Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
A filmmaker whose releases from Jaws to West Side Story spawn phenomena and have reached more people than any previous Hollywood icon.
On the island
Eight records
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
It was one of the first times that a song led me to the theater, not the other way around.
Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin
It's the piece of music I most identify with my father.
Michelle came on… I look over at her, she's got tears in her eyes, and just before the song is over, she jumps over on my side of the car and starts kissing me.
What the World Needs Now Is Love
It's exactly what the world needs today. It's what the world needed yesterday. It's what the world needed 78 years ago.
One of my favorite signature Frank Sinatra songs has always been Come Fly With Me.
The Ghost of Tom Jod is one of my favorite songs that Springsteen has ever written.
Original Broadway Cast of West Side Story
I just remember this one song that made me cry as a kid whenever I listened to it, and that was Somewhere.
Cool HandFavourite
Whenever I hear this song, it just reminds me of just the privilege of parenthood.
In conversation
Presenter asks
2:14What does [making The Fabelmans] do to your fear levels?
It shoots them through the roof, of course, because I'm a private person that's going public about… I can't hide behind somebody else's authorship or a book or a genre or American history… I'm just stuck with myself right here talking to you.
Presenter asks
11:26When you were seventeen your parents divorced and your mother left the family home. After the divorce you became estranged from your dad and didn't speak for fifteen years. What happened?
I was upset because even though I knew where my mother's heart was residing, I also didn't understand why it was my father that fell on the sword… I had real problems with that.
Presenter asks
15:45You started making films when you were ten. One of your first was a three-minute western. Tell me how you shot it.
Well, it was for a Boy Scout merit badge… I made this little western… And they went crazy… At the end, they applauded like crazy. And I got bitten by this bug, and that was it.
The keepsakes
The book
John Steinbeck
It would be the grapes of wrath. It's my favorite book. And Maude Jod is my favorite maternal figure in terms of a literary character, a literary figure. My mom is my most favorite maternal figure, but Maude Jod comes in pretty close. And this book has just spoken to me ever since I first read it when I was very young.
The luxury
I would bring the camera made by Bolex and and if I had to stay on the island for a long time, I would wind the camera and put it up to my ear just to listen to the gears turning. That would be enough for me. That and the waves flopping in.
Presenter asks
23:45You are sometimes accused of being sentimental. Is that a criticism that bothers you or a badge of pride?
I think everybody who says I can tend toward the sentimental is absolutely right. I'm very nostalgic… but I never bristle when I hear that at all, unless somebody says it ruined the movie for them. And then that's sad. I don't like that.
Presenter asks
24:44Why does that idea of a positive message and an outcome drive so much of your work?
I think that hope is better than despair. And there could be despair in the body of the story. But if there is a solution or a promise of a choice we could all make collectively to lead better lives and live in a happier world, then I'm as a filmmaker, I'm going to make that choice.
Presenter asks
31:40You said your biggest fear was loneliness. How will you cope with the isolation of life as a castaway?
I won't be able to. I'm going to be one of the people that will confess to you that I will not be able to survive this island alone for very long.
“I'm a private person that's going public about, and I can't hide behind somebody else's authorship.”
“I got bitten by this bug, and that was it.”
“I think it's a scarier movie without seeing so much of the shark.”
“I think everybody who says I can tend toward the sentimental is absolutely right.”
“I would wind the camera and put it up to my ear just to listen to the gears turning. That would be enough for me.”