Marvin Hamlisch

Speaker 10:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Disc's archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen eighty three.

Speaker 10:11

And the presenter was Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:30

This week our Castaway is a musician, composer, conductor and pianist Marvin Hamlish.

Presenter0:36

Marvin, you're said never to stop working.

Marvin Hamlisch0:39

I enjoy working. I think it's uh it's something I love to do, you know, and if it's something that you love to do, you you do it. And I have this feeling that uh it's important for me to put work out that I think will touch people and will hopefully uh give them songs that they can listen to and hum and enjoy and laugh at or cry at and that's what I like doing.

Presenter1:01

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch1:01

You Have Gospel.

Presenter1:02

Eight discs with your w did you have any plan in selecting them?

Marvin Hamlisch1:06

Well, you know, funny enough, I've had certain favorite songs for a long time. And there are certain songs that always for me connote a certain way that I feel and a certain thing that that this when I hear the song and it makes me either laugh or it makes me get very kind of up.

Marvin Hamlisch1:21

And and things. And so that's why I've picked them. I mean, the first one that I picked is from a show.

Marvin Hamlisch1:26

which is Gypsy, which is my favorite all time Broadway show ever. I think it was the best classic Broadway show. I saw this show in New York about seven times when I was at high school because

Marvin Hamlisch1:38

A friend of mine could get house seats, you know? Yeah. And so I used to always see this show.

Marvin Hamlisch1:44

And when Ethel Merman would sing this song,

Marvin Hamlisch1:47

It just got you to be honest with you, it got you crazy because the voice, the impact, the orchestration, everything. And I think this is just one of those songs that if you're on a desert island and you need an alarm clock and a wake up call, this is exactly what you want to wake up to.

Speaker 42:00

Think that we're through, but baby

Speaker 42:06

You maze, well, you'll be great. Gonna have the whole world on a plate.

Speaker 42:16

Starting here, starting now. Honey, everything's coming up rose and

Presenter2:26

Ethel Merman, everything's coming up roses, from Gypsy.

Presenter2:31

Marvin, you're a New Yorker, we've gathered that.

Presenter2:34

From what part of Europe do your family roots come?

Marvin Hamlisch2:37

My parents came from Vienna.

Presenter2:39

Mm-hmm.

Marvin Hamlisch2:39

And uh that's why I'm still crazy for things like Sachetorter and all the good things in life, a little gulash never hurt, uh Vienna schnitzel. Your father was a

Presenter2:48

Uh

Marvin Hamlisch2:48

Musician. Oh yes. Played the accordion and conducted. Did you take to music or were you put to it?

Marvin Hamlisch2:54

I think it was a combination. I mean, I have perfect pitch. I could play at a very early age. My sister was taking all the lessons, and then the teacher would leave, and I could just go to the piano and just do it. What sort of music did you play? I played at that time basically, you know, the Bach and the Beethoven and the little cherny exercises. And as I got older, I started playing all that plus a little rock and roll, you know. So it was very clear to me at a very young age that I was never going to become a great performer of classical music, though I studied for 14 years at Juilliard.

Presenter3:24

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch3:24

Uh

Presenter3:24

You were the youngest pupil ever to go to Juilliard, I believe.

Marvin Hamlisch3:27

Yeah.

Presenter3:28

Did I vote?

Marvin Hamlisch3:28

Their entrance age was eight, and I got in seven and a half.

Presenter3:31

What subject?

Marvin Hamlisch3:33

Well, this was just to be, you know, to become a pianist, you know, to take just music.

Presenter3:36

Yeah.

Presenter3:37

Did this take you away from the other kids when they were out playing softball, you had your practice to do? Did it?

Presenter3:43

Where are you?

Marvin Hamlisch3:44

It didn't worry me because truthfully my mother was very liberal and felt it was important for me to play with the other kids. The problem was that uh sometimes they would have these nicknames for me, like I was called Fingers at the age of eight. You know, and I couldn't play hardball, I could just play softball. But no, I um

Marvin Hamlisch3:59

I never had that feeling like I was missing something, no.

Presenter4:02

When was the very first time you played to an audience?

Marvin Hamlisch4:05

Well, the first important one I was about nine years old, I I won a contest to play for an audience and it was a terrible affair because what happened was that I won. My mother bought me this beautiful, beautiful suit and it was kind of scratching me and itching me. You know, it was a very strange thing. It didn't feel right to me. So on the day of the concert my mother put pajamas underneath the pants so it wouldn't bother me that much, you know, the wool.

