Alan Alda

Speaker 20:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 20:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety one.

Speaker 20:11

And the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:32

My Castaway this week is an actor. Born in New York, the son of a vaudeville artist, he went on the stage at an early age. By his mid thirties he'd been in several films and starred on Broadway. It was then that he landed the part that transformed his life. He was cast as the wise cracking, womanising surgeon Hawkeye in the American television series MASH. It made him rich, it made him famous, but it didn't stop his appetite for work. He's written, directed and starred in his own films, Sweet Liberty and Betsy's Wedding at two. He's even stolen the limelight in other people's. He was the eager maniacal film producer in Woody Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanours. At the moment he's doing something he hasn't done for more than twenty years. He's back on the stage again, playing in the West End of London the gentle, thoughtful narrator in Thornton Wilder's Our Town. He is Alan Alder.

Presenter1:24

Well, Alan, after all those uh films and television series, it must be a kind of professional culture shock to walk onto a stage, begin a play and not stop until it's finished.

Alan Alda1:32

I wish I could say it was. I feel like I'm coming

Alan Alda1:36

Home to the stage. I'm on the stage the whole time, whether I'm in front of the audience or not. I'm I'm sometimes just behind a little piece of scenery, sitting on a chair for a couple of minutes, listening to the other actors. And I look up into the flies and I look I look at the lights and the and I can see the

Alan Alda1:50

All the backstage works there, and I feel so happy to be there. I love.

Alan Alda1:58

I love the dark of the backstage and

Alan Alda2:01

the sound of the audience, uh, just before the show.

Alan Alda2:06

And if you if you let them, they'll they'll make your heart beat faster, you know.

Presenter2:10

But that love of the stage was born in you at a very early age, wasn't it? As I said, you went on the stage at a very early age.

Alan Alda2:16

My father carried me on stage in Burlesque when I was six months old.

Alan Alda2:20

But what you're talking about didn't happen until I was about nine when I would go to the Hollywood Canteen with my father, which was a place where s servicemen were entertained during the Second World War in uh in Hollywood. And we did sketches together. I was nine years old and I carried a baseball bat and I was chubby and had buck teeth. And I was I was Lou Costello and he was Bud Abbott and we did Who's on First together.

Presenter2:42

So you got the laugh.

Alan Alda2:43

I did, boy, did I ever get those laughs. There were about two or three thousand soldiers and sailors there, and I suddenly realized that I could not only make them laugh, I could stop the laughter when I had to, so they could hear the next line. I was in control of a room full of people.

Presenter2:58

We cast you away on this program onto a desert island.

Alan Alda3:02

And I'll never forget it either.

Presenter3:04

Do you fancy the idea?

Alan Alda3:05

Well, I take it very seriously. I'm an actor. I'm imagining this. You're saying, what records will you take? I'm thinking of what else will I put in my bag?

Alan Alda3:13

I need a razor or probably not, but suntan lotion? I don't know how much time I have to prepare. My agent wants to know if I'm going there first class.

Alan Alda3:23

I think it's sort of a sadistic idea, if you ask me, and I think everybody sitting listening to this is probably wearing leather and rubber.

Presenter3:30

Okay, so what's your first record?

Alan Alda3:33

Well, I would love to hear Glenn Gould playing Bach, uh the uh s English Sweets. I I I I I've seldom heard anybody who made such contact with the music and made the music his own. He

Alan Alda3:46

He has

Alan Alda3:48

lent his brain and his fingers to

Alan Alda3:51

to Bach in such a way that I never heard Bach sound like that.

Alan Alda3:55

And and uh it's o it's as though he's really speaking to me.

Presenter4:50

Glenn Gould playing part of Suite number five in E minor from Bach's English Suites.

Presenter4:55

So your father, Alan Alder,

Alan Alda4:57

I love English sweets, don't you?

Presenter4:59

Jelly babies, especially your your father was a travelling player, it was kind of nomadic life, wasn't it? Yes, yes.

Alan Alda5:03

Yes, yes, especially in the beginning. But it lasted for years and years.

Presenter5:07

And what sort of places did he perform in? Was it

Alan Alda5:09

Burlesque houses where the women took their clothes off and the men uh did uh baudy sketches and uh sometimes uh very uh very brilliant comedians performed uh in those sketches.

Presenter5:19

And were these your family's friends as well, these people?

