Buddy Hackett
Buddy Hackett plays a chauffeur on Fox’s Action.
Q: Hello.
A: This is Buddy Hackett.
Q: Wow. Thanks for calling. I was wondering if we can still do the interview tomorrow like it was planned, if you can. I haven’t prepared any questions yet.
A: Okay. But let’s talk now for an hour and maybe that will help for tomorrow.
Q: Okay. When’s the last time you had a Tuscan Yogurt pop?
A: The last time I did a commercial.
Q: But you weren’t eating them at home, were you?
A: F--- I wasn’t. It was delicious. The man who owned Tuscan had some brothers or cousins who were partners and they went with Dick Van Patten, and the sales kind of disappeared.
Q: Who wants to buy a yogurt pop from Dick Van Patten?
A: You know you’re being kind of, what do you call it, I don’t know, those wise-guy papers? Tabloids. Your being a little tabloid with me here and I don’t really like that very much. So don’t do that.
Q: Okay.
A: Also don’t do wise-guy things to me.
Q: What do you mean?
A: Like “Who wants to buy a pop from Dick Van Patten?” You’re trying to get me to commit to one of your ideas. I’m not going to do that.
Q: Well, I’ll try to come up with smart, non-wise-guy questions tomorrow.
A: God, there’s so many other things that are important. Are you just looking for a humorous story.
Q: What’s more important?
A: How to get along in life. How to find a sense of values that are important and stay with them.
Q: This isn’t right. Buddy Hackett shouldn’t be getting all serious on me.
A: I’m not getting serious on you. I’m just a very smart person.
Q: Well, I’ll call...
A: I’ve met a couple of women who had higher IQs then I do, and I was really bemused by it. Jill St. John has 162. And there was a girl, a dancer in a show I was in on Broadway, her name was Morocco. And she had over 180.
Q: Did you not expect women to have high IQs?
A: I didn’t say that, did I?
Q: You said you were surprised there were women had higher IQs than you.
A: No. Meaning two people who had higher IQs than I did.
Q: How high is your IQ.
A: 150.
Q: When did you have that tested.
A: When I was a child.
Q: You haven’t had it retested?
A: In the army, whatever the ATC was, you needed 110 to be an officer and I had 137.
Q: So you dropped from 150 to 137?
A: No. It’s a different kind of test.
Q: But the same scoring system.
A: I doubt it very much. The army doesn’t do the same as anybody else. They dig a well by going up.
Q: What?
A: You’re in bad shape, kid. They dig a well by going up. Where’d you go to school?
Q: To college?
A: No. I don’t know anything about college.
Q: I went to public school in New Jersey called J.P. Stevens in Edison.
A: Edison is a very pretty town. Very clean. Very lawned. It’s out of picture book.
Q: The malls are very nice.
A: The malls weren’t built when I was there. I was there 50 years ago.
Q: What did people do before malls?
A: People sat in the backyard and talked to each other. I lived in Leonia, New Jersey and next door to me was a guy named Anderson. He had a son, he was the cutest kid. And he’d walk in and suddenly show up in the kitchen and his opening line would be, “Guess what we’re having for dinner tonight?” And we’d say, “What are you having?” And he’d say, “T’ompany.”
Q: You have this reputation for being a dirty comic and you’re telling me cute little stories about kids. What happened?
[Buddy Hackett hangs up.]
Luciano Pavarotti
Luciano Pavarotti is a famous singer.
A: I was studying.
Q: Why were you studying?
A: The day after tomorrow we go to United Nations to sing.
Q: But Pavarotti shouldn’t have to study. You should know that stuff cold.
A: Everybody has to study. You have to warm up.
Q: That’s a good lesson to the kids. Are you at all nervous?
A: I am always nervous.
Q: Do you sing in the shower.
A: Sometimes. When I have to refresh new pieces. But very seldom.
Q: Have you ever been singing in a car and somebody asked you to stop?
A: I never dare to sing in a car of somebody else. When a tenor sings he needs more room.