Speaker 14:28

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch4:29

And I went out on the stage and I thought I was going to be just brilliant, and I he started to hear people laugh.

Marvin Hamlisch4:34

What I didn't realize was that the pajamas were starting to show from underneath, you know what I mean?

Speaker 14:37

From underneath

Marvin Hamlisch4:39

So there I played Town Hall in my orange pajamas and a gray flannel suit. It was a kind of unique thing. Your second disc, Pete.

Marvin Hamlisch4:46

You know how people always say to you, I can't stand rock and roll, I don't understand the lyrics, it's terrible, it's so loud and thin. Well, I find that in rock and roll there are some groups that are absolutely magnificent. And I don't at all belittle some of these songs that I think are just wonderful. And there's a group that I am totally crazy about.

Marvin Hamlisch5:04

which is the uh Doobie Brothers. I think they're just magnificent. And they recorded a song a couple of years ago called What a Fool Believes, which I think is not only very sophisticated, but if you can understand the lyric, I think it makes a lot of sense.

Speaker 45:35

Poppy

Presenter5:46

The Dobey Brothers What a Fool Believes. What happened to you when you left the Juilliard?

Marvin Hamlisch5:51

Well, I was at Juilliard School of Music. I was at a place called Queens College and I wanted to get into, you know, show business. And there was a fellow by the name of Buster Davis who was working with

Marvin Hamlisch6:01

A girl by the name of Liza Minelli.

Presenter6:03

I've heard of her.

Marvin Hamlisch6:04

You've heard of her, right, right. And she and I became good friends and she told this man, this Buster Davis, that I was a very good pianist and whatever. So he auditioned me and he liked me very much. And the first thing he did was he gave me a job

Marvin Hamlisch6:17

As a rehearsal pianist for this television show. Which television show? It's called The Bell Telephone Hour. I don't know that you've ever seen it, but what it was is in America we had the show for about five years where stars, particularly middle-of-the-road stars and also opera stars, would come on and sing or dance. I mean, Baryshnikov or Gene Kelly. I mean, it ran the gamut. It literally was unbelievable.

Marvin Hamlisch6:41

And because of my Juilliard background, I could play for all of them. I could play for Leontine Price, I could play, and then I could play for Perry Como. You know, I mean, I was able to move around, so to speak. And that's what I did for five years. And what that taught me was, first of all, it taught me how to get along with, quote, stars, which is a whole other world that you have to get into. And it also made me really learn how to.

Marvin Hamlisch7:05

go through the whole thing of rehearsing them.

Marvin Hamlisch7:08

getting it on paper, uh doing the arrangement.

Marvin Hamlisch7:12

Seeing it done and constantly do it. So I really learned the craft. You know, it was a normal.

Presenter7:15

It was an enormous repertoire.

Marvin Hamlisch7:17

Yes, it was called Learn While You Earn is what we is what we used to call it. So I had a great opportunity and I did a lot of I remember Duke Ellington, for instance, was on the show and I would stand in for him and play. One of my greatest thrills in life was that Lena Horn was married

Marvin Hamlisch7:32

to one of the great pianists of all time by the name of Lenny Hayton. Incredible.

Marvin Hamlisch7:36

So I assumed that when she was going to walk in to do the show, that there was no question that he would accompany her.

Marvin Hamlisch7:42

And she walked in and she said to me, I hear you're pretty good, kids. So I left my husband at home. And I went.

Marvin Hamlisch7:47

You know, like that. And it was great to play for her. I mean, it was just wonderful. You know, very exciting.

Presenter7:52

You had no ambitions to be a solo concert pianist.

Marvin Hamlisch7:54

No, never. No, I in fact I was too nervous to do that. I knew at a very young age there was no chance for me to do that. And composing was for me simple.

Marvin Hamlisch8:03

It was something that I enjoyed doing and I loved the idea of watching someone else sing my music. I still love it. My biggest thrill still is when someone, you know, gets up and sings one of my songs.

Presenter8:09

Yeah.

Presenter8:13

How early in life did you experience that?

Marvin Hamlisch8:16

I experienced that particularly at high school. I went to a school called Professional Children's School, which is a school for all the kids.

Marvin Hamlisch8:23

New York City that you know are professionals and are on television, are in shows. And I was the composer for one of the shows, and it was incredible to have people who later became stars sing my material. Right from the beginning. Yeah, incredible. Record number three.

