[00:00] Speaker 1: (intro music plays) Welcome to Hollywood and Horsepower, the show about the story behind the story. Today, we are joined by a very special guest, a close friend of mine, somebody I consider family, Michael Blowen. Michael is the founder of Old Friends Farm, which most people know that. What people may not know is that Michael and Diane Blowen had com- two other, three other careers before that, going back to being with The Boston Globe and even prior to that, a professor at Emerson College. So Michael, welcome to the show. Welcome to Hollywood and Horsepower.

[00:57] Speaker 2: Oh. Thanks, Marc. I've been looking forward, uh, to this for a long time. This is great. Congratulations on the show, and I'm looking forward to it.

[01:06] Speaker 1: Thank you. And it's, it's really exciting to have you on the show. I mean, you've ... We've always been really close, and I really appreciate everything you do, um, not just for me but for the industry in general. So, what I'd like to do, because I ... You know, obviously people know about Old Friends. We talk about Old Friends on this show every week. We basically support two foundations on this show. OldFriendsEquine.org. If anybody is not familiar with it, take a moment, look at their website. If you're anywhere near Lexington, Kentucky, it's the number one rated attraction on Tripadvisor in the Lexington area. You owe it to yourself to go and it's really the only place you can get face to face with a Kentucky Derby winner.

[01:50] Speaker 2: (coughs) .

[01:51] Speaker 1: Um, the other foundation that we support here is No Fallen Heroes. So, No Fallen Heroes was founded by a Top Gun pilot, uh, Matt 'Wiz' Buckley, good friend of the show, and they are one of the few foundations that helps not only military but first responders. So, those being the two things that we support here, Michael Blowen, our guest today, is the founder of Old Friends. And, you know, people know a lot about that. What they may not realize is where you started. So, take us back.

[02:24] Speaker 2: (coughs) .

[02:25] Speaker 1: You grew up in Connecticut. What part of Connecticut was it?

[02:28] Speaker 2: It was, uh, Milltown, Thompsonville, Connecticut, in northern Connecticut, just over the border from, uh, Springfield, Massachusetts, and, uh, right on the Connecticut River, and it was a mill town. We had the largest at the time, had the largest carpet mill in the world and grew up kind of like, you know, working class kids-

[02:47] Speaker 1: Big textile area.

[02:47] Speaker 2: ... working class family. Yeah. And, uh, then I went, ended up going to school in Boston. I loved the Red Sox so I wanted to, I wanted to (laughs) , I wanted to go someplace that was near Fenway Park. So I went to, uh, Boston University, and then, uh, graduate school at Emerson College, and after that, uh-

[03:08] Speaker 1: And you taught at Emerson College, correct?

[03:10] Speaker 2: Yes, until they came to their senses and denied me tenure. (laughs) But they said-

[03:16] Speaker 1: Before that happened, tell us a little bit about that, because you had a really interesting career there, where, you know, you were teaching classes ... Now I'll let you tell the story. But, you know, you, you had a really interesting approach where you brought in people from old Hollywood, and tell us a little bit about the classes and a little bit about some of your students-

[03:37] Speaker 2: Well-

[03:37] Speaker 1: ... that probably a lot of our listeners know.

[03:40] Speaker 2: Well, what was very interesting is, Emerson was a small, uh, liberal arts school in Boston that specialized in acting, and, and performing, and, uh, I got a lot of kids in my class, and, uh, pupils, and Jay Leno went there, and Henry Winkler, and, uh, it was a, it was a, it was a really great time, and it was a good time to be a, be a, be a teacher there, and it was a good time to be in, to be in Boston. Um, after that I, I ... Well, one summer, let me say this. One summer I, uh, I had the opportunity, along with my friend G- uh, Gary Grossman, a wonderful guy, uh, and I got to teach a summer s- school session at Boston University, and it was about, uh, film. Uh, it was a very general course. Uh, it was a six-week course, five days a week, and, uh, it was in, uh, three hours a day. And I, in, in a moment of lucidity, I turned to Gary and I said, "You know, Gary. I don't know about you," I said, "but I can tell them everything I know about filmmaking in an hour and a half.

[04:53] Speaker 2: What are we gonna go (laughs) do for the rest of the summer?" And, uh, and we started thinking about that, and, and a friend of ours named Deke Rossell, who was the former editor of one of the alternative weeklies in Boston, had just gotten a job as a publicity guy and marketing guy for the Directors Guild of America, and, uh, we decided that since we couldn't, we couldn't really sustain ourselves, and, and frankly only about five or six people had signed up for the course anyway. Uh, we got, uh, the head of the department to send us out to California. I'd never been to Hollywood in my life. We stayed in the Chateau Marmont, uh, Hotel, which was then just a dump heap. It was a terrible, terrible, ugly hotel, and a few days, a few weeks rather after we left, that's where John Belushi died. Uh, in the, in the Chateau Marmont Hotel.

[05:47] Speaker 2: Anyway, it's very, very nice now and I can't afford to stay there, but we went out there, and, and I, the, the proposal we'd made to Deke Rossell was, we wanted to find some director out there who wasn't doing anything that could come help us teach this course-... and maybe we'd, we'd attract a little bit more interest and the whole burden wouldn't fall on Gary and I to just show 16 millimeter movies all summer. And, uh, so, uh, (laughs) so, uh, we went out there and it was, it was ... The response from the older directors was just stunning.

[06:22] Speaker 2: When we come back and they-

[06:24] Speaker 3: They loved the idea.

[06:25] Speaker 2: They loved the idea because it's, it's, it's a real parallel, frankly, to the horses. Because once you couldn't make money anymore, they were just disposed of and the same things with the horses that we have now. We have these great horses that had marvelous careers, some of whom are in the Hall of Fame. (coughs) And, um, and it was the same thing with these old directors, nobody was paying any attention to them. They were just s- basically sitting around.

[06:51] Speaker 2: So by the time it was done-

[06:52] Speaker 3: That's very true. Hollywood's always been like that.

[06:54] Speaker 2: We put ... Yeah. That- that's right. And they were older and, you know, when you get older, you know, I know the feeling really strongly now because now I'm, I'm at the age that they were when they came to the, came to the school. (clears throat) So I thought if we could just get one of them, we'd be all set. Well, it was a s- they, they just, they were just gr- really, really grateful that we knew that what they did and that we appreciated it and we appreciated-

[07:24] Speaker 3: The rear end of their work.

[07:25] Speaker 2: ... their contribution to the history of the, of the, the motion picture. (coughs) So, uh, the first one to come onboard was Edward Dmytryk who did-

[07:39] Speaker 3: Wow.

[07:39] Speaker 2: ... you know, Mur- Murder My Sweet. Uh, he did, uh, Caine Mutiny. Uh, he did all kinds of really, really good pictures. A great director. And he was, uh, blacklisted as one of the Hollywood Ten, uh, when they had the big, big, uh, the big scandal about whether there were communists in the movie business or not.

[08:01] Speaker 3: Yeah, the McCarthy hearing.

[08:02] Speaker 2: Mm-hmm. And so, uh-

[08:03] Speaker 3: Which was horrible. They even went after Lucille Ball with that.

[08:07] Speaker 2: They went after everybody. John Houston. They went after my friend, uh, Julius Epstein who wrote Casablanca and some other things. They found communists under every rock and it was only a, you know, it was just a ridiculous ... It's, it was, it's ridiculous now, it seems ridiculous. But in those days, it was dead serious and the, and the, the people who ran the studios were deadly afraid that one of their stars would be called a communist and they'd lo- lose tons of money.

[08:33] Speaker 3: Oh, yeah. It ended, it ended careers. There was-

[08:35] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[08:35] Speaker 3: There was guys that never worked again after that.

[08:37] Speaker 2: Yep. Yeah. It, it was very, very bad.

[08:39] Speaker 3: And they really were innocent. I mean, they went on later to prove those people didn't have anything to do with that.

[08:44] Speaker 2: Of course not. It was all manufactured, uh, by a demagogue. Uh, so, uh, so Edward Dmytryk, uh, climbed onboard and then we started getting ... Uh, we started to fulfill our other obligations to interview other people, but we were, we were playing with a pretty good hand knowing we already had him in. Well, by the time the whole thing was done, Edward Dmytryk taught the first week. Uh, second week was taught by Rouben Mamoulian, uh, who is a terrific director.

[09:14] Speaker 3: Wow.

[09:14] Speaker 2: He did, uh, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, he did the first Technicolor picture, uh, Becky Sharp. I think he directed almost all of Eugene O'Neill's plays on Broadway. So h- the first week was Dmytryk, the second week was Mamoulian. Then, uh, then King Vidor who directed his first film, I think, about 1923 and his last film in 1957. One of the greatest and most underrated film directors ever.

[09:45] Speaker 3: Mm.

