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 The swift-thinking,
wise-cracking, cigar-totin', martini-guzzling,
magician/presenter of 'Outlaw Radio - Live from the Lighten Up
lounge' exhales across the Cable Radio Network to over 26
million homes across America every week.
Catch up with him at
www.mrcigar.com.
JL: Where did you
start smoking?
MA: Out in the
desert in northern Nevada, with my 'hippy' Uncle Dick; I was
probably 15 years old, and we would go out arrowhead hunting,
because I love the desert - I really am a desert rat. Uncle
Dick had some 'Swisher Sweets', and turned me on to one of
those. So I started smoking cigars with these sweet tips. It's
funny, more than actually enjoying the cigar itself, I felt
that I was very Clint Eastwood-like. And then these other
types of cigars without tips that were cheroot-like and looked
like something Clint would smoke - because I've always been a
fan of Clint Eastwood, and especially his Spaghetti Westerns.
So we would just spend hours and hike way way out into the
desert and search for arrowheads, and any other relics that we
could find around there. My uncle, now, is officially a
relic, so maybe I could find him.
JL: What do you
smoke now?
MA: Well, let's
see...my favourite cigar right now - and I say this and
they're not a sponsor of my show - is just an incredible
cigar, the El Rico Habano, made by the legendary Ernesto
Carillo - maker of the La Gloria Cubana. And it is
everything, if you like strong cigars, which I do, it's
everything you're looking for in a cigar. It's not strong,
just to be strong, or for the strength itself. Which a lot of
companies - you've probably noticed - over the last couple of
years - everybody loves to gloat about, "Oh we've got this
new, very strong, blend cigar." And then you taste it and,
yes, it's strong, but it's got no finesse. It's got no real,
what I call 'base response', which you can get in a really
great old Cuban cigar. That 'base response', that 'bottom
end'. This El Rico cigar that I'm smoking right now has that
'base response' and it also, believe it or not, has a certain
sweetness to it. Now, I generally don't like sweet cigars but
it's not sweet as in candy, it's just a certain sweetness.
Like, some of the Davidoffs tend to have a certain sweetness
to them. I tell you, Ernesto Carillo is one of the most
brilliant cigar guys on the planet. I actually prefer the El
Rico to his better known La Gloria Cubana brand. If you
compare the two, I think he's lightened up the La Gloria's
blend to make them more consumer-friendly. So this cigar is
great. I also truly enjoy the Fuente Don Carlos more than the
Opus X, but the best cigar Fuente makes is the Ashton VSG. On
a personal level, Carlito Fuente is a class act. Another
'kick ass' heater Is the Fonseca Serie F made by the gentleman
of the cigar industry, Manuel Quesada, Also, don't miss the
intensely strong Joya de Nicaragua Antano, smoke it after a
big ol' Porterhouse Steak...As far as the giant cigar
companies go, I take my boxers off to the General Cigar
Company. They are producing cigars as good and sometimes
better than my favourite boutique brands, which include the
exceptional Sancho Panza double maduros, Ramon Allones,
Partagas Black, and the Cohiba XV. But, if you're going to
smoke a flavoured stogie, I'll take Heaven, and this has
nothing to do with the fact that the owner of Heaven is a
knockout!
JL: So why do you
smoke flavoured cigars?
MA: The only reason
is because this is the first flavoured cigar that actually has
the flavour through the entire cigar. And when it says
'chocolate', it actually tastes like chocolate, all the way
through. They have this special flavouring method, and it's
kinda funky because it's a bit moist on the tip, which is
never a bad thing - unless you need a penicillin shot. (LAUGH)
If, on occasion, you have a hankerin' for a sweet taste,
without all the fat and the calories, I highly recommend
Heaven.
JL: You don't have
to wear a dress to smoke it?
MA: No. But it
helps.
JL And how many
cigars do you smoke a day?
MA: Let's see,
during the week, four to five. On the weekend, oh my God! We
start the show at 3 o'clock on Saturday afternoon but I get
going earlier during the day and, you know, I'll go through
seven or eight. But no inhaling them. I've never smoked a
cigarette so I think I'd probably throw up if I inhaled a
cigar.
JL: It's funny your
saying that. I'm asthmatic and I find cigars soothing. It's
cigarettes I cannot inhale.
