Really yeah, but a pickle, a pickled cucumber, I love it.
Speaker 2: All right. We were talking about I'll tell you anything.
Speaker 4: I'm an open face.
Speaker 2: About New York. You got the Broadway show.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I just fell into things. I fell in your
Speaker 4: first movement oh, that's right. But well, then I but no, no, no, here,
Speaker 4: here's what I was gonna.
Speaker 3: So I went back to study after that year at
Speaker 3: the same chame I just finished, which I think was fortuitous,
Speaker 3: because I see, I was a little more mature, you know,
Speaker 3: to encounter this training really, And so finished up a
Speaker 3: second year of work with Bill Esper. William Esper, you
Speaker 3: may have heard of Sam Rockwell, studied with him and
Speaker 3: and then and then said, hey, I guess and finished
Speaker 3: that program.
Speaker 4: Finished two year program you did, and then said to myself, geez,
Speaker 4: I guess I have to now.
Speaker 3: No, I better look for a job. I guess I'm
Speaker 3: although the two year program in the Meisner way is
Speaker 3: meant to be the first foundational step, launching you ideally
Speaker 3: upon a twenty year study after which you can and
Speaker 3: only after which you can call yourself an actor in
Speaker 3: twenty years. So it's really a twenty year program, the
Speaker 3: first two with which he sends you off and goes here,
Speaker 3: here's a foundation of two years. That's the idea. And
Speaker 3: so I went, hey, I guess I better embark on
Speaker 3: this thing now. And the first thing I auditioned for
Speaker 3: was a play called El Grande to Coca Cola and
Speaker 3: I got it and.
Speaker 4: That was it.
Speaker 3: And then and then the first movie I ever auditioned
Speaker 3: for was Death Wish in nineteen seventy three. Went and
Speaker 3: kind of showed my stuff and improvised and was bad, bad,
Speaker 3: and got that part around such a scary movie.
Speaker 5: Charles saw you saw that, Oh yeah, young, Yeah, It's
Speaker 5: like one of those where you're.
Speaker 2: Like, oh, well, you know that was your first movie.
Speaker 2: You went out for it and you got it. That
Speaker 2: was a big movie, one of these.
Speaker 4: Three bad guys. And then that same week.
Speaker 3: Robert Altman, of whom we spoke, had seen me in
Speaker 3: Elgrinde de Coca Cola and liked me and said, here,
Speaker 3: come on out to California. I want you to do
Speaker 3: this two scene part in California Split.
Speaker 4: And I did. I did More Wish and then next.
Speaker 3: Week went to do California's but never been to Los
Speaker 3: Angeles before.
Speaker 4: Right flew me out did California Split.
Speaker 3: Met Elliott Gould and George Siegel who were in that movie,
Speaker 3: and Gwen Wells who's no longer with us, but she
Speaker 3: was the female She was the female leader in that movie.
Speaker 3: I later did Between the Lines and.
Speaker 4: Nashville with her.
Speaker 2: I mean, Nashville is like a cult classic. It just
Speaker 2: goes down as one of that movie that's cool, is great?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I believe, Yeah, I like it.
Speaker 2: It's so interesting. So you have Altman, you have very
Speaker 2: specific relationship with directors.
Speaker 5: I think that you connect with viscerally because you've done
Speaker 5: different work with different movies with.
Speaker 2: The same director.
Speaker 4: Futa.
Speaker 2: Yes, what is it that sort of you connect with
Speaker 2: with these.
Speaker 5: Guys, like what is there something like Altman or Wes Anderson?
Speaker 2: You know, is there a well?
Speaker 3: I love those you know, it's probably just you know,
Speaker 3: I'm so lucky to get to work with people of
Speaker 3: that caliber anyway, and those particular guys. But Robert Allman, Yeah,
Speaker 3: I mean I was crazy about him, and there was
Speaker 3: something about him that's about me that I guess interested him.
Speaker 4: So we wound up doing just that little thing in.
Speaker 3: California's but Nashville, and then I went while he was
Speaker 3: in Europe living in Paris.
Speaker 4: I did Beyond Therapy.
Speaker 3: Okay, not his successful whole endeavor for him, but an
Speaker 3: interesting thing. And you know, oftentimes I see things and
Speaker 3: I wish I could go back and do them again.
Speaker 2: I think that's what.
Speaker 4: Comes with trying to get better and go back? Oh,
Speaker 4: I know a little bit more now.
Speaker 3: We did that, and then I had a little part
Speaker 3: in the Player and this and that, and then I
Speaker 3: did you know, his protege was Alan Rudolph early on,
Speaker 3: if you know him.
Speaker 4: He was an independent filmmaker.