[09:45] Speaker 2: His films included what I consider to be the greatest silent film which is The Big Parade and, uh, a World War, oh, a one drama silent movie. And, uh, and all the way up to, uh, all the way up to, uh, The Fountainhead and some other films that he did in the, in the, in the '50s. Uh, he was terrific. And he had such a good time that he stayed over another week at his own expense and he team taught the course with, uh, with Frank Capra who, of course-

[10:16] Speaker 3: Oh, wow.

[10:16] Speaker 2: ... was just the, the old maraschino cherry on top of the old sundae. He was fabulous. And the other thing that I learned by listening to all these old guys is that th- because they're not interested anymore in, uh, or they're, they're not, they're not being invited anymore to, to generate income for the studios, the chances of them telling you the truth were much greater. And so-

[10:43] Speaker 3: Sure.

[10:43] Speaker 2: ... you really got the real stories. And when people found out who was gonna be teaching this course, the enrollment went from six, five or six, to over 300. And we had to get-

[10:55] Speaker 3: Oh, wow. You had to cut it off.

[10:56] Speaker 2: We had to have it in the theater and it was, it was just great. And all Gary and I had to do (laughs) was thread the projector and let them go. It was (laughs) , it was the easiest money I ever made in my life and it was, it was so much fun I would've paid to, to, to, to ... Boston University to allow me to teach it. But it was, uh, it was-

[11:14] Speaker 3: Did Julius Epstein come and teach one of them?

[11:16] Speaker 2: What's that?

[11:17] Speaker 3: Did Julius Epstein come and teach one of them?

[11:20] Speaker 2: No, he didn't. I didn't know Julie at that time.

[11:22] Speaker 3: Oh, you didn't know him at that time?

[11:24] Speaker 2: Uh-huh.

[11:24] Speaker 3: Okay.

[11:24] Speaker 2: Yeah. He ... That came later because coming out of that, um, I started to do some interviews with some directors and things and, and sell them. I did a interview with Elia Kazan when, uh, The Last Tycoon came out. Of course-

[11:40] Speaker 3: Oh.

[11:41] Speaker 2: ... Elia Kazan was a-

[11:42] Speaker 3: Oh, wow.

[11:42] Speaker 2: ... another one that was involved in the blacklist and, and he was another one who, uh-

[11:46] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[11:46] Speaker 2: ... made, uh, you know, t- he, he, he, he directed all, he, he directed almost all of Tennessee Williams', you know, plays that were made into films, you know, Streetcar Named Desire. And he was great and I s- I did an interview with him and I sold it for $100.... I-

[12:06] Speaker 1: Oh, wow.

[12:06] Speaker 2: ... it was a local, local alternative weekly. And then, uh, the, th- there were so many movies coming out and the, that the Globe needed a second string movie critic to come and pick up the s- the slack and do the, you know, r- see the movies and review the movies that the, uh, the main critic, the fi- first run critic didn't wanna see. So, they called me and I started doing that on a freelance basis and a few years later, they, they made me quasi-

[12:32] Speaker 1: So that was how you got into Globe.

[12:33] Speaker 2: ... legitimate movie staff.

[12:33] Speaker 1: They approached you. So that, that was really how you got to the Boston Globe was they approached you?

[12:41] Speaker 2: Yes. Yeah.

[12:43] Speaker 1: Well, that's amazing.

[12:43] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

[12:44] Speaker 1: We're joined by Michael Blown, Old Friends Farm and former Boston Globe movie critic, um, talking about Hollywood, his career. So you're at Emerson, you, you've put this together with all the directors and everything, which is, that's a book in itself. You could write a book about that class.

[13:02] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. It was an amazing group, Mark.

[13:04] Speaker 1: I mean, that, that, like, amazing to have that many people go through that room with that much experience from Hollywood.

[13:10] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[13:10] Speaker 1: It had to be just surreal.

[13:12] Speaker 2: Well, as you know as a friend of mine, I only like to do things that are fun. (laughs) That was a lot of fun.

[13:18] Speaker 1: Yeah, and you do it very well.

[13:19] Speaker 2: (laughs) Very little work and a lot of fun is my motto.

[13:24] Speaker 1: But you also, you have a gift of being able to put it together and let people do what they do.

[13:29] Speaker 2: Right.

[13:29] Speaker 1: And that's a perfect example of that. It's-

[13:32] Speaker 2: Well, I wanted to be a movie director originally. And I actually got some, uh, I got hired to make a movie in Ireland.

[13:42] Speaker 1: Oh, wow.

[13:42] Speaker 2: And, uh, and I wrote the script. It was about two American, uh, folk singers. One was a native Irishman and the other was a Irish-American, and they go back to Ireland and the, and the... And I wanted to do, it was kind of like a, I thought, uh, an interesting St. Patrick's Day special, where-

[14:03] Speaker 1: Sure.

[14:04] Speaker 2: ... the, the Irish-Americans saw everything romantically. And so we had these romantic things about how beautiful Ireland is, et cetera. And the other guy, the Irishman, of course, was much more cynical and we had some other stuff in there that wasn't as-

[14:16] Speaker 1: (laughs)

[14:16] Speaker 2: ... that wasn't as complimentary to the old sod. (laughs) And, uh, and I made that movie and, and through this wi- wild, crazy series of circumstances, I got a print of it into the hands of the, the great producer, uh, director, Otto Preminger.

[14:37] Speaker 1: Wow.

[14:37] Speaker 2: And I brought it down to New York and, uh, I left it off with him and he told me to come back later at his, uh, at his apart- at his, uh, at his house, his townhouse in Manhattan and, and pick up the movie. So I went off and, uh, went around New York and then I came back at 6:30 at night and I rang Otto Preminger's doorbell and the butler answered and Otto came out. And he goes, "Mr. Blown, thank you for coming." (laughs) I said, "Okay, Mr.

[15:05] Speaker 2: Preminger, thank you for looking at my movie." And he goes, "You know," he says, "I think that's the worst movie (laughs) I ever saw in my life."

[15:14] Speaker 1: Oh, no. (laughs)

[15:15] Speaker 2: (laughs) Yeah. And I said, "Really?" He goes, "Yeah." He says, "One of the reasons I wanted to come down and talk to you rather than just hand it off is, I was very curious about what exactly you had in mind." (laughs) So now it's funny, it wasn't that funny then. But, uh, but it was very good career advice 'cause I would've been, I would, would, would have made probably a very poor m- movie director and, and-

[15:38] Speaker 1: So you-

[15:38] Speaker 2: ... my life ended up the way it has.

[15:40] Speaker 1: ... you start working at the Globe then, what was it that led you to full-time or was it just kind of natural attrition as you kept getting busier and doing more that they pulled you in?

[15:52] Speaker 2: Well, you know, the Globe was expanding too. The Globe was just-

[15:56] Speaker 1: Okay.

[15:58] Speaker 2: ... a tremendous newspaper. It's, uh... And I don't wanna sound too nostalgic about all this, but, you know, my wife Diane White was a great columnist there. And they had-

[16:06] Speaker 1: Yeah, I wanted to touch on that.

[16:07] Speaker 2: ... you know, you know, Ellen Goodman and Mike Barnicle. Uh, and then the sports section, you know, Peter Gammons was covering baseball and Bob Ryan was covering the NBA, and Bud Collins was covering, uh, tennis. And Will Montgomery was covering-

[16:21] Speaker 1: And to put it in perspective for our listeners-

[16:23] Speaker 2: ... national football.

[16:23] Speaker 1: ... especially our younger listeners, you know, this is pre-internet. So when you're talking about the Boston Globe at that time, you know, it was kind of one of the three points of the triangle, in my opinion. You had the LA Times, New York Times, and Boston Globe. And so, yeah, it was, it was huge.

[16:42] Speaker 2: Yeah, it was a, it was a great time. And, and, uh, you know, when I first started, you know, I was an academic and I was young, and I was very snobby about the movies. And, uh, I taught courses on Ingmar Bergman and, and Federico Fellini. Now, the Globe sent me out to, to review movies called The Hills Have Eyes and The Incredible H- Melting Man and Ice Castles and all this drivel. And I thought that was totally, I thought, beneath me. And, uh, and, and, and, uh, so w- but, but that, that was very important too, because I... by the time I started to be able to review the, the better movies, um, uh, I had a really, really good foundation in, uh, in trash. I mean, it's a good place to start.

[17:30] Speaker 1: Made you appreciate it a little bit more.

[17:32] Speaker 2: Yes. And, and ............................

[17:34] Speaker 1: And tell us a little bit about what that was like, because I think people don't realize that at this time, you didn't just send somebody an email. You would actually get on the plane or train and go out to Hollywood and meet with the directors and meet with the actors and spend time with them.

[17:52] Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, it was different, as you point out. Like, I'll give you an example. Uh, as, when I was the second string critic, I'd complain all the time to my editor that I needed to see some decent movies 'cause I was going nuts just looking at the same stuff. And I was getting really good feedback from readers and feedback from other editors and things.... and, um, and I knew that I could do it. Uh, but I was still a second circuit. So I found out that John Huston was, uh, coming to town to promote his autobiography. And I went to my editor and I said, "Look, I promise you I won't complain about anything for a year.

