Conversations with Steve Martin by Robert E. Kapsis

Author:Robert E. Kapsis
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University Press of Mississippi

A Conversation with Author and Actor Steve Martin

Charlie Rose / 1998

From The Charlie Rose Show, September 29, 1998. Reprinted by permission.

CHARLIE ROSE: Steve Martin is here. He first made his mark as an Emmy Award–winning writer for The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in the early 1970s. His long career spans the worlds of standup, television, film, theater, and books. He may be best known for such films as The Jerk, All of Me, Roxanne, and L.A. Story. In the past few years, he has returned to where he began—writing. He has completed several plays, including Picasso at the Lapin Agile. His new book, Pure Drivel, is a collection of his comic essays, taken mostly from the New Yorker magazine. I am very much pleased to have him back on this program. Welcome back.

STEVE MARTIN: Thank you. Nice to be back. We had a good go-around last time.

CHARLIE ROSE: I know, I was just saying to you, “It’s a little bit tough when you have a conversation that’s so interesting to me in looking at it later.” Where do you go? Because you can’t look you in the face and say, “Well, let’s talk about this, and—”

STEVE MARTIN: Just repeat the same conversation.

CHARLIE ROSE: I’ve forgotten what the first question was.

STEVE MARTIN: We’re both wearing stripes, after all.

CHARLIE ROSE: Yeah, I noticed. When I walked in—

STEVE MARTIN: I know. I haven’t worn this suit in a long time.

CHARLIE ROSE: Yours is more interesting than mine, actually.

STEVE MARTIN: Well, this has, you know—

CHARLIE ROSE: Mine’s a [crosstalk]. A little yellow and red there makes it better.

STEVE MARTIN: You know—well—

CHARLIE ROSE: Pure Drivel. [holding up book]

STEVE MARTIN: Thank you. Oh, you read it?

CHARLIE ROSE: Yes, at least the title. Now, why do this now? I mean, was it—what’s the idea behind putting this together?

STEVE MARTIN: Well, a couple of years ago—it might have even been longer—I started writing for the New Yorker. And writing the little comic pieces on the back.

CHARLIE ROSE: A dream of a lifetime for you.

STEVE MARTIN: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, to be in the New Yorker. I mean, once I was interviewed for the New Yorker by Adam Gopnik, and that was my highest achievement so—you know, at that point, and to now actually be writing for the New Yorker was—

CHARLIE ROSE: And then you did this program and sort of—it was—

STEVE MARTIN: Then it was clear sailing.

CHARLIE ROSE: Right.

STEVE MARTIN: Entree to the intellectual elite of New York.

CHARLIE ROSE: More through the New Yorker.

STEVE MARTIN: And I started writing these pieces and they got great response. And I kept writing, and I published some pieces in the New York Times, and then I wrote some new pieces for the book, and then there’s the book.

CHARLIE ROSE: I think Nora Ephron said that she thinks that fundamentally you’re a writer. That’s where you’re at your fundamental essence.

STEVE MARTIN: Well, I believe that the writing part of me is, in terms of my comedy, is where my pride is. And,

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