Speaker 3: He was the ad I think on Nashville, but then
Speaker 3: did movies like Welcome to La And we did a
Speaker 3: movie called Remember My Name, Alfrey Woods first movie, and
Speaker 3: Geraldine Chaplin was in it, and Tony Parkins.
Speaker 4: Really was in it. Okay, believe it or not, you
Speaker 4: know Tony. Yeah, of course he was married to Barry Barons. Yeah,
Speaker 4: sister of Marissa, which takes us to Barry Lyndon.
Speaker 3: So these directors you asked about, so, yes, So Alton
Speaker 3: was fantastic.
Speaker 4: I don't know, it's just lucky.
Speaker 3: I short, you know, admired him and yeah, I revered him,
Speaker 3: and I guess he was interested in me for a
Speaker 3: little bit.
Speaker 4: But with those things.
Speaker 3: And then likewise, Philip Kaufman, you didn't mention I did.
Speaker 4: Two movies with him.
Speaker 3: I did in nineteen seventy eight, now still early Hnish
Speaker 3: Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
Speaker 2: Crazy great movie. I mean, yeah, I thought so too.
Speaker 5: Razy Sutherland and that last scene of Donald Sutherland screaming
Speaker 5: when he points his finger in his mouth and like
Speaker 5: then you're.
Speaker 2: Like, yes, chills, Yeah, I thought so too.
Speaker 3: And San Francisco and you know where we shot and
Speaker 3: Michael Chapman was the cinematographer who had shot Raging Bull. Okay,
Speaker 3: very interesting a guy and an artist. And then I
Speaker 3: did a little part in the Right Stuff with RL Kaufman.
Speaker 3: So those are two movies with him, and then yeah,
Speaker 3: Wes Anderson and then yeah, yeah yeah, and then west
Speaker 3: Amston I've done now four things with and he's.
Speaker 2: Just you know, fantastic secret fries.
Speaker 3: Thanks to those fries, by the way your mind, I see, yes,
Speaker 3: the obligatory thing.
Speaker 4: And of course we call this air it just would
Speaker 4: you prefer any other? No? No, no, not mad? But
Speaker 4: what do they usually call.
Speaker 3: It is when you make the mayo a little bit
Speaker 3: fancier lemon or some you know, Paprika. I wish that
Speaker 3: that should have been my name. I chipped into a hotel, right, yeah, Prika, So.
Speaker 2: You did, Annie Hall. You had a small part, which
Speaker 2: I mean I've seen the movie. One of my favorites.
Speaker 2: You're very when she.
Speaker 5: Comes out to California, that guy. I mean, so you
Speaker 5: were just you were like nailing it. It was very clear.
Speaker 5: Each step took you to the mat. Just Yef's in
Speaker 5: the right place right.
Speaker 4: Well, I don't know how.
Speaker 3: I mean, like I say, I look at things now
Speaker 3: and go, boy, I'm lucky.
Speaker 4: I kept getting chances after that.
Speaker 3: I would do that a lot differently now and she
Speaker 3: or sometimes like, oh that's that's pretty good. But but
Speaker 3: it was no, it was lucky to come across. You know,
Speaker 3: people can serious people and seriously talented people and accomplished
Speaker 3: people can never encounter terrific directors and doing doing the
Speaker 3: great and doing the terrific movie. That's really lucky. That's
Speaker 3: really lucky. And so I was not particularly strategic. I
Speaker 3: was just I'm throwing caution to the wind. And this
Speaker 3: isn't this is an adventure of the heart of some
Speaker 3: kind of crazy.
Speaker 4: You know. I was from Pittsburgh and I didn't know anybody,
Speaker 4: but I went down.
Speaker 2: That's what I must do. And that's great. You didn't
Speaker 2: know anybody. I mean, one of the things that's such magical.
Speaker 5: About you is you sort of you do spend an
Speaker 5: interesting amount of times, and you're.
Speaker 4: It's a nice way of saying, I think what you're saying.
Speaker 5: I know, but you're so now you're contemporary, You're still
Speaker 5: very much of the moment. You do something that's very
Speaker 5: unique that a lot of people can't do, which is
Speaker 5: you stay relevant generationally. There are people my age, are
Speaker 5: people twenty years younger than me that all know you
Speaker 5: and love you.
Speaker 2: What do you think it is about you?
Speaker 4: Well, again, it's luck. Luck.
Speaker 3: You know a lot of luck, and you know, unaccountable mystery.
Speaker 3: But but like I say from the beginning, I do
Speaker 3: have But this is lucky too for any of us.
Speaker 4: Of course you're lucky if you listen to Neil deGrasse Tyson.
Speaker 3: And Carl Sagan, you know, just to be here we
Speaker 3: won the Big prize, just to have survived and be
Speaker 3: you know at this point.
Speaker 4: So that's all wild wild luck.
Speaker 3: And then yes, and then this sort of life.
Speaker 4: Force that we all have.