Alan Alda5:21

Yes, yes. And when my fa when my father, in fact, went to California, uh, when he was about twenty-nine, he got, um

Alan Alda5:28

the chance to play George Gershwin in Rhapsody and Blue, uh the the film biography of Gershwin, which was a big hit, but nobody knew it was gonna be be a big hit until uh, you know, w when he was asked to do it. And he um

Alan Alda5:41

He still kept his friends from burlesque.

Alan Alda5:45

and they'd come over to the house on a Sunday night and we'd all do burlesque sketches together.

Alan Alda5:49

And then we'd get down on the rug and shoot craps. I mean, it was a very simple.

Alan Alda5:55

sweet, um it was like an innocence to it.

Presenter5:58

What about your mother? Was she a performer too?

Alan Alda6:00

No. No, she had been in a bea a beauty contest when she was young and uh and that and then toured I don't understand can't quite understand it. They they toured a bunch of beauty contest winners.

Presenter6:10

But she was apparently a rather unhappy woman, not a very unhappy

Alan Alda6:13

Well, unfortunately she was not uh she was not mentally stable. She was she had she was schizophrenic and uh paranoid and uh she had a very unhappy life.

Presenter6:21

And did that make you unhappy as a child?

Alan Alda6:23

Well, yes, you I don't I think that's the history of all families where where uh

Alan Alda6:27

Um schizophrenia. Um

Alan Alda6:30

Enters the scene.

Alan Alda6:31

Uh in those days it was especially difficult.

Alan Alda6:34

Uh

Alan Alda6:36

Because you didn't talk about it, that you were ashamed of it, you thought there was something wrong.

Alan Alda6:41

uh with with you or your family. I mean, very often uh uh children think that that they're responsible for the bizarre behavior of their parents. Uh I did when I was a kid. Uh and and the family didn't sit around and discuss it, you know, and didn't think of it as a medical problem.

Alan Alda6:57

Um I don't know if people now remember what that must have been like. You you thought you didn't talk about it and you didn't think of it as a medical problem. It was a shameful thing and if she would only pull herself together

Speaker 47:10

Yeah.

Alan Alda7:10

Things that well, if you know, you can't pull yourself together, you need I mean there there wasn't even any medication.

Alan Alda7:17

Um at that time that would uh that would uh alleviate the symptom.

Presenter7:20

But she apparently pulled herself together enough to s to save your life when you were really very ill and near death's door, weren't she?

Alan Alda7:26

Well, she had an interest one of the lucky things for me was that she had an interest in reading, um

Alan Alda7:32

Uh

Alan Alda7:33

popular science magazines, sci magazines that that uh that dealt in a popular way with uh scientific and medical um

Alan Alda7:41

articles. And uh she knew what the symptoms were of polio uh and and and in a way di uh did in fact diagnose me when I got polio and got a doctor to me within hours. Other otherwise I might have been dead or paralyzed'cause I had it all all over my body. I was affected. I had it I when I was seven years old.

Presenter7:57

Yeah.

Presenter8:01

Okay.

Alan Alda8:01

Reum

Presenter8:02

But it was a lucky escape by the sound of

Alan Alda8:03

It was, very much so, yeah.

Presenter8:05

Shall we have your second record?

Alan Alda8:06

Well, it comes from around that time. Um um I I would pick uh George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue.

Alan Alda8:13

Because when my father

Alan Alda8:16

made the film biography of George Gershwin.

Alan Alda8:20

He had to learn.

Alan Alda8:21

Um

Alan Alda8:22

to to play the exact notes on the piano.

Alan Alda8:27

that Oscar Levant played, because Oscar Levant made the recordings.

Alan Alda8:31

that were used in the film that were supposed to be played by Gershwin. And my father was playing Gershwin, so he had to do the exact fingering for the uh scenes in the movie, and he didn't know how to play the piano, so he he learned it note by note. And this was the first

Alan Alda8:45

serious music I had ever heard, and I would lie on the rug in front of the phonograph and just listen to it hour after hour and uh

Alan Alda8:52

Uh so it has a special

Alan Alda8:55

place in my heart and in my head, uh especially that first uh

Alan Alda9:00

That first noodling on the clarinet in the beginning of Rhapsody and Blue.

Presenter9:59

The opening of George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, played by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas.

Presenter10:05

It was obviously then a a a fairly unpredictable, chaotic childhood that you had, and yet, you know, as we see you today, you're very conventional. I mean, your life to outward view looks very stable, very secure, very calm business. Is that a kind of reaction to what went before on your

Alan Alda10:21

I think that's probably true. Yes, I think that's true. I think.