Marvin Hamlisch8:38

Well, there are certain landmark musicals in the theater, and one of them is Westside Story, which I saw many times. And it, of course, had the lyrics of Stephen Sondheim, who has turned out to be one of the greatest composer lyricists that we have. The musics by Leonard Bernstein. And what is beautiful about Westside Story is

Marvin Hamlisch9:00

One of the criticisms you always hear about shows today is, You can't hum it, you can't hum it, I can't hum it a melody.

Marvin Hamlisch9:06

West Eye Story was probably the most difficult show for people to come out of and grab on to any melody. It was just very difficult. But because it was so successful,

Marvin Hamlisch9:16

These melodies start to grow on you, and there's a song that is in its complexity it's so simple and the lyric is so beautiful that this is a song that really lets me be at peace if such a thing is possible.

Speaker 49:27

Oh, time and place. Hold my hand and we're halfway there. Hold my hand and I tell you there. Summer, summer, summer.

Presenter9:58

Rary Grist singing somewhere as she did in the New York production of West Side Story. I believe it was a a chance meeting with a producer that took you to Hollywood for the first time.

Marvin Hamlisch10:08

Right. I wanted to write Broadway shows. No one was letting me do that. I went to a uh party

Marvin Hamlisch10:14

to play the piano for uh

Marvin Hamlisch10:16

Sam Spiegel, mm, very well known producer.

Speaker 110:17

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch10:19

And I just played songs, you know, and things like that. And at the end of it, he was telling me about a picture that he was doing. He was looking for a new composer. And so I put in my two cents and then I came back to him about a few days later. I had read his screenplay and I wrote a song based on the screenplay. And next thing you know, I'm in Hollywood and I'm doing a score for a picture called The Swimmer. So that was my first one.

Marvin Hamlisch10:43

Burt Lancaster

Presenter10:43

Black is there was a

Marvin Hamlisch10:44

Yes, exactly. And one thing led to another, and I did a lot of pictures then.

Presenter10:48

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch10:48

Did you accept the discipline?

Presenter10:49

film writing, working to the stopwatch a few seconds at a time.

Marvin Hamlisch10:53

Yeah, well, you know, uh film music is, I think, sixty to seventy percent inspiration and certainly thirty percent mathematics, just to know how long you need, where it has to start, where it has to stop. And the more I've done, I think the more I've been able to have more inspiration and less feeling like I'm working to the clock. But in the beginning it was very much trying to be very correct and very, you know.

Presenter11:11

Yeah.

Speaker 111:11

Uh

Marvin Hamlisch11:15

Make sure that it's one minute, thirty-eight and two-thirds seconds, you know, be careful.

Presenter11:18

Be careful. How many feature pictures have you done?

Marvin Hamlisch11:21

Would you believe twenty six?

Presenter11:23

Uh

Marvin Hamlisch11:24

You know, so it's been a lot.

Presenter11:26

And of course you conduct your own recruiting sessions. You do the whole thing. The whole thing. You had three Oscars before you were 30.

Marvin Hamlisch11:27

Regarding set.

Marvin Hamlisch11:32

Correct.

Presenter11:32

The sting? What were the others?

Marvin Hamlisch11:34

Well, it was for the adaptation of Scott Joplin's Music for the Sting, and there were two awards for The Way We Were, for the score that I won and also for the song.

Marvin Hamlisch11:43

Yeah.

Presenter11:43

At what stage do you start, Mervyn? Do you start from seeing the shooting script, or do you wait for the first rough cut?

Marvin Hamlisch11:48

Do you wait for

Marvin Hamlisch11:49

I wait for the rough cut. You know, it's one thing to read a script, but in a movie.

Marvin Hamlisch11:54

You know, you've got to see what it all looks like, you know, the texture of what it actually looks like on the screen. So I wait to see the movie and then then start to get my ideas.

Presenter12:02

Obviously it the content, the musical content varies from film to film, but roughly how long does a film score take? How long do you allow?

Marvin Hamlisch12:06

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch12:09

Normally, you should get six to seven weeks. The truth is that the way films have been going lately is.

Marvin Hamlisch12:16

that for some reason I don't know why but

Marvin Hamlisch12:19

All of a sudden, you get the assignment and you're told you have exactly two and a half weeks. And you go, That's impossible. And they go, Okay, I'll get someone else. You say, Okay, I'll try it. You are really talking deadline time.