Speaker 3: But I have some kind of particular I do enjoy
Speaker 3: early on, even when I was a kid, I did
Speaker 3: you kind of enjoyed myself?
Speaker 4: Yeah, yep, yep, this is not me. And I hate
Speaker 4: to toot my own horn.
Speaker 3: But miss Veblin in fourth grade sent home my report
Speaker 3: card and said he's a joy. Really right, she said,
Speaker 3: And then missus D from across the street, Bob my
Speaker 3: best friend's mother, Bobby D said to my mother Shirley,
Speaker 3: you know, I really enjoy being around Jeffrey. He comes
Speaker 3: over and plays, you know, and there's just something something
Speaker 3: calm about him or I don't know what she said,
Speaker 3: but anyway, I.
Speaker 5: Think you probably they do not, jeff they do not.
Speaker 5: You have a very do you have a way about
Speaker 5: you Like there's like think you know yourself in a
Speaker 5: certain way that you present yourself that's so comfortable and
Speaker 5: you just say who you know, you just are who
Speaker 5: you are, which is very unique.
Speaker 4: Well, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3: And then however, it got to me, I did have
Speaker 3: this passion for.
Speaker 4: Wanting this thing. I had this appetite and interest.
Speaker 5: Is there an influence, an early influence from a movie
Speaker 5: or television that you were like in Pittsburgh going I
Speaker 5: want to do that?
Speaker 3: Well, my parents, you know, both had flirted with, you know,
Speaker 3: being in My dad said he either wanted to be
Speaker 3: an actor or a doctor. Okay, and then he stuck
Speaker 3: his head in the back of an acting class, as
Speaker 3: legend has it, at the time it was Carnegie Tech,
Speaker 3: before it was even Carnegie Mill when he was you know,
Speaker 3: seventeen or eighteen around the time, and and he said
Speaker 3: to himself, Oh, that's out of my league. I don't
Speaker 3: know what he meant by that, but you know, I
Speaker 3: guess I do. And so he was a he became
Speaker 3: a doctor, a good doctor. And my mom was a
Speaker 3: sort of a vivacious, you know, performer of one kind.
Speaker 3: And the story about a scout coming from New York
Speaker 3: and seeing her in high school play saying, oh, it's
Speaker 3: talking to her mother. She's got you got to send
Speaker 3: her to New York, which the mother refused to do,
Speaker 3: et cetera. So I think they were a little titillated
Speaker 3: with that idea, and they and they are in there
Speaker 3: in their lives Pittsburgh lives, would go to New York
Speaker 3: City and see Broadway shows and bring back cast albums
Speaker 3: of musicals and plays and playbills and stuff like that.
Speaker 4: And and then they.
Speaker 3: Were cinema lovers of some kind. And in Pittsburgh there
Speaker 3: were a couple of art house theaters. Not only would
Speaker 3: we see, would they send my sister and I to
Speaker 3: a kind of a jewel box theater near near us
Speaker 3: in the suburbs, and we'd see everything but first run
Speaker 3: movies of you know, Bridge on the River Quai and
Speaker 3: very interesting things.
Speaker 4: But we'd go on vacation to.
Speaker 3: Atlantic City and I remember when we saw the first
Speaker 3: run of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf and other art
Speaker 3: house movies at the time, you know, Morgan and Elvira.
Speaker 3: I am curious, yellow and interesting movies. I've recently made
Speaker 3: a list of all the movies I remember seeing, and really, yeah,
Speaker 3: theaters when I was a kid.
Speaker 2: That's very cool.
Speaker 4: So they exposed us to that. And then children's theater.
Speaker 3: But I remember the day that they took us to
Speaker 3: see my you know, early on at the Pittsburgh Playhouse
Speaker 3: would have children's theater and it was kind of the
Speaker 3: standard thing. A clown would come out and say be quiet,
Speaker 3: don't be yelling during the thing because we were little kids.
Speaker 3: And then they put on Beauty and the Beast or something,
Speaker 3: and I remember being very jazzed up seeing it, going what.
Speaker 4: Are they doing?
Speaker 2: Back?
Speaker 4: Who aren't who is that? And what are they doing?
Speaker 4: How do they do that? Et cetera et cetera, like
Speaker 4: a lot of kids are, I guess. But anyway, that's
Speaker 4: how I got kind of you.
Speaker 3: And then by the time I went to Carnegie Mellon
Speaker 3: University for these summer sessions like you did at the playhouse,
Speaker 3: I was baying at the moon and going, that's I
Speaker 3: must really, yes, make this happen somehow, I must be
Speaker 3: an actor. And then I would, as I've told story
Speaker 3: many times, I would write on the shower door, steamy,
Speaker 3: the last shower door every morning, you know, when I
Speaker 3: was taking a shower before school.
