Peter Guber: King Is Good
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Hey, Peter. How are you? I'm good. I'm sporting the one of your many team colors uniforms. I love it. I love it. I love it. I usually record my introductions to my guests after they leave. Great. But you, I want you to sit here and take it. No, no, don't do that. Hey, everybody.

You have found it. This is the podcast. This is what you were looking for, literally, with Rob Lowe. And my guest today is the legendary Hollywood figure, sports figure, businessman, producer, author, Peter Guber. I mean, I've known you for how many years now? Since 1983? Yeah. Yeah.

And I know, you know, I've always wanted to have you on the show. I love you as a, just as a man and a person and all those things. But last night I figured it was time to be professional really is what it was about. I figured like, you know, you know, professional people. So I know people that masquerading as professional people, but they're not very professional. Well, that that's true. You've seen all shapes and sizes. So here, okay. You own, you're the co-owner.

Of four pro teams, including the Dodgers and the Golden State Warriors, you are a number one New York Times bestseller. I, sir, cannot claim that. I'm a New York Times bestseller, but never went to number one like you have.

I read last night, which I recommend to anybody out there listening to go and read what you wrote for the Harvard Business Review, which is the four truths of the storyteller. See, I write for stupid things like Vanity Fair. You write for the Harvard Business Review. That's one of the many differences in the size of our brains. This is my favorite, though. The movies you have produced have earned three awards.

billion dollars at the box office and have 50 5-0 Academy Award nominations. I'm just going to give you a little bit of a list. I'm sorry I'm turning this into This Is Your Life, but fuck it. I don't care. It's too good. Alright? So...

You have been in, listen, you've been a studio head. You've run. So that means you literally have said, make this movie. Don't make that movie. You produced movies, which as you know, means from the ground up working on them, but however, you've been involved in them.

The movie list is shampoo, taxi driver, the way we were, a few good men, Philadelphia, sleepless in Seattle, a river runs through it, city slickers, basic instinct. You produced Rain Man, Batman.

Color Purple, Midnight Express, Missing, Flashdance. And then when you decided to dabble in television, there was that show Seinfeld. But more importantly than all of that, you produced Youngblood with me. How do you like that? I do. You know what? It's like Ty Cobb said, it ain't bragging if you've done it, dude. And you have done it. So I'm really, really thrilled to have you here.

on the show. But I got to put a big asterisk next to that because you know, because you're you've been in show business your whole life. All right. Big asterisk. I let I did not do it. I participated in it. I helped it. I coerced it. I coached it. I ran the company or I put the thing together or I help. And there it's

These are all collaborative enterprises to say that the word I did it. No, I was there. I helped it. I nurtured it. And being responsible as one of the people that were deeply involved in it, yes. But you cannot take singular credit for anything in showbiz. Well, and that's the other thing that's great about you is you're so humble and so willing to –

to spread the glory and the praise to others. And as you know, there are, you know, we got one in the White House. It's like me, me, me, I, I, I, me, me, me, I, I, I, I, I. But it's true. What we do is a collaborative art, for sure. I mean, and I think people who aren't filmmakers or TV makers will be shocked to know that anywhere along the production line,

someone can elevate it beyond measure or fuck it up immediately. True. Which was, which do you think is, is harder for you? I'll ask you, which is more interesting later, but what, what did you, which was harder running, having to look at a script and going, yeah, I think this story about two estranged brothers, one of whom with severe mental disabilities is a massive hit. Yeah.

By the way, it doesn't sound like it when you pitch Rain Man. But you greenlit it. Was it harder to greenlight movies and pick and choose what to make with your investors' money? Or is it easier just to produce movies and put them on your back and try to sell them? Well, the last one, put them on your back and try to sell them, that was Rain Man. It started out as a television script.

rough television script that Barry Morrow wrote. And we labored with it for nearly five years before we got to the Academy Awards. So the journey was long, arduous, and at all times uncertain. With many directors doing it, developing it, and then dropping out of it. Sidney Pollack did it for a while and dropped out of it. You know, Spielberg did it for a while and dropped out of it. And, you know, a lot of directors dropped in and out of it.

So these projects are generally marathons as opposed to sprints. And so what you really say is what's really harder, what takes more tenacity or skill or endurance? They all do at different times in different ways. And, you know, if I used to say this to people,

because I don't remember, and I'm not attributing it to me. I heard it from somewhere, but I own this statement because it relates to what I do. If I made all the pictures I passed on and passed on all the pictures I made, I'd probably be still sitting here talking to you. So I'm not sure I could take any credit for anything. That's true.