Presenter12:27

Yeah.

Presenter12:29

And you have a budget, of course, for the number of musicians.

Marvin Hamlisch12:31

Yeah, that's the easy part. The hard part is just getting enough time to do it.

Marvin Hamlisch12:36

Another record.

Marvin Hamlisch12:37

Now, this means a lot to me, this record, this you belong to me, and I'll tell you why. I was thinking to myself, if I'm on a desert island.

Marvin Hamlisch12:44

One cannot forget about sex. You know, I mean, that sex is an important thing in your memory on a desert island. Am I right?

Presenter12:51

I don't

Marvin Hamlisch12:52

Don't

Presenter12:52

Yeah, memory on it doesn't matter.

Marvin Hamlisch12:53

Exactly. And to me, the sexiest singer is Carly Simon. I just think she's just hot stuff.

Marvin Hamlisch13:00

So on a cloudy day on the island, it would be a wonderful way to kind of, you know, get from four o'clock to eight o'clock to hear You Belong to Me, which I just think is a hot record.

Speaker 413:13

Prove to me that you're beautiful to strangers

Speaker 413:19

Well I've got love and eyes of my own, my own.

Speaker 413:26

And I can tell, I can tell, darling.

Speaker 413:30

J, you belong to me.

Speaker 413:34

Tell her.

Speaker 413:36

I will not do me long

Presenter13:45

Carly Simon, you belong to me for a cloudy day. That's right. What got you started on Broadway? Now, you'd done quite a number of films. You had...

Marvin Hamlisch13:53

Yeah.

Presenter13:53

One Oscars, etc., etc.

Marvin Hamlisch13:55

Well, I had been this rehearsal pianist on shows, and one of the people I worked for was Michael Bennett.

Marvin Hamlisch14:01

And he called me up and he told me about an idea called Chorus Line. I was in California having just won a lot of awards and I decided there's no way to beat that. I might as well go back to New York, which is where I live, and talk to Michael. Got together with Michael, loved the idea.

Presenter14:16

Was it a rather difficult show to say?

Marvin Hamlisch14:17

Oh, yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch14:19

That's right.

Presenter14:19

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch14:19

Right. It was totally a new venture with no star parts.

Presenter14:19

Right.

Marvin Hamlisch14:23

There were practically no sets to talk about, and there was no real book. We were just searching for it, we were looking for it, we were trying to discover it.

Marvin Hamlisch14:31

And Michael had faith in me, and I've always had faith in him, and it was a wonderful collaboration. I think that what has to be stressed in doing.

Marvin Hamlisch14:39

A show more than a film is.

Marvin Hamlisch14:41

When you do a show, the collaborators must collaborate. I mean, that is the name of the game. If they all go into various departments, the show cannot make it. On a film, the problem is that the star leaves by the time I get it, right? I mean, by the time I get it, Catherine Deneuve is somewhere else. The director talks to you for a little bit and then he's gone. The producer's off in Santrope, and you're sitting alone with a Muviola trying to figure out what you're going to write for this film.

Marvin Hamlisch15:06

A show is much more exciting for me because it's foreground music, it's not background, and you you have a great say in what the show is going to be and how it's going to turn out.

Marvin Hamlisch15:15

A film to me is something where they hire you as a last resort. You know, you're the last person that they hire as the music.

Presenter15:20

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch15:21

Now chorus line

Presenter15:21

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch15:22

The long

Presenter15:22

Confuse

Marvin Hamlisch15:22

Stop.

Presenter15:22

New York run

Marvin Hamlisch15:23

Okay.

Presenter15:23

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch15:24

Any musical episode? How many performances?

Presenter15:26

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch15:26

Oh, well, it's over three thousand three hundred at this moment. It's still running. So hopefully we may get a shot at four thousand. How many other countries? Oh, we've been all over the place. I mean, I I haven't been to all the places it's been, but it's been around.

Presenter15:38

Lovely idea all those people in different countries working every night and making money for you.

Marvin Hamlisch15:42

Isn't that nice?

Marvin Hamlisch15:44

But you know it's a funny thing, you'd never write thinking about the money. It's really the work that I find the excitement. To to put something on the earth that wasn't there yesterday. That's what I like.

Presenter15:53

That's what I

Presenter15:54

Record number five.