Alan Alda10:26

Um

Alan Alda10:28

When you have to constantly test reality, if you know, if your mother says uh those cracks in the wall are uh because people are taking pictures of me from the other side,

Alan Alda10:39

And you're only uh six or seven or eight. You you have to think

Alan Alda10:44

Is somebody taking pictures from over there or what? What, you know, you uh.

Alan Alda10:49

you get you get uh used to thinking about um

Alan Alda10:53

Life

Alan Alda10:54

with a little a little more um you don't take things quite for at face value. You don't always j

Alan Alda11:02

I'm gonna believe everything you hear.

Presenter11:04

But the root of of of at the root of your existence and your security is is your marriage. You've been married to the the same woman for thirty-five years.

Alan Alda11:10

Thirty four years it'll be thirty five and next next March it'll be thirty five.

Presenter11:14

This must be a record for someone who's had success in Hollywood and the other one.

Alan Alda11:17

It's one of the records I'd like to take with me to this island.

Presenter11:20

And we're still on Television.

Presenter11:22

But it what's the secret? I I I mean, is it because you set out to make it work because you needed to make it work?

Alan Alda11:28

No, I get asked this so much. I think in our case we both

Alan Alda11:32

We both love each other and we uh we lo we we want to make each make the other one happy if we can and we both

Alan Alda11:42

are willing to

Alan Alda11:44

wait out the bleak periods that occur in every relationship and uh and work through the ones that can be worked through. And uh and we both love to laugh. I mean, we there's cer certain things we love to do. We both love to laugh, we love to eat, we love music. I mean, there they're things that uh and we've taught each other. She's taught me about music because she was a musician when we met.

Alan Alda12:06

And uh and uh she's learned about the theater through me.

Presenter12:10

The next record.

Alan Alda12:11

It's a weekend in the country from A Little Night Music. And I love this number because of the the his all of his all of his

Alan Alda12:20

Characters are

Alan Alda12:22

are so clear in his lyrics. There's such characterization, there's such an understanding of people and the way life is lived, the lies people tell each other, the the uh the way we win we win maneuver one another, the way we try to exercise our dreams and our fantasies at the expense of other people, and all of this is all in these wonderful

Alan Alda12:43

Delicious lyrics, and the orchestration in this weekend in the country I find thrilling. When the bells start to ring,

Alan Alda12:50

My hair stands on and I start to smile. It's just, it's a wonderful thing. I would listen to this over and over again.

Speaker 412:57

We can in the country globes in their heights The shallow worldly figures of rival sights Or devil's companions know not whom they saw It might be instructive to absorb

Presenter13:27

A Weekend in the Country from Stephen Sondheim's musical A Little Night Music.

Presenter13:31

Of course, Alan Order to be stable and secure, it helps if you've got money and and you've got that these days. But you didn't always have it, did you?

Alan Alda13:38

No. I don't think it helps to have money, to be stable and secure either. Well, it means you haven't seen it. To be s secure in some ways, but.

Presenter13:41

Well there you haven't say it does.

Alan Alda13:45

Uh uh if you don't have your head screwed on right, you can you can do a lot of harm to yourself with money.

Presenter13:51

But what sort of work did you do before you were established to make ends meet?

Alan Alda13:55

Oh, I drove a cab and I was a doorman and uh

Alan Alda13:59

A doorman at a Ritzy restaurant where I had to wear a funny costume with a stupid hat and uh and my agents were constantly getting out of the cabs and I like tipped my hat so they couldn't recognize me. And uh um

Alan Alda14:12

I I colored baby pictures, I sold mutual funds, I was um I um I I was hypnotized at a a psychiatric clinic for twenty-five dollars uh uh

Alan Alda14:24

um a session and uh they they were doing some study where they had a hypnotizer.

Presenter14:28

Now tell me th how the big success story came about then. It was it was nineteen seventy two, wasn't it? And you were an established actor.

Presenter14:36

Um and uh you had this wife and three daughters and you'd put down your roots in a small town in New Jersey and then one night the phone call came.

Alan Alda14:44

Well, they sent me this script to MeSH and I thought it was one of the best things I'd ever read, but

Alan Alda14:50

I called Arlene and told her and said that I didn't

Alan Alda14:53

See how I'd be able to do it. I I said, I got this wonderful script, but I can't do it, of course, because it's gonna be shot in California and uh

Alan Alda15:00

Uh we would have to uproot everybody.