MA: James, I love
the fact that you said that because one of our regular 'Demons
of Decadence' on the show is a man named Don Woldman; he is
the King of all divorce attorneys and a true friend - he did
the Marlon Brando palimony suit. Well, Don's wife is a really
great woman, except that she professes to be asthmatic and
won't allow us to smoke in the house. That would be fine but
Don's pool table, or should I say, "billiard table"
(PRONOUNCED WITH A HIGH-BROW ENGLISH ACCENT), is located on
the third floor, downstairs, away from everyone. Even though
the pool room is hidden away, smoking is not allowed. I say if
you're gonna play pool, you must smoke a cigar. Pool playing
and stogie smokin' go together like O.J. Simpson and sharp
cutlery. You simply cannot separate the two. Matt's new law:
"If you can't enjoy a cigar whilst playing pool, get rid of
the table!" To add insult to injury, I caught her smoking
cigarettes the other day. Do asthmatics smoke cigarettes?...hm,...I
think not. I truly believe that she uses the asthmatic ruse so
that we won't 'stink up' her home. I do forgive her, though,
because she's really hot, and isn't that really the most
important thing.
JL: I know what you
mean - at least about the asthma, not Don's wife - who I've
never met. I've appeared on a number of television shows here
in Britain, fighting the smokers' corner - usually by winding
up the ant-smokers with the facts. Anyway, I was on a show
recently and a woman representing the National Asthma
Association came on and blamed the rise in asthma in young
British children to the fact that their parents smoke, i.e.
passive smoking. And I replied, "How can that be, for the
number of adult smokers in Britain has actually decreased
dramatically in recent years. So how on earth can you blame
this recent rise in asthma on smoking? Why don't you put the
blame on the real culprits which includes the fumes from cars,
junk food and all these other chemicals in the air." And, of
course, the following week, my answer turned out to be far
nearer the truth. I also pointed out on that show that I'm
asthmatic and my asthma, to my knowledge, has never been
triggered by second-hand or even first-hand smoking. "What
actually triggers my asthma," I told that woman, "is listening
to people like you. It's enough to make anybody breathless,
with anger." She didn't answer, oddly enough... So, I don't
agree with that asthma claim at all. Not long after, I found
an old tin of tobacco, which is now in the Fox Museum in St
James's Street, London, and it was called 'Potter's Asthma
Mixture'. And on the tin, which is probably 50-60 years old,
it says, "This will make you breathe more easily, and it's
very beneficial for everybody else in the same room when
you're smoking..."
MA: That's
beautiful.
JL: In post-World
War Two Britain, doctors used to prescribe tobacco for certain
ailments.
MA: They did the
same thing here.
JL: There's a
medical reason why smoking cigars can actually help asthma
sufferers...
MA: It controls
breathing, for one thing. George Hamilton talks about this all
the time - he's been on the show a bunch of times - and he
talks about how it fores you to relax. It forces you to sit
down and relax and controls how you breathe. I think it works.
JL: Yeah, I think
he's right. Aside from your backyard in Encino, where else can
guy enjoy a quiet smoke in public in California, these days?
MA: Nowhere.
JL: Really?
MA: Well, there is
one place, which is a private club in Beverly Hills. My
'Demons of Decadence' from the show, including movie casting
guru, Michael Hirschenson, and I, get together there every
Thursday night. Tonight is that night so we'll be there this
evening. We get together at the Grand Havana in Beverly Hills
and it is the only, as I understand it, the only smoking place
you will find in California indoors. Occasionally, you will
find a place that will allow it, for a few minutes - we're
talking outside now - as long as someone won't bitch about
it. And I think about my rights, and what about that hideous
perfume they're wearing. What if I bitch about that, will
they move their table? Well, no, that's absurd! That's why I
think we have such a loyal following to the 'Lighten Up'
lounge and why we have celebrities just show up out of nowhere
on a Saturday. They show up because it's the one place where
they can sit back and they can have a Ketel One vodka - from
Holland - martini and a cigar and no one is gonna bitch about
it. In fact, the only time people bitch, is when they don't
do it...Oh, I just thought of another venue to smoke indoors
in California - the Tiki Ti on Sunset Boulevard, in Hollywood.
It's an exceptional tropical drink bar that legally allows
cigarette and cigar smoking because it is manned by a father
and son with no employees - a California-smoking-loophole. The
Tiki Ti has been in the same location since 1960; which is old
for us, yesterday for Europeans.
JL: Don't you find
now that cigars are really great for networking?
