History as a hollywood director. And hes changed the world consistently and constantly with his cage rattling messages and his wisdom. Thus the changemakers award tonight. Its a new award. Were starting here at fau. From his movie nixon to any given sunday the Joy Luck Club to the people versus larry flynt. From born on the fourth of july remember tom cruise and one on the fourth of july to platoon. From my favorite heaven and earth to salvador jfk Natural Born Killers in the movie the doors oliver stone has become the worlds most controversial and one of the most respected directors. Hes a mover a shaker a world changer and an icon of the past several decades and this time hes being on it for a different sort of history one about himself his own memoir. So please welcome the oscarwinning writer and director. Oliver stone are these these microphone would have been better . Oliver wants a diploma is what he said backstage. Finish my college education. I expect that award to sit on oscar olivers mantle with all his oscars. Ive been to his home and i think theres a little space for that one on the tv room mantle. Last night at dinner oliver turned to me and he said its all up to the moderator. These things die when the moderators boring. So have some peck. So this is me having pep right now. Well just dive in i got a lot of questions and then were going to were going to talk about the book about film and then i think 15 minutes left. Were going to do some q a so you guys can ask questions. So just diving in this book is great this book. I read it over the last two weeks or so oliver. I love the book. The pros is amazing. Its a real tour through history. Its through the history of film through vietnam through obviously your life and the personal it really is not just a memoir of what happened when its very personal and it was terrific. Thank you. I just want to alan neglected to tell you that i i hired him years ago. Thats true, and hes been my moderator since no just joking. He was the second writer on the wall street Money Never Sleeps which was done. We did in 2012 and we worked together. I pushed him as hard as i could and got the best out of them and i had quite enjoyed it. Hes very smart you wouldnt think so very smart and a bachelor though. Thats i am about 52 years old. That is correct. This is correct, but lets talk about you. You wrote the book. Well, i dont have a book rather have yeah, id rather talking about yourself is pretty tough, but i will say that. In short my life. I feel is like coming into history. Its it starts selfish your baby. You want everything for yourself you think about yourself your egocentric you go through life and you start to have experiences real experiences with other people. And coming from a small family as i did one. I was the only child it took me a bit of adjustment and the adjustment was sometimes very painful because through divorce and through war. But i feel like ive gotten closer closer and closer to the to the American Experience in terms of history. And obviously ive been occupied very much with the events of our time and theyve shaped me shaped me enormously and theres no way you can associate i can associate myself anymore with just the person i was when i was William William oliver stone. Im now become part of this history, too and i hope my work can. Can be remembered hello and obviously will be you mentioned in the book your diary a few times and you obviously couldnt write this from memory. So i want to start with some diary questions actually. How long have you kept diaries and how often do you write in it . When did you start doing that and well briefly when i was 17 19, i wrote i wrote outside school. I wrote a novel. This was called a childs night dream, which is very personal. And it was my big hope to justify my life because i dropped out of Yale University to write this book and it it no, excuse me. That was a second time. I dropped out at the alien university the first time i went over to asia to become a teacher and i taught two semesters in saigon and then i was in the merchant marine and various other things i and i came back here and i went back to the yale and i was writing a book by the time i went back and i really was interested in experience my experience and putting it on paper so i could understand it. Thats part of the reason most writers do this. To understand yourself and that led to a lifeline a lifetime engagement with writing itself. The the book was rejected and it was very painful for me. I went back partly to destroy myself. Because i was i was suicidal those of you who were young at that age. Perhaps know what im talking about. Its a very black and white. Feeling about life when youre call it a teenager and you feel like you dont have any place in the world. Youre dislocated. So this book reflects a lot of that. Destruction destructiveness, but i couldnt do it. I couldnt go through with it. And going into the military as an anonymous infantryman. And i insisted on infantry. Is this an on vietnam because i was afraid theyd send me to germany or korea. Didnt want any of that. I wanted to go to the real thing. And experience it like it was id read about in novels and books and red badge of courage and you know, oh hemingway red batch of courage is pretty interesting its about fear. And then after six months i went they took they brought me over in september 67 and i served for 15 months. That was the probably the worst stretch of the war and i got i got wait. I got woken up pretty fast death is not fun and its pretty messy and drug task and all that stuff youve read heard about which led me to appreciating survival put it that way and coming back from that war . It was a whole different head on me about where i was in the world and the world itself. I knew a great injustice had been done to the in that war and was fought for very sinister reasons and not good reasons and our treatment of the of the locals had very much a pick upset me, but i i wasnt active about it. Theres a lot of racism towards the third world in that in that in that war a lot. And they took the brunt of our a lot about they took the brone of our hatred. What did you ask me . Im just about you documenting everything in diaries and