Speaker 4: Please God let me be an actor.
Speaker 2: Really.
Speaker 4: And then it was a secret.
Speaker 3: I didn't tell my parents, and I'd wipe it off
Speaker 3: before I left, right so nobody would know.
Speaker 4: It was like secret Fries. It was like my secret fries.
Speaker 2: That is very cool.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And so I have to think that this sort
Speaker 3: of life force or interest or whatever you call it,
Speaker 3: passion had something to do maybe with ascending out some
Speaker 3: vibrational feelers.
Speaker 4: I've attracted the luck that was to happen.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and you put it in the universe. It's like
Speaker 5: that added you put it in the universe, it will come. Yeah,
Speaker 5: build it and it will come.
Speaker 3: Something like that, And I was a hard worker, even
Speaker 3: though I didn't know how to work in some many
Speaker 3: ways that I now understand better. My dad was a
Speaker 3: work ethic guy, and I knew to apply myself. I
Speaker 3: knew that I needed to try hard. But it could
Speaker 3: have gone in a million ways anyway.
Speaker 4: It was like.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to table for two. Jeff's time on the
Speaker 1: silver screen spans generations, and yet his acting always feels
Speaker 1: new and exciting. I'm curious what has changed for him
Speaker 1: throughout the decades and what keeps his work feeling so fresh.
Speaker 5: So looking at your work, you have the seventies, have
Speaker 5: the eight let's just say seventies, eighties, nineties, It's so
Speaker 5: interesting to.
Speaker 2: Me how movies and everything changed.
Speaker 5: So like, you know, you have your major the nineties,
Speaker 5: Jurassic Park. You go into the eighties, your films like
Speaker 5: Big Chill, you have films like The Fly, very like
Speaker 5: I can remember where I was when I saw The
Speaker 5: Big Chill nineteen eighty three, Second Avenue between sixty sixth
Speaker 5: and sixty seventh Street theater.
Speaker 2: I was about fifteen or sixteen.
Speaker 5: Ye where second efty second Avenue, There's a big building
Speaker 5: and there was theaters downstairs.
Speaker 4: Well, I used to go.
Speaker 3: You know, I lived on the Upper east Side, you
Speaker 3: know where I lived when I was going to the
Speaker 3: neighborhood playhouse. They moved, my parents helped me move, and
Speaker 3: then I was on my own financially too. Once I
Speaker 3: kind of hit it into this show. But they moved
Speaker 3: me into an apartment near there on fifty seventh Sutton Place,
Speaker 3: you know between first and second where you know greta guard,
Speaker 3: you know, I say, all the people lived. I had
Speaker 3: a little apartment cost two hundred and fifty dollars a month,
Speaker 3: but I walked to the neighborhood place.
Speaker 4: Anyway.
Speaker 3: I was on the Upper east Side, and my theater
Speaker 3: of choice when I went out was the Sutton Theater
Speaker 3: of course on fifty seventh I think in like second
Speaker 3: or so. But then I would go walk the one
Speaker 3: more block to the Core and net right, yeah, and
Speaker 3: go to you know near Bloomingdale's there, walk up a
Speaker 3: couple of blocks.
Speaker 5: Too, you know, you know they were all there, all
Speaker 5: those like independent little theaters. Films changed, and you sort
Speaker 5: of have fortunate enough in my mind to sort of
Speaker 5: be in the genre of like the Annie Hall movies,
Speaker 5: these Body Snatcher.
Speaker 2: Really then you go into the eighties, which is about relationships.
Speaker 2: Is there a decade of.
Speaker 5: Movies that you in your career that you go, yeah,
Speaker 5: this is like how do you define the decades?
Speaker 3: First of all, off the top of my head, just
Speaker 3: like national borders decades, the boundaries between decades sometimes are
Speaker 3: seem artificial, of course, you know, because they're you know,
Speaker 3: case by case basis, like many interesting movies and different
Speaker 3: kinds of movies across the decades. But it's a fun
Speaker 3: It is a fun way to play the car, you know,
Speaker 3: movie character continuum game, and you know the seventies. Of
Speaker 3: course one says, ooh that was an I And if
Speaker 3: I'm scrolling around, I find myself going.
Speaker 4: Movies are the seventies if there's anything that.
Speaker 3: I've missed or want to see again, because I will
Speaker 3: want to and find myself attracted that.
Speaker 5: So do you have a big posse of actors that
Speaker 5: you are friends with that you or is it you
Speaker 5: know you've worked with everybody, you are with a lot
Speaker 5: of people. Do you keep in touch with all these
Speaker 5: people like, I mean each It's like when you're making
Speaker 5: a movie, it's such it seems like it's such a
Speaker 5: closed experience, like a family.
Speaker 3: You know, yes, an intimate and intense and sometimes yeah.