You think that's the batting average? Yeah, well, you know, it's a funny thing. If you're in the game, a lot of stuff comes across your screen and you're picking and choosing and you're developing things and some things work, some things don't work and fate and circumstance shines on you. The movie God is very perverse, you know. Just when you think your life's over, they give you, you know, some film or some of the last dance. They give you your last act and they give you Youngblood, your first act.

You know what I mean? So you're just, you're not in charge, but you're in charge of how you react to it. So, you know, you have to have too much hubris to believe that, you know, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I did this. I worked 10 years. I look at what I did. Look what I did. And sit down. Those 15 seconds of the award, whether it's the Golden Globe, whether it's the Grammy, whether it's the beer in Germany, whether it's the

The Cesar. I was talking about the Cesar with Alec Baldwin. That 15 seconds for that piece of plastic or metal isn't what it's about.

It's the journey. It really is the journey. It's what makes up you. You know, it's what holds you together. It's the stuff that you look at and say, yep, I know what I went through to help get that produced, made, developed, the changes you do. And you have to take that has to nurture you. It can't be the credit or the box office or whatever.

It has to be your own internal engine that you march to that you feel is fulfilled by the process. And I think that's what you do. Do you feel like it's harder to make? Look, I'm just looking at some of the credits again. I mean,

A River Runs Through It is not made as a movie today. No fucking way. But that's a good story. That's a really good story. All right. It's a story about fishing. No, no. But listen, that's what I'm going to tell you. So I'm running Sony. Too much fishing in it. No, but listen, it's a great story. I'm running Sony. The whole company, the whole gigantic company.

And I wasn't running the movie companies. That was John Dole. And I wasn't running the studios at that time. There were two different studios, men running it and women running it. And I wasn't the head of production. There were people there. And we used to give the budgets out to each company and what they would do. And one day, this rascal comes running into my office and saying, Mark Canton says, we have to make this movie. We have no money in the budget. It's River Runs Through It. I said, River Runs Through what?

And he says, this is the river. I said, but I don't make that decision. Go see them. He said, no, they don't want to make it. They won't make it. You're the boy. I'd say, I don't do that anymore. He said, yes, you've got to look at it. So what's it about? He says, fly fishing. I said, I'm going to choke you to death right now. I'm going to reach across the table and make sure you never can speak again to anybody. You want us to make a picture about fly fishing? Fly fishing? Are you crazy?

Fly fishing? He came back time and time again. Then he brought Bob Redford back. Bob Redford was the director at that time. He said, I want to make it. When he brought Bob Redford back, he had me at hello. That was one of the problems. Even with fly fishing? Even with fly fishing? Here was the problem.

He said, I said, you don't have the money in the budget. I said, I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll take 5 million, you need 5 million more, out of the next year and give it to you this year. But you're going to pay for it next year. You're going to have less currency in your company. I'm going to tell the head of the studio, the head of your studio and the head of production that.

But man, you better catch a fish, man. And he did, you know. So everybody makes decisions along in the process. That happened to be one of the seminal decisions that got that picture made with Sony. It might have been made with somebody else. Somebody else could be sitting here talking about that movie. You know, fate and circumstance play such a part in success and failure. But by the way, but I don't believe today whoever's in your position at that company now

And that exact same thing happens. And somebody comes in with, who would it be? It was Redford then. First of all, here's half the problem. Who would it be today? It might be Leonardo DiCaprio. Could be Matt Damon.

Could be Christian Bale. There are some really fine superstar actors that still move the meter. I mean, nobody guarantees it like it was back then. More guarantee. But, you know, you're making the... You have to make... If you're in the movie business, you have to make movies. You have to greenlight them. You can't wait, you know, for what you think the perfect script is. I waited once for the perfect script. It was with Mike Nichols and Warren Beatty and Jack Nicholson and a whole... And... Oh, those hacks. Forget those guys. Those hacks. Jesus. And it was called...