journals and using them for this book is because the details extraordinary in the book. It just couldnt be done from memory. The truth is you cant write anything when youre in their jungle because its so wet and i couldnt theres no paper that can work. So at the end of the tour towards the last three months. When i was a better soldier and i knew what i was doing. I was i bought a little camera pentax and i took a lot of pictures so it became a visual experience beautiful country beautiful country and the colors are amazing the moods. The storms the monsoons and from those pictures came my interest in photography. So when i got back to the states i had lost my interest in writing any novels again, no more novels. Because it was us it was a racket. I didnt want it. Its like theater, you know, you go to you can only score in new york. Its just impossible to its a very limited business movies seem more democratic to me at that point. This is 1969 and they were changing movies were becoming a new kind of form and it was exciting and i eventually after being addicted for a while. I ended up at New York University film school with among my teachers. Theyre very good teachers. Theyre very smart school was Marty Scorsese who was my long. Are nutty kind of guy talking very fast. He was my first sight and sound purdue teacher and he was great good teacher loved movies and he can he conveyed that enthusiasm to us. Very strongly, so i went on in movies and of course suffered. There was no jobs after film school at all. It was it was it took me seven eight years of screenplays 11 screenplays 10 screenplays rejections, and eventually i got a couple of options from the Hollywood Community and broke through in 197 seven eight with the midnight express, which was i was hired to write it as a screenplay from a kid. From a book written by billy hayes who would been busted in turkey sentenced at first to five years or something and then resentenced under the turkish system of justice the 30 years in prison. There was an interesting story. Of course, there was a lot of i hadnt been told all the truth, but we didnt talk about that right talk about in the book and that launched me and one thing after another still had many failures after that many failures and i talk about that in the book and then eventually in 1985 six. I made two films back to back that were really me as opposed to a construct. This was me. Were talking directly to the audience because frankly hollywood had turned it back on me again. So i went directly to my own talking to the audience direct with salvador and platoon. Yeah and somehow salvador was well received not seen much but platoon went through the roof around the world. The timing was right people were willing finally to get away from the rambos and the Chuck Norriss and the the false war that we had seen. And deal with it and that was quite stunning. It was a stunning moment in our history too because frankly, i think it screwed up ronald reagan. He was on his way to among other things. He was about to invade nicaragua people forget this but then we had the conjugate hearings and oliver north and six or seven people in reagans administration resigned mcfarland. It was a whole group of people. It was a dirty dirty scandal far worse than watergate. I know you were my previous Jeffrey Garrett was here talking about watergate but contragate was was much much bigger because reagan was giving arms to the iranians and and sending the money to the contrast illegally, so its quite a scandal. I will say i rewatched very recently salvador if you guys havent seen in a few years rewatch it its fantastic. Its just a fantastic movie politically the the monologues in there and jimmy woods the performance about him unbelievable. So going back to chasing daylight the memoir. How long did it take you to write it . Did you have to put it down and bring it back up or did you go straight through . No. No, i went. I went straight through. When i i just got out of movies for about a year two years and i really excuse me. Im wrong. Yeah, i got out of movies in 1995 after nixon. I stopped for a while and thats when i wrote it. Is that when i wrote it . No, i dont get confused. Im sorry. Its just writing writing writing. He asked about a diary. I always keep a diary of writing everyone but the memoir chasing daily. Yeah, he saw im sorry. Its just its starting to get but jumbled sure as too old. I wrote this. I wrote this in 2017. All the way through after snowden. Okay, thats just no. Yeah snowden was my last feature film and then i was doing documentaries and i just basically did as much work as i could ask plus c for off and on a year two years. And it was unfortunately in my timing again not great film the book came out wonderful reviews from people who were in the film community, but covid was was with us and no books signings. No ability to go to bookstores and the book dies. I mean it did okay on its own, but theres no publicity available really so authors need bookstores and they need to sign and get out there mix with the public. Thats what i its such a great book and people are going on, you know. But i think itll last i think its a movie a book that is is worth some worthwhile. I hope you find itself. I wanted to ask about in the book and every script as we know. Theres a protagonist point of narrative an anchoring moment to which the story is told in chasing the light that moment seems to be the bicentennial the bicentennial choice that you come back to that all the time in the book and its very cool thing. Why why that time why 1776 because 1976 was in the deer. I was 30 years old. We turned 30 youre supposed to have supposed to have a concretized your life. I hadnt i was grasping but failing. I hadnt succeeded so its the book opens on the bicentennial new york city. You remember all the tall ships and all the celebration of american . The birthday the 200th birthday. Yep, and i am course of feeling in the dumps completely in the dump. So i contrast that and you see this struggle to understand the American Experience through that whole period from 1976 to 86. Im in the movie business and im broke. Go through jobs marriage. All the usual failures of life and youre laughing at me because he told