Marvin Hamlisch15:55

Well, I like Bach because Bach is very straightforward, I find, and it is kind of um

Marvin Hamlisch16:06

Music that

Marvin Hamlisch16:07

It's like a diamond.

Marvin Hamlisch16:09

Depending on how the sun is hitting it, depending on how you look at a diamond, it changes all the time.

Marvin Hamlisch16:13

Depending on what mood you're in, this kind of music, literally, you can perceive differently. So it's not just hearing something, you know, and it always comes at you the same. This changes. So, depending on what mood I'm in, so I thought this would be good to have because my moods on the island would change. Am I right? It's conceivable.

Speaker 116:28

That's evil.

Marvin Hamlisch16:29

Anyway, this is a Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring.

Marvin Hamlisch16:32

For me, it's peaceful, but it also allows me to think about

Marvin Hamlisch16:37

my own thoughts and and get very introspective.

Presenter17:39

Jeez You Joy of Man's Desiring from Bach's Cantata No. 147, played by John Ogden.

Presenter17:46

Marvin, one of your shows, they're playing our song, a musical about a songwriter, is said to be about you.

Marvin Hamlisch17:53

True or false?

Presenter17:54

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch17:54

Well, you know, Neil Simon certainly wrote it about me and about Carol Bear Sager. I never totally felt that it was the real story of Marvin Hamlish because the truth was that he never did an in-depth study of me. He just found the idea very interesting of a team of writers who are lyricists and composer who live together and work together, which is exactly what I was doing at the time. And it was a very exciting thing to do, you know, to write with Neil Simon. That was a lot of fun.

Presenter18:19

And obviously if if it was about you, your music fitted. Yes, exactly right.

Presenter18:24

Do you like to do your own orchestration?

Marvin Hamlisch18:27

Well, I don't do the orchestrations on any of the work I do, except for the fact that I give quite.

Marvin Hamlisch18:32

large sketches to the orchestrator of exactly what it is I want. When I'm writing, I'm writing rather quickly.

Marvin Hamlisch18:38

And it's taking up time, and I don't then have enough time to really orchestrate. And to be very honest, I don't think I would be one of the great orchestrators of all time. But I do.

Marvin Hamlisch18:48

Indicate on my parts: I want the trumpets here, I want the French horn here, and here I just want a lady cellist for no reason, but it'll be fun, you know what I mean?

Presenter18:55

Be fun, you know.

Presenter18:57

How do you split up your year? Do you take what comes up or plan ahead?

Marvin Hamlisch19:03

Well, up to now I've done a lot of concerts. So when you do concerts you have to plan ahead because you have to know what city you're going to be in. I'm I've just about given up my concert career because I really just want to be doing the writing.

Presenter19:09

I

Speaker 119:09

Uh

Marvin Hamlisch19:14

So having now had uh Gene Siebert here in London, I will be taking a little bit of a rest and then we'll be going back and start probably on another film. I love to move around, meaning I like to do a show, then a film, then a this, then a that. Tell me about your your concert career. At what sort of concert? In America I played with a lot of um orchestras. I played here in fact with the um

Presenter19:27

Then if

Marvin Hamlisch19:38

LSO and so I've ha I've done concerts which I've really enjoyed with big orchestras playing my music.

Presenter19:43

And you like to chat to the audience. Oh, yes. And you like to do a better comic in the audience. Oh, and always, always.

Marvin Hamlisch19:44

Polyas.

Marvin Hamlisch19:46

Oh at all.

Marvin Hamlisch19:47

Yeah.

Presenter19:47

Yeah. That's part.

Marvin Hamlisch19:48

Part of the

Presenter19:48

It's communication, isn't it? I mean, uh,

Marvin Hamlisch19:50

I think so. I think that's I mean, to me, music finally is about touching someone, that the listener hears it and is touched in some way. And that's called communication. And some of us use it verbally, and some of us use it musically. Next record. Well, the next record are two records. I've always said that the most beautiful thing in life is when someone writes a really great ballad. And they are hard because ballads.

Marvin Hamlisch20:15

are meant to somehow

Marvin Hamlisch20:18

Be simple, but yet not banal. Somehow or other, they have to be original.

Marvin Hamlisch20:23

But they have to caress you. They're like a good wine. It's like you don't know why that ear is better than the other ear. You just know that it goes down good, you know? And two of my absolutely

Marvin Hamlisch20:33

Favorite ballads come from uh one show called Oliver.