Q: Even a station wagon?
A: Even in a bus.
Q: Have you ever karaoked?
A: No.
Q: You’d be great.
A: Yeah. I know. When we make concerts sometimes, new pieces you don’t know by heart, you go to a kind of screen that gives you the words when it’s your turn.
Q: Kind of like opera karaoke?
A: Yeah.
Q: Do you sing on your answering machine at home?
A: No.
Q: Will you sing on mine?
A: No. If you want I will sing in the shower the next day. I promise.
Q: Have you ever broken glass with your voice?
A: No.
Q: Even thin glass?
A: Those are stories you see in a movie?
Q: I hear you work out every day. How much can you bench press?
A: I don’t lift. I walk and a do gymnastics.
Q: On your last album you sang with the Spice Girls. Which do you find most attractive.
A: All four. I think they are pretty, very nice. They have a reputation to be too spicy, but with me they were very good.
Q: You’re used to spicy, aren’t you?
A: I’m not used to Spice Girls.
Q: Do you and Placido just make fun of that third tenor guy behind his back?
A: No. Why? He’s famous too. All three of us are very well known.
Q: Have you ever thought about making Julio Iglesias the fourth tenor?
A: It can’t be. The logo is three tenors.
Q: You’ve sung with Jon Bon Jovi...
A: Bon Jovi, Stevie Wonder, Celine Dion, Natalie Wood...
Q: Natalie Cole?
A: Natalie Cole. Not Natalie Wood.
Q: Who has a better voice Bon Jovi or Meat Loaf?
A: They’re different. Bon Jovi is very fresh. He’s a very fresh guy. I like him.
Q: He’s very New Jersey. That’s where his coolness comes from.
A: I know.
Q: You’re sometimes called the Big P. What’s that about?
A: I hope the P is for Pavarotti. That is what I hope.
[someone picks up the phone and starts dialing.]
A: Lasio me stale! No polo papolando!
Q: Who was that?
A: Somebody else on the line.
Q: You just screamed at them in Italian, didn’t you.
A: Yes.
Q: That was cool.
Ingrid Newkirk
Ingrid Newkirk, the cofounder of People for the Ethical Treatment for Animals, has a new book, You Can Save the Animals: 251 Simple Ways to Stop Thoughtless Cruelty.
Q: You know that animals themselves eat other animals, right?
A: Yes. And we pick on the vegetarian ones: turkeys, cows, chickens, pigs. We pick on the gentlest, least offensive animals.
Q: You know dolphins seem real nice but they gang rape each other.
A: They also can be sexually active when human beings are in the water with them, if they’re kept in a lagoon.
Q: Really?
A: Oh yeah. They’ve jumped a number of people in the swim-with program.
Q: They jump people?
A: They might decide to detect a cancerous tumor in you with their echolocation, or they might decide to jump you.
Q: When you did those anti-fur ads, how many seconds did it take you to convince Pam Anderson to take her clothes off?
A: She’s a real team player.
Q: Meanwhile, Naomi Campbell is not a team player. Just a big hypocrite.
A: Just not a big thinker. If somebody is waving the money, she’s pretty much there. Very few people would wear wolf these days.
Q: I talked to her for five minutes on the phone once.
A: That was a sentence.
Q: Yes. It sounded like I was talking to someone who had just been shot. It was very tortured and very slow. She’s barely with us.
A: If we’re cruel, we’d keep and enjoy a tape of her on E! where she tries valiantly to make a sentence. It goes for an interminable period of time.
Q: You wrote 250 Ways to Make Your Cat Adore You. Have you ever read 101 Uses For a Dead Cat? That book is funny.
A: No. Because, I like humor, but I’m scared of it because people can get ideas. I’m not one for big censorship, but having worked as a cruelty officer and knowing where people get ideas of how to torture cats, particularly, it didn’t sit with me well.
Q: Have you seen Fox’s When Animals Attack. I think it will change your mind.