Alan Alda15:03

And she called me back the next day and said, You know, I'm sure you can. We can probably work it out. Why don't you do it?

Presenter15:09

Can you explain its huge success?

Alan Alda15:11

No, I don't think anybody can. I think uh the only thing I can point to is the fact that we had

Alan Alda15:19

We had an unusual collection of people. The writers, the directors, and the actors were very.

Alan Alda15:27

Talented.

Alan Alda15:29

But more important than that, we understood

Alan Alda15:32

That

Alan Alda15:33

This was a chance to try to

Alan Alda15:37

try to tell s to tell stories that reflected the life that was really lived by those people, rather than making them serve some kind of a sitcom

Alan Alda15:47

fantasy world. Uh we knew we didn't want to make

Alan Alda15:52

Uh hijinx at the front.

Presenter15:53

Is it still true that it's still always playing somewhere in the world even if you're not?

Alan Alda15:58

Yes, like it. The sun never sets on meshes.

Presenter16:00

Really it's still going on.

Alan Alda16:02

This is the country to say that in, right?

Alan Alda16:05

Record number four.

Alan Alda16:07

Um

Alan Alda16:08

Yes, yes, yes. Well, this has a lot of meaning for me, and it has, and it ties in with MASH, too. This is the Mozart clarinet quintet and A. I first.

Alan Alda16:18

heard this on a on a historic night in my life.

Alan Alda16:22

friend had invited me to chamber music at at uh her apartment. She was a uh a conductor. And uh they were playing the Mozart clarinet quintet and there was this beautiful young woman playing the clarinet.

Alan Alda16:35

Poor.

Alan Alda16:36

who was Arlene Weiss, and she uh uh later became uh Arlene Alda.

Alan Alda16:42

But that made such an impression on me, that piece.

Alan Alda16:46

That

Alan Alda16:47

In the final episode of Maj, which was watched by you know

Alan Alda16:51

Some people say 100 million people in the United States on one night, all in one moment, you know.

Alan Alda16:59

There was a s um

Alan Alda17:01

One of the stories we told in that long episode, which was lasted about two or two point five hours, was how the character of Winchester taught these Chinese musicians that had been captured

Alan Alda17:15

uh to play the Mozart clarinet quintet on Chinese instruments.

Alan Alda17:20

And then unfortunately they

Alan Alda17:22

They have to

Alan Alda17:24

Everybody has to leave because there's a fire and their truck gets bombed and and these people he's been training die and uh the New York Times said that

Alan Alda17:33

More people heard

Alan Alda17:35

The clarinet quintet that night than had heard it since Mozart wrote it. So it was really, and it was wonderful because people were like calling up the next day, people were calling record stores and calling radio stations, asking what the name of it was, who wrote it, what's it called? It was wonderful to take something that meant so much to me personally because that's how I met Arlene. And then.

Alan Alda18:02

Um tie it in with people's emotions around America that night.

Presenter19:06

Part of Mozart's Clarinet Quintet in A performed by Tashi with Richard Stoltzman playing the clarinet.

Presenter19:12

Well, now, Alan Alder Hawkeye Pearce was cynical, arrogant, subversive, a womanizer. I mean, he wasn't like you at all. Um how come you could play him? Do you like playing people who are not like you?

Alan Alda19:23

Oh, very much. Uh, when I got to play I loved playing Hawkeye and I loved playing uh

Alan Alda19:28

Um

Alan Alda19:30

The uh cynical, uh womanizing, um um egomaniacal uh

Alan Alda19:36

guy in uh Woody Allen's movie.

Alan Alda19:39

Crimes and misdemeanors.

Presenter19:40

Uh

Alan Alda19:45

Somebody

Alan Alda19:46

That you're not allowed to be. Either you don't allow yourself or the world wouldn't go for it, you know, to be able to, you know, to be Richard III and.

Alan Alda19:56

And just have a go at everybody. It's really fun.

Presenter19:59

It's fun being a rat when you're a nice guy.

Alan Alda20:00

When you're a n

Alan Alda20:01

Well, I guess it's fun being a rat no matter what if you can get away with it. I mean I guess we'd all be rats if we could get away with it.

Presenter20:08

Of course, by the time you did Crimes and Misdemeanours wi with Woody Allen, you'd already been writing and directing and starring in your own films. Wa was it difficult suddenly being told by somebody else what to do? Particularly if that person's Woody Allen?