Marvin Hamlisch20:37

Which is of course uh a London show that came to America in fact, but I think the London recording is much better and uh little night music and

Marvin Hamlisch20:46

Both of these songs, I think, are simple.

Marvin Hamlisch20:49

And yet

Marvin Hamlisch20:51

They feel right. One is called Where is Love? which is wonderful as a title because

Marvin Hamlisch20:55

That's so simplistic. To begin with, you think Oh, come on

Marvin Hamlisch20:59

And then it turns out it isn't simplistic. There's a fabulous fellow singing it, and it and it's what makes the London recording so great is because it is a real English child singing it. The other, I think, has become universally known as one of the great standards of the of the seventies and eighties and I'm sure will live forever, which is Send in the Clowns, which just

Marvin Hamlisch21:17

Is Sondheim probably at his best lyrically? A wonderful melody that he wrote. I mean, that's a great fusion of melody and lyric. And those come.

Marvin Hamlisch21:26

Very rarely.

Presenter21:27

You suggest that we should play these two together so we don't break the spell.

Marvin Hamlisch21:31

Exactly. Yes. Well, you know, when you're on a desert island, once you get into one of these moods, you want to stay with it for a while.

Speaker 421:36

Till I am beside this someone who I can meet

Speaker 421:47

Something to wear

Speaker 421:54

Where is love?

Speaker 422:06

Don't you love a farce?

Speaker 422:11

My fault, I fear.

Speaker 422:15

I thought that you'd want what I want, sorry, my dear.

Speaker 422:23

But where are the clouds? Quick send in the clouds.

Speaker 422:31

Don't bother.

Speaker 422:35

Uh

Presenter22:39

Young Keith Hampshire singing Where Is Love from Oliver, and Glynnis John singing that marvellous number from A Little Night Music.

Presenter22:48

You've just written the score for an American musical which has had its premiere in London, Jean Seaberg. Yes.

Presenter22:55

About

Presenter22:57

A not entirely successful American movie star. Whose brainwave was this?

Marvin Hamlisch23:01

This was the brainwave of a fellow by the name of Christopher Adler who came to me. It's his first show. And we started collaborating together. We've been working on it for over three years. We brought in a writer by the name of Julian Berry to write the book. And when we were all finished, I felt it was very important because it is a drama with songs. I felt it was very important to get a really great drama director. So you had it all complete. Well, we had version number one. We're on version 2800, but we had the first version complete, yes. And then we brought in Peter Hall. And

Speaker 123:29

We had the first

Marvin Hamlisch23:34

He was unavailable to direct it in New York City, and he told us that the place that he could direct it would be at the National, and that's why we came here.

Presenter23:43

How would you enjoy working at the National?

Marvin Hamlisch23:45

I like it a lot because people say to me it must be very different. I think work is work.

Marvin Hamlisch23:50

It's been a very good experience, and obviously we've had the ups and downs that you would have on any show and with anyone.

Marvin Hamlisch23:57

So it's been rather exciting and I particularly like the way he works because he's very flexible. The only thing I don't like is I'm not in his diaries and I feel that that is a big problem in my career. Well there'll be another volume. Well, I'm hoping maybe they do a supplement. Something, you know I mean something under H they look under it, you know?

Presenter24:12

We come to your last record. What's that?

Marvin Hamlisch24:15

Well, I thought vanity.

Marvin Hamlisch24:17

Should now take over because I feel like up to now I haven't played any of my songs. And I think there comes a moment when you're on a desert island where you say to yourself, Wait a minute, you know, it's enough with Sondheim already, let's go for the Hamlish. And this is just the song that James Galway recorded, which is from Gene Seaberg. This doesn't have lyrics, unfortunately. I mean, it does have lyrics in the show, but not on his because the man plays the flute. But it's called Dreamers, and basically it says that sometimes we need to change the way that we feel.

Marvin Hamlisch24:46

Cause to dreamers the real world can be unreal.

Presenter25:51

James Galway playing Dreamers from Gene Seaberg. Now, on this desert island.

Presenter25:58

A short examination as to your suitability for a castaway. Could you look after yourself? Are you a handyman? Can you build things? Have I brought a maid with me, or am I just alone? You're just alone.

Marvin Hamlisch26:07

Uh

Marvin Hamlisch26:08

I won't be there long, I'll tell you that.

Presenter26:10

Could you build some kind of shelter?

Marvin Hamlisch26:11

You mean just out of, you know, s stuff and the twigs and everything?