A: I’m on that. I have an interview on it. They were very good at putting some sort of context to it. They had victims say, “Yes, I know why the mother bear tore my arm off. Her cub was there and we got in the way.”
Q: How many times a day do you compare something to the Nazis?
A: Almost never.
Q: I read you spay and neuter your animals. Have you no heart, woman? Do you know what that feels like?
A: Yes.
Q: Oh. I’ll drop that.
A: I think what’s cruel is that because domesticated dogs come in heat twice a year, which doesn’t happen in the wild, they can have a litter every six months. The shelters are bursting at the seams. No one gives them a choice, as we have, if they want to reproduce or not.
Q: Why do they have two heats a year now?
A: This interests you doesn’t it. It’s that age.
Q: When you were a child, was an animal perhaps your only friend?
A: No. I was at a boarding school most of the time, stuck with tons of kids day and night.
Q: I don’t like animals, but I love mischief. So let’s go do something.
A: All right. You’re on. We’ll dream something up for you.
Jimmy Kimmel
Jimmy Kimmel, co-host of The Man Show, landed his own talk show starting on ABC this January.
A: (Assistant:I have Jimmy on the line for you.)
Q: Hey, Mr. Network. You have other people place your calls for you now?
A:You know, Mr. Big Shot. I have meetings during phone calls, while the phone is ringing. But the truth of the matter is, it’s a big deal, and everybody’s excited and I’m getting all these phone calls, but five days into it I’ll never be heard from again. Even my parents will stop watching. Every three weeks they’ll check in and see what’s going on, but the excitement will wane.
Q:The Kilborne phenomenon.
A: Exactly.
Q: Now that you’ve got your big break, you’re not taking Adam Corolla with you. That’s what kind of friend you are?
A: I am an asshole. I have a history of it with Ben Stein as well. But Adam assured me he wouldn’t take me with him either.
Q: Without Adam Corolla, who’s going to provide the homo-erotic sexual tension on the show?
A: Adam actually will be under the desk, so we will have that.
Q: You’re taking over Bill Maher’s spot. He’s not the most stable guy in the world. have you beefed up on the home security?
A: Bill Maher and I are actually very good friends. The first date I ever took my wife on was to see him do standup when I ws in college at Arizona State.
Q: That’s a date?
A: With me, that’s as close as it gets.
Q: Did you get some after the Bill Maher show?
A: I think I did.
Q: You helped Carson daly start his career. What level will that land you in Dante’s hell?
A: You are a snide little motherfucker. I stand by Carson Daly wholeheartedly. He’s a good guy and talented. I’ve known him since he was 12 years old. I love him.
Q: ABC. Wow. Imagine the caliber of girls you’ll be able to get on trampolines.
A: You know, originally the Man Show was made for ABC. Then the stockholders and Michael Eisner looked at it and said this is filthy. But they gave use a million dollars to make our pilot.
Q: Did you smoke that? That pilot didn’t cost a million.
A: Well, you know, there’s a lot of skimming that goes on.
Q: Can you get me a job on the show? I have to get out of this place. they keep putting babies on the cover.
A: We’ll talk about it. We’re going to have to work on your attitude though. Did you get beaten up as a kid.
Q: Yeah, I did.
A: That’s what I thought.
Q: Is there going to be a lot of therapy like this on the show with the guests?
A: There may be. I’ve been thinking about you a lot and thought I’d point you in the right direction.
Q: How many strippers do you know on a real name basis?
A: Including the ones that work on the show? I think about six. Oh, wait a minute, I know a male stripper too. So make it seven. He married my cousin.
Q: You and adam were interviewed in the Anna Kornikova Penthouse that was pulled from the shelf. Why do the innocent always suffer?
A: That wasn’t us. That was someone else. And we will sue them if they say it’s us. You know, that may be the last issue of that magazine. It should be. This is karmic retribution for showing girls peeing in their magazine. It ruins pornography for me. I’ve never met anybody who finds that erotic.
Q: It’s good to see you take a stand on something.
