[ music ] we are back, thank you. Hello okay. If youre just joining us, mr. Jack paar is here tonight. Elaine degeneres, stephen lang. What were you doing in new york . I was with the rochester Philharmonic Orchestra for a few days. Just as a guest, or did you play with them, or what . Yes, i played. Did a concerto in rochester . Did a little conducting and in rochester . Yes, and it was very, very cold. It stays cold in rochester about when . Next june . Something like that . Summer is on july 4th. [ laughter ] anyway, how many of you remember when you were in school, uh, and you would do something you got caught goofing off or something, and the teacher would write it down and say, this will become part of your permanent record. Remember that . [ applause ] that happened to me. Did you ever have visions years later, your boss calling you in and saying yes. We just looked at your permanent record [ laughter ] you threw a sandwich at Peggy Malkovich in the 3rd grade . But teachers did that to kind of control you. Theyd say and you thought forever, this would be part of your permanent record. Well, thanks to the Family Educational rights and privacy act, you have the right to send away for a copy of your record. Did you know that . Schools usually keep them on microfilm, and they charge a few dollars for the services. And besides your grades, the permanent record, uh, has your teachers comments about the way you behaved in school, intelligence tests, your exams and so forth. We sent t the permanent records [ laughter ] see, right here, folks. It says right here official permanent records of some wellknown people and we have excerpt excerpted or excerpted . Excerpted. Yes. Some comments from the School Records of some very famous people. For example, heres one about Geraldo Rivera [ laughter ] april 17th, 1951, when we called his home, he told us he tried to go to school but couldnt find it. [ laughter ] now, you all know roger ebert . Yes. Film critic. All right, heres what they said about roger. Rogers a bright boy, but ive had problems with him. Yesterday, he gave a scathing critique of my history lesson. Luckily, the siskel boy stood up and disagreed with him [ laughter ] saying my presentation had warmth and humor and a happy ending, and calling roger a foureyed [ laughter ] now, we sent back to iowa Ronald Reagan went to a small school in iowa as a youngster. It says, today, ronald was kept after school for selling spare spitballs to students at a rival school. [ laughter ] [ applause ] just reading the official Muammar Gaddafi this was not easy to get, but we got it. [ laughter ] heres what they said about him 7th grade muammar is an eager pupil, but he does have a nasty tendency to slice the throats of the cafeteria ladies. [ laughter ] on the days we have lima beans. [ laughter ] even then. Don king heres what they said about don don i that can be disruptive. He spends all his playground time arranging fights between the other boys. [ laughter ] during his infamous scrimmage in the gymage the other day, i had to drag him to the Principals Office by the hair. [ laughter ] and im worried because it hasnt gone down yet. [ laughter ] [ applause ] ted turner. Up his crayons when he tried to color a visiting nun. [ laughter ] thats really an inside joke. Heres one about our attorney general our now attorney general, ed meese. Miss thompson, the librarian, caught eddy committing an act of vandalism. Hed grabbed a book on creation turned to the picture of adam and eve and the fig leaves, and drew dr. Denton pajamas on them. [ laughter ] meese wasnt even funny when he was in school. What about fidel castro . Not easy to get these. Right here we have official [ laughter ] fidel was caught, once again, behind the gym smoking a cigar. We feel if he keeps this up, it will stunt his growth and he will become a communist. [ laughter ] [ applause ] Vincent Price the circulation of blood, marred only by the repeated use of the phrase, plump, luscious, throbbing neck veins. [ laughter ] would you like to know what they said about Bruce Springsteen when he yes. Was at school . All right. Bruce is a conscientious, softspoken boy. But if you value your hearing, dont ask him where he was born. [ laughter ] [ applause ] School Records were not available. Destroyed in the great fire in rome. [ laughter ] [ applause ] one about ed. I wish ed was here, we could read this. Ed mcmahon, edward, only in grade 2, but already he has a clear idea of what he wants to achieve in life drinking age. [ laughter ] and somebody [ applause ] they even sent away for some of my records that would be about 8 years old, right . John was kept after