[18:33] Speaker 2: You can send me to the ice capades, I'll do whatever you want."

[18:36] Speaker 4: (laughs)

[18:37] Speaker 2: "But, but, (laughs) but I really wanna interview John Huston. If you let me interview John Huston, and let me set that up, I, I promise I won't complain for a year." So she agreed, (laughs) quickly, uh, al- almost too quickly. (laughs) But anyway, uh, so I, I set up this interview to talk to John Huston, uh, um, it was about three weeks away from his scheduled visit. And in those days, of course, there's no VHS, there's no, no, you know, there's no home movies or anything. You, I had to go to the Boston Public Library, but it was great. I went to the Boston Public Library where they had a huge collection of 16 millimeter, uh, prints, and I watched all these great old John Huston movies.

[19:21] Speaker 2: You know, the-

[19:21] Speaker 4: Wow.

[19:21] Speaker 2: ... Treasure of the Sierra Madre-

[19:24] Speaker 4: He's got a lot of movies.

[19:24] Speaker 2: ... you know, the African, the African Queen, uh, The Maltese Falcon. I could go on and on, but anyway all these great movies and ... So I was really prepared. So I made arrangements with the publisher to show up on ... I was gonna spend, uh, spend the day with him, uh, instead of just sitting down on a, in a room for an hour and talking to him. And, and so I was all excited. And they said, "Okay, show up at 7:00 on Monday morning to Ritz Hotel. Just dial up his room and, and, and off you go." I said, "Fine." So, Monday morning, 7:00 on the dot, I dial up his room and he answers the phone.

[20:04] Speaker 4: Oh, wow.

[20:04] Speaker 2: And I told him who I was, Michael Blohm, Boston Globe. "Uh, I've come to spend the day with you, uh, Mr. Huston." And there's a pause and he goes, "Well, Michael," he says, "I don't, I don't see anything, uh, about it on my paper." I go, "Oh, (laughs) okay." He says, "But why don't you come up and we'll work it out."

[20:20] Speaker 4: Yeah.

[20:20] Speaker 2: I said, "Okay." So I go up to his room. He answers the door, he's still in his pajamas. And, and, uh, he says, "Why don't you have a seat? I've called up for some coffee and muffins. Here's my itinerary, you look at it, see what you can find." I get the itinerary and it has nothing about me on this Monday. Nothing. And I turn-

[20:41] Speaker 4: Oh, wow.

[20:41] Speaker 2: ... around the page and, and, and on Tuesday I'm, I'm scheduled to spend the day with him on Tuesday. So, uh, according to the itinerary, uh, I showed up a day early and woke him up. And now I wanna do what horses do when they're scared, they, they just wanna run away. (laughs)

[20:58] Speaker 4: Turn and run.

[20:58] Speaker 2: I just wanted to, I just wanted to head for the elevator, but I did sneak in back out. He says, "What'd you find?" And I said, "Well, I, I really apologize." I said, "I, I guess I'm, I'm f- wasn't supposed to come till tomorrow." He goes, "Well, why don't you sit there and, uh, and, uh, we'll, uh, we'll get the, we'll get the coffee. It'll be here any minute and we'll, we'll talk." And we started talking a little, and then he noticed that I had a racing form sticking out of my back pocket. And he looks at me and he goes, "Is that a racing form?" I go, "Yeah." He says, "They have racing here?" "Yeah." "They have a racetrack, thoroughbred racetrack?" "Yeah." "Oh, oh. Do you ... Oh, are they racing today?" I said, "Yeah." "Oh, okay. Now," he says, "don't go anywhere. I'll be back. I'm going..." And he goes in the other room and he comes back about 15 minutes later. He goes, "I've rearranged everything.

[21:50] Speaker 2: While I'm doing all my interviews in the morning, we're gonna go to the track this afternoon."

[21:55] Speaker 4: Wow.

[21:55] Speaker 2: And we went to the track both days that he was there.

[21:58] Speaker 4: (laughs)

[21:58] Speaker 2: We became great friends. He gave me what I think is one of the great books ever about horse racing, a, a book called Laughing In The Hills by Bill Barich that is set at the old Golden Gate Fields up, up in, uh, San Francisco. And, uh, and, uh, we became really, really good friends. Uh, and he was-

[22:20] Speaker 4: And he's one of my favorites as well. I mean-

[22:22] Speaker 2: He, he, he was, he, he's a sp- he's just an amazing person.

[22:23] Speaker 4: ... you know, his movies to me are like amazing.

[22:27] Speaker 2: Yeah. He, Mark, he, he was just, uh, he was my godfather. If ever anybody didn't wanna do an interview or didn't wanna do something, I could call him up and he would make the phone call. And, and that's, it, it's funny how it works out because th- that's how I got to, to meet Jack Nicholson and, and, and develop a, uh, a relationship with him.

[22:47] Speaker 4: Yeah, you and Jack became very good friends.

[22:48] Speaker 2: And, uh, and the reason is, is because they were promoting a, a really funny (laughs) mafia comedy named, called Prizzi's Honor. And Jack was in it with Anjelica Huston. And, and so it's, it's a really funny movie and John directed it.

[23:04] Speaker 4: (coughs)

[23:05] Speaker 2: And after it came out, uh, J- Jack was, never did television, and he wanted to, uh, do it. He promised to do an interview with The New York Times, the LA Times, and everybody else had to, had to, uh, put their name in a hat. Uh, so Scott, you know, Ebert & Siskel and the Washington Post, everybody else, all of us. And, and Jack got the list and he gave it to John and John told him he should talk to me and that's how that whole thing happened, just because of, because of John.

[23:36] Speaker 2: And, uh-

[23:36] Speaker 4: Oh, wow.

[23:37] Speaker 2: ... I'm eternally grateful.

[23:37] Speaker 4: Yeah, you and Jack ended up being really good friends. You'd go to games.

[23:41] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[23:42] Speaker 4: And you'd do a lot of stuff.

[23:43] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, we were, yeah. We, we don't see each other much anymore, but, but, uh, I asked him once. I said to him, "Why are we friends?" I said, you know, (laughs) uh, "we don't see each other. We don't go any- you know, we go to a ballgame or something or, you know, get together for lunch or dinner or something or, you know, nothing, nothing a lot." And I said, "Why are we still friends after all these years?" And he said to me, "Because..." He says this, "Because you never acted as a go between."

[24:09] Speaker 4: Yeah.

[24:10] Speaker 2: You know? He says, "You're the only friend I've ever had who never asked me for something."And I thought, wow, that's really interesting, 'cause it wasn't intentional. (laughs) If I'd have come up with something I really wanted, I would have asked him, but I didn't. And that's how he remembered it, and that's how we became, we became friends. And, and I have to say this, I probably shouldn't admit this, but (laughs) at least publicly, the, um, (laughs) every time they had a Breeders Cup at Santa Anita or at, at Del Mar, I would get Jack to call my editor and tell me he'd do an interview, but it had to be on the Friday, and it was always the Friday before the Breeders Cup.

[24:49] Speaker 2: And I got to go out-

[24:50] Speaker 1: What a journey.

[24:50] Speaker 2: ... at the Globe's expense and go to the races. (laughs)

[24:53] Speaker 1: Statute of limitations are probably up. Accounting probably won't-

[24:55] Speaker 2: Probably. I don't think-

[24:56] Speaker 1: ... match. Good point.

[24:57] Speaker 2: ... nobody cares anymore anyway. (laughs)

[25:00] Speaker 1: (laughs)

[25:00] Speaker 2: So, so-

[25:01] Speaker 1: That is amazing though. So that kind of leads me to another story, and I'm gonna bait you a little bit.

[25:06] Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.

[25:06] Speaker 1: But I've loved hearing about the dinner parties with Sheldon Hahn.

[25:12] Speaker 2: Oh, yeah.

[25:13] Speaker 1: And since this-

[25:14] Speaker 2: He was-

[25:14] Speaker 1: ... kind of pulls us over to Hollywood, it's a perfect segue.

[25:19] Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, how that happened, it goes back a little ways, uh, when I did get to be the first string critic, uh, I, uh, I, I reviewed a movie called Reuben and Ruben with Tom Conti. And, uh, and uh, he plays a teacher in a small Vermont college. Uh, it's based on a Peter Debris movie, uh, novel. And I noticed at the end credits that it was written by Julius J. Epstein, and I said, "Wow, that guy must be related to the guy who wrote Casablanca," one of the Epstein twins. He and his twin brother...

[26:00] Speaker 2: Julie and his twin brother Philip wrote a lot of great movies for Warner Brothers, including, you know, Casablanca-

[26:07] Speaker 1: My favorite of all time.

[26:08] Speaker 2: Yeah. Mr. Skeffington, you know, they w- they wrote a lot of good movies, and they improved a lot of good movies by adding dialogue and things. Anyway, they were real professionals and they worked at Warner Brothers from like 1935 until Phil's death, and then Julie continued on as a sync and, and wrote a, a lot of, a lot of movies. But he was a great guy.