A: I’ve decided to speak my mind.
Q; I worked for you for a week on The Man Show. You didn’t really use any of my ideas. Were they too complex and sophisticated?
A: We don’t really use any of the writers ideas. They’re really there just to hang out with us and watch games with us.
Q: So I did okay.
A: Although none of the writers really like you. You took shots at them in the article you wrote about it, but in fairness, I don’t think they liked you beforehand.
Q: Who will you never invite on as a guest.
Q: Oprah. And George Clinton. I stood next to him once at a taxi stand and he smelt horrible. Just the worst smell you ever smelled. Like a buffalo or something.
Q: How goddamn desperate is ABC? First the LLaverne and shirley sitcom and now this. They’re putting Dragnet on too. If somebody is going to make a mistake at least it fell in my favor for a change.
Q: Have you met ABC President Susan Lyne? She’s kind of hot. I wouldn’t mind seeing her on a trampoline.
A: She is kind of hot. She’s delightful. I tried to get Barbara Walters on the trampoline. She said, “You’ll never get me on the trampoline.” I said, “Don’t worry, you’ll warm up to.” She said, “Never.” So I said, “How about a pogo stick.”
Q: If you can’t get her, you can get Meredith Viera. She doesn’t wear underwear.
A: Is that right? We’ll put her on there.
Q: What is the talk show void that only a big heap of Kimmel can fill.
A: With Rosie retiring and Oprah announcing her plans to go, there is a niche for an overweight talk show host that only I could fill.
Q: Yeah. With BIll Maher gone and Larry King sure to go soon, will you be the least attractive TV host?
A: Oh no. Conan O’Brien.
Q: Some women find him cute.
A: That’s just because he’s on TV. Believe me. Some women find me cute too.
Lili Taylor
Lili Taylor stars in The Haunting.
Q: In The Haunting, the directors just sent you in the woods and tried to scare you. That must have been weird.
A: No. It was inside mostly.
Q: I think that’s The Blair Witch Project.
A: Hon, yeah. You’re confusing that. No, honey. This is inside. Honey, they stuck me in a house and had me run.
Q: I like that you keep calling me honey. Where’d you pick that up from?
A: I don’t know.
Q: Were you able to get into this movie, or did you keep thinking, “This is too silly?”
A: Very into it. And Jan De Bont, the director, helped me get very into it.
Q: On the set, did he refer to his Leonard Part 6 experiences?
A: Jan directed Leonard Part 6?
Q: Oh yeah.
A: Nope. Nope. He never brought that up.
Q: You’re writing a movie about your parents. My Mom won’t let me mention her name in this magazine. I say you get out of this now.
A: They didn’t have any notes on the script.
Q: Did you take it real easy on them?
A: Oh yeah. You can’t throw something in someone’s face.
Q: Tom Green does.
A: Who’s Tom Green?
Q: He’s on MTV.
A: I don’t have a TV.
Q: Why not?
A: It’s easy to turn it on. It’s not like I’m high and mighty. It’s like I’d probably never shut the thing off.
Q: You’ve been on TV. You were on Mad About You, back when it was funny.
A: Is it not funny? I think they’re in their last season.
Q: They’re done. Do you keep calling them for work and they’re not calling you back? You’re probably still calling I Love Lucy trying to get work. “What do you mean Lucy can’t return the call?”
A: I do read the paper.
Q: You won a Blockbuster award.
A: So they tell me.
Q: Is that the lamest award you’ve ever won?
A: Probably. Yeah, probably.
Q: You have a Golden Globe. But that’s becoming serious.
A: It’s a precursor to the Academy Awards.
Q: Maybe the Blockbuster is the precursor to the Golden Globes.
A: I don’t think so, sweetheart.
Q: I like that you switched to sweetheart. I feel like I’m at a diner. So how bummed were you when this whole indie thing died. I mean, Parker Posie doesn’t even do movies anymore.