MA: Gosh, it is
amazing. It is the greatest leveler. It is a bond that is
like no other bond. And it doesn't matter whether you're a
truck driver, a cab driver, you work on the roadways, or
you're a multi-millionaire, a stockbroker, a CEO of a major
film company, or an idiot radio personality. It is the one
thing that really brings everyone together and there is no
hierarchy when all those folks get together and smoke cigars.
JL: Let's talk
about Cuban cigars. How easy are they to buy, in California,
these days?
MA: I steer away
from the Cubans, because I feel that they're inferior at the
moment, with the exception of the Cuaba brand. But we have a
couple of guests, including a guy from a very prestigious
casting company, who usually comes equipped with a Cuban - not
the cigar, but his personal valet, who hails from the small
Island. The other guy, not the afore-mentioned attorney, but
another attorney, he has a walk-in humidor in his house -
larger than most humidors in tobacconists, and he has cigars
dating back to the 1980s and early 1990s, and he'll have some
pre-Castro stuff too. And this guy smokes 'em because he
loves 'em. But he really truly also enjoys domestic cigars as
well, he really does.
JL: Moving on to
your show, what gave you the idea for 'Outlaw Radio - Live
from the Lighten Up Lounge'?
MA: Well, for many,
many years - and I am still a workaholic - it's weird but I
enjoyed nothing but work. I never really went out. I would
occasionally go to a fine restaurant, but usually I'd go to a
truck stop and eat a chicken-fried-steak; which, by the way, I
still enjoy. That was really my enjoyment, and it was fairly
one-dimensional. And I was in a cigar/wine party at a
friend's house and he, the famous radio magnate, Jack Silver,
had these incredible cigars; some domestic, some Cuban. Now at
this point I didn't know much about cigars, and I wasn't even
aware that Jack didn't even know about the Cuban embargo.
Which, if you talk to a lay person not into cigars, they
really don't know, they're not totally aware. So I went to
the party and I smoked a little bit of each one - there were
three of them - and there was a Hoyo de Monterrey double
corona, and I smoked, I don't know, about a quarter of it and
I brought it home with me. And I left it on the front stoop of
my house and the next day I realized that it was still out
there. It was a Sunday. So I went out front and grabbed the
cigar, I was by myself, and just lit that thing. And about
five minutes into it I really started to get it. I really
started to understand what this was about...the flavour, the
nuances, and the relaxation. And because of me being a
workaholic it caused me to kick back and relax, for once in my
life. That was really the beginning of my real passion for
stogies.
JL: You're been on
radio for many years?
MA: Since I was
twelve years old.
JL: So, what gave
you the idea for 'Outlaw Radio - Live from the Lighten Up
Lounge'?
MA: Oh yeah, that
was the original question - maybe I should have answered it,
that would have helped! The idea really came to me in
1992/1993 and I thought, "What a ridiculous idea." It came to
me in a dream about three o'clock in the morning and I woke up
and wrote down, "Cigar radio." When I woke up the next
morning and looked at what I had written down I thought, "Boy,
that's a stupid idea." But all these things started coming to
me, like the 'Good Life' and the 'Fun Things in Life' and
'Enjoying a great cigar and a great cocktail and hanging out
with your buddies.' I wrote down a few more ideas, and so on,
and then I made some calls to friends of mine in the cigar
industry. Because since 1989, I really developed a tremendous
passion for cigars, and when I develop a passion for anything
I want to know everything about it. So, I learned by calling
and talking to people like Dick Dimeola who, for many years,
has been one of the big cigar guys. Robbie Levin, over at
Ashton, became a friend of mine. And I said, "What do you
think of this? I wanna do a radio show and it'll be about
cigars but also be about lifestyle and having a good time.
And I'll throw a few celebrities into the thing and make it
more appealing than just interviewing those folks that just
love cigars. It'll bring people from the outside, who would
never even think about smoking a cigar, into this programme,
because we're having so much fun." And Robbie said, "Sign me
up!" Dick Dimeola, who was with Consolidated, said the same
thing. And two or three other companies said, "You know
what...we'll sponsor it if you do it." And that was it. So I
put in on the air and we did one satellite thing in about 1994
at Premiere Radio Networks - which was kind of a test run -
Premiere is a radio syndication company. And I had a buddy
there who also smoked cigars and we'd get together like two or
three times a week in a little watering hole down the street
called the Valley Inn, which is kind of a famous place in the
valley where lots of celebrities have gone ...and a lot of
writers. It's more a writers' joint than anything else. And
so we would sit there and just smoke cigars and so on, and we
talked about this and talked about this, and he said, "Why
don't you go up and do a test run?" So I grabbed some guys
together and we went on the satellite - which I don't know if
anybody heard the damn thing - and we got a demo out of the
thing. And from that, I put it on the air, and started
syndicating.
