096 Ranch Dresser transcript (Paul Newman)

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Warburton: [00:00:00] Is famous and gravy biographies from a different point of view. To participate in our opening quiz, email us at hello@famousandgravy.com. Now here's the quiz to reveal today's dead celebrity.

Osborne: This person died 2008, age 83. In 1943, he joined the Navy Air Corps to be a pilot. When a test showed he was colorblind, he was made into an aircraft radio operator.

My military history is basically zero, [00:00:30] so I might actually know this one for once. I don't know it yet. Ronald Reagan, not Ronald Reagan. In the early 1950s, he was accepted as a student at the actor studio in New York where he took lessons alongside James Dean Geraldine Page and Marlon Brando.

Friend: I know it's not Leslie Nielsen.

This is just pulling out of thin air, but I'm thinking about the guy who played Captain Picard.

Osborne: I'm happy to report that Sir Patrick Stewart, as if this recording is still with us. Okay. In [00:01:00] midlife racing became his obsession. His racing career included his first race in 1972, his first professional victory in 1982, and his co-ownership of an indie racing team, which won eight series championships.

Friend: There is one name. That I know, but that I can't think of Dale Earnhardt.

Osborne: Not Dale Earnhardt, but good guess. All right. In 1982 as a Lark, he decided to sell a salad dressing he had created and bottled for friends, [00:01:30] thus was born in Enterprise. The brand has expanded to include lemonade, popcorn, spaghetti sauce, pretzels, and wine.

Friend: Got it. Paul Newman.

Paul Newman.

Archival: Is it? Is it Newman? Newman's Own that salad dressing. Randy Newman. Is that his first name?

Osborne: Dam. Today's dead celebrity is Paul Newman.

Archival: How is your memory Terrible [00:02:00] and getting worse? And what do you do to help yourself? Do you make lists or do you They say choline is good. What is that? That's the massage parlor outside of Westport, Connecticut. No, it's a vitamin. Well, I remember the bad things and I have trouble remembering the good things.

You sure as hell have a lot of good things to remember? No, but I can listen to them while you tell me. Well, you've got, you've, you've got a good wife and you've got a fairly fulfilled [00:02:30] career, which in a kind way, allows you to choose whatever work you may want to work at given the right material. I'm very fortunate.

And you're wealthy. Yes. And there are those people who say, good looking guy, what do they know?

Osborne: Welcome to Famous and Green. I'm Michael Osborne.

Warburton: My name is Michael Warburton.

Osborne: And on this show we choose a famous figure who died in the 21st [00:03:00] century, and we take a totally different approach to their biography. What didn't we know? What could we not see clearly? And what does a celebrity's life story teach us about ourselves today?

Paul Newman died 2008, age 83. So Amit is away today, but I am thrilled to be joined by Michael Warburton. Michael is an actor based in the uk. He and I connected a few years ago on social media, whether you are on Twitter X [00:03:30] Threads or Blue Sky, if you like Famous and Gravy, you will love following Michael Warburton.

His posts are all about hidden moments in pop culture history. Michael previously joined me on our Philip Seymour Hoffman episode, and more than anything, I'm excited to welcome my friend. Back to the show.

Warburton: It's an absolute pleasure to be back here on Famous and Gravy.

Osborne: Let's just get to it. Category one, grading the first line of their obituary.

Paul Newman, one of the last [00:04:00] great 20th century movie stars, died Friday at his home in Westport, Connecticut. He was 83. Okay. That's it. Yeah. You and I looked at this the other day and I was like, wait, that's it. That's it. I have had so many reactions to this first line of the obituary. I was expecting Paul Newman, that blue-eyed actor from Butch Cassidy, HUD, the Verdict, and nobody's fool who also parlayed his success into race car driving and.

[00:04:30] Philanthropy, entrepreneurship, and was on salad dressing bottles, died in Connecticut. They didn't do any of that. Like all of that stuff comes later in the obituary. Now. Are they going for more with less or something? I don't know. What was your reaction to this first line?

Warburton: Well, my initial reaction was, well, that's kind of ridiculously succinct.

Yeah. But then the more I looked at that opening sentence, two things I thought to myself, well, it made me as a reader want to know more. It made me want to read the rest of the obit. So it hooked you in that way? Yeah. Yeah. And I think that. That tallies of what [00:05:00] you just said about the less is more thing, but also the second thing.