Alan Alda20:19

Particularly.

Alan Alda20:20

Yeah, no, it was it was great. It was I I looked forward to it as a nice vacation from

Alan Alda20:26

Having to have all all the answers to tha the thousands of questions that the director gets asked all day long. And it was

Alan Alda20:34

better than a vacation. It was uh it was just a a glorious experience.

Alan Alda20:39

difficult at first because he has a a unique style of directing that doesn't involve talking to you.

Alan Alda20:44

I think

Presenter20:44

I was going to say he doesn't answer any of the questions that do that.

Alan Alda20:45

That's right. He probably doesn't uh do that either, but he doesn't um

Alan Alda20:50

He doesn't give you any hints. He doesn't uh hardly talks at all. And and uh that's just a personal uh

Alan Alda20:58

Uh

Alan Alda20:59

habit of his I think and he's turned it into a directing style which is very successful

Presenter21:03

How can you direct if you don't tell people what to do?

Alan Alda21:04

Well, he if you don't do it the way he likes, he he rewrites it so that it you have to do it a little bit more what he uh toward uh more like what he had in mind.

Alan Alda21:13

And then it gives you another chance, he rewrites it again, and if after the third or fourth time, then he fires you.

Presenter21:19

But as he rewrites it, then you remake it.

Alan Alda21:22

Yes, you're you're always reshooting. Most of what is in that movie was not what we shot the first time.

Presenter21:22

Yes, you're always

Presenter21:27

Shall we have another record there?

Alan Alda21:28

Oh, this is into the woods.

Alan Alda21:31

Into the woods, it's interesting you're talking about making movies because uh and and reshooting.

Alan Alda21:38

When I was making the the last movie that I wrote and directed and acted in all at the same time, it was called Betsy's Wedding. It was a very difficult picture to make. It's a very light, happy movie.

Alan Alda21:50

But it was a very dismal experience for me. I I couldn't I couldn't get people to do what I wanted. I got bad luck with the weather. And the one thing that got me through it was that I had a a tape of Into the Woods

Alan Alda22:04

And and you know how much I love Sondheim and I love his

Alan Alda22:07

His wit, but I also love his insight and his understanding of.

Alan Alda22:13

the ambiguity of life and

Alan Alda22:16

I would play this tape in the car. I'd play the first act on the way to work and the second act on the way home every day, and it got me through.

Alan Alda22:25

The idea that you have to go into the woods.

Alan Alda22:28

But in the woods is where you're tested.

Alan Alda22:32

And you can come out of the woods with something if you'll make the journey, if you'll take the chance, if you'll take the risk.

Alan Alda22:40

I was in the woods and I had to come out of the woods and I got I got the nerve to get through it from Sondeim.

Speaker 422:48

Into the woods, it's time to go, I hate to leave, I have to, though. Into the woods, it's time, and so I must begin my journey. Into the woods, and through the trees, to where I am, expected, ma'am. Into the woods, to grandmother's house!

Speaker 423:02

Into the woods to grandmother's house. You're certain of your way. The way is clear, the light is good. I have no fear, nor no one should.

Presenter23:14

Daniel Ferland singing Stephen Sonte's Into the Woods.

Presenter23:17

Do I sense a certain disenchantment then, Alan Alder, now, with writing, directing, and starring in your own films? Have you had enough of doing it all?

Alan Alda23:26

Doing all of those three things at the same time, I I don't think I'll ever do that again.

Alan Alda23:31

Uh I I want to direct the pictures and I want to write them.

Alan Alda23:34

And I I really love acting.

Alan Alda23:37

Um

Alan Alda23:39

I I appreciate being an actor probably more than most actors do because I I know how hard all those other people have to work around me in order to

Alan Alda23:48

Um

Alan Alda23:49

keep me relaxed and happy so that um all the troubles of filmmaking won't show on my face, you know, because I'm I've had to do that with for for a

Alan Alda23:58

Uh other actors, and I know how I know how much trouble you have to go to. Um

Alan Alda24:04

But I and I therefore feel so much uh happier just uh just doing one thing at a time.

Presenter24:11

Why do you think you say that now? I mean, is that just just you've had enough of doing all three, or is it age creeping up on you?