Presenter26:14

stuff like twigs and everything.

Marvin Hamlisch26:16

Not everything.

Presenter26:17

And what are you going to eat?

Marvin Hamlisch26:18

I like Chinese food, and you know they deliver anywhere.

Marvin Hamlisch26:21

So as far as I'm concerned, there's nobody.

Presenter26:22

Right. Are you a good fisherman? Have you done any of that?

Marvin Hamlisch26:26

You know, my uncle used to love to fish, and I thought it was a wonderful sport, except for one thing. I don't understand why you have to get up at four thirty in the morning. You do. He used to just fish all the time at four thirty in the morning. It's not my thing. Y as you can probably tell by my pallor, which is rather, rather, rather pale. I'm not an outdoorsman. You know what I mean?

Presenter26:44

Uh

Marvin Hamlisch26:44

I see. But I would do my best. I would give it my best shot.

Presenter26:46

Would you try to escape?

Marvin Hamlisch26:47

Oh, of c

Presenter26:48

What

Marvin Hamlisch26:48

But

Presenter26:48

Are you kidding? In what or on what? Would you build a raft?

Marvin Hamlisch26:51

Yes, I that I would do. Get a little wood, get going, and get my little eyes out, look for the nearest land, and keep going. You can't build a hut, but you can build a roof.

Presenter26:59

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch27:00

Huts are not important. Huts are not important.

Presenter27:01

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch27:02

Uh

Presenter27:02

Well, while you're on the island you have your eight record. If you lost seven of them in the surf one day while you were building your raft,

Presenter27:11

Which one would you like to keep? Which one would be most important to you?

Marvin Hamlisch27:14

Probably the Ethel Merman one because

Marvin Hamlisch27:17

Seeing that show, seeing Gypsy, changed my perspective of what it is that I wanted to do. It ignited me and said, I want to get into this business called Broadway Shows. So I would say that would be the one.

Marvin Hamlisch27:29

Could I keep the cover, by the way, of the Carly Simon? Well, I'll give back the record, but I'd like to keep the cover. Yeah, I'd like to take the photograph of that and I'll put the album of. Is that allowed? That's allowed.

Presenter27:33

You want my photograph?

Presenter27:38

Okay, it's a bit devious, but it's a little bit of a test.

Marvin Hamlisch27:40

Yeah.

Presenter27:40

And you're allowed to take one luxury, any one object of no practical use, something to look at, to touch. To enjoy.

Marvin Hamlisch27:47

Yeah.

Presenter27:48

Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch27:48

I have a picture of my mother when she was about 17 years old. That's one of the most beautiful pictures that I've ever seen from Vienna. And she was very, very skinny, and she

Presenter27:55

Yeah

Marvin Hamlisch27:59

Had a man take this picture'cause he was a photographer and he just thought she was so pretty.

Marvin Hamlisch28:04

And I would probably take that because every time I look at that picture, it's just, you know, it's a warm feeling.

Presenter28:09

Fine. We'll put it in some kind of waterproof case. Exactly, always.

Marvin Hamlisch28:09

What I

Marvin Hamlisch28:12

It's a

Presenter28:13

And you have a small library. You are given the complete works of Shakespeare and a Bible. And you can choose one other.

Marvin Hamlisch28:17

Yeah

Marvin Hamlisch28:18

Honey bunch.

Marvin Hamlisch28:19

Which Bible, by the way, because of my thing, I mean, King James is not going to help me. I mean, you're going to go for the whole Bible, right? I mean, both parts.

Presenter28:25

Both power

Marvin Hamlisch28:26

But not yet.

Presenter28:26

Oh yet. Yeah.

Marvin Hamlisch28:27

So you have one more book? I would take a phone book and hope that possibly

Marvin Hamlisch28:33

Something would happen like an E. T. or something like that, and I could make contact with the world. And when I make contact with the world, I want to make sure I know all the numbers. So I would take a phone book. The world's phone books? No, no, no, just my phone book. Your own personal, you know, Hi, how are you, Aunt Sarah? How's it going? No, I'm on an island. Don't call me. I'll call you. You know what I'm saying?

Presenter28:45

My own

Presenter28:48

How's it going?

Presenter28:51

All right. Yes, good. We'll give you that one. And thank you, Marvin Hamlish, for letting us hear your Desert Island Discs.

Marvin Hamlisch28:57

Thank you.

Presenter28:58

Goodbye, everyone.

Speaker 129:24

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