美国国家公共电台 NPR In Shirley MacLaine's New Movie, She Has 'The Last Word'

 

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:

The movie "The Last Word" opens with a series of photographs. We see a baby then a little redheaded girl becoming an ingenue and, ultimately, a sprightly¹ woman in her 80s. These are all pictures of Shirley MacLaine. She plays a character obsessed² with designing her obituary³.

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE LAST WORD")

SHIRLEY MACLAINE: (As Harriet) These are obituaries⁴ from newspapers all over the country. I want you to read them and see what other obituary writers are doing.

AMANDA SEYFRIED: (As Anne) Wow. I'm sorry you don't like what I wrote, but that's that was just me reading about your life.

MACLAINE: (As Harriet) My life is not over yet.

SHAPIRO: So when this grande dame⁵ of Hollywood came into our studios, I had to ask, where do you want your obituary to begin?

MACLAINE: Probably, The New York Times (laughter).

SHAPIRO: (Laughter) Front page, lead story.

MACLAINE: Well, I don't know. What would mine say? I don't know.

SHAPIRO: Shirley MacLaine told me when she does live question and answer events at theaters around the country, people almost never want to know about her Hollywood roles.

MACLAINE: No. They ask about reincarnation and UFOs and how to find one's center and how to meditate⁶. It's all about the stuff in my books.

SHAPIRO: How could they not ask about - I don't know - "Terms Of Endearment⁷," "Steel Magnolias," your years with the Rat Pack or on and on and on - "Sweet Charity," going all the way back to Broadway.

MACLAINE: Ari, can I call you that?

SHAPIRO: Please.

MACLAINE: They're interested in themselves. And they come to the different places that I speak to learn about themselves not me. I consider that a great compliment.

SHAPIRO: It's funny. I read an article about this movie that described this as your first major film role since last year. (Laughter) And I just thought, you know, a lot of actors in their 30s and 40s are not making a movie every year. You are 82 and easily could have retired⁸ long ago if you wanted to. You keep up this incredible pace.

MACLAINE: Well, I do have energy. I'm healthy. I'm having a good time. I'm too interested in everything. I could sit and watch people all day. And I remember I used to do that when Warren and I were kids.

SHAPIRO: Warren Beatty, your brother.

MACLAINE: Oh, really?

SHAPIRO: I'm just letting some listeners know who might not be informed (laughter).

MACLAINE: (Laughter).

SHAPIRO: So the two of you would sit and watch people? Describe this for me.

MACLAINE: Well, my dad would visit some kind of - above a store place. I never knew what it was up there. He was certainly not into drugs. We would be left in the car with mother. I'm talking for hours, it seemed. So I learned to be very observant about human behavior, body movement, rhythm, what people are thinking, feeling and expressing really early. And it's never left me.

SHAPIRO: I've read a few interviews where you said, you don't know how to act. You can't act. You don't know anything about acting⁹.

MACLAINE: Haven't got a clue.

SHAPIRO: When I look at your just litany of awards of roles of standout films, what do you mean when you say that?

MACLAINE: Listen, really, I don't know how. I'm not interested in learning how. I like to be in the present of the idea that occurs to me. And you can't plan that. You can't make a study out of that. I'm not sure how I do it. I wish I could help people understand it, so they could do it themselves. The closest I've come to is, I have no past and no future in my thinking at that moment and just do what seems right for the character if we're talking about character.

And by the way, having a dancer's mentality¹⁰, I don't want to leave anybody out. So I don't make plans that would leave out the other actors, leave out the director, leave out whoever else - the DP for goodness sakes who wants me to do some standing¹¹ up because he doesn't have to move the lights, you know?

SHAPIRO: That's the director of photography, yeah.

MACLAINE: Really?

SHAPIRO: Just letting listeners know. I know you know the term. I'm just filling listeners in (laughter).

MACLAINE: OK, Air, really? (Laughter). And so I just live in the present, basically, I guess is my answer to all that.

SHAPIRO: You referred to yourself as a dancer just then, and I know that throughout your career you've always thought of yourself as a dancer first. In real terms when you're making a film, what does that mean that you see yourself primarily as a dancer?

MACLAINE: How she moves, how she sits - physical decisions to make about her expression relating to her body.

SHAPIRO: Her meaning the character you're playing?

MACLAINE: And then the other thing is my discipline. I have a work ethic¹² of a dancer. I'm not a diva. I try not to keep people waiting. I think my - I mean, don't do any research on this but think my extension of kept them waiting is maybe five and a half minutes.

SHAPIRO: You were about 15 minutes early for this interview.

MACLAINE: That's early. We're talking late here. And I don't do that. I can't stand thinking that people are expecting me, and they have other things to do.

SHAPIRO: So when you talk about bringing a dancer's physicality to a particular role, can you give me an example of how the physicality of one character that people might be familiar with you having played is different from another one?

MACLAINE: OK. Let's take Ginny in "Some Came Running" - one of my favorite characters by the way. She was this woman who always wanted to please Frank Sinatra - Dean Martin and them. And so she would sit with pigeon-toed kind of look.

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "SOME CAME RUNNING")

MACLAINE: (As Ginny Moorehead) I'd do anything. Ask me.

FRANK SINATRA: (As Dave Hirsh) Would you - would you clean up the place for me?

MACLAINE: (As Ginny Moorehead) Oh, could I?

MACLAINE: My character Aurora¹³ in "Terms Of Endearment" would never sit in a pigeon-toed fashion because she's always displaying outside.