Alan Alda24:17

It could be. I think I'm I'm uh I don't have the same energy I did twenty years ago. You know, it take I I thought that I would have I that energy uh all all my life and that I w it would be f would

Alan Alda24:28

It would be fun to keep doing all three things, but I who do I don't have to prove anything to anybody. I have a craving to work, I have a craving to get better at the things I know how to do.

Presenter24:36

Why, though, what is it you want out of it?

Alan Alda24:38

A pleasure. I want to have fun. I want to enjoy myself. I

Alan Alda24:42

I

Alan Alda24:43

had spent

Alan Alda24:44

A lifetime trying to get good at these theatrical skills that I have.

Alan Alda24:49

And I know I'm good at them. And I love.

Alan Alda24:53

exercising them and I love getting even better at them and there's plenty more I can learn.

Presenter24:58

Record number six.

Alan Alda25:00

This the uh the Largo.

Alan Alda25:02

In um

Alan Alda25:04

In this um

Alan Alda25:05

Bach and Cherdo.

Alan Alda25:07

is it just kills me.

Alan Alda25:12

It's w the the Largo is one of the sexiest

Alan Alda25:15

most romantic pieces of music I ever heard. It's really it really uh it it it kind of whispers in your ear, you know.

Alan Alda25:26

So if I'm going to be all alone on this island, I at least ought to have something that reminds me of past glorious moments. What do you want from me here?

Speaker 425:28

Something that reminds me of

Presenter26:36

Part of the second movement of Bach's concerto number five in F minor, played by Raymond Lepard with the English Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Raymond Lepard. Your um your life's work really is about family. You mention your daughters and your wife, it's about relationships, marriage, friends, the joys and the miseries of the whole thing. And really on a desert island, I suppose you'd have time to lean back and think that all through again. And would you be utterly desolate sitting there thinking back through it all?

Alan Alda27:06

Uh I probably, knowing myself, there would be things when I'd c I I would uh I would probably I'd think what I would

Alan Alda27:12

Do I organize my day so that I'd set aside 15 minutes a day to cringe about past mistakes? I'd just cringe for 15 minutes and get it over with instead of.

Alan Alda27:20

cringing while I was at the top of that coconut tree, you know. It it's n dangerous to cringe then.

Alan Alda27:26

And I really have imagined myself on this island, and I don't think it's a beautiful island.

Alan Alda27:30

Uh I think it's scruffy, scrubby, not too much grows you can eat.

Presenter27:36

I wonder if your concept of the island indicates that, you know, behind all the

Presenter27:41

The happy, rounded optimism of Valen Alder. There's a kind of pessimist lurking in there somewhere, is there?

Alan Alda27:46

I wouldn't call it pessimistic, I would call it realistic. Even as I fantasize about this desert island, I'm prepared for a reality.

Alan Alda27:55

that will have n beautiful sunsets.

Alan Alda27:58

And cold nights.

Alan Alda28:00

You know, every boss. I mean, I

Alan Alda28:03

I like

Alan Alda28:05

I like to look at life that way, because life is that way.

Presenter28:08

Record number seven.

Alan Alda28:12

Oh, see, this is perfect. This is because Beethoven's Fourth Symphony has a gallop in it. I call it a gallop. I don't know what the musical term is, probably there isn't one. The the the it's it's it's a fast uh

Alan Alda28:25

A fast thing that just gallops along, and it makes me smile every time I hear it. It gives me strength, gives me energy, because as much as I want to be prepared for emergencies,

Alan Alda28:37

I most of all want to be prepared

Alan Alda28:40

to have fun. And uh it's a peculiar thing about the fourth symphony. The the Beethoven's fourth has this gallop in it, and I think so does Schubert's fourth have a gallop in it. And I think what happens is after they write three symphonies they suddenly get happy.

Alan Alda28:56

Pretty much, you know, probably any composer of Sports Symphony has a gallop in it, you know? Isn't that great? So this makes me happy.

Presenter29:04

Let's hear the gallop.

Presenter30:06

Part of the finale of Beethoven's Fourth Symphony in B. Op. sixty, played by the Berlin Philharmonic, conducted by Herbert von Carrian.

Presenter30:14

Pessimist or optimist, Alan Alder, I think you have to admit, really, that you've not been dealt a bad hand by life, have you?

Alan Alda30:21

have been very, very lucky very lucky.

Presenter30:24

So what's next on the agenda? More work, more money?

Presenter30:28

But on the personal front, I presumably you're not a grandfather yet, are you?