school for carving his girlfriends initials into his desk. John will need a new desk because his girlfriend later had her lawyer take possession of it. [ laughter ] [ applause ] those are real, official this is official. Anyway, if you join us, we have stephen lang from crime story, comedienne elaine degeneres, and in just a moment, mr. Jack paar will join us. So stay where you are. [ music ] [ applause ] all right, were back. Sure, sure thing. My next guest is a very talented actor. He received a dramadous a dramadous dramadous dramadery no. A drama desk nomination for his work in death of a salesman on broadway. He also starred in a television version, and hes one of the stars of the Television Series crime story, which apparently has been on fridays ten its going to move to its going to move to fridays. It wasnt on fridays. Its moving what the hell am i talking about . [ laughter ] will move to fridays at 10 on nbc, beginning december the 5th. Would you welcome stephen lang . [ music ] thank you. How are you . Im good. Good to meet you. My name is steve allen. Steve [ making strange sound ] do you go back you dont go back that far no. To the early days of steve allen . No. You probably i was talking with jack paar before the show, and jack was very concerned. He says, you know, theres a jack always talks this way. He says, theres a lot of people out there who are not going to remember me at all. So, you dont go that far back, do you . No, but, its okay, nobody remembers me, anyway. Yeah. Im kind of new. Yeah. You broadway, di sure did. Yeah. I did it with Dustin Hoffman and John Malkovich and yeah, and a tv version also . Fascinating play. How did it i saw it on television i didnt see the broadway play. Did it transpose as well to television, or is the theater its always its always tough sometimes to transpose something yeah. Well, we redid it completely. Right. I mean, we played it about 250 times on broadway right. And you know, you find out what works on stage doesnt necessarily work on film. Who is to some extent, the comic relief in the play, and you know, comedy on stage is very, very different than comedy on film. Right. And dustin, who is i would characterize as the pete rose of acting hes a relentless actor was really after me the whole time to change my performance to gear it towards film. Right. That was difficult after having done it, you know, so many times on stage. Do you find doing Something Like that on broadway night after night, that the audience reaction will be different, even though youre essentially doing the same lines . Yeah. And you try to figure out why that is . Yeah, its different but with this play, it was always with salesman, which i think is the greatest American Play yeah. It was always it was a monumental reaction we had every night. They react differently to the nuances of the play. Right. But we had i never was involved in something that had such a special relationship with an audience because and and every night, we were reluctant to let that relationship go. Yeah. Somebody told me in relation to that, hoffman would come out and make very long curtain speeches. Well, as i said, he was reluctant to let the audience relationship end, and so, he would go out after wed taken our bows and make a little speech. Talk about something that happened it first happened in chicago. Right. And it was a night that ethel merman had passed away, and he gave an impromptu eulogy to ethel merman that was kind of touching. Right. And he enjoyed it so much that he began making impromptu speeches, uh, about what . Just anything that came well, if somebody had a birthday a cast member hed point it out to the audience, and wed get applause. If somebody had an aunt visiting from iowa, hed introduce her. Someone it was dentists son, had a bar mitzvah he would talk about hed point that out. He just like to just liked that relationship, yeah. Whats your background . Originally. Im from new york city. Yeah. From queens. [ applause ] yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Home of the championship oh, yeah. [ applause ] you were probably too young to remember the mets when they were the laughing stock of baseball. Not at all [ laughter ] no, really. Not at all 1962. I was there at the beginning, and Marv Throneberry . Marvelous marv, yeah, elio chacon, Pumpsie Green and now theyre the champions. I remember at one point, the mets carried four catchers and they had, uh, chris cannizzaro, who could throw. Right. And they had jesse gonder, who could hit, and they had norm sherry, who could catch the ball. And they had choochoo coleman, who couldnto so he started. [ laughter ] what did you