[26:29] Speaker 1: 'Cause back then, they would basically hire people, wouldn't they? You were like under contract with a studio.

[26:36] Speaker 2: That's correct. So, there would be a script that they might need a few funny lines, or they needed another situation, or they needed something to improve it, and they'd send it over to Julie and, and his brother Phil, and they'd, they'd work on it and fix it up. There's some, several scenes in The Big Sleep, for example, with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, um, the Raymond Chandler adaptation, that the best stuff in it was inserts that, uh, that Phil and Julie put in there about... And some of them actually, uh, the, the ones, uh, the, the metaphors in there about horse racing and the jokes about horse racing in there were all Julie and Phil's. But anyway, so I call up the studio and find out if this guy that wrote Reuben, Reuben is related to Julie.

[27:21] Speaker 2: Uh, and, uh, they said, "No, it's the same guy." I said, "You're kidding."

[27:25] Speaker 1: Oh, wow.

[27:26] Speaker 2: "He used to make... write movies?" Yeah, so I, I made arrangements to, to go out and, and interview him, and I did, and we really, really, really hit it off. And, in fact, when he, uh, uh, died about eight years later, I was in the middle of writing his autobiography or helping him go... I was ghostwriting his autobiography.

[27:49] Speaker 1: Oh, wow. Did they ever-

[27:50] Speaker 2: And anyway, but he just-

[27:50] Speaker 1: ... finish that, or you didn't have enough information?

[27:53] Speaker 2: No, there wasn't enough material to finish it. Uh, I wish there was. We never got... He, he, he, he, he unfortunately had a heart attack and a stroke over, uh, over Cleveland, coming back from Boston to California. The only amusing thing about that was, a year, uh, about... a few months later, he was in the, the recovery. He was going through recovery, uh, in a, in a, in a high-end, uh, reh- uh, rehab place in Beverly Hills. And I went to see him, and it was dur- during one of the Jewish holidays, and they were having...

[28:32] Speaker 2: a Purim play was being performed-

[28:35] Speaker 1: Okay.

[28:35] Speaker 2: ... while they were feeding poor Julie, who'd made so much... whose, whose wit and talents and personality were so vibrant, was now, he couldn't talk much, and, and they had to hand-feed him, so they were feeding him some gruel for lunch, and, uh, and it was dripping down his face, and it was really humiliating, and... And they had a woman and a, and a guitar player up on this little makeshift stage in the dining room. Uh, and, uh, and they're putting on this play, and I'm waiting to see when Julie's gonna be done so I can at least sit with him for a while. Well, Ju- Julie's, uh, there... this, the, the, this play, this incessant guitar playing from a terrible guitar player and a woman with a terrible voice, and Julie's eating this... trying to eat this food, and they're forcing her to listen to the music in the thing.

[29:29] Speaker 2: Anyway, in the middle of all this, in walks Walter Matthau, and, uh-

[29:35] Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.

[29:35] Speaker 2: ... Julie wrote Pete & Tillie, uh, for Walter Matthau.

[29:39] Speaker 1: Oh, wow.

[29:39] Speaker 2: And they were all good friends, and... Now, when Walter walks into a room, you know he's there. You know what I mean?

[29:45] Speaker 1: Absolutely.

[29:46] Speaker 2: (laughs) He makes an entrance-

[29:47] Speaker 1: Hurricane just gets hit with-

[29:48] Speaker 2: ... like he's Billy Wilder still directing him. And he walks in. He rushes into the room, "Julie, Julie, the game's on, Syracuse and Penn State." Well, Julie went to Penn State. "I got some dough on it. Come on, Julie, hurry up, Syracuse and Penn State." So, I guess that was a signal for them to stop feeding Julie, and, and, uh, we wheeled him back into his room, and, and, uh, W- W- Walter and I and the, and the nurse got him into his bed, and we propped him up, we turned on the TV to watch the game....

[30:19] Speaker 2: and Julie turned to me and in perfect English, like he didn't have a stroke or anything, just perfect, plain English, he goes, "That's the worst play I've ever seen." (laughs)

[30:33] Speaker 1: (laughs) Timing was everything.

[30:34] Speaker 2: And those were the last words he ever said to me. Those were the last words he ever said to me. He just sat there and Walter was there. I mean, it was-

[30:44] Speaker 1: Poetic words.

[30:44] Speaker 2: ... so nice of Walter to come, and it really gives you another side to Hollywood, too. Some of these people are really connected to one another. Um-

[30:51] Speaker 1: Absolutely.

[30:51] Speaker 2: It's a small town.

[30:53] Speaker 1: So I, as you know-

[30:53] Speaker 2: But there's a lot of small things.

[30:54] Speaker 1: ... I was around the studios for quite a while. And what the, what I noticed over time was, the, the circle, people stay inside there because, kinda like what you were talking about with Jack, they're, they like people that are genuine with 'em. And they like people who, who aren't grabbing at goldbrickers, you know. They want people that just wanna be their friend. And I think, at least my, my opinion, that's why they're such tight friendships because when they do find somebody who's genuine, they really hang onto 'em.

[31:28] Speaker 2: Yeah. It, it's like, it was like a small town back then. Of course, now it's all different because they make movies differently, they make movies-

[31:34] Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so global. Yeah.

[31:35] Speaker 2: ... the whole sy- the whole sys- the whole system's different now. They, they don't need big studios anymore.

[31:41] Speaker 1: Right.

[31:41] Speaker 2: Um, there are more distributors than anything else. Uh, there's a lot of, there's a lot of differences. But I was, I was so fortunate to be able to enter, you know, be in that world for a little while and, and, and experience it because it was a real, it's a real pleasure. And, and it's not unlike, it's not unlike being around these horses every day. It's pretty much the same thing.

[31:59] Speaker 1: Well, it's interesting, too, because, you know, back then, there were so many references to horse racing. And I think, you know, what's always been interesting to me, if you look back at the movies and even television shows, there were so many references to Hollywood Park and Santa Anita, especially, occasionally Del Mar, but mostly those two. And I, I always thought that was really cool. And it was, you know, you've told stories, I remember stories of, you know, Hollywood Park in the afternoon was almost like walking the back lots of the studio, you'd see so many people.

[32:34] Speaker 2: Yeah. It was amazing. Well, I, in preparation for this, I did prepare a bit, not much-

[32:40] Speaker 1: Okay.

[32:40] Speaker 2: ... but a little. Um, there's a really wonderful, uh, book, if people are interested, called Hollywood at the Races by a guy named Alan Shuback, S-H-U-B-A-C-K. You can get it on the internet.

[32:53] Speaker 1: Okay.

[32:53] Speaker 2: Um, Hollywood at the Races, Alan Shuback. And it's, I was just going through it and it talks about how Hal Roach, who, who was the-

[33:02] Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.

[33:02] Speaker 2: ... he founded, he founded, he did a lot of silent films. Uh, he put Laurel with Hardy-

[33:07] Speaker 1: He was very famous for Laurel and Hardy.

[33:10] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. He, uh, he, and he did the Our Gang comedies and everything. You know, he's bas- basically into, into low-budget, uh, comedies and shorts. And, but he loved racing and he was one of the people that, that developed, he and Charles Strube were the two people that basically developed, uh, uh, Santa Anita.

[33:32] Speaker 1: Oh, wow, I didn't know that.

[33:32] Speaker 2: And then... So I was looking through this book and I found out from 1934 to 1937, uh, there were almost 50 movies that were about racing.

[33:47] Speaker 1: I'm not surprised.

[33:49] Speaker 2: You know, Charlie Chan at the Racetrack, In Old Kentucky, Down the Stretch, Three Men on a Horse, Wine, Women and Horses. I mean, Little Miss Thoroughbred. I mean, most of these movies are gone. You probably can't even find them anymore. But, uh, uh, but it's amazing-

[34:05] Speaker 1: King Crosby did-

[34:06] Speaker 2: ... because, you know, racing was so popular.

[34:07] Speaker 1: ... he had a lot of references.

[34:09] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.

[34:10] Speaker 1: Days of Races.

[34:12] Speaker 2: The, the, the very, it's, uh, some of the best interviews I ever did were at the clothing or the ones with John were, were, were at the racetrack. I remember, uh, I remember Jack Klugman, who was very active in horse racing, uh, during the time of The Odd Couple, uh, he and Tony Randall were doing a road show, uh, company, uh, for the, for the, uh, for The, uh, Odd Couple, the Neil Simon play, and they came to town and I got sent over to talk to Jack and I was talking to Jack and, you know, racing came up because there was a wonderful horse back then that he had named Jacklyn Klugman. And, and we started talking about that and we, he found out that the same thing John Houston did, I told him, you know, "Well, there's racing here, you know, Suffolk Downs. We have racing, we have simulcasts," you know. And so every day that he was there, I'd pick him up in the morning after they did their real read-through for the play, and I'd pick him up every day at the, at the Colonial Theater.