JL: And now, it's
syndicated right across America?
MA: Yep. All
across America, and then, through the Web, all across the
world. We just did a deal with the Cable Radio Network and
they're in 26 million homes in America, and it's radio through
television. CRN is run by an innovator, a brilliant guy named
Mike Horn, who also happens to be a lover of cigars and great
libations. The response has been just tremendous on this. I
had a buddy, my best friend out of Seattle, he was in a little
town in Alaska and I got a call from him one Friday night -
because the show plays on Fridays at 7pm West Coast Time on
the Cable Radio Network - and he called me and said, "Jesus!
I can't get away from you." He was flipping around the
channels and Boom! he heard my frightening voice and heard the
show. And he said, "I think this is the best thing you have
ever done." So it's the Cable Radio Network, and 26 million
homes, and we have a portion of that audience. And, yeah,
we're pretty damn happy about it.
JL: So what's the
next stage - television?
MA: Yeah, with Ryan
Stiles, from England. He originated the American version of
'Whose Line Is It Anyway' and is one of the stars of 'The Drew
Carey Show', and he and I are executive producers of the TV
version of 'Outlaw Radio'. We shot the first show six weeks
ago and are negotiating with several Networks. Ryan simply
starting coming to the show as a guest and fell in love with
the concept. He is even known to listen to archived shows on
vacation at www.mrcigar.com because he misses it so much. What
it is, is taking the radio version, which is really about a
bunch of guys and some good-looking women and just...hanging
out, and talking about show business and talking about
politics and talking about freedom. I call my guys our
'Freedom Fighting Fanatics' because we believe as long a
tobacco is a legal product - for Gods Sakes! - then why should
this hatred for cigar smokers be in the eyes of everyone in
America. You know, if they could, I think they would kill
us. They'd line us against the wall.
JL: And they
wouldn't give us a final cigar...because it's bad for our
health...
MA: Yeah, that's
true!
JL: I'd like a
final double corona before I go. That way, I could hang around
for a couple of hours.
MA: Yeah, give me a
Monte 'A'.
JL: If you could
convince them to give you a box of Monte 'As', you'd be around
for another month...if you smoke 'em real slow.
MA: Yeah. This
show is really about a Hollywood lifestyle meets cigars and
Ketel One martinis in an interview show BUT at an 1876
Virginia City-style bar here in the hills of Encino. Which
goes back to hanging out with my 'hippy' Uncle Dick, out in
the desert, and Virginia City, a goldmining town which I have
loved since I was five years old. So this bar in my backyard
is a replica of a bar up there. It also has a little Magic
Castle thrown in there too - the Magic Castle is a private
magic club in Hollywood that's been around since 1962, in an
old English Victorian mansion. If you look at the interior of
the Magic Castle and look at some of what we've done to the
'Lighten Up' lounge - which is the bar here in the backyard,
you'll notice some similarities. It started off much
smaller. We took an old pool house and we ripped a hole in it
and then we added an awning and some other stuff. And then,
eventually, we just kept building on, and we enclosed it, and
added an authentic old tin awning. And then we added another
five feet, about nine months ago. It keeps growing larger and
larger. Soon, it'll take over the pool. We'll have no pool
and it will become part of giant lounge...
JL: Or maybe the
pool will become a large ashtray?
MA: It already
has.
JL: It must be so
frustrating in America, just like in Britain, where they have
initiated all these smoking bans but not actually banned the
sale of tobacco. How hypocritical! And it's not as if all
those millions of smokers can, or want to, suddenly quit
smoking. People must be getting so tired of all this
political correctness, or what we call in Britain, 'The Nanny
State'. I imagine your show must be quite refreshing to all
those smoker-friendly listeners. It reminds them of what they
should all be doing - just having a bit of fun.
MA: It's true.
That's why bigwigs and gurus of the industry will stop by here
on a Saturday. Marshall Silverman, from Warner Bros, who
calls the shots over there, he's the head counsel for Warner
Bros, he's been there 22 years. He could go anywhere on a
Saturday, and this guy decides to come over here and hang with
out us. Stan Winston, who is the most famous special effects
guru on planet Earth - he's the guy who did all the
'Terminator' effects, including 'Terminator 3'. He missed a
couple of weeks when he was working on 'Terminator 3' and
emailed me, "Man, I miss it so bad!" Here's a guy who hangs
out with Arnold Schwarzenegger, or should I say Governor
Arnold, and he chooses instead to hang out with us on a
Saturday.