I can't remember what it was called, but it was a flop. I know what it was called. It was, was it the Elaine May? Was it, did Elaine May write it? Who wrote it? Elaine May, I think wrote it. It was, it was what they, it was two films, shampoo and that film. Both were being greenlit at the same, at the same time for Warren Beatty. And, uh,

I mean, so we picked the two. We said, we don't want to make the one about the hairdresser. We don't want to make that ridiculous film, the hairdresser. We want to make the other one with Mike Nichols. Well, we made them both. And Mike Nichols was the flop and the hairdresser with shampoo was the hit. Go figure. If you just sat in a screening room, though, and seen both as a double feature before you released them, would you have known the difference? Well, let me say, I would have probably...

been insecure as I was when I made the decision. I'm not sure. It's the old story. When can you tell us a hit? You can tell us a hit when the box office fills up. You know, just nobody really, really knows till the audience turns up. Because

I think Shampoo was a unique picture with Hal Ashby directing and really well done, and Julie Christie and Warren Beatty. But Mike Nichols' picture with that cast and that director, holy moly, that was the gold standard. But there are no sure things in baseball or in movies. And I look at movies, I look at things like, you know,

By the way, Midnight Express, one of my favorite movies, doesn't get enough credit today. I mean, my memory of Midnight Express was it blew... It blew my mind. It blew...

It just it's like cuckoo's nest. It's like one flew over the cuckoo's nest for me, where a movie that is seminal formed like what it means to be an actor. I remember being in the movie theater and it was so intense and all of those things. Am I? I'm not wrong in that. Right. That my recollection of experiencing it as a 15 year old boy.

Is exactly as it was, correct? A giant mother of a hit that nobody even suspected that the club that I was a producer then and Columbia didn't even want to after they made the picture, didn't want to release it, didn't want to release it. So they decide they take it to France, the con where we could get buried, you know, in the in the director's sections.

And it's like anything. It took off around them and it made a big change. I remember when the government, they said the government is going to prevent this film from coming out because it's pro-drug and this and that. It's going to stop, it's going to stop. I thought, okay, that's what's going to happen. Instead, the government said, this is the best anti-drug film we've ever made. We're going to play the music and all the customs halls for the next three years for everybody coming back to the country. Laughter

Man, if I was carrying a joint and they started playing that Giorgio Moroder theme, I would lose it. Right, right. Oh, my God. I mean, that movie made going through customs more frightening than swimming in the— I was way more frightened of going through customs than people were seeing Jaws and going in the water. Right. 100%. Right. Hold that thought. We'll be right back.

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So it's funny that you said Rain Man was a TV series. I want to circle back to that for a minute. It was a TV series? Did I hear you right? You said you just said that, right? TV movie of the week. TV movie of the week. It's funny because how everything in life comes full circle.

I had a meeting with a very famous producer about two years ago who wanted to work with me and do something in television. And he owned the TV rights to Rain Man. And I was like, and he's like, and you'll play the Tom Cruise part and blah, blah, blah, blah. And I started thinking about it. I said, wait a minute. Let me just let's just walk this through to its logical conclusion. It works as any form of a TV series, which is a big if.

That means that whoever is playing the Dustin part is killing it. Right. Which means I will be sitting in the front row of every awards ceremony applauding him with a statue. Right. Am I wrong? Was that thinking exactly right? You're 100%, a thousand million percent right. Absolutely right.

I actually thought Tom Cruise should have been nominated and won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. I thought he was great in that movie. Great. He's great in it, and it's one of those parts that – the movie doesn't work without Tom. It doesn't. I mean, Dustin's got the showy and crushes, as he wants to do, but that movie doesn't work without Tom supporting it. And I just –

That's what 40 years of being in show business gives you is that kind of perspective. Totally. Where I'm like, hmm. Yeah. So if we catch the heel. Very smart decision. They had you at What About? And you knew it didn't sound right. What about? Here's, you know what was interesting is you also were involved with one of my favorite movies, American Werewolf in London.

And I love that movie so much. And I was talking to Jason Blum, who does all of the great horror movies today. He's an amazing business. He's a really smart man and

And just, I mean, has crushed it, 100% crushed it. And I said, he wanted to do something and we were trying to, I said, let's, is there a version of a movie like American Werewolf in London to be done? Because it's been forever. It's another one of those movies that I think is underappreciated and there are generations of people I don't think that are as familiar with it as they should be. And he was like, you can't make that movie today. So what do you mean?

You just can't make it. Cannot make it. Because I make horror for a living. I wouldn't know how to sell it because of that tone. And I thought, what a shame. Yeah. What a shame. But he's right. The scenes in American Werewolf in London where Griffin Dunn is decaying in the movie theater over and over and talking to McNaughton, it's just hilarious and frightening. And they don't think they could do it today. Films are always...