[35:16] Speaker 2: And Tony Randall would be there and he'd... (laughs) Every day, Tony Randall would wag his finger at us and go, "Now, boys, I know where you're going, and that's not a good thing." (laughs)

[35:30] Speaker 1: (laughs)

[35:31] Speaker 2: And Jack, Jack would go there and he, the people would see him at the track and he'd sign autographs and it was really, it was, it was, it was really nice. He was very nice and he loved the horses and he loved the gambling and he loved the people and people loved him. It was, it, it was really nice. And, and that led to a good relationship, too.

[35:51] Speaker 1: So how did you come to go to... We started to talk about how you came to go to the Sheldon Leonard dinners. Was that from Julie? Was that-

[35:58] Speaker 2: Okay. Yeah. Thanks, Mark. Thanks for keeping it on track. Um-

[36:01] Speaker 1: No, I'm just-

[36:03] Speaker 2: No. No. I think that's-

[36:04] Speaker 1: ... Dr. Segway, everyone.

[36:06] Speaker 2: ... a segue. So, so after I found out about Julie Wright and, uh, Reuben, Reuben, I went out to see him and we really hit it off. And he, and, uh, it, the interview came out really... I thought it came out great 'cause of Julie. He was saying great things of...... all interesting and it was re- it was, if it was regurgitated, nobody would listen to it for thir- for th- past 30 years. From then on, every time, al- almost every time we went to California, to Hollywood, uh, Diane and I would get invited to a dinner at Julie's. And it was all old Hollywood.

[36:46] Speaker 2: Um-

[36:46] Speaker 1: So-

[36:47] Speaker 2: ... Sheldon Leonard, as you mentioned, Sheldon Leonard was a guest. Uh, Max Shulman, uh, Don Taylor, the actor/director, and his wife, the horror queen, Hazel Court, I remember very, very well. And, uh, and we would just sit around and they would go, we'd go around the table and they'd just start telling stories, and it was such a, it's, it was f- it was just one of those really fortunate times, everybody laughing and, you know, uh, Julie loved to tell stories about Bette Davis and how, uh, because of the success of Casablanca, Warner Brothers allowed he and his brother to become producers, and they produced one movie, Mr. Skeffington. But, uh, but they had such a hard time with Bette Davis that they never did it again. They went back (laughs) to their writing. (laughs) Even though it didn't pay as much as Julie pointed out.

[37:41] Speaker 2: (laughs) It was good 'cause they didn't have to deal with Bette Davis anymore because I guess she was fairly d-

[37:48] Speaker 1: That's so neat.

[37:48] Speaker 2: ... fairly demanding.

[37:49] Speaker 1: And, and the story was that they actually, as most people know, Casablanca came together relatively quickly. What people may not know is that Mr. Skeffington was the one that they put a lot of work in, and it is almost unknown today.

[38:05] Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, Casablanca is such an, it's such a unique-

[38:10] Speaker 1: It just exploded.

[38:10] Speaker 2: Everything about it.

[38:12] Speaker 1: Yeah.

[38:12] Speaker 2: It clicked in, they didn't have a lot of time to make it, nobody thought it was gonna do any good. Th- then nobody had any expectations for it, at all. They just, most of the actors, Ingrid Bergman, Bogie, they just wanted to get onto their next pictures. And yet-

[38:29] Speaker 1: It's so funny how down through the years, it seems like there's a lot of those stories. And I, I know like-

[38:36] Speaker 2: You-

[38:36] Speaker 1: ... you, you've talked about some of them, like Animal House, you know, Jaws. Jaws especially, I know some of the people thought that was gonna be the end of their career, and that ended up being what started for a lot of people.

[38:49] Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, it is funny. Uh, I mean, I remember, speaking of Jaws, I remember doing an interview with, they, with Steven Spielberg when E.T. came out. He said E.T.-

[39:00] Speaker 1: Yeah, he was one of the ones that thought he was gonna get fired.

[39:03] Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. E- E.T. and Poltergeist came out the same weekend, and I made a wager with Steven (laughs) Spielberg of $50, uh, that weekend because, or the weekend before, we had this drunk get up in New York and, and we saw E.T. and Poltergeist and that was at a time when children's movies were relegated to the matinees and rarely played evenings. Walt Disney was on the verge of bankruptcy because his last few movies were only playing afternoons, he couldn't make his money back, and they weren't as good as the classic ones, you know, movies like, uh, you know, Robin Hood and, uh-

[39:42] Speaker 1: Snow White, yeah.

[39:43] Speaker 2: ... and, uh, and, uh, uh, uh those mediocre animated movies that they made, uh, before they had their great, (laughs) th- th- whe- where, before they had their great resurrection and they started to become more popular. But I told him, he said, who, who, he asked me what I thought was gonna be more successful, E.T. or Poltergeist, and I said, "Well, by far, E.T. E.T.'s a great movie and Poltergeist is a good movie." And he said, "Well," he said, "I'll bet you 50 bucks." I said, "Okay, fine." Well, of course, you know, E.T. comes out and it goes crazy, and the next time I interviewed him, which I thought, I think was for The Color Purple, um, he gave me the 50 bucks.

[40:30] Speaker 1: Oh, that's funny. (laughs)

[40:32] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[40:32] Speaker 1: He lived up to it.

[40:34] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[40:34] Speaker 1: So-

[40:34] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[40:35] Speaker 1: ... the other half of that, you know, we kind of skimmed past it, but I can't be remiss if we didn't touch on it. So you talked about your amazing wife, Diane White. You have to tell the story about how you guys met.

[40:49] Speaker 2: Oh, (laughs) yeah, well, um, as I say, Diane was a prominent columnist at The Globe-

[40:56] Speaker 1: Phenomenal writer.

[40:56] Speaker 2: ... and a prominent columnist in the city. Very good, v- very funny, very witty, very biting sometime. Uh, Martha Stewart used to refer to her as that nasty-

[41:05] Speaker 1: And she was syndicated. She, she was all over the world.

[41:08] Speaker 2: Yeah, she was syndicated. Oh, yeah. She was everything, and, and, uh, so, uh, one year I was coming back from Saratoga and I knew that they were gonna have the f- Boston Magazine did their annual survey and best lobster, best this, and they had a media page, best columnist, best TV anchor, all that stuff. So, I knew this was the year I was gonna become the, I was gonna get the award for best movie critic 'cause everybody else had left. As I mentioned before, Deke Rosselle had gone out to Hollywood to work for the Director's Guild, Janet Maslin had gone to the New York Times, David Ansen had gone to New Y- uh, the, uh, to Newsweek, uh, uh, s- oh, yeah, so and, uh, Stephen Schiff had gone to The New Yorker along with David Denby, so I was the only one left. They had to give it to me. So I come back and it was one of the few times I had a successful meet at Saratoga, paid for the whole vacation and still had money left over.

[42:11] Speaker 2: I went to the Harvard Square newsstand and, uh, I got the issue of Boston Magazine and I open it up to the media page and it says, oh, there's Snow White, and all the rest of the columnists are just dwarfs, especially her husband, Dopey.

[42:30] Speaker 1: Oh, no.

[42:30] Speaker 2: ... and, uh, that- that's why we have all these stuffed Dopeys around the house. And, uh, so that was a, that was a career high. (laughs)

[42:43] Speaker 1: But I think the-

[42:43] Speaker 2: But she was spectacular.

[42:44] Speaker 1: ... part-

[42:45] Speaker 2: And that, that, and then the way we met was kind of interesting because it was a, as I said, I was the second string critic. I never got to go to any of the good movies. But, but one time the, the chief critic, uh, Bruce McCabe, who did a wonderful job, he, um, he, uh, he was sick or he was gone someplace else, or he had something else to write about. I don't know what it was, but they sent me to this fabulous Russian movie called A Slave of Love, uh, directed by a, a movie director named, uh, Nikita Mikhailov. It's a, it's a really good movie, and it was set... It was about the making of a movie, and it was set in the period of the Russian Revolution and the transition from silent films to sound films, and all that is integrated. So I started to explain how the making of the movie in the silence, uh, sound was trying to... It was the same, it was paralleling the transition from the Czar to the Bolsheviks, it went on and on and on. Four stars, masterpiece, whatever.

[43:49] Speaker 2: And that review came out on Saturday, and on Tuesday, Diane's column came out and, and this is when I just knew her, really, I just knew her as a colleague. And, uh, and, uh, her- her- her- column started out something like, "Well, uh, over the weekend, I decided to go see this movie, A Slave of Love at the Orson Welles Cinema in Cambridge. And, uh, because this, the critic at this paper and others are raving about this movie.