Speaker 4: And do you delicious right?
Speaker 2: Do you keep that going or does it sort of?
Speaker 2: And then that's.
Speaker 4: An interesting question. You know, I don't have a lot.
Speaker 3: Of close, close, daily contact pals with whom I've worked
Speaker 3: in the past, which is normal, that's not abnormal. As
Speaker 3: a matter of fact, my life now is so and
Speaker 3: this if there's any kind of key to or element
Speaker 3: to that contributes to my you know, still getting chances
Speaker 3: here and there, it's the fact that I'm still, like
Speaker 3: early on, kind of interested in life in some way.
Speaker 3: And I have these kids now, and this fantastic wife
Speaker 3: and this interesting life, nourishing life that keeps me.
Speaker 2: Did you want to have children?
Speaker 5: Was it like when you were because you know, Charley
Speaker 5: and Rivers, so you said eight.
Speaker 4: And eight and six turned seventh, eight seventh.
Speaker 5: So we have a sixteen year old and sixteen year yes, yes,
Speaker 5: and we have a and then we have I have
Speaker 5: a stepdaughter, Billy, who has two small children.
Speaker 2: So it's like there's grandchildren involved.
Speaker 5: Did you when you were like in the you know,
Speaker 5: all those fun decades, Yes, were you thinking family children
Speaker 5: or were you just like and then all of a sudden.
Speaker 3: I had wonderful I had wonderful relationships and marriages, a
Speaker 3: couple of marriages, and there was talk of children. But
Speaker 3: I get but it didn't happen. I guess I wasn't.
Speaker 3: Not that I never ever tried, I ever tried with anybody,
Speaker 3: but I think perhaps, and it's probably true that I
Speaker 3: wasn't so called ready. And then Emily and I got together,
Speaker 3: and here's what happened. Not to be too intimate, but
Speaker 3: let me see, here's what happened. We were together for
Speaker 3: a couple of years, and.
Speaker 4: Then one day at home, she was saying, boy.
Speaker 3: This is so it's getting so this has been so
Speaker 3: fun and it's so kind of great, and wouldn't it
Speaker 3: be interesting and maybe fun to have a baby. And
Speaker 3: I wasn't choked up like I'm getting now a little bit,
Speaker 3: but I was like something about the way about you
Speaker 3: and about us right now, and about the way you
Speaker 3: just said that it's never been so to me before,
Speaker 3: like just like that, And I immediately thought she we
Speaker 3: should go together to see my therapist, Lewanda Katzman, and
Speaker 3: kind of talk have a serious talk about what you
Speaker 3: just said, which we did over the course of the
Speaker 3: next year. Uh, and talked about marriage and and things
Speaker 3: and about all my you know, because I let's be
Speaker 3: you know, let's really explore it. If we're going to
Speaker 3: do this, this isn't something serious business.
Speaker 4: And we and we did. She was great, lou Katzman,
Speaker 4: and after I think about a year, she was.
Speaker 3: Like, Jesus's Emily is very particularly wonderful in my if
Speaker 3: you want my opinion, and you know, and maybe this
Speaker 3: idea of having kids, so we so we we It
Speaker 3: became clear it revealed itself to be a good idea.
Speaker 4: And then we got married at the Chateau Marmont, I'll
Speaker 4: be darned.
Speaker 3: And Lewanda Catzman was she she got registered, she got
Speaker 3: whatever it's called, and she was our she she she officiated, Yeah, officiated,
Speaker 3: that's what it was called.
Speaker 4: She officiated.
Speaker 3: And so it was really sweet. So it wasn't just like, oh,
Speaker 3: I don't know whoever these guys are. They say, we
Speaker 3: had one meeting and they they're right for each other,
Speaker 3: so go go ahead.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 3: No, she was like, yes, I know, Jeff, because I'd
Speaker 3: been seeing her for not as needed, sort of once
Speaker 3: a year, but early on more often, but knew her
Speaker 3: for over a decade or so, and and she was, yes,
Speaker 3: these these, these two, and Kaganga.
Speaker 2: Was a lovely sorry.
Speaker 5: And I have to say, I think Charlie River are
Speaker 5: very lucky. Do you have a lot of fun with them?
Speaker 5: I mean that's crazy great.
Speaker 4: Yeah, she's a great, great mother.
Speaker 3: Yeah, she's amazing in many many ways as a mother,
Speaker 3: she's just great. We have a spectacular amount of fun.
Speaker 3: But also, as you know, the whole.
Speaker 4: Palette of experience this morning, oh my gosh.
Speaker 3: There was I woke up, I had a good night's sleep,
Speaker 3: but sometimes after a good night's sleep, your body is like,
Speaker 3: you know, still recovery, still, you know, now, I know
Speaker 3: now I'm feeling kind of bushy tailed, but it's but
Speaker 3: early on I was like, oh, I felt ludgend and
Speaker 3: sensitive and not ready for I had to launch into breakfast.