JL: That must tell
you something...
MA: It does.
JL: Arnie used to
smoke cigars, before his heart attack. I don't know if he has
smoked any cigars since then?
MA: I don't know
really but I would tend to say yes. Even David Letterman, I
think, lights up a cigar occasionally, even after his bypass.
I tell you what, I really don't believe it's gonna kill ya.
Take a look at Milton Berle - it nailed him at 92.
JL: Which leads me
on to my next question. Of all your cigar-totin' guests, over
the years, who's your favourite? Would that be Milton Berle?
MA: There are
several of then. Milton was certainly one of my favourites,
if not the top one or two. Just because he was a
no-holds-barred kind of guy. He would say what's on his mind,
and it didn't matter, even on the show. He said, "Yeah, I
smoke and I think it's great for you, and I love it, and I
enjoy it, and I have loved it since I was a kid." He told me
about the time he smoked his first cigar, and he mentioned it
several times because we used to hang out together at the
Friars Club in Beverley Hills. He had tons of stories. All
his cronies who were sitting around the Round Table there
would eventually be gone and it would just be Milton and I.
And then I'd either take him home or take him down the road to
the Peninsula Hotel where, at that time, you could smoke
cigars. He had his own little corner there, and his wife
would meet up with him. He told me the first time he smoked a
cigar was on a cruise ship. His mother and him were getting
on this thing and they were on the gangplank and heading up.
And it was just a crowd of people and he noticed some guys
selling cigars, so he picked one up and bought it - he was
just a kid. It was a Cuban cigar and he lit this thing up and
he started smoking it. He was kind of choking at first but
after three minutes or so he started enjoying it. And his
mother noticed he was smoking a cigar and, as he said, "Just
whapped me upside the head." And he said, "But Matty, she
knew how to hit me so it wouldn't show. She was a showbiz
mom." He said the only reason he smoked a cigar, at least in
the beginning, was because it made him look and feel older.
"Now," he'd say to me, "I don't really have that problem. I
smoke them out of enjoyment." I think it was after he was hit
by his mom that he got into boxing. He was a hell of a boxer.
JL: I hope he
didn't hit his mother back...
MA: I think he was
very afraid of her. She was a very controlling, out-of-the-box
person. He talked about his mother all the time; he didn't
talk about his father, that much. But his Dad did give him a
word of advice. Milton said that one day, many many years
ago, his Dad took out of his wallet a crumpled 100 dollar bill
and gave it to him, and said, "As long as you have that 100
dollar bill in your billfold, you'll be OK." And Milton kept
that 100 dollar bill in his wallet, for the rest of his life.
JL: What other
guests would be among your favourites?
MA: Peter Salinger
was pretty good. He was a fairly outspoken gentleman and
talked about the time that JFK Kennedy sent him to Cuba to buy
all those Havana cigars before he signed the Cuban embargo.
JL: Straight out of
the horse's mouth...
MA: Yeah, he said
it, and I believe it's true. This story has been printed many
times. I asked Salinger if it was true and he said, "You'd
better believe it's true." My God, on this programme we've
had Lee Lacoaca, the inventor of the Mustang - who's just one
of the nicest guys on the planet. He's coming back to Outlaw
Radio in three weeks. I had to get him a very special cigar -
I forget what the hell it was - some kind of a little Cuban
robusto, and he loves that and he loves his whisky.
JL: Of all the
people, alive or dead, who would you love to share an ashtray
with?
MA: It's kind of a
two-part answer.
JL: You can mention
a live one and a dead one, if you like.
MA: OK. I'll do a
dead one first. When I was fifteen and a half years old I was
living in the Seattle area and I was doing radio and
television there. I was also doing my magic shows, at
shopping malls and community colleges, anywhere they would
have me. And so I called the Magic Castle in Los Angeles.
