Interesting Interviews: Reminiscing with Robert Mitchum

From Cinematical.com

It's safe to say that once God made ROBERT MITCHUM, he then turned around and broke the mold. The late actor was a one of the kind talent -- a fantastic performer who was every bit as interesting when he was just being himself. He was the antithesis of today's celebrities -- Mitchum didn't care about fame in the slightest. A tough guy actor who often made you believe he was more than capable of doing everything he'd done onscreen in real-life, Mitchum was always a great interview. While surfing around, looking for something else entirely, I stumbled across this Salon piece from back in 1997. In it, author Dick Lochte reminisces about the actor's career after his passing and shares excerpts from a four-hour chat -- one filled with vodka, no less -- they'd had twenty years earlier. It's a great piece of writing, made memorable by Mitchum's characteristic candor and humor. Don't expect any politically correct answers in this one.

Full interview at Salon

NY Screening of Bruce Weber's 'Nice Girls Don't Stay for Breakfast'

From Italian Vogue:
On June 21st, 30 Rock star and Emmy Award-winning actor Alec Baldwin hosted a special sneak peak of fashion photographer Bruce Weber's latest film, Nice Girls Don't Stay for Breakfast, (the title comes from a 1967 album by singer Julie London) a beautifully shot documentary examining the life of the movie star with the tough guy looks and a cigarette always in his hand, ROBERT MITCHUM

The film also reveals never before seen studio recordings of Mitchum, a notorious Hollywood bad boy who starred in films like The Big Sleep and The Last Tycoon, singing. Filmed mostly in black and white, the movie is narrated by New Orleans rhythm and blues musician Dr. John and features revealing interviews with Mitchum, his brother John and many of his friends.

... Weber is most famous for his erotically charged photographs of semi-nude All-American boys, but he is also an Academy Award nominated director who has turned his movie camera in 1988 on jazz trumpeter Chet Baker in Let's Get Lost (which earned him the Best Documentary Oscar nomination), on his herd of beloved pet dogs and on teenage boxers in Broken Noses in 1987.

Weber is attracted to not only male physical perfection, but to beauty's flipside: damaged, wayward souls, so Mitchum, who often played anti-heroes and was called by film critic Roger Ebert "the soul of film noir," is the perfect subject.

From The Huffington Post:

The big question of the night, how did Weber get such candid footage from interview-phobic Mitchum who eluded the invitations of Barbara Walters, Dick Cavett, and Larry King. Weber, in signature head scarf, is disarming and sly, telling how he sent beautiful women with gifts to Mitchum's door ...

Through Weber's lens, the Hollywood tough guy of Westerns and noirs, the creep in the original Cape Fear with deep cleft chin and eyes at half mast emerges as a shy, modest, non-celebrity jamming sweetly off-key with Dr. John, Marianne Faithfull, and Rickie Lee Jones ...