Speaker 4: And the whole.
Speaker 3: Schedule today was chock full of many things. And I
Speaker 3: have an obligation to get my homework done. I have
Speaker 3: a piano homework, an hour's study that I have to do,
Speaker 3: and I work out and and other things to do,
Speaker 3: so you know it's gonna be and she's choc bowl.
Speaker 3: Every day needs to be productive. But the kids, yes,
Speaker 3: they well, they had a good they had a good
Speaker 3: time today, but early on so but they're studying piano,
Speaker 3: for instance. So we get breakfast and there's breakfast happening,
Speaker 3: and Charlie makes my coffee sometimes.
Speaker 4: Nice, isn't that something?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: I love the little coffee that he makes for which
Speaker 3: he did this morning.
Speaker 4: And they liked task, and they're good. But they were
Speaker 4: they were at each other this morning. Oh that's right.
Speaker 4: I still is feeling very tender. And Emily.
Speaker 3: Was already attending to get one one breakfast of some kind.
Speaker 3: And we heard them screaming and fighting, and she said, chef, cheff,
Speaker 3: go go, go see what's uh? And when she gives
Speaker 3: me a task, I'm you go. I comply, Yes, yes
Speaker 3: I go, even though it was painful, I knew what
Speaker 3: it might entail, and so I launched him there.
Speaker 4: And sure enough I saw them in their room and
Speaker 4: what was going on at this stuff?
Speaker 3: They were having some It seemed like some kind of
Speaker 3: half game that Charlie was playing. Is bigger two, almost
Speaker 3: two years older than River. With River wanted some clothes
Speaker 3: that he wanted to put on. They were naked, half naked,
Speaker 3: and he wanted to put on some clothes from the hamper.
Speaker 3: They were already in the hamper, and I don't know
Speaker 3: if they were Charlie's clothes or his clothes or but
Speaker 3: he was Charlie was, you know, opposing him right, and
Speaker 3: he had these big kind of yoga pillows, hard kind
Speaker 3: of pillows that he was bashing at him, and so
Speaker 3: they were having a major joust and I kind of, oh.
Speaker 4: My gosh, and so there was screaming.
Speaker 3: It wasn't exactly screaming Greek tragedy yet level, but it
Speaker 3: was getting there, half fun and half.
Speaker 4: You know, so I kind of had to intervene a
Speaker 4: little bit. I got but ow dow, Charlie, you got
Speaker 4: me on my et cetera, et cetera. And then I,
Speaker 4: after some time, I kind of, you know, gave up.
Speaker 3: I did some wrestling, and then they were running into
Speaker 3: the other room and thankfully engaging mamal et cetera, et cetera. Anyway,
Speaker 3: that cycle passed. So there's all that to say that
Speaker 3: there's cilarity and amazement, but also the whole range.
Speaker 2: Of you got.
Speaker 1: In addition to being an amazing actor, Jeff Goldblum is
Speaker 1: also a very talented pianist. He released his first album
Speaker 1: in twenty eighteen, and it's obvious that his love of
Speaker 1: jazz runs deep. What inspired him to pursue a career
Speaker 1: in music?
Speaker 2: Jazz is such a love of yours.
Speaker 5: And you have an orchestra and you've played at the Carlisle, Like,
Speaker 5: how did music? And we're at the tower board where
Speaker 5: there's a piano which no one's allowed to touch except played
Speaker 5: you've played.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yes, because we've stayed here, we've had a little
Speaker 3: staycation right right or twice and they've allowed me to
Speaker 3: do it.
Speaker 5: The music in your life and your love of jazz
Speaker 5: and you played the piano and you're an incredible pianist.
Speaker 5: How did that enter was there? Was music always part
Speaker 5: of your life growing up?
Speaker 2: Did you?
Speaker 5: I mean you just seem to, like, from my perspective,
Speaker 5: you want to do something, you do it and you're
Speaker 5: successful at it, like you you know you want your musical,
Speaker 5: your artistic You're.
Speaker 2: Tell you know you just like this. You're the renaissance man.
Speaker 2: So how did music get into Well, I'll tell you.
Speaker 4: I'll tell you. You know, they gave us like parents
Speaker 4: might have. But you know, with four kids in Pittsburgh.
Speaker 4: They gave it. They exposed us all this is delicious.
Speaker 3: By the way, I just had that chicken, which is good, nice,
Speaker 3: and I like this whole thing, and I.
Speaker 4: Like it chopped. I like things chopped. I like that
Speaker 4: chop sound. Is there cucumber in here? By the way,
Speaker 4: I don't think, yes, yes, a little bit, but I've
Speaker 4: had it.
Speaker 2: You're great, there is.