[44:21] Speaker 2: And this is a perfect example of why you should never trust movie critics." And she- (laughs)

[44:28] Speaker 1: Oh, no. (laughs)

[44:29] Speaker 2: ... she just laid into it. Said, "It's a terrible movie. The actor sounds like Minnie Mouse." (laughs) And she went, she just tore it apart. And so that's really how we met. I went to her-

[44:41] Speaker 1: Well, you have to tell the rest of the story, that you marched up there to give her a piece of your mind and... (laughs)

[44:46] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[44:47] Speaker 1: It didn't go so well.

[44:47] Speaker 2: I walked up there and gave, gave her a piece of my mind, and I guess kinda like-

[44:50] Speaker 1: Took one look at her, yeah.

[44:52] Speaker 2: Yeah. Said, "Wow, this is fabulous." I mean, it's... Got to meet White, 'cause, uh, you know, I used to read her column long before I met her, so it's been great now we've been married for-

[45:02] Speaker 1: Well, that kind of brings us up to, you're in Boston, you and Diane. You know, Diane's working for The Globe, you're working for The Globe, and you decide you're gonna take your horse racing knowledge to the next level. Tell us a little bit about how you got into horse racing. Like, I mean, I know you were always a fan, but when you s- you, you decided to go take a second or a side job to learn more about it.

[45:26] Speaker 2: So, yeah. So, what happened was this. We used to... My friends at The Globe, uh, if people ever saw the Oscar-winning movie, it won, won best picture, uh, called Spotlight. Those, all the people that are playing in Spotlight was pretty much a lot of those guys are our ******* at least to play like three days a week at lunchtime. And, uh, one by one, each one of us got hurt and couldn't play anymore, so we had to do something else. So I convinced some of my pals to get together and we'd buy a race horse. And we did, and I always thought, "Well, I need to know more about horses. I need to know something more about horses, uh, if I'm gonna become a better handicapper." And so now that we owned one, I decided to apprentice myself out to a bottom of the barrel trainer at Suffolk named Carlos Figueroa.

[46:26] Speaker 2: And, uh, and I did, I became-

[46:28] Speaker 1: A legend.

[46:29] Speaker 2: (laughs) Yeah, a legend.

[46:31] Speaker 1: (laughs)

[46:31] Speaker 2: Yeah, he's a, he's a very interesting guy, Carlos. Uh, but he was, he was a legend, all right. He was called The King of the Fairs 'cause that's where he used to make all his money. He'd go to the fairs and run these $3500 claimers and he'd win races, and he... To give you an idea what kind of a drainer he was, he had a horse named Shannon's Hope that preceded my employment with him, and, uh, he ran Shannon's Hope five times in seven days at the fairs.

[47:04] Speaker 2: And he finally was approached by the ASPCA, and the-

[47:13] Speaker 1: (laughs)

[47:13] Speaker 2: ... and the, (laughs) and the animal abuse lady in, uh, Great Barrington, Massachusetts, and they told him that, uh, he- he was, uh, he should be advised that if he continued to do that, he was gonna, they were gonna, they were gonna arrest him. And Carlos says, "Well, let me say this."

[47:32] Speaker 1: (laughs) In my defense.

[47:33] Speaker 2: "You're gonna put me in jail. You have this other guy, his name is Paul Revere. He goes 20 miles over the bramble and over the stone walls and over this and over that. He comes back and he rides 22 miles, Paul Revere, and you put up a statue to him. I run this horse, uh, around the track three times a day for five days, and you're telling me you're gonna put me in jail." He says, "And you're gonna put a statue up to Paul Revere. This is ridiculous." So, he never got arrested. He talked himself out of- (laughs) He talked himself out of that one.

[48:06] Speaker 1: Well, with that kind of logic, how could you? (laughs)

[48:09] Speaker 2: And the fairs were, you know, gr- were really great for the, for the people because they were fun and amusing and all that kind of stuff, but they were terrible, terrible for the horses. And, and that's how I started getting into the horse part of it because I- I saw what was happening to the horses at the end of their careers, and it wasn't very pleasant. And I thought, well, you know, that was always in the back of my mind. And so when-... when, uh, years went by, I guess I was with The Globe for 20 years something, and Diane was there for 30 something. And, uh, when they offered the buyout, Diane was the first one to take it, and I was the fourth one to take it. And I came up with this (laughs) idea, the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, uh, in their... I don't know why, but they, they asked me to be their operations director.

[49:02] Speaker 2: And, uh-

[49:02] Speaker 1: Was that still in Boston or was that in Con-

[49:05] Speaker 2: No, it, it was, it was all over. It wa- they've got great offices.

[49:09] Speaker 1: Oh, it was everywhere. Okay.

[49:09] Speaker 2: They've done a great job. Yeah. It's a fabulous organization. (coughs) Anyway, I was their operations. They offered me this job of operations director, and I said, uh, "Hmm." I said to Diane, "Look, we're not doing anything. Our son lives in Australia. Uh, our parents have passed away. Let's, let's try this, and if we don't like it, we'll just, we'll just come back, and we'll go someplace you wanna go, or we'll s- come back to Boston, whatever you want." So she thought about it for a while.

[49:44] Speaker 2: (laughs) And 20 minutes later, she comes back, and she goes, "Okay, I'll go with you, but only (laughs) under one condition." I said, "Okay, what's that?" She goes, "That when I leave you, you won't come looking for me." (laughs)

[49:56] Speaker 1: (laughs)

[49:57] Speaker 2: I said, "Oh, yeah. That's all right." So anyway, we... That's how, uh, that's how we came down here. It was the experience of Carlos, the idea that I thought that, uh, racing could... Much better job with aftercare, and, uh, and that's how we ended up in, in Kentucky, and that was in 2000.

[50:15] Speaker 1: And prior to that, you'd actually done a little bit of rescuing up there. You have to tell the story about Little Silver Charm in 2000.

[50:22] Speaker 2: (coughs) Yeah. Well, so Little Silver Charm, you know, what happened... Well, let me put it this way. W- when you fall in love, whether you fall in love with a person or with an animal or whatever you, yourself, whatever you fall in love with, it's gonna change your life.

[50:41] Speaker 1: It's gonna change-

[50:41] Speaker 2: No matter what, that- it changes your life, and that's irrevocable. So I fell in love with the horses. I really wanted to, really, really, really wanted to, to, uh, to do something about it. And, and that's, that's when we started to get involved in the aftercare, and when we decided to come to Kentucky and work for the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation. And out of that, I thought, "Well, I saw the people were like, if you went to a ballgame with Nicholson, you had to leave, like, 30 seconds early because it was like the Red Sea with people chasing them." And I thought, "You know, they're like this around these movie stars." They were like that around Jimmy Stewart, and there were a lot... There, there, people were really, really crazy about these, some of these movie stars. So, and I was that way around these horses.

[51:34] Speaker 2: I thought, "If you could do the same thing with the horses and have a place where the people could come to visit them, it might, it might work out." And that's-

[51:42] Speaker 1: The motion picture home for horses.

[51:43] Speaker 2: ... that's why we came down here. And w- we brought Little Silver Charm with us, and I got Little Silver Charm, who's our miniature horse, our mascot, and I think the oldest horse on the farm. I think he's about 36. We got him, and, uh, and, uh, I got hi- him because one day at Rockingham Park in New Hampshire, now defunct, and coincidentally, or I should say parenthetically rather, um, when I was growing up, there were 17 licensed thoroughbred tracks in New England. Now there's none.

[52:22] Speaker 1: Yeah.

[52:22] Speaker 2: Uh, which is a-

[52:24] Speaker 1: That's really sad.

[52:24] Speaker 2: ... stunning statistic. But one day, up at Rockingham, a semi came by, and there was a banging on the outside, on the inside of this truck. And Larita Lindeman, who was my trainer, said to the guy, uh, the driver, "What do you got in there?" He says, "Well, I got, I got two ducks, a goat, and a little horse." And she says, "How much do you want?" And he goes, "$40." So we came up with the $40, and we got the ducks and put them on the pond at Rockingham. We got the goat, who got adopted by one of Larita's thoroughbreds, and then when we moved to Kentucky, Diane and I got Little Silver Charm and, and brought him down here.

[53:07] Speaker 2: And he's been with us ever since, so I think that-

[53:09] Speaker 1: And he's been a regular fixture. Actually, like you say, the mascot for Old Friends.

[53:13] Speaker 2: Yeah. (laughs)

[53:13] Speaker 1: And he used to be a, a regular, a fixture in Midway. Midway, Kentucky, is a small town, and Little Silver Charm would stroll the streets with you.

[53:24] Speaker 2: It was great because, uh, we'd end up in the bar, and there'd be, like, four people there. And then you'd find out the little horse was there, and, uh, there'd be, like, t- se- 60 or 70 people getting their picture taken at the bar with, with Little Silver Charm. And he didn't have to pay for his oakie Chardonnay that they fed him in a saucer, and I didn't have to pay-

[53:42] Speaker 1: Oh, that's great.