do, now ive always asked actors who do this what you do when youre between as they say, at liberty . What kind of jobs have you had . You know those like, poles, along the roads . Little guardrails . Yeah. Id paint them. Wow. [ laughter ] that was me. That was you . Yeah, i painted them, yup. And, uh. Oh god, what else did i do . I used to work at a moving company. Which is an interesting thing is probably the most dramatic and the most traumatic right. Experience in a persons year, probably. And so, id see an awful lot of drama and trauma. And i could always. I can tell ya two things about moving. One is that the husbands never home for it, ever. Thats interesting. I didnt know that. And the other thing is, you can always tell if its a company move, because if its a company move, they will take the dirt from the backyard. [ laughter ] cause that says well move you and your belongings to your new job. Everything. Ive moved dirt. Ive moved trees. Ive moved garbage. But i think probably the most the job i liked best is one i didnt continue on, was cabbing. I think every actor should drive a cab. Thats what they say because you probably can draw on more experiences later on in acting and meet all different kinds of people. I didnt get too far with it. What happened was, i was in philadelphia at the time, and you had to take a test phillys great too. I had to take a you had to take a test, and the test consisted of a day of classes if you want to get from this hotel to the airport. And then at the end of the day, you go with the instructor, whos a cabbie emeritus right. I guess. And he give you a you take a written exam. And its a 25question exam and he gave us all pencils and paper, and it was 1 to 25, and he says, what im going to do is im going to read the question to you, and you will pick a,b,c, or d multiple choice, but to save time, im going to give you the answer to put in. The question, and then hed give us the answer. And so, that was the test for being a cabbie. But the sad thing is, a couple of guys flunked. [ laughter ] even with all of that . But i got most of them right. Yeah. [ laughter ] i dont want to embarrass you, but there was a was it 60 minutes that did the profile of your father . Yeah. Eugene lang . Yeah, it sure is, yeah. He did a very interesting thing yeah. Your father, if i remember the story. Of new york . P. S. 121, its an Elementary School up in east harlem, and he graduated there about 50 years ago. And now hes a selfmade man, and about in 1981, he was asked to be the Commencement Speaker at the 6th grade graduation. Right. And he went up there and he realized as he was going to talk about these kids its primarily a black and Hispanic School now but he was about to say to them, which is basically, you know you are the future try, try, try right. Everything was going to be regarded as a lot of irrelevant crap by then. Right. So, inspi and began talking to them about the necessity of dreaming, and out of that came, he said, you know, if you can make it if you make it through high school, i guarantee that every one of you will have an opportunity to go to college because ill put you through. The words just came out. And that was, uh. And you know, in new york, nationally, we have over a 50 dropout rate yeah. And in ghettos, its much, much higher than that. But this particular group of kids we have about a and who are going to go on because your dad agreed to pay for their High School Education and if they finish that to go on to yeah, because somebody cared about them and theyre going to and he keeps in touch. [ applause ] not only does he do that, but he keeps in touch with them. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, we have to cut away. Well be right back. [ music ] [ applause ] oh, hello there. We are back. Anyway, your show is having big success. Crime story is going to move to ten on friday are you enjoying that . Yeah, very much. Weve been on a tough timeslot yeah. But weve got viewers and theyre moving us. Nbc has the grace and the confidence to move us right after miami vice. I wish you much luck with it. Thank you very much. Thank you for being here, stephen. Thank you. My apologies to, uh ellen degeneres, who was supposed to be with us tonight, and weve asked her to join us when she can, i would like to mention where shes going to be. Shell be appearing at the punchline in san francisco, the 3rd of december to the 6th, and at the improv in dallas december the 9th through the 14th. So, ellen, come back with us soon. [ music ] my thanks to jack paar, thank you. And well see you tomorrow night. [ applause ] im humbled by that applause. . Come and knock on our door . . Come and knock on our door . . Weve been waitin for you . . Weve been waitin for you . . Where the kisses are hers and hers and his . . Threes company, too . . Come and dance on our floor . . Come and dance on our floor . . Take a step that is new . . Take a step that is new . . Weve a lovable space that needs your face . . Threes company, too . . Down at our rendezvous . . Down at our rendezvous . telephone ringing i got it hello . Mom, hi and how are you . Oh, good. How are things back home . Youre where . And dads with you . chuckling how nice. Uh, what . No, no, no, mother. Mother, you cant come here. Im going out. But could i meet you somewhere . Mom, hey, dont hang up. Mom, dont hang. Hey, janet, whos that . That was my parents. Calling from indiana . No. From two blocks away and theyre coming over. In big trouble now. What do you mean . Ever since i moved away from home. My parents have been on my back to get married. Lots of parents are like that. But my parents are absolute fanatics about it. Especially after the baby came. The ba. Janet. Jack, please. My sister had a baby. Oh, thats right. Last month, my fathers ulcer starts really acting up and so my mom says the reason my dads ulcer is acting up is because he worries about me all the time. So i got really upset when we were talking and i ended up saying, tell him im married and she did. laughing wait. You mean, that. That my parents think im married. Well, janet, congratulations. Whos the lucky guy . You are. coughs me . Why me . I wasnt about to marry a total stranger. Oh, jack, please, cant you just play along . Youll hardly have to see them at all. I have a date with shelley green. Shes driving all the way in from oxnard. Cant you call her . if she had a phone in her car. doorbell rings jack, thats them. Please dont let me down oh, please, jack all right, all right oh, thank you. Remember, youll have to tell them the truth sooner or later. I will. Later. Oh, janet oh, honey oh, hi oh, mother. Oh, daddy. Come in. Hello, sir. Oh. Very nice oh, you. You look wonderful, dear. Marriage must be agreeing with you. And you, you must be janets husband. Thats what janet told me. Well, why dont we all sit down . Honey, could you pull out that orange chair for daddy . Here we go. Let me just get this old chair. Fix the pillow here for you. Is there anything i can get for you . Oh, no thanks, dear. Lordy, lordy, lordy, lordy. So, janet tells us youre a cook. Oh, daddy, not a cook. Jack is a chef. He graduated at the top of his class. Every restaurant in town is begging him to work for them. What restaurant are you cooking in now . Well, you might say the beggings still going on. You mean, youre unemployed . How do you manage . Well, mom, i still have my job at the flower shop. Youre supporting him . Well, somebody has to pay the rent. Leave them alone. Now, just be thankful that janet finally got married. Well, i am. Though, i do wish they had uh, let. Daddy, mother. Nobody was invited to this wedding because we eloped. Oh, how romantic. Where did you go . Tijuana. Las vegas. Well, now, what difference does it make, ruth . Theyre married. Theyre happy. Were happy. Everybodys happy. Its a lovely purse you have there. For dinner tonight . I cant. I have a date. A, uh. A date . A date with the guys. Its my bowling night. laughing oh, but, darling, you could cancel that if you really wanted to couldnt you, snookems . I want to. I want to. doorbell ringing excuse me. Jackie great news look, look, look, look. If we play our cards right i think we could be the water boys. Larry, id like you to meet janets parents. Her parents . Mom, daddy, this is our neighbor larry. Look, uh, about those wet tshirts the, uh, contestants are all the tiny tots from the neighborhood uh, pee wee football, little league. Larry, larry, larry. I want you folks to know that you have one heck of a girl here. And in spite of how it looks there is absolutely nothing going on between these two. Well, we were sort of hoping there would be. Janet, i didnt know your parents were so liberal. Could i see you outside . You wouldnt happen to have any other daughters lying around . Out of doors. Where you going, honey . What im going to do. I got a date tonight with a gorgeous redhead. Have you lost your memory . Shes driving in from oxnard. Shed already left. I cant stop her. So you got to go out with her tonight. You not only lost your memory you lost your mind. Listen, her name is shelley greene. Shes fantastic. Im supposed to meet her at the chez robaire restaurant at 8 00. Yeah, got you. Theres got to be a catch to this. Why cant you make the date with shelley . cause janet told. Jack, get b