Speaker 3: I like it and mozzarella and chickpeas, and I've had
Speaker 3: many times.
Speaker 4: I like it. The here's what happened. So they gave
Speaker 4: us music lessons. I had some facility for it, but
Speaker 4: like a little like ARLEYN. River was like, oh, I
Speaker 4: don't want to.
Speaker 3: Probably didn't know the joys of discipline yet or homework
Speaker 3: and would be unprepared for the weekly lesson.
Speaker 4: And it was a miserable thing. But then he gave
Speaker 4: me jazz.
Speaker 3: He gave me a couple of jazz arrangements, and that
Speaker 3: really turned me on, and I sat and played until
Speaker 3: I could play those things. That's when I started to
Speaker 3: get a little better. And then I got these fake
Speaker 3: books now they call them real books, you know of
Speaker 3: jazz heads, lead sheets that you could play and learn
Speaker 3: how to improvise from and I fashioned my you know,
Speaker 3: I thought, well, I want to play piano, and I
Speaker 3: want to go to a cocktail lounge and play piano.
Speaker 4: But my parents loved loved jazz and loved music.
Speaker 3: And only would they would they come back and with
Speaker 3: cast albums and Broadway musicals. But Errol Garner his record
Speaker 3: Who's from Pittsburgh in sixty whatever, it was misty. You know,
Speaker 3: Garder plays misty. He would be on the High File
Speaker 3: all the time. So I fell for jazz this way.
Speaker 3: And I was just kind of in me a little
Speaker 3: bit syncopation and that kind of stuff.
Speaker 4: And I started to play. And then I.
Speaker 3: One day I went, I'm going to get a job, job,
Speaker 3: I'm going to look I took the Yellow Pages secretly also,
Speaker 3: you know, with this secret Life of Men and on
Speaker 3: the Secret Fries and not only my acting aspiration, but
Speaker 3: my this. I went into the study and kind of
Speaker 3: closed the door and looked through this thing and got
Speaker 3: on the telephone when I was when I was, I
Speaker 3: forget how old, you know, it must have been twelve
Speaker 3: or thirteen, and started and started to cold call places,
Speaker 3: starting with A and say, hey, I hear you, you're
Speaker 3: looking for a piano player there. Yeah, And most of
Speaker 3: them would say, well, I don't know where you got that.
Speaker 3: We don't even have a piano. But but some would say, well,
Speaker 3: who's this what? Yeah, we do have a piano, no
Speaker 3: where he plays it, but maybe you should come around
Speaker 3: and play it.
Speaker 4: We'll see. I did a couple of things and I
Speaker 4: got a couple of.
Speaker 2: Jobs out of here.
Speaker 3: So it was not only yes, I had this. I
Speaker 3: had this part of me that was like, hey I can. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm not really qualified, but I'm going to try it
Speaker 3: kind of thing for no reason and a little bit
Speaker 3: of a I think I need a job, which is
Speaker 3: pretty important now that I'm raising kids. Yeah, I'm no
Speaker 3: you know, conventionalist, but I know the system that we're in,
Speaker 3: and I think sooner than later.
Speaker 2: But I don't.
Speaker 3: I don't want to scare them. They should figure out.
Speaker 3: I mean, I love the creative life. It saved my life.
Speaker 3: But also this idea that hey, you know, you got
Speaker 3: to row your own boat.
Speaker 4: So I'm gonna.
Speaker 2: Among to teach kids.
Speaker 3: Most people don't, right right, I mean, I'm not going
Speaker 3: to do it for you, and you're not gonna want
Speaker 3: me to do it for you. You gotta figure out
Speaker 3: how to find out what's wanted and needed and where
Speaker 3: that intersects with your love and passion and what you
Speaker 3: can do, and even if it doesn't, you might have
Speaker 3: to do that anyway.
Speaker 4: Yeah, all of that, you know, conversation.
Speaker 3: So I think I had that luckily in me a
Speaker 3: little bit, like I better. Hey, I remember the day
Speaker 3: my parents were saying, yes, you've got to at some point,
Speaker 3: what are you going to do or what you got
Speaker 3: to have a job? And I was a little bit shocked,
Speaker 3: and I think maybe a little sobered or frightened or something,
Speaker 3: and I went, oh, okay, I got it. And I
Speaker 3: think I took it on board and took it seriously,
Speaker 3: and maybe that got me even at that moment, Hey,
Speaker 3: I need to because I'm going to make a little
Speaker 3: cash doing this too.
Speaker 4: Maybe there was that.
Speaker 3: And then, like I say, I got real lucky with acting,
Speaker 3: not like anybody else I've ever heard of. I just
Speaker 3: fell into a job right away. I'm kind of an
Speaker 3: income right away a little bit. So there's that. So
Speaker 3: who knows what I could have been capable of or
Speaker 3: had I not been so lucky, But maybe I have
Speaker 3: that a little bit.