It's one of those places where it's a real honour for a
magician to perform. It means that you've made it. So I
called there and I said if I came all the way out to L.A. can
I get an audition. And they said, "You bet you could." So,
here I was, this brash little fifteen and a half year old, and
at the same time I wanted to be on 'The Gong Show', with Chuck
Berris. He was, like, America's Game Show Guru, he did a
dating game, and a newly-wed game, and all that. So I called
and set up an audition for 'The Gong Show', in the same week
that I set up an audition for the Magic Castle. So I jumped
on a Greyhound bus with my giant truck of magic and took the
bus to Hollywood. And with no reservations anywhere found
this motel called the Motel 8 on Cahuenga, in the heart of
Hollywood, just a seedy place which someone told me, later,
was a hooker motel. I wondered why the women used the pay
phone outside over and over...and they were very scantily
clad. But I had no idea, I was just a kid. So I went down and
took my gigantic truck of magic - and it weighed a hell of a
lot. And I didn't know about cabs, at that time. L.A. is not
a very cab-friendly city. But I knew that the audition was on
Cahuenga. So I went down, auditioned for 'The Gong Show', and
I got the gig - that's another story. And then, right after,
I felt great about it, and I went up the street to Franklin
Avenue, where I knew that the Magic Castle was. Now, at this
point, I didn't know if it was right or left, I just had a
feeling, took a left, and it was about half a mile down the
street. I found the Magic Castle, found the one guy that did
auditions there - who happened to be there at the time, before
it opens. This was about noon and the club opens at five in
the afternoon. So I walk in and all of a sudden this man by
the name of Peter Pit, who was just one of the great
performers of all time, he came out to the lobby and said,
"So, why are you here?" And I said, "Well, I'm here to
audition." And he said, "Well, I guess we can spare a couple
of minutes, but I'm kind of busy right now." Then, all of a
sudden this huge fellow walks in, this gigantic mountain of a
man. And we're the only three people there at the Magic
Castle at this time of the day. So, before being addressed,
he says, "Matt, come on in" and we walk into the Palace of
Mystery, which is the big performing area there...they have
many different performing areas in the Magic Castle, it's a
place you would love to death. So, now all of a sudden, this
gigantic man introduces himself and he says, "Hello young man,
what's your name?" And I said, "It's Matt." And he said,
"Where are you from? And what type of magic do you do?" And I
said I do this and that and that. And then he said "My name
is Orson Welles, I've been in the radio business, and in
movies..." and so on. And all I knew about this guy was that
he was the Paul Masson wine spokesman on TV commercials:
"There'll be no wine, before we dine." I didn't know about
'Citizen Kane' or 'War of the Worlds', I knew nothing about
all that. I ended up spending two hours with him at the
Magic Castle, just him and I sitting there watching Peter Pit
on stage as Orson was blocking out a television special he was
putting together. And he would say, "So what do you think
about that move there?" And he was asking my advice about his
show and it was just amazing. And he was smoking this big fat
stogie. At that time I was not smoking. But that was one of
the most amazing things on the planet. Peter Pit passed away
about four or five years ago. And before he passed away I
said, "Peter, I hope you never die, because no one will
believe this story." Because I never got a photo and I never
had Orson sign anything for me. So he was the one guy that I
actually did get a chance to meet and, knowing now - I wish
I'd known this then - My God! - I would have talked to him
about everything on the planet. I wish Orson was still
alive. I have the greatest memory of spending those two hours
in there with him. He was the nicest man on the planet. He'd
be the greatest person to share an ashtray with, because you
could tell he loved his cigars, loved 'em. Currently, it
would be down to two people: Johnny Carson and Clint
Eastwood. Why? Clint Eastwood, always with those cheroots in
the Spaghetti Westerns. I've been a fan of his since all
those things. I'd just like to talk to him about all those
Sergio Leone movies and the motivation, and when he was
smoking that cigar was he choking it back or did he really
enjoy it. Johnny Carson - why? - because he's the guy I have
admired since I was seven years old. I don't think there's
been a guy, before or after, who's been the quintessential
television star and who is the greatest interviewer on the
planet. When Johnny Carson would walk into a room - this
comes from the owner of the Magic Castle - you could have
your back to him but you would know he was there. There'd be
such a silence, all of a sudden. He was that big and that
huge. There were only two men with this presence. Cary Grant
was the other one.
JL: Finally, if
there was a magic button, that stopped everybody in the world
smoking cigars, immediately, would you press it?
MA: Currently, the
'Magic Button' belongs to my girlfriend. When I push it
correctly, great things happen. Sex is the only thing that
comes even remotely close to enjoying a fine cigar. Eliminate
those two things and say GOODBYE TO HUMANITY FOREVER...OK, so
a wee dram of Macallan Gran Reserva ain't bad either. |