A: I was very bummed. For like a year. At first I didn’t realize it was happening. Then I started being able to articulate what was occurring. Then I realized I had to accept it and do something about it.
Q: It’s like the seven stages of grieving for the indie industry.
A: Totally.
Q: You interviewed Sharon Stone for The New York Times magazine and she was just awful to you, telling you to wear a low-cut dress and more make-up. What’s wrong with that woman?
A: I kind of expected it.
Q: She hung up on me for no reason once.
A: She’s also very nice. The one thing about Sharon is that she is what she is, and for that I respect her.
Q: What she is is shallow.
A: But she doesn’t put on any airs. It is what it is.
Q: She’s up front about her shallowness. That’s nice. We respect her for that.
A: Right.
Q: Well, thanks for doing this. And good luck with the movie.
A: Are you going to see it?
Q: The Haunting? Um. Uh....
A: Do you like scary movies?
Q: Not so much. Is it really good?
A: Why? You don’t think it’s going to be, between me and you?
Q: Between me, you and the readers, no.
A: Why? From the preview?
Q: It’s a house that comes alive.
A: So you think it’s going to be stupid?
Q: Yeah.
A: And you got that just from hearing about it.
Q: The premise. It’s a scary house.
A: I don’t think it’s going to be stupid. The production designer is brilliant.
Q: I promise I’ll go see your movie about your parents.
A: Okay. Gotcha. Okay honey.
George Carlin
George Carlin, the author of Napalm and Silly Putty, appears in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.
A: The reference in your article on August 17, 1998--“That’s like stealing lyrics from Pete Seeger”--just mystified me. It implied that you were the only one who didn’t know I had a very active career with a Times bestseller at the time.
Q: Imus is still yelling at me about that. You’ve got to call the dogs off.
A: I don’t encourage, I don’t discourage. I just had to tell you so I could get it off of me and threw it up in the air.
Q: Of course, neither of us want to say that Pete Seeger isn’t still a powerful and interesting singer.
A: Absolutely. He’s probably less visible these days than I am.
Q: For 20 years, you owed the IRS money. Were you taking financial advice from Willie Nelson?
A: How that happened was bad business advice and doing drugs at the same time.
Q: Your next HBO special is going to be called I Kind of Like It When a Lot of People Die. Can I steer you to something lighter and funnier like Hitler May Have Been Right.
A: First of all, Hitler was a Catholic. People forget that. Hitler was also elected in a free democratic election. People forget that. That aside, he was a knockout dancer. Ballroom dancing was his specialty, but he could do a lot of other things. For me, watching this race destroy itself is immensely entertaining. I want to get these humans out of here so another phylum can take over. Time for the insects, I can say.
Q: I’m hoping giant worms.
A: Giant worms would be fine. But I’d like to see the ones with the exoskeletons for a change. Let’s see if they come up with sneakers with lights in them and snot candy and spray cheese. Then we’ll know there’s no hope for any species.
Q: The other advantage is we get attacked by aliens we’re not going to scare them, but giant insects? They’re out of here.
A: I think frankly the aliens are scared enough. No wonder we’re not getting any radio signals from these people: They’re not sending any. They’re afraid we may answer them.
Q: If there is a God, you’re pretty much screwed though, right?
A: Absolutely not. If he’s any kind of a fair guy this whole thing about judging your inner motives and your actions, I’m in the clear. I’m in good shape, Joel.
Q: If you had to pick an eighth dirty word, would it be “balding”?
A: No. I’m proud of that. That’s fine with me. “Religion” would be.
Q: There’s a joke in your book, “Every six minutes there’s a rape in this country and boy is my dick sore.” How did you come up with that? You kill me.
A: You hear such and such happens every 14 minutes. On the rape one, I just made that leap, that little neural leap. I said, “Here you are, George. Here’s the thought for the day.” So there I was.
Q: I’m glad we struck a peace.
A: I never had anything more in me than a lot of curiosity about how you could be in a national news magazine and not notice me being a little more active.