me earlier that he never got married to avoid divorce. And i understand i mean a threetime man myself 26 years the one yeah, youre currently in 2016. Yes, thats good. So obviously shes a keeper. I got i got a quick question. I want to go to some of the films or to some of your film career. Think about which film of yours say pre 2001. Do you think hollywood now would never make you just could never get me free 2001. Yeah. Oh probably platoon really because its a to there were you know platoon was rejected for 10 years. In its and its written form. It was rejected as too too much of a two realistic to grim too much of a downer. And you have to understand that you need to make those kind of films once in a while because they you need to tell the truth and its about truth. Really not that i hit all the truth, but i hit some of it because you cant say certain things. I mean there are certain conventions to a movies that you have to Pay Attention to such as tension such as rising climax, you know, im aware of that but i the movie to me is reflects pretty honestly according to many veterans what we saw over there. With some liberties taken and license taken but you dont think that gets made now i talk about three lies in the book. I talk about the damage from friendly fire which no one talks about thats ourselves killing ourselves. So many soldiers are killed that way and wounded so many i would estimate and you may not the pentagon would think im crazy. I would say up to 20 and that is a very tough for American People to take parents of course dont want to hear about their kid being killed by some artillery round and landed. In our midst or bomb or this or that and i talk about the the treatment of the vietnamese villagers as a a very ugly story and then the mili massacre would be the the highest example of it, but it was going on in the smaller scale everywhere in the in the field that i saw and i was in three different units. So the third thing the third lie the biggest lie of all is that we were saying from the very beginning were winning this war. And changing the body counts lying lying lines. Thats what characterizes war and to this day. The characterizes the United States government approach to war lies lies. The only way to get people involved in a war wanting to fight a war and supporting the war and to do that. They will go to know to any end. They will go to any end to calaminate to. Alan youre a writer. Propagandize propagandize propagandize. Yes. This was what it was like when we worked together. You in the book you spoke about your fathers challenges with the evolutionary evolution of wall street the sandy while and the building of bundling of financial services, and i want to ask you how do you see the challenges for old men like you and me now in hollywood with the changes with the streamers the franchise obsession in the shrinking studio system. Youre jumping ahead. Yeah. Well thats in here. Thats the end of the book. Thats thats the next book. No, thats the third book. He we decided hes going to do three. Frankly im not qualified to say because like every like many people i feel inundated by the choices. I cant follow all these shows that are being made and trying occasionally to keep up i have seen downton abbey. I told you. Yeah, and i enjoy ive enjoyed many series, but i they last night you listed four or five new ones that secession and white lotus you wrote him down oliver wrote them down the teenage one before euphoria. Yeah, thats really crazy one. Im not qualified to but in terms of making movies these days. Its a changing business and in the way it was when you were making. Oh, yeah and getting a movie made versus today business that i knew and you see in those days, at least they had studios where studios in the sense and the Old Fashioned sense. They were a patrons and they would support development development. Its crucial for screenplays writing it can be abused no question. A lot of people did abuse it they took far too much money and didnt do the work the right amount of work, but its like an r d for a business you have to put research and development into a business to grow it, but they stop doing that about about 2000s around the war on terror time that was terrible time and the they stopped doing that and it became the people like you would have to do things on spec and bring it into the studio and go through the whole process of selling something. Right right, then id rather developing absolutely and now they are its just theyre making theyre making less movies that type that that you made. I mean, theyre just its almost you know, exclusively marvel movies and franchises and they got exclusively marvel, but there are a lot of cheaper movies being made than there and theyre some of them are very good. I cannot criticize the oscar choices, but something has changed i something has changed and i cant quite put my finger on it. I have to write about it. Um, i do want to talk about some of your films quickly here. I know when people ask you. Whats your favorite film . Theres no answering that because its like children, but could you speak about a few of your many children who might not be as accomplished as platoon or born on the fourth or wall street . I can throw a few out or you can choose one or two, but like what Natural Born Killers, what do you want me to do . Just speak on just speak about a few thoughts on other all different. You know, right. I never tried to repeat myself natural. Born killers is is an oddball movie. Its a oneoff. Im very proud of the fact that its got such a low rating on Rotten Tomatoes on Rotten Tomatoes. Thats the best signal of all im serious. I mean critics have often been very unkind critics tend to judge the package what you what you say in public and you should never try to explain your film because youre dead if you say this is about and thats then theyll come back at you right so you how do you deal with the press . Its a very tough question because thats when you make a movie. Not only do you have to make the movie which is monster job, then you have to go out and sell it and talk about it. Thats the worst thing possible. You shouldnt talk about it, but we have to because so much money is involved, you know, so and