Most always live within the period they're made. Very few films, very, very few films, very, very few films, you know, transition, uh,

into another era, another period, either the filmmaking or the narrative. I mean, you take a film like Godfather, you can still watch it today, young eyes will watch it and find it, you know, compelling and beautiful and interesting, but more reflective. It doesn't have the pacing or the tone of today's films. So it's a contemporary art form. And so you run that risk of films having that, that,

Short lifespan, but powerful lifespan. Well, then how do you avoid the old man yelling at the clouds meme? Like, in the days when we used to be able to take time to tell a story. Like, I don't find anything wrong with the Godfather's pacing. And yet, you're right. It wouldn't be made like today. Couldn't be made like that today. And you've been through all of it. And another one of the things I love about you is...

Your perspective on life is that of somebody who's still in their 20s. Like there's no notion coming from you that you it was better at a former time. Although clearly, clearly some things had to have been better. I'm not saying all of it, but it's so easy even at my age to look back and go, man, music today sucks. You want great music. I will I will pitch you 1970s.

1979 to 1985. And go ahead, try and beat it. Go for it. And I never get that off you, ever. You're like, today is the best day that ever was. How do you do that? Well, you know, I have a motto. The past is history.

The future is a mystery. The present's a gift. That's why they call it the present. So I try to live and do what I need to do today to feel fulfilled and positive and constructive in my life and participating with the tools and resources that the marketplace gives me. That's my dog barking. I got to tell him to shut up. Shut up!

Okay. He got quiet. That's direction. That's the good director. That's real power. Another thing that I didn't notice about you, were you really a juror in the Winona Ryder shoplifting trial? Yeah, that was an out-of-body experience, you know, and that was truly, I retreated to another place. You know, I retreated into a place where I couldn't believe it. But, you know, when you're asked the question by the judge,

The main judge with the D.A. sitting there and just asked you one question when you were being reviewed or whether or not they got being on the trial. I wanted to be off it no matter what. I didn't want to be in the jury and a jury. He said, let me ask you something, Mr. Goober. I want to know this answer. Yes or no. Will you tell the truth? Will you give the truthful answer to your view?

Now, I thought, I say, no, I won't. I look like the biggest dope on the planet. Yes, I will. That's going to mean my fate is sealed. I'm worried. I said, yes, I will. Of course. I always tell the truth. But is there any reason that you shouldn't be on this jury? I said, I could list 35 of them. Will any of them change your mind? He said, no. I was cooked. So that was it. Two weeks. They did two weeks of listening to people talk.

And really getting a sense of what a jury is about, which I said, I'm never going to break the law to be in front of these 12 people. Never, never, never, never. Because they, you know, they had all predispositions of what the person did and how he did it or she did it or what it was. And it wasn't no it wasn't no pretty television show. That's for sure. Really? So behind the scenes of it.

of a jury. It wasn't like 12 angry men. It was like 12 angry people because they, when the, one of the jurors, male jurors said, well, you know, she has to be guilty. She went in and bought two barrettes

just before she took the stuff, supposedly, two barrettes for $25 a piece. So I said, sir, my daughters also bought barrettes for $25 a piece at stores. Would that make them guilty too? I mean, the whole idea of the way people see and focus in these things is scary with a jury. You know, they bring their own predisposition, their anger, their drama to it. It was...

It was both boring and interesting at the same time.

Two weeks of it was too much. It should have been, should have been all done in an hour. But it's what it is. My, my, my dad is a lawyer in Ohio. Trial lawyer has been for over 55 years and he just marvels in California. He said the average case in California would be one day. Yeah. In Ohio. Crazy. It's crazy. That's crazy. Um,

I also love your – and then we've got to get into sports at some point. But I love that you're so articulate and specific about the power of storytelling.

and um and its power beyond show business i mean obviously in show business we have got nothing if we don't have stories but you you have you have a very um fine way of talking about its power in the larger scope and and i agree with you i would argue that storytelling might be the most powerful tool that man has don't you think absolutely if you really realize it um

At the end of the day, people couldn't transmit or transform or move anything, any information across the population without narrative. You couldn't hold the information unless you had the context of narrative. You couldn't hold it. You couldn't remember.

Remember it. The idea is narrative gives the emotional base, the contextual base to information, which propels people to action. So the idea that you can have the skill, whether through voice or writing or tele, just plain visual skill of telling your narrative, telling your story is a totally empowering tool. And despots used it to great extent and have made careers and turned worlds around and

you know, poets have done it and, and magicians have done it with words and dialogue and gestures, all part of storytelling because you want to move people to action. I use a word that I use for it that I think is that I, I,

It's emotional transportation. It moves people emotionally. And when you move people emotionally, you capture them. You can't just give them information. It's resonant, memorable and actionable when it is in a narrative form. And so teaching young people how to understand and decode information, decode story and how to recode it so they can get people to collaborate and conform to laws and rules or work together in industries or businesses is a crucial part.