Q: We noticed. It’s just that you were an older guy.
A: Not quite as old as Pete. And way more active than a lot of the comedians who are younger than I.
Method Man
Method Man is touring with the Wu Tang Clan.
A: You like uptown, man? You like Harlem?
Q: I’ve only been to Harlem once.
A: You need to go up there now, it’s like Hollywood. Word. They’ve got the Magic Johnson Theater.
Q: I want to go brunch up there.
A: Brunch? Whoa. You say “brunch” up there I don’t think they know what the fuck you’re talking about. They’ve got a Starbucks up there.
Q: All right. I ask these goofy questions. If you don’t like one, just don’t shoot me.
A: Let’s rock. Come on.
Q: You’re known as Johnny Blaze. Wasn’t that Greg Brady’s stage name.
A: Johnny Bravo was Greg Brady’s stage name. Johnny Blaze was a character from Marvel Comics’ The Ghost Rider.
Q: I was checking out the Wu-Wear website and I like the skullies and the snowsuits, but the $50 navy twill dress pants---they’re to die for.
A: $50 pants? Jeez, ya’ll niggers is rooking motherfuckers, man.
Q: You didn’t know?
A: Hell no, I ain’t know. $50 pants, jeez. $50 is too much to pay for a pair of pants. I don’t pay for shit, so I don’t know.
Q: Wait, didn’t you have gold teeth with diamonds in them?
A: They hurt my teeth.
Q: I could have told you that beforehand.
A: The shit was killing me and I didn’t want to fuck my joints up.
Q: I bet you don’t even need silverware to eat steak when you have diamonds in there.
A: You can’t eat with them shit. (Looks at Raekwon, eating Chinese food with his gold teeth in). Well, some people can. But me, I couldn’t. The food get caked up in there and your breath be smelling like shit.
Q: What’s my Wu Name? I need a Wu name.
A: Whitebred.
Q: Thank you.
A: That’s the dope shit. I give most of the names out. I gave him his name. (points to assistant)
Q: Seven? Why Seven?
A: He’s Gregory. The G. It’s the seventh letter of the alphabet.
Q: Isn’t Seven the hot chick from Star Trek?
A: Is that the borg bitch? Yeah. She used to be a borg.
Q: And she’s not anymore?
A: No. She converted. I don’t how the fuck that shit happens. They lost me at Next Generation. Because Captain Kirk was the coolest motherfucker.
Q: What’s this movie where you smoke someone smart’s ashes and it makes you smart?
A: We’re going to start shooting in August. It’s called How High. A friend of mine who died, we smoke his ashes and we take the SATs. We don’t even remember taking the test. And we wake up and have letters saying we got accepted to Harvard. Then we have to find some more ashes. And we dig up the body of one of the Presidents at the graveyard they have of Presidents.
Q: They have a graveyard of Presidents at Harvard?
A: The alumni gets buried there. One of them, we dragged his body in the joint and tried to smoke his ashes, but he was crazy dumb and we got dumb off it.
Q: What do you use coffee grinders for?
A: To grind the weed. You have to break it up with your fingers and sometimes it’s so sticky it sticks to your fingers so when you’re rolling up it sticks to your paper and fucks your whole blunt up. When you grind it in a grinder, it chops it down and all the resin that’s left you can use that as hash.
Q: You should put out a book.
A: Parents will really love me for that shit.
Q: Does Inspectah Deck do any woodwork?
A: What you mean?
Q: You know, like inspecting people’s decks.
A: Yeah. He do.
Q: I’m sure he’s not cheap, but I need some stuff done.
A: Give us a call. We’ll come over and fuck your lab up. As long as you got Kool Aid, we’re all right. Damn, what happened to shit like that. Even the Quick Bunny’s gay now. Sugar Bear was the coolest motherfucker.
Q: You think Elmer Fudd was gay?
A: I think Elmer Fudd was misunderstood, with a small dick who compensated with a big gun.
Q: When’s the Wu Tang Behind the Music?