[53:42] Speaker 2: ... for my beer, so it worked out really well. And he became the mascot. In fact, at one point, I found out we were... and a sheriff came with a s- with a notice that I had two weeks to get the hor- get Little Silver Charm out of my yard at Midway, and, uh, because it was in violation of the code that said you couldn't have livestock in your yard. And I tried to explain to the gentleman who delivered this ominous news that, uh, he was a pet, he wasn't livestock, but that did no, uh, no good, and, and it was gonna end up in the, in the, in the courthouse. So I had to act quickly because there was no way that we were gonna stay in that house if we couldn't have Little Silver Charm.

[54:35] Speaker 2: So I called Penny Chenery, who had become a friend of ours, and Penny, as most (laughs) horse aficionados know-

[54:41] Speaker 1: Most notably known.

[54:43] Speaker 2: ... Thoroughbred knows it. She owned Secretariat, and, uh, was his caretaker for all those years, along with River Ridge. Anyway, Penny was a wonderful woman.

[54:52] Speaker 3: And was also a part-time Midway resident.

[54:54] Speaker 2: Yes. She... At this point, she lived in, in Lexington, on Holiday Road. And she was a fabulous supporter of Old Friends. She was one of the few people at the beginning of this odyssey to say that, uh, Old Friends was a good idea. Uh, and I... And though, she was, like, one of the first people in the racing establishment to acknowledge that it was a good idea, and it was okay to talk about aftercare. So I call her up, I go, "I don't know what to do." So she says, "Well, I'll, I'll come over there." This is on a Friday. She came over on Sunday. We spent all day Sunday going around getting people to sign a petition to keep Little Silver Charm in the yard.

[55:35] Speaker 1: (laughs)

[55:36] Speaker 2: And more people signed Silver Charm's petition than voted for mayor on both sides.

[55:43] Speaker 1: That's hilarious. (laughs)

[55:44] Speaker 2: Yeah. So n- and, and needless to say, I got a call from somebody in the, in the courthouse and said, uh, they said to me, "Okay, look. I'm not supposed to tell you this. I'm not gonna j-... I can't tell you exactly, but I think you'll be pleased by the news." I said, "Okay, great." And he goes, "But you have to promise me one thing." I said, "What's that?" "Don't bring the little horse to the courthouse." (laughs)

[56:12] Speaker 1: (laughs)

[56:12] Speaker 2: So I said, "I've got a horse." And that was our, that was our deal, and he, he's been with us ever since. And he's still out here, grazing and having fun. And now he's right across the pasture from Big Silver Charm.

[56:25] Speaker 1: And he's had how many books written about him? Two or three?

[56:29] Speaker 2: I don't... Yeah, yeah.

[56:31] Speaker 1: Several, yeah.

[56:32] Speaker 2: Yeah, several. Diane, my wife, wrote, wrote the great one. The, the one where she, she claims to have taken dictation from him and just wrote it down, but I have a feeling that's not exactly true.

[56:43] Speaker 1: It's interesting to note for people, I mean, he's... We're joined by Michael Blown, um, founder of Old Friends Farm and formerly of The Boston Globe, talking about Old Friends, Hollywood and Little Silver Charm. It's interesting to know, it would, it would... You might know this actually. I wonder how many different publications and TV shows he's been on.

[57:07] Speaker 2: Well, I know-

[57:07] Speaker 1: It's gotta be staggering.

[57:09] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. He's been on at least 50 TV shows.

[57:13] Speaker 1: Yeah.

[57:13] Speaker 2: And probably-

[57:13] Speaker 1: And, and everything from the Today Show to, I mean, just a laundry list of big shows.

[57:21] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. He's, he's very popular. And I'll tell you, I don't know how much money he's brought here, but people, people come here and they get their picture taken with him, and he plays with the kids, and... You know, Rosie Napovnik, the great, uh, jockey, now retired, and her husband, trainer Joe, Joe Sharpe, came here when their kids were really tiny. And Little Silver Charm was, uh, the first horse that either of those little kids got on. So he's had his, he's had his, uh, he's had his fans come here, and he, he really likes it. He's really into it. He likes all the attention. He really does. It's funny. He's a funny horse.

[57:58] Speaker 1: And that kind of brings us up. So it's like, you know, and that's something I think a lot of people, people that know you now may not realize, and you touched on it a little bit. When this first started, it wasn't instantly popular with the ins- industry. I remember, and I don't remember the exact year that you and I met, but the way we met, I was working for a company, and I floated around, and I didn't know anything about horseracing.

[58:24] Speaker 2: No.

[58:24] Speaker 1: Still don't, but I knew less then. And I was just going around banging on doors like a door-to-door salesman. And Bob Cleveland over at Woodford Feed told me, he said, "You know, you need to go meet Michael Blown. I think he could help you, and you guys might benefit each other." And I didn't know you from Adam, and I don't know if you remember this, but I just, I just drove in the driveway. And I'll never forget this. I don't remember the horse that was there, but it was a beautiful, big, gray horse. And I think he was pretty famous.

[59:01] Speaker 1: And I-

[59:02] Speaker 2: Yeah, Black Tie Affair.

[59:04] Speaker 1: That's what I thought, but I wasn't positive.

[59:05] Speaker 2: Mm-hmm. Yep.

[59:07] Speaker 1: And you, you were outside with people. They were working on his legs or something. And that was how you and I met, and we just hit it off, and we've been friends ever since. But I can tell from personal experience, when you and I first met, we could part the crowd like the Red Sea. Now I can still do that, but you don't. And it's funny how the industry in the beginning... I don't wanna say they were against it, but they definitely didn't go out of their way to help it. And now it's like, it's become the poster child for aftercare (laughs) worldwide.

[59:40] Speaker 2: Well, you know, it's very interesting. And in retrospect, I understand their reluctance now. I didn't then. I thought it was-

[59:47] Speaker 1: I d-... In fair- in all fairness, I do too, because there's so many times that people have, maybe with, uh, good intentions, and it just ended up being a mess.

[59:57] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[59:57] Speaker 1: So I'm sure that they were a little concerned. But it is remarkable, and I don't think, uh, and, and I'm not saying this just because you're here, I honestly don't think the results would've been the same if it wasn't for you. Because you've got a unique gift of skills that have really brought it to where it is.

[01:00:17] Speaker 2: Well, that's, that's, that's very kind of you to say, Mark. And, uh, but, you know, as I say, it's-

[01:00:21] Speaker 1: And I know this was a lot of help.

[01:00:23] Speaker 2: Yeah, a lot of help. And, you know, when you fall in love, it's a different thing. You just, you do it 24 hours a day. It's not like dividing it up into 40-hour weeks. It's like, this is what you are. And that, that, that part of it actually makes it harder and easier at the same time. But when I first came here-

[01:00:41] Speaker 1: Well, and I think an interesting piece to this is, too, your focus is always on what's best for the horse.

[01:00:48] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[01:00:48] Speaker 1: And I think that there's something very poignant in that, in the sense that it isn't about, oh, we need to do this to achieve this goal for the farm, we need to do this to achieve this goal for our finances. It's always been the focus that this is what's best for the horse, and if we keep that focus, that will get us through, and it really has. Because in the darkest of days, and it's no secret, the- the farm has struggled at times. You always kept your focus on the horses, and people saw that, and they realized that it wasn't anything but a love for the horse that- that was the reason they did what you did.

[01:01:29] Speaker 2: I couldn't believe that I couldn't convince them, a lot of people ag- to do that. Now, I'll gi- the one great example of all this, when I first started, I went to see Governor Brereton C. Jones of Airdrie Stud, who is, uh, one of the most remarkable men I've ever met. He died a few years ago, and- and, uh, I was, it- it was devastating. But anyway, he- he run- ran a great farm and everything. So I said, "Well, I really, I know what I want to do. I just don't know how to do it, so I'm going to make some appointments. I'm going to go around s- talk to a couple of people," and he was one of them. And so I made an appointment to see him. I show up at his office at 10:00 in the morning, and, uh, we're surrounded by pictures of all of his great horses and all the great mares and all the great, uh, thoroughbreds that he has, h- had at- at Airdrie and that still are there.

[01:02:19] Speaker 2: Um, and, uh, we sat down, and after I explained what I was gonna do, he looked at me and he goes, "Mike," he says, uh, "Let me get this straight. You're gonna get these horses, right?" I go, "Yes, sir." And he goes, "You're gonna bring some of them back from Japan." "Yes, sir." And he goes, uh, "But you're not gonna, you're not gonna sell them." "No." "And, uh, you're not, you're not, you're not gonna, uh, race them." "No." "And you're not gonna breed them." "No." And he looked at me quizzically and said, (laughs) "What exactly are you gonna do?" And I said, "Well, I'm gonna put them in my yard and hope people come visit." And he looks at me like I was from outer space. And, uh, we sat down, and after I explained what I was going to do, he looked at me and he goes, "Mike," he says, uh, "let me get this straight.