a crucial, crucial humanistic tool. And without it, you're in deep trouble. Do you think that storytelling has the same kind of people practicing it that it had in the past? I guess what I'm really asking is, is there any notion that storytelling is slightly a lost art or no? No, I think that whether it's...

three lines on a television commercial or whether it's a speech by a political foe or somebody that you're in favor of, or whether it's editorial. I don't think anything could have been lost from that importance of narrative. The idea that you can shape

How you see something, you shape it with narrative. You shape it with what it means to you. How do you feel about it? That contextual reality is why we're alive. It is the sine qua non of our humanness. We do it in our religions. We do it in our faith base. We do it in our social area. We do it in our political area. We do it in our sports area. You know, they won four to two. That's a piece of information. You don't remember. Ah, they won four to two with two outs.

and two strikes and no balls in the ninth inning, and they won four to two. How'd they do that? So it has the ability to create curiosity in people. It has the ability to be able to transform people's actions, to move them to action. So it's an art form that's not really taught really well because we learn it ad hoc from our parents when we're young, either to shut up and don't say anything or just give me the information, whatever.

We learn it, you know, with all kinds of repercussions if we don't learn it well. But the real masters of it, whether they're despots or whether they're our heroes, have really been the archetypal people who have delivered narrative and success. And you'll see it in sports people, and you see it in movie people, you see it in television people, you see it in politicians, you see it in everybody. You see it in mothers and fathers. If a mother or father can narrate to their children

With their stories, they can give them tools and resources and resourcefulness they can use all their life. Information is a cold comfort. It doesn't do much. It's only when it's wedded into a contextual reality of narrative that it provides propulsion, what I call emotional transportation, and moves people to action, to believe in something, to do something, to take action, to reconsider something. And without that, you don't got it.

Well, you know, that's what I believe. I teach that. I think that's the most important thing.

You know, I'm so did that. I want to run through a motherfucking wall right now. It's got me so pumped. That is. Let me give you the synachron since you're a great actor. I want to tell you something. You hate me. You just say you hate me. You just loathe and detest me. It's disgusting. You don't like what I life's about. You don't like that. OK, now there's another me. You love me more than anything in the world. You're the greatest thing. You had great success with me and all terrific.

The hate me guy that you hate, the other guy, this other person gives you a script and the love you guy gives you up. The hate guy gives you got the guy you love, gives you a script and it's shit. I mean, from the first three sentences of the script, you go, oh, well, how could you even get it? It's just absolute shit. I love this guy. I love him. But it's crap. The guy you hate is just giving you Lawrence of Arabia or the Godfather and you hate the fucker. You know, just hate him. All right.

You're going to find a way to do that script because you know what's on the page is the goal. And the other guy you love a lot, but you're going to have dinner with him, but you ain't going to do that movie. So that's the power of narrative. It speaks itself. There's a very important truth. Now, actors bring great value and performance and nuance and quality, but you can't put in what God left out. If you have a crappy script and you're in a play and you're the actor, you're

Make it a little better, but crap is still crap. And great, if it's great, you can make it even greater and better and give it nuance. So, you know, those stories are an emotional currency that we all look for in our lives and in the writings that we choose to do in movies and television or in political framework.

Look at the politicians that raised people to your action, just crazy action with their stories and speeches. And look at the people that brought us great faith and hope and expectation with their political speeches. It's, you know, the story. Here's what I used to say. If it ain't on the page, it ain't on the stage. So show me the script and I'll show you the money. And we'll be right back after this.

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Do you have any recollection of where you were when you read a certain thing? You've seen so many great strips. Like, I remember where I was when I read The West Wing for the first time. Does anything pop out to you where you go, holy shit, I remember turning the page and it was whatever. What project was that? I was a producer before I ran Sony. I was a producer before I ran Sony.

And after I had run Columbia and after I run the other company that would produce for a number of years. And I was friendly with Marvin Hamlisch and different Broadway people, David Merrick and stuff. So I'd always go off Broadway to pap. There's such. And I wanted to see the show that that just was opening. Then no reviews was in workshop. And I asked I had some clout by being in the business. I asked this this this.

I said, can I get this show? It was sold out. It was like a 99-seat theater. I don't remember what it was, 200 seats. It was a small theater in New York. I wanted to see it.

And they set up a chair for me in the aisle and I went and I saw it. And I was 10 minutes into it and I couldn't sit still. I wanted to get over so I could try to buy the show. 10 minutes into it, I had seen something that was like, oh, my God. By the time to the end, I was I had I had herpes on my head because I was sticking my arms around myself. I couldn't move. It was called A Few Good Men. And I looked at it. I said, we got to buy it. I went back to the studio. I said, you got to buy. We got to buy. I got to buy. I got to buy. I got to buy this.