MACLAINE: (As Aurora Greenway) It's time for her shot, you understand? Do something. All she has to do is hold on until 10, and it's past 10. She's in pain. My daughter's in pain. Give her the shot, you understand me?

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: (As character) You're going to behave.

MACLAINE: (Aurora Greenway) Give my daughter the shot.

MACLAINE: But every character has a kind of body swish to me because I was educated in dancing.

SHAPIRO: Your character in this film "The Last Word" is sharp-tongued, difficult to be around. One could say the same of the character you played in "Steel Magnolias" and the character you played in "Terms Of Endearment." These are some of your best-known roles. Do you think there's a pattern here?

MACLAINE: (Laughter) Yeah.

SHAPIRO: Well?

MACLAINE: I think I am myself sharped tongue. And they are written in penetratingly in that direction.

SHAPIRO: Well, we began by asking what you want your obituary to say.

MACLAINE: Ari (laughter). Why does this make me laugh? Why am I laughing? Because you think I'm going to die, and that isn't going to happen.

SHAPIRO: No because the whole film is about a woman thinking of and designing how she wants to be remembered. You spent how many months inhabiting this character who is single-mindedly obsessed over her legacy¹⁴?

MACLAINE: Yeah. Well, isn't this fascinating? OK, that's what I was doing. When I am the person who doesn't believe anybody ever dies, so what's the point of writing an obituary?

SHAPIRO: And yet, you know they will be written.

MACLAINE: Sure. I could say, listen, I didn't really die, so beware. I'm watching (laughter).

SHAPIRO: Beware, she's watching - is that the first line?

MACLAINE: (Laughter) You want to make a headline here, babe. I know, but I don't.

SHAPIRO: (Laughter).

MACLAINE: Let think about this. It's a good question. Nobody's asked me this. Let me think about it, and I'll get back to you in another life, how's that?

SHAPIRO: In another life? Shirley MacLaine, it's been an absolute joy. Thank you.

MACLAINE: Thank you.

(SOUNDBITE OF WHITE ARROWS SONG, "WE CAN'T EVER DIE")

1 sprightly   

adj.愉快的，活泼的

参考例句：

• She is as sprightly as a woman half her age.她跟比她年轻一半的妇女一样活泼。
• He's surprisingly sprightly for an old man.他这把年纪了，还这么精神，真了不起。

2 obsessed   

adj.心神不宁的,鬼迷心窍的,沉迷的

参考例句：

• He's obsessed by computers. 他迷上了电脑。
• The fear of death obsessed him throughout his old life. 他晚年一直受着死亡恐惧的困扰。

3 obituary   

n.讣告，死亡公告；adj.死亡的

参考例句：

• The obituary records the whole life of the deceased.讣文记述了这位死者的生平。
• Five days after the letter came,he found Andersen s obituary in the morning paper.收到那封信五天后，他在早报上发现了安德森的讣告。

4 obituaries   

讣告，讣闻( obituary的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Next time I read about him, I want it in the obituaries. 希望下次读到他的消息的时候，是在仆告里。
• People's obituaries are written while they're still alive? 人们在世的时候就有人给他们写讣告？

5 dame   

n.女士

参考例句：

• The dame tell of her experience as a wife and mother.这位年长妇女讲了她作妻子和母亲的经验。
• If you stick around,you'll have to marry that dame.如果再逗留多一会，你就要跟那个夫人结婚。

6 meditate   

v.想，考虑，（尤指宗教上的）沉思，冥想

参考例句：

• It is important to meditate on the meaning of life.思考人生的意义很重要。
• I was meditating,and reached a higher state of consciousness.我在冥想，并进入了一个更高的意识境界。

7 endearment   

n.表示亲爱的行为

参考例句：

• This endearment indicated the highest degree of delight in the old cooper.这个称呼是老箍桶匠快乐到了极点的表示。
• To every endearment and attention he continued listless.对于每一种亲爱的表示和每一种的照顾，他一直漫不在意。

8 retired   

adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的

参考例句：

• The old man retired to the country for rest.这位老人下乡休息去了。
• Many retired people take up gardening as a hobby.许多退休的人都以从事园艺为嗜好。

9 acting   

n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的

参考例句：

• Ignore her,she's just acting.别理她，她只是假装的。
• During the seventies,her acting career was in eclipse.在七十年代，她的表演生涯黯然失色。

10 mentality   

n.心理，思想，脑力

参考例句：

• He has many years'experience of the criminal mentality.他研究犯罪心理有多年经验。
• Running a business requires a very different mentality from being a salaried employee.经营企业所要求具备的心态和上班族的心态截然不同。

11 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

12 ethic   

n.道德标准，行为准则

参考例句：

• They instilled the work ethic into their children.他们在孩子们的心中注入了职业道德的理念。
• The connotation of education ethic is rooted in human nature's mobility.教育伦理的内涵根源于人本性的变动性。

13 aurora   

n.极光

参考例句：

• The aurora is one of nature's most awesome spectacles.极光是自然界最可畏的奇观之一。
• Over the polar regions we should see aurora.在极地高空,我们会看到极光。

14 legacy   

n.遗产，遗赠；先人(或过去)留下的东西

参考例句：

• They are the most precious cultural legacy our forefathers left.它们是我们祖先留下来的最宝贵的文化遗产。
• He thinks the legacy is a gift from the Gods.他认为这笔遗产是天赐之物。