[01:02:57] Speaker 2: You're gonna get these horses, right?" I go, "Yes, sir." And he goes, "You're gonna bring some of them back from Japan." "Yes, sir." And he goes, uh, "But you're not gonna, you're not gonna sell them." "No." "And, uh, you're not, you're not, you're not gonna, uh, race them." "No." "And you're not gonna breed them." "No." And he looked at me quizzically and said, (laughs) "What exactly are you gonna do?" And I said, "Well, I'm gonna put them in my yard and hope people come visit." And he looks at me like I was from outer space.

[01:03:05] Speaker 2: And then he reached into his lap drawer and he picked up, he pulled out a tattered old checkbook, and he wrote Old Friends a check for $5,000, which, it might have been

[01:03:15] Speaker 1: Which, at that time, it was a huge-

[01:03:15] Speaker 2: ... at that point, in the history-

[01:03:17] Speaker 1: Yeah.

[01:03:17] Speaker 2: ... of Old Friends, it might as well have been a million bucks. And, uh, he handed it to me and he said, "Well, uh, well, good luck to you. Good luck to you." And, uh, and it was as if to say, "I'm going to give you this money. Don't ever come back here again." (laughs)

[01:03:31] Speaker 1: Yeah.

[01:03:32] Speaker 2: Now-

[01:03:32] Speaker 1: Save it for the funeral.

[01:03:34] Speaker 2: Yeah. Over the years, over the years, he came to the farm. We, we, we have several of his, uh, his horses that s- that had, uh, careers at- at Airdrie, including, uh, Afternoon Delights, and we just got, uh, McCracken, just retired here.

[01:03:52] Speaker 1: Oh, wow.

[01:03:53] Speaker 2: His son, Brett, now runs the farm, and he's doing a great job, and he retired McCracken to us. And, and at the end, you know, uh, Brereton gave us more money and more support, and no one was more stunned that these people finally did start coming by the busload to- to visit all these very deserving, uh, horses, who just, uh, earned every penny of having a, having a suitable retirement. And that was a good showcase for the horse racing people to be able to show people that we take care of these horses w- in, in, in their dotage. And, uh, and it's, and it, and it's worked out, uh, uh, way beyond my wildest expectations. It's just taken a lot longer than I thought it would.

[01:04:36] Speaker 1: And I think... And I think that that brings us to a, a really good point, and we're- we're kinda up against the hour, so we're gonna have to wrap up here, which I hate to do. We're gonna have to do this again. But, um, one of the things that's interesting to me is that Old Friends continues to grow, continues to outdo itself, and has actually benefited the industry in multiple ways now, beyond just giving these amazing athletes a place to retire. It's become the largest group of aging thoroughbreds in the world, which has benefited equine medicine in countless ways. It's benefited, um, farrier schools. You know, I know vet- veterinarians schools use Old Friends continuously. It's been something that has, it, it, there's, the list of- of educational purposes that have come out of Old Friends is amazing to me.

[01:05:32] Speaker 1: And, I mean, everything, much more than people would normally think, everything from photography, to journalism, you know, farrier schools, veterinarian schools, you know, equine management. It's- it's pretty remarkable the benefits that this farm has provided beyond the benefit of giving these old horses and retired athletes a, you know, home that's deserving.

[01:05:59] Speaker 2: Yeah. I would- I would concur with that. In fact, the shoeing school's here today, the Kentucky Shoeing School is here today. They do all our trims and do all our feet. They come every six weeks and make sure the horses' feet are okay. Uh, Rude and Riddle-

[01:06:11] Speaker 1: And I think there's no bigger, um, success story to that than your farm manager, Antonio.

[01:06:17] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[01:06:17] Speaker 1: He was a graduate of this school.

[01:06:18] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Antonio's learned everything. Now he runs everything. Uh, he- he went to blacksmith school, so... You know, and the other thing is, you know, the other thing that's good for the horses, everybody's around these horses all the time. So, in- in fact, half of the people that work here live here, l- in houses around, uh, on the farm, so that no little, even a little nick doesn't go, uh, unnoticed for very long.

[01:06:43] Speaker 1: Sure.

[01:06:43] Speaker 2: And, uh, we're only 14 minutes from Rude and Riddle, so any opera- any, uh, time we have a crisis...They're right there to help us immediately, and the sooner you get to those things, the better off everybody is. And, you know, we just, we lucked into some of this stuff, we earned some of this stuff. And, uh, and, uh, I told Diane when we moved here from Boston, I said, "Well, we're going to die," I said, but, "Like everybody else, but there's two things I think we're not going to die of." And she goes, "What's that?" And I said, "Shoveling snow and boredom." And so far, that's true.

[01:07:17] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[01:07:18] Speaker 1: It has held true.

[01:07:20] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[01:07:20] Speaker 1: It has held true. And it, you know, it is remarkable. I would go one step further though, it's amazing to me how many times you see good luck and fortune follow a lot of hard work. And I, I was there to see a lot of your hard work. Not all of it, but I know it hasn't been easy. I know it's been a labor of love, but I also know it hasn't been easy.

[01:07:40] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, you do know, Mark.

[01:07:42] Speaker 1: And-

[01:07:42] Speaker 2: And I appreciate your, your help with the, all kinds of things, with the, the fence and your friendship and, and your, uh, and your advocating for Old Friends. It's meant a lot to us, it's meant a lot to the horses. It really has, and I appreciate it.

[01:07:56] Speaker 1: Well, and I appreciate you guys. I mean, it's-

[01:07:58] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[01:07:59] Speaker 1: ... it's been a amazing friendship from the beginning, and I, I really enjoy you a lot. I think of you as family. Diane as well. So, we're up against the hour here. I hate to say it, but we're going to have to say goodbye. Thank you so much for joining us, Michael. This has been Michael Blowen from Old Friends Farm, former Boston Globe, um, entertainment writer. Um, we really appreciate it, and I really hope you'll come back and do another show with us. We, um, are brought to you today by King Umberto's in New York. If you're ever in New York, you have to go to King Umberto's. The Palm if you're in Miami. Don't forget to take a t- take a moment and look at oldfriendsequine.org. If you're anywhere within two hours of Lexington, you owe it to yourself to go take a tour. Go to the farm, take a tour. You'll be happy you did. Michael has a standing policy that if anybody isn't happy, he'll give them their money back, and I don't think he's ever given a refund.

[01:08:59] Speaker 1: So we, we highly recommend you go and see it, and you have to say hi to Game On Dude for us.

[01:09:05] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[01:09:05] Speaker 1: My favorite horse of all time. I will tell you, and you kind of touched on this, Michael, um, I'm kind of like you, I don't get starstruck very easily. I've met a lot of celebrities, I, I don't know. I mean, you stood next to me when I met Joe Torre and I didn't even know who he was. Um.

[01:09:22] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[01:09:22] Speaker 1: The, um, thing that I, I have always kind of been amazed with is, is horses. And I will never forget the day that Game On Dude came. I'll never forget the day you told me Game On Dude was coming. And that was interesting to me because he was a horse that I followed in Cal- I was working in California when he was big. And I can't say that I was a big race, horse racing fan. I had gone a few times more for the entertainment than anything, and I didn't really know the sport, still don't, as far as handicapping or anything like that. But I, but I, his name caught your attention. He was in the news a lot out there because he was so big, he won so often. He just... And it was one of those ones you, that his name stood out. And, you know, a mutual friend of ours, Bob Baffert, he, he was his trainer. And, you know, Bob always kind of stood out to the media. So, when he was coming to Old Friends, that was, that was kind of...

[01:10:22] Speaker 1: I, I don't think I would have been much more taken aback if somebody told me Elvis was coming.

[01:10:27] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[01:10:29] Speaker 1: Um, it w- it was kind of that level. And I remembered, I remember the day he walked off the trailer and it was almost surreal. So I do understand what you're saying. It's like you, there's, there's something about them that's just, you know, captivating and magnetic. And I would encourage anybody, if you have an opportunity to go see Old Friends, you owe it to yourself to go. It's, it's a tremendous organization. But beyond that, it, it has to be one of the best places to take a tour and really get to see the industry. And not just the horses, you get to see some of the memorabilia. They have a beautiful event barn there now, you can actually do events there. There's a l- there's a lot of things that the farm does. They have a lot of events throughout the year. Take a moment, take a look, oldfriendsequine.org. Our other foundation that we support here is No Fallen Heroes. Please take a moment and take a look at these people.

[01:11:25] Speaker 1: We're losing over 53,000, I'm sorry, 53 vet, vets every day to suicide. And we have to put a stop to that. So, anything that we can do to help these people. And No Fallen Heroes is run by a vet for vets. And the other thing that they do that's unique is that they help the families and first responders. So it's not just veterans that need some help. Um, if your company's in need of help with their healthcare, please take a look at mbgrayhealthcare.com. She is the best of the best when it comes to healthcare consulting. This has been Hollywood and Horsepower. We have been joined by Michael Blowen who was gracious enough to spend some time with us today. We thank you for joining us, and we look forward to seeing you guys again next week. Thanks, everybody.

[01:12:17] Speaker 1: (instrumental music)