A: We just need one for Old Dirty Bastard.
Q: Because he’s already hit the low point.
A: They’d have to censor that shit. And put a warning sticker right before they show it: This is not recommended for children. Parental Guidance recommended.
Q: He’s crazy.
A: He ain’t crazy. Dirty’s always been like that. He’s playing with all your motherfucking heads.
Q: On your album 2000: Judgement Day you predicted the apocalypse on New Year’s Eve. Feeling stupid?
A: No. It was like I did a movie. It wasn’t like I was saying it was over, like I’m Nostradamus.
Q: You can hide behind that now.
A: I was playing off the paranoia myself. Trying to get slick on me with your little word play. I’ll bite the shit out of you.
Q: I was afraid of this.
Al Neuharth
Al Neuharth, the founder of USA Today, which will turn 20 this year,now runs the Freedom Foundation, which is responsible for both the Newseum and the traveling Newscapade.
Q: Now that the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times have made their papers more graphic and lighter, do you feel your mission of ruining American journalism has been accomplished?
A: No. That has never been a mission of mine. I feel that USA Today has had some influence on both the content and the appearance over the last 20 years for better or worse.
Q:What do you think of the new Journal. Still too wordy and factual?
A: First of all, I think The New York Times is a far better paper in appearance and content than it was 10 years ago or five years ago. I think The Wall Street Journal has improved its product this week.
Q: Isn’t it a little sad, though to see the journal try to use color? they put beige behind their charts.
A: This is a small step. And perhaps giants leaps are necessary. I expect those bigger steps will follow.
Q: But beige? Did the Journal grab their palette from 1984?
A: I wouldn’t be too critical. They have taken a small step in changing their appearance. Five years ago, when The New York Times moved into color they weren’t using nearly as much of it as boldly or effectively as they do know.
Q: How should USA Today retaliate? How long until they get a page three girl?
A: I don’t have any decision making role at USA Today. I give them my thoughts, but I don’t want to express those thoughts to you. But I don’t think there is any reasons for USA Today to react to what the Wall Street Journal has done. Circulation numbers indicate that USA Today is doing a pretty good job with its particular audience.
Q: You once wrote an article saying that stewardesses aren’t pretty anymore?
A: That’s not what I said at all. I said that in the beginning, stewardesses had to be registered nurses and they had to be young. I said if I were Donald Trump and owned the Trump shuttle I would try that.
Q: I think Trump wound up going with showgirls instead of nurses.
A: This doesn’t have too much to do with newspapering, Joel
Q: Does USA Today get screwed out of Pulitzers because people think of you as the guys with the snapshot?
Q: People don’t pick Pulitzers. When I was at the Miami Herald I asked Jack Knight, who was then the owner of the organization that is now Knight-Ridder, “Jack, how the hell do you win a Pulitzer Prize.” He said, “You get somebody on the advisory board.” Look at the winners and see how many of them have somebody on the advisory board year after year. Occasionally, they’ll reach out, when their conscious bothers them and pick a little newspaper out in the boonies, but generally it’s just those people on the advisory board.
Q: How do you get Craig Wilson on the advisory board?
A: You don’t. It’s pretty self-perpetuating.
Q: How could USA Today get rid of Larry King?
A: Are they insane? Editors make changes from time to time. I don’t comment on changes that are made in USA Today.
Q: You own a ring that says, in diamonds, “Al Neuharth, founder USA today.” That’s why they run so much wire copy, right?
A: I was presented that when they retired me. I shamed the President of the Gannett company into it. I said, “Oh you’ll give me the usual crummy watch.”
Q: What’s the name of your sled?
A: My sled? I don’t have a sled. I have children who have sleds, but I don’t have a sled. I don’t get the point Joel.
Q: People call you Citizen Neuharth. You’ve never heard that?
A: No. I’ve heard a lot of things. I’ve heard worse than that.
Q: Can you get me a job at USA Today?
A: These people keep putting a baby on the cover. I don’t work there anymore.