We bought the play and later when I became head of the studio, Rob Reiner found it, made it into a movie. But when you read Aaron Sorkin, when you see somebody who can really put

put the magic of words and story and narrative together in such a way that you'd watch about some story about two guys in Guantanamo Bay and think you'd be compelled to it because it was really about something more than Guantanamo Bay. It's about something that was inherent in your life. You see that power, that narrative. It's so powerful. I couldn't sleep at night. I just had to figure out a way to get that show. Guys, it's so funny because I...

When we were doing West Wing, that show made air and air and wrote it when he was 24 years old. Right. Wrote it on the back of napkins as he was a bartender. And...

I can, I never saw the play. It was famous. I remember hearing about it. And then the movie came out and obviously the movie was huge. But when we were on West Wing, we would talk about the play, A Few Good Men, not the movie, the play. And there'd only been a few people who'd ever played Caffey, Tom Cruise part. I think Tom Hulse of all people created it. I think Bradley Whitford did it for a while. And then Timothy Busfield. That's it.

And every one of those guys would talk about how funny the play was and how many laughs there were. And I was like, I saw the movie. There weren't that many laughs in the movie as good as it was. And then I got to do the play with Aaron. We went to London and we did it at the Haymarket. And you're right. That play is so spectacular. It is like a Swiss watch movie.

for it for the audience to to it just works it works like a like a finely calibrated watch and you got to see the original that's so cool yeah it's cool there's all stories all the way through when the film came up when i was running the studio with rob reiner

Every piece of story there is, there's another unique piece of filmmaking lore and story, you know. A quick one, all right? Just a quick one. Yeah, please. Yeah. So that movie was being made, and Rob Reiner, we were the owners of Castle Rock, Sony owned Castle Rock, 55% of Castle Rock, with Alan Horn and Rob Reiner and those guys. Yep. And Rob got a hold of the material out of Columbia's...

because Columbia was the company working with out of Columbia's library, got ahold of the play material. So I'm going to make this movie, puts the whole movie together. It's inside the budget of the movie, gets it all together. I don't even know about it. I'm running the movie company, running the corporation. And all of a sudden I get a call. Rob Ryan won't see. I said, you don't see me. You see, you've got to go see John Dole. You know, you've got to go see the head of the studio or Mike Medavoy. Don't see me. I'm not making the movie decisions.

So, no, I got to see, I got to see, I got to see. And I was his friend and everything. So I see him. He says, listen, we don't have the money to get the act of Fugasuga men. I know you're familiar with the material. I hear the back. Remember, I heard the story about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I said, boy, I want to throw him out of the office. Anybody comes in, they're only asking. You can hear the rattle of their begging cup when you come to my office. They're rattling that begging cup. You can hear it all the way. I'm just waiting for them to bring it out from behind their back. So he said,

I need the money. I said, I need a really great actor to play the colonel role in A Few Good Men. I said, yeah. He said, I want to go after Jack Nicholson. I know you made a bunch of films with Jack Nicholson. I want to go after him. I think I have a chance of getting him. But it's very expensive, like $5 million for two weeks work. And I have been saying no to everything. And I don't make any decision or anything. It's everybody because otherwise I'd be in trouble. I said, no.

Do it. With just two words. Do it. I said, you got the money. He says, why? You just say it that way. I said, King is good. I remember Mel Brooks said that. Do it. And he went and got him and he got the money and did it. So, you know, I think Jack Nicholson in that movie.

You know, you want to hear the truth? Jack Nicholson in the movie. I'll tell you the truth. Jack Nicholson was a villain and villains make movies successful. Villains are really, really important in movies. Whether it's Anthony Hopkins or Jack Nicholson, when you're a good villain, man, that really makes the movie cook. Wow, that's such a great story. But what the listeners of the podcast don't really know and what you're too kind to say is,

is no one sits in that chair today like you and says, do it. They don't. What they do is they run it through marketing. They make a poster. They call Germany and see how much they can get from the Germans. And then they go, well, if we sell it to what's the Thailand would be and how would it do in China? And then they call and then they put their finger in the wind and maybe they say, do it. Maybe then maybe. Yeah.

