Jack Lemmon Talks About His Toughest Acting Experiences on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson

Jack Lemmon talks about his toughest acting experiences on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. Air date: 03/18/1982 #johnnycarson #jacklemmon #acting

Video Script:: 

my first guest is a good friend he is a he's a magnificent actor he's won two Oscars seven Academy Award nominations starred in three dozen films the latest one is titled missing would you welcome please mr. Jack Lemmon three dozen films my god I didn't know it I didn't need that so you said it now almost like a heart attack there's a lot of pictures yeah I often asked even friends of mine and you're certainly a friend of mine just for the fun of what is the worst picture you ever made you've made so many great pictures but what if you got one that's a good about an hour no no come on you have made that many is there one Turkey somewhere along the line we've all had performances we look at and you say wow I wish I hadn't done that or yeah and and you never know why you're doing you really don't use you know you work just as hard on a bad show is nobody goes out to make a bad picture of bad TV sure sure don't I there was several really that I think probably with the lowest grosser well they hit the $0.50 houses in about 10 minutes a long time ago I did one called love lu v and have adored right down the tubes and a few years ago i did one called Alex and the Gypsy I know that my agent saw it I think my mother my aunt me felishj Christ on Chris that's not and you saw it I saw em we're still friends I'm so no no no there were good moments in the picture no that's what they didn't want people want real that came what's the worst thing you've ever done I saw one the other night and again that they had played and I watched it from the day of winding days of wine and roses and I watched the thing you were wonderful in that God you were good in that I don't know how you don't matter today my favorite scene and I know because we're gonna talk about things that sometimes making pictures is not comfortable they try to make you as comfortable as possible because you shoot on location you're missing with shot we're in and around Mexico server in our Mexico City but that had to be a tough scene if you remember days of wine and roses he plays an alcoholic and Lee Remick his wife and you have a scene charles Bickford who has the green house right oh oh and you go into the green house at night you've fallen off the wagon and you have you have stashed hidden a bottle of whiskey in a plant for throw fifth plant no it's fifth fifth pot fourth row and you go through about a five or six minute scene it is incredibly physical it was the worst experience I've ever had professionally and it's the only time it ever happened to me but the only way you can do a scene like that yes you can't pick it up in the middle and Blake Edwards the director who did a marvelous job in it very wisely only had one cut but even in the second half of it we would go back and start it all over again in the very beginning so that you could get into it so by the end of the day we took a whole day I was totally exhausted but completely a lady because I really felt well the scene is the best credit that I could possibly do yeah and everybody was just thrilled with it we couldn't wait to come in the next day and see the rushes to see how it was and I got in the next morning all ready for the next scene and I went out on the set and it was like an iceberg everybody was just you know sitting like that the film had been ruined in the lab and we had to do it all day or all over again and I'll never know whether it was as good as the first grant to get and to get up for sea off yet again and then reach that let all of them yeah wonderful so you know do you want your own when I was wondering other actors when you know you're on television something you've done years ago and it's in your is you know it's on you you said and watch it I'll flip by sometimes and I won't deliberately go if I happen to read in you know they're in the paper or on TV guide or whatever that it's on right but if I'm flipping around and an old one that I hadn't seen a thought of for a long time is on I might watch it for a little bit yeah but usually I start beginning to see more wrong than I see right because now you've grown older and in retrospect maybe you would play the scene differently or something not that you're necessarily right but I can't stand it after a while I got a flip save your lesson trouble with actors especially if they know their craft they they start picking out the negative things sure I get it maybe if I to read this line that way and so forth then it's passed yeah now when you did Airport under the water oh yeah that must have been that yeah that was uh that was fascinating I must say and I look forward to because I had never done any snorkeling or you know diving or lungs or any of that stuff and I was working with the the frogman who are really I mean they are crazy who they've got I think they've got it they got a real death wish I'm not kidding yeah I mean they're in there they go oh boy and you know they used to over in Nam and everywhere else they would parachute in the middle of the night into the water with the lungs or into the water and not open the chute until they were about four or five hundred feet above the water so that they could beat the radar and everything and all they're doing is while they're free falling down there they're looking at a luminous dial that's supposed to tell them how many feet they've got left you know and then whack they'd hit the water and then end up three miles under you know going on up a river and then a carry and machine guns never never they're crazy anything they teach you to scuba dive yeah they taught me how to ski they taught me how to scuba dive and said one of the important things is you take care of your own gear right right those that's your air there there's a your lungs maybe I could hardly pick the things up so after we've been doing it for about two weeks we're going down for it go very deep down and for a scene and I get mine I picked up mine I know exactly what I'm doing and they're all suited up and they're just flopping into the water and going on down and I picked him up by now they were getting lighter you know I thought damn I'm getting in shape and I'm feeling better hotdog but I put him on and I went on down there and I wanted they were lighter they were empty I got down I swear to you it was pitch black I know I was at least a hundred feet down and nothing nothing nothing now I knew it I did I panic of course not I said wait a minute what does this signal for when you're in an emergency or this and that there was very little light they had lights on already and so forth and I remembered I thought it was something like this now that means I'm in trouble so a guy is swimming about ten feet away and he looks over and I go like that he looks right back at me and goes I dump the air and I felt those I had absolutely no air I thought but I want to tell you something when you think if you get an emergency and you think that you don't have air boy do you have air we really don't ever use our lungs fully you know that's like training opera singers learn how to use their lungs really we only use about half or two-thirds and I had to come all the way up but I could not come up fast because I'd embolize I try to go up about ten or twelve feet and you stop and then you go more and you have to let air out that's right I didn't have any to begin with I didn't think what I not only make the hundred feet but when I got through that last bit saw the top I came out of the water and went about six feet straight up into the air man and then back down but still had an eye put I could have gone another hundred feet are you super are you superstitious where you gonna picture like things like that you carry good luck charms I know I know there was one thing we do that Felicia always but for I don't know how it started I've forgotten but I think it started even before we were married but she puts a marble somewhere either in my briefcase or in my pocket or whatever on our wedding day a marble I don't know it's just a crazy thing but I'll always find a marble I'll get there and get in my dressing room and start emptying my pockets or something suddenly it'll be a marble I don't know how he got there but it got there and it's just it's a good luck Toby you've never had any really close calls in no not really what do you do the scene I would ask because I know you probably tired of answering questions like this but there's no wrong about me go ahead I mean mr. Roberts when you did ensign Pulver and you went down in the laundry room with a former native mercury to put the bomb you're testing it and they had that wonderful soapsuds scene with that huge explosion where you were Oh passageway stairway everything was completely yeah done with sadist now you do get that on what you get that on one shot no they got it in several shots I did it once and then a stuntman did it because I began to get irritated we didn't realize what was happening they couldn't use regular soap because of the consistency it wouldn't stay it fluffed up it would start to go down immediately so they got some kind of a chemical and so I did it and came through and we then went to lunch as I remember and by the time lunch was over and I was beginning to get all red and irritated so they had to stuntman do it well both of us ended up in the hospital for a couple days yeah eight unfortunately we violet it was a slight irritant in there that was everything that had to be one of your favorite roles oh yeah that's that's I mean to work with I thought at that point I said well yeah you're a kid you're in your 20s and you're about your third or fourth picture and you're working with Hank Fonda Magni and Bill Powell and one in one of the great great American plays and this is it you've hit you know when he said I'm do when Cagney stopped you on the ship you've been aboard how long yeah was it eight months sir but he's on board the ship eight months it's just ensign Pulver are you on my ship yeah laundry must keep you very busy wonderfully let's take a break we're gonna come back here and do things [Applause] you