Alan Alda30:32

No, that I would I'm really looking forward to that. We have uh three daughters, two of them married so far, and uh

Alan Alda30:39

And they all want to have uh children and and and and we want to be grandparents. We I think there's a grandparental hormone hormone that goes through your body at a certain age and we uh stop women with baby carriages and

Alan Alda30:52

sort of drool on their babies and things, huh?

Presenter30:54

Yours is twitching, is it?

Alan Alda30:55

Yes, yes. I'm my my hormones racing now.

Presenter31:00

I think we'd better have your last record.

Alan Alda31:01

Well, I love the the Sgt. Pepper album, the Beatles Sgt. Pepper album. It r it

Alan Alda31:07

And uh

Alan Alda31:09

You could pick almost any tune. I uh Will You Still Need Me? I I if we if I any time I played that I'd uh I'd find myself humming it the rest of the day. I love their melodies, I love their their youthful exuberance and creativity. They it reminds me of of when I was a kid and and and tried to write songs, only they really wrote songs and and uh

Alan Alda31:29

And they had this joy of life and playfulness and I loved that.

Speaker 431:35

When I get old, I'll lose in my head Many years from now

Speaker 431:42

Will he still be sending me Valentine Birthday greetings, bottle of wine, If I'd be down till quarter to three?

Speaker 431:53

Would you lock the door?

Speaker 431:56

Will you still need me, will you still feed me, When I'm sixty-four?

Presenter32:03

The Beatles singing When I'm Sixty Four. So, which of those eight records, Alanola, can you choose one that's more important to you than the others?

Alan Alda32:11

I think if I had to choose one it would probably be um a l a a little night music. I because the people are so vivid to me in that. I think I'd feel like I was in the company of people.

Presenter32:23

What about a book? Is there a book that would inspire you?

Alan Alda32:26

I think uh not I I not not inspire me, I think I might have fun. I was thinking of um if I had a way to write.

Alan Alda32:35

uh either a computer or a paper, I would uh

Alan Alda32:38

I would maybe take uh Defoe's um

Alan Alda32:40

uh ROBINSON CRUSO.

Alan Alda32:43

Which was an imaginary account of a guy stranded on an island. I thought it would be fun to compare line by line.

Alan Alda32:50

that imaginary account with what really

Alan Alda32:53

happens. And there would also be a way uh to be rescued because I think if if a

Alan Alda32:58

If a literary agent knew I was writing a book he'd find me.

Presenter33:02

You hope. So that is that your luxury, this uh writing implements, is it?

Alan Alda33:07

Well, see, we have to negotiate a little bit here.

Presenter33:10

Yeah.

Alan Alda33:11

I really would like, as a luxury, to be able to cook my own pasta every day with imported Italian pasta and imported tomatoes with the Reggiano cheese, you know, and basil, fresh basil.

Alan Alda33:27

And garlic, a lot of garlic, and really good virgin, extra virgin olive oil. And you may think this is like a sneaky way to get a survival thing in here. It's not survival. If you would just come over to our house and taste my pasta, you don't understand I'm speaking of a luxury here.

Presenter33:44

You can have that if you don't wanna write the book, I think.

Alan Alda33:47

Oh, really? Oh, oh, that's wonderful. Well, well, I know, see, only you have to choose between these two things. You have to choose between writing and eating.

Presenter33:54

Yeah.

Alan Alda33:55

Oh boy.

Alan Alda33:57

This is tough. This is tough.

Alan Alda34:00

Because it's

Presenter34:01

Uh The pastor or the book.

Alan Alda34:02

Yeah, you see, I I mean, I I but the book

Presenter34:05

There's no more negotiation, is the pastor on

Alan Alda34:12

I can make my own books. You only give me one book. I can now I say

Presenter34:16

We'll give you two. We'll give you the Bible and you've got the complete works of Shakespeare.

Alan Alda34:19

The Shakespeare market.

Presenter34:19

You can write the rest in your brain while you eat the pasta.

Alan Alda34:22

Well, if I have Shakespeare

Alan Alda34:25

I can write in the sand,'cause it's all writing in the sand anyway.

Alan Alda34:29

Doesn't really matter. So I'll take the pasta, I'll write in the sand, and I can come back tomorrow and read it uh and I'll I'll see if I can forget it in between.

Presenter34:39

Alan Alder, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island discs.

Alan Alda34:42

Thank you for the pasta.

Speaker 234:51

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.

Speaker 435:36

Uh