They don't say do it in the room. You're kind, but I'm sure they do it in a different way because it's a different time. But, you know, I came to that role as being a filmmaker. I came in that role that way. I didn't come in from marketing or from finance. I came in as a person that loved the mythia of film and what it meant and what base it was for storytelling. But, you know, Rob, one of the things that's interesting to look at in decision-making is

on projects. They're made by a collection of people. It's a truly collaborative art form. I'm sure you in your life, somebody says something to you, you're working hard on a project and somebody just on the side who may be a set dresser or something will say, you know something, you know, I don't think you should wear the hat in this scene out of the clear blue sky. And you think, oh, it's crazy. Then you think, you take off the hat and you look, you do the scene. Wow, that was a good suggestion. You know, I mean, you have to be

You have to be open to listen to it, but you must have to have a filter. Both things. You can't just take everybody's suggestion, but you really have to be open to the ether to deliver things to you as an actor or director or storyteller that are useful. It's a collaborative art form at the very heart. You said the key thing just now is you came into it as a lover of film and someone who'd been –

involved in storytelling and filmmaking and the nuts and bolts of it before you got into the big chair, as they say. Now, it's a lot of Wall Street guys and people who come from business and other areas. And that's not necessarily a bad thing, but they're not there because they love movies. That's not how they got there.

That may not be how they got there, and they may love movies and be there, and they may not love movies but love business. But it is called show business. If it was just called show show, they'd be all broke. If it was just called business business, they'd be looking at budgets on the screen instead of actors and locations. So it is a blend of this. It is a commercial art form. And when you're spending upwards of –

50, 100, 200 million dollars on a movie, on a film, you have to leaven it because it can mean the demise of your entire company. So it does give you a little bit of sphincter arrest. You know what that is? Yes. It gives you a little bit. It's like, so you think about it, you know, from a

number of contextual realities. Will this sink the company? Will I be able to survive in it? But, you know, if you become risk averse and you're in the business of making films and making television and making stories, if you become risk averse, you know what you have?

A flop. It's called a flop when you become risk averse. There is risk built into every new and good and interesting film or television show. So if you're risk averse, you're really going to be in the in the in the hallways of film posters. But listen, Peter, come on. Now, you need to be honest with me right now. This is you're in this business as much as anybody still. You can get you can win all the basketball championships you want. There's you're still the thick of it.

You don't think that everybody today isn't risk averse? I think every decision – I don't mean to sound like I have any bitterness. I don't. I mean, I'm having a wonderful career and I love it. But, dude, I got to feel like everywhere you go to sell, you have to overcome the risk averse nature that permeates the buying world out there.

Yeah, it's a true statement. I see it. You know, no is a two-letter word, N-O, you know, and you hear that all the time. But I look at it, people like you and I, that we have to be dyslexic. We've got to think no means on. And we just got to keep going. We just got to keep rolling, man. If you have the belief and conviction and have some tools and resources and resourcefulness, that you'll overcome that. So maybe those hurdles are

are there because the business is so much riskier now and everything is so much uncertain now that those things are there. But, you know, a really good script, a really good actor, a really good director, a really good entrepreneur has to paddle in those waters. I mean, you buy into that. I think the real element today is...

you know, today is that films have taken a very dramatic turn. It's very, very difficult in the theatrical business, let alone all the theaters being closed right now, but it's very, very difficult in the theatrical business to make the kind of stories of coming home or deer Hunter or,

you know, being there or Forrest Gump. You can't get those films made today. Really, really, really, really can't. You know, the height of what you have and who the audience is that's going to theaters is very much defined by that. Okay. Why? I want to just do a quick deep dive on this because you just mentioned all movies that

that made me want to be an actor. Yes. You mentioned the movies that on a Friday, as a kid, those were the choices. You get to go to a theater and see being there. You get to go to a theater and see the deer hunter coming home. That does not happen anymore. But why...

Do people stop loving those movies? I can't imagine that that happened. No, but they're now nine-part series on television. Great writing on television. Great, great projects made all over the world. I mean, wonderful acting. Fantastic directing. Wonderful. The format's different now. They're watching them on a giant screen in their...

four foot by three foot OLED screen, or they're watching it on one of these little phones like this. I mean, you make a $125 million movie and there's a kid watching it on this. I mean, you're worrying about the art form and they're watching on this and they're listening to it live and you worked so hard in the sound and so hard in the color and the texture. And they're looking at this while they're picking their nose, drinking a beer, patting their dog and groping their girlfriend all at the same time while you're competing for the movie. So the whole

format has changed. The darkened theater where people have appointments, plan to go to the movie on Tuesday or Wednesday for Friday. They plan it in advance. All of that has changed. So we have to change our storytelling formats. And I think what's really happened is the power of narrative and of movie making has been transformed so that we have these unbelievable five, six, seven, eight hour or eight segment shows with the

phenomenal writing and wonderful acting being done. I don't want to call it on television. It's on television, but it's on a screen other than a theatrical exhibition marketplace. So I'm compelled that that gives you the opportunity to reach them efficiently. And, you know,