Speaker 1: I've had so much fun spending time with mister Goldblum.
Speaker 1: He's constantly working on new projects. So before we leave,
Speaker 1: let's find out what he has coming up.
Speaker 5: You have Wicked and Wicked two twenty four, twenty five
Speaker 5: is Wicked too?
Speaker 2: You have Chaos?
Speaker 4: Yes?
Speaker 2: Do you know anything about that?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 3: Chaos comes out in August Wow for Netflix, eight episodes
Speaker 3: of an updated version of the Greek Yeah character as
Speaker 3: I play Zeus and Janet McTeer, the Great Jedi Tier
Speaker 3: plays my wife.
Speaker 4: Here David Thulis plays my brother Hades.
Speaker 2: Yeh, it's I loved mythology.
Speaker 4: Something well great, I might dig this.
Speaker 2: And you know, Wicked is this huge phenomenon.
Speaker 5: Like when they played that commercial during the super Bowl
Speaker 5: and you're you also had an epic commercial turning the
Speaker 5: super Bowl. It was like everyone stopped in the room.
Speaker 5: Do you feel the energy around this?
Speaker 4: Well?
Speaker 2: I have project of you.
Speaker 3: Yes. I've become aware of the fan base, you know,
Speaker 3: because I am part of part of it.
Speaker 4: I saw Christian Chadwick and.
Speaker 3: Originally before I knew anything about it, I was like, no,
Speaker 3: I don't know that there's a book.
Speaker 2: And who knew of the prequel, didn't even ow.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I went into that theater, you know, and they had
Speaker 3: drawn picture, they had painted the lobby, and I went, oh, no,
Speaker 3: this is about that.
Speaker 4: Oh I'm a goner. It really got a sucker for
Speaker 4: that because The Wizard was.
Speaker 3: I love that movie, and sure enough, at the end
Speaker 3: of that thing, I was crying my eyes out. I
Speaker 3: mean and since then and then when this came up.
Speaker 3: You know, hey, you don't play the Wizard.
Speaker 4: Yes.
Speaker 5: I couldn't think of a better person to cast than
Speaker 5: you and that movie and this is going to be
Speaker 5: like next level.
Speaker 4: Well, thank you. I I hope everybody's happy with it.
Speaker 3: Wait till you see Ariana Grande and Cynthia Revo.
Speaker 4: You know, are you a fan of that show?
Speaker 2: Yes? Well, and they both.
Speaker 3: Do yeah great, And you know, and John Chu is
Speaker 3: the perfect person. I directed that. Wait till you hear
Speaker 3: them do that music and Michelle Oh, of course, Jonathan Bailey.
Speaker 4: But wait till you hear them do that.
Speaker 2: It is show. Yeah, my buddy Joe Mantello, he directed it.
Speaker 4: It's your buddy.
Speaker 3: Oh. I've heard all the legendary stories about how it
Speaker 3: was birthed in San Francisco and the development of it
Speaker 3: and I mean drama.
Speaker 2: Very crazy.
Speaker 5: As we sort of conclude our lunch, first of all,
Speaker 5: this has been beyond joyful.
Speaker 2: Thank you for coming years.
Speaker 4: Thank you so so much, like thank.
Speaker 2: You lupping it down to the tower.
Speaker 4: And we're going to be closer than when you were.
Speaker 2: Thank you for coming, Emily, Brian. We have to have
Speaker 2: That's what I was going to say.
Speaker 3: Let's stay in constant touch, let's exchange all, exchange everything.
Speaker 4: And have many many eventually.
Speaker 5: And if you've pulled up a chure, like I said,
Speaker 5: we hit a wild ride today with you, sir.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, thank you very very much.
Speaker 4: I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Table for two with Bruce Bosi is produced by iHeartRadio
Speaker 1: seven three seven Park and Airmail. Our executive producers are
Speaker 1: Bruce Bosi and Nathan King. Our supervising producer and editor
Speaker 1: is Dylan Fagan. Table for two is researched and written
Speaker 1: by Jack Sullivan. Our sound engineers are Meil B. Klein,
Speaker 1: Jess Krainich, Evan Taylor, and Jesse Funk. Our music supervisor
Speaker 1: is Randall Poster. Our talent booking is done by Jane Sark.
Speaker 1: Table for two's social media manager is Gracie Wiener Special
Speaker 1: thanks to Amy Sugarman, Uni Scherer, Kevin Yuvane, Bobby Bauer,
Speaker 1: Alison Kanter Graber, Barbara Jen Jeff Klein, and the staff
Speaker 1: at the Tower Bar in the world famous Sunset Tower
Speaker 1: Hotel in Hollywood. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your
Speaker 1: favorite shows.