You know, the idea is I don't put gas in my car anymore. I just plug it into the wall. So I drive the car. It still gets me where I want to get to. So if I want to move people emotionally, if I want to be a filmmaker or storyteller, a narrative person, a talk show person, do a podcast, if I want to move people to listen to me and follow me, I have to be compelling inside the format I'm choosing. Yeah.

you know, inside that format. Normally, years ago, if we were to do something, it would be like this. It would be 30 seconds at the end of the news with you asking me one question. But now you have this giant platform where you can talk for 45 minutes and not edit it and make it real life and have a whole different experience with it. So you have to surrender the past for what the future offers. Yeah, no, you're right. And it's true. The birth of the eight-hour program

uh limited series is where all the stuff that inspired me to be an actor lives now but then and you see great work being done all that um basic instinct so that was like the thing that everybody talked about in that movie was was that interrogation scene where you you look up her her skirt come on as an actor you don't know where the camera is come on what say you peter goober

I'd say that narrative helped make the film successful. That, that, not the shot, the narrative, not the shot.

The shot was, if you really examine the shot, and we had to look at that shot five times for the MPAA and everything because it wasn't exposed, wasn't exposed, all those issues. But the issue, just as you framed it, became the dialogue that everybody talked about. That was the dialogue. Did she know? Didn't she know? What was it? What was it? Is it right? Is it wrong? That became the pinnacle of discussion around that. So everybody, in order to have a say in it, had to see it.

See, that was that that was the secret sauce. Not somebody made that up. It just happened that way. You know, so the idea is sometimes, you know, the interest of the public is piqued by an experience like that. And then people would never go see that movie. I got to go see that movie because the water cooler. That's what people used to meet around. Everyone's talking about. I don't want to be the dunce that didn't see it. You know what I mean? So so the idea is if I knew.

All the time what made success, what was the equation of success? I'd just make hits. But I make hits and flops because I don't know that. I just hope that I catch the zeitgeist of the interest in the people and have the uniqueness that people want to talk about it, think about it, and communicate to others about the show or film so they go see it. In that particular film, that was the thing. I mean, Michael Douglas did a really good performance. He was really good in it. But, you know, at the end of the day...

That became the voice. That's my wife yelling at me. That's my voice.

That is Hillary Clinton calling in. Yes, right. It's the voice of doom. Well, listen, thank you for doing this. I adore you. I love you so much, man. And to be able to bring some of your wisdom and just your worldview to people, this has been maybe my favorite podcast because of that, because I'm lucky. I get to know you, and now everybody else gets a little bit of...

some of that Peter Guber goodness. I only have one thing to say to you in closing. You know what it is? What? You know what that is? No. The seal in Machu Picchu and Galapagos. See, Peter Guber and I went to the Galapagos together and were attacked by all kinds of animals. But that is for a whole, we got to do our mutual Omaha's wild kingdom. Ha ha ha.

You can be Marlon Perkins. Up river, right? Yeah. All right, my brother. All right, be well. Thank you. Okay, bye-bye. Bye. Wow. So inspiring. It's, you know what? I think as guys, I'll speak for myself. It's hard to have mentors. People don't, you know, we don't sometimes as men share with each other and

Open up to each other and pick each other's brains. Yeah, we have our fathers and things and we have our friends. But like it's to have for me to have a mentor like Peter Guber is such an amazing gift. And I'm just reminded of it. Listening to that conversation, some of which I've heard before from him. But to be able to share that with you guys is just makes me so happy. And, you know, I mean, he's going to be 80 years old soon and listen to him.

Like that heart and that spirit. He's not jaded. He's not tired. He's curious. Doesn't claim to have all the answers. Really, really, really inspiring. And I'm glad that you joined me. And I'll see you next time.

You have been listening to Literally with Rob Lowe, produced by Deventory Bryant and Delena Turman, engineered by me, Deventory Bryant, executive produced by Rob Lowe for Lowe Profile, Adam Sachs and Jeff Ross at Team Coco, and Colin Anderson and Chris Bannon at Stitcher. The supervising producer is Aaron Blair, talent producer Jennifer Sampras.

Please rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts, and remember to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. This has been a Team Coco production in association with Stitcher.

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