I like the, the statement about one of the last great 20th century movie stars. That's a hell of a thing to say, period. But what it does do is I think it instantaneously gives the reader the sense of status that, that this guy had in terms of being an icon.

Osborne: Yeah. I mean, it's all that they say. Full stop.

Warburton: Mm.

Osborne: Let me tell you another reaction I had to this. Okay, so what's interesting is he dies in 2008, but then like in 2022, we suddenly learn [00:05:30] a lot about Paul Newman through one primary source. That becomes two things. So he in the eighties and nineties had gotten interested in maybe doing a memoir. And he had a friend do a number of interviews with him and everybody in his life, he has those recorded on cassettes.

Then he burns those tapes. Mm-hmm. But the transcripts survive. And so a few years ago, his family says, we'd like to make these transcripts available. They turn into two things. One is the Ethan Hawk documentary, last great movie stars, [00:06:00] and then there's also a Paul Newman memoir. These are released in 2022.

We don't hear any audio. 'cause the cassettes were burned by Paul Newman in the nineties. Mm-hmm. But the transcripts make all this material available. The name of the Ethan Hawk documentary is last great movie Stars. And I looked into this, that was said by Gord Vidal, the author, who is a close friend of Paul Newman.

What's interesting is that he says that in those transcripts that are hidden from view, and that becomes the [00:06:30] title of the Ethan Hawke documentary, but that phrase is also showing up here. So two people came to that phrase last great movie star, the New York Times Obit Writers and Gore Vidal independently.

Like how do you interpret that phrase?

Warburton: I think what I really like about it is that he was one of the last, he was specific to a very particular era in filmmaking and he was one of the last, he was part of a movement in terms of acting and acting in film.

Osborne: Yeah.

Warburton: That was in its own way, [00:07:00] entirely pioneering.

And of course he was also working in a, an entirely different Hollywood studio system.

Osborne: That's what they mean by movie star here. That's like your take on this in

Warburton: terms of 20th century. Yeah. Yeah.

Osborne: No, I mean there is a generational divide and he does represent a break in something. Let me say what I like about this, and let me say what I don't like about this to sort of sum it up.

What I do like about it is, you're right, it creates mystery and the man is mysterious. And I also do think Paul Newman's passing represents the end of an era, [00:07:30] and so I agree that it does hook. What it doesn't do is say, this is what you should know, this guy for one of the things that has happened.

Through my experience of Famous and Gravy is I've realized how specific mercurial and fading fame itself can be. The person who wrote this, there's no question in their mind, everybody knows who Paul Newman is. We're reading it now, 17 years later, you and I absolutely know who Paul Newman is, but there are younger people who may not, and I [00:08:00] think the question of is he going to remain a figure who we know about?

30 years from now, 50 years from now. He's an interesting one to ask that question. I think there's a case to be made that Paul Newman more than most will be really remembered, but this first line doesn't do any of the work to say Here's why he shall be remembered, other than it's closing a chapter on history, sort of presumes everybody knows who he is, which in 2008 was maybe true.

I don't know if it's as true in 2025.

Warburton: Well, it's interesting. You recently did [00:08:30] a fantastic episode on Elizabeth Taylor.

Osborne: Yeah. I've been thinking about the Elizabeth Taylor episode because they're contemporaries.

Warburton: Exactly. You spurred something in me when you were talking just now, which is it would've been very easy to say something like the Oscar winning Paul Newman.

Something that, that referenced his credibility as, as an artist rather than only as a movie star. Because again, listening to your Elizabeth Taylor episode, one of the interesting areas you talked about was, you know, probably movie star first. Not the greatest actress who ever lived. Far from the worst, of [00:09:00] course, right?

Um, but Newman had the male version of Elizabeth Taylor looks, but Paul Newman had more acting chops for me than his, than Elizabeth Taylor.

Osborne: I agree with that. I think he transforms more.

Archival: You've said acting doesn't come natural to me. You've described yourself as cerebral. You've said some people are born intuitive actors and have the talent to slip in and out of characters acting to me.

It's like dredging a river. It's a painful experience. I don't know the things [00:09:30] that I have a gift for except tenaciousness. Nagging dissatisfaction is the very thing that, uh, keeps me on my toes and makes me curious about doing variations on a theme.

Osborne: Uh, you know what? I would love to say more about the rest of the obituary, but that's not part of our category, so I, we will have to do it justice.

In the rest of this episode, I have my score and I'll go first. I'm giving this a six outta [00:10:00] 10.

Warburton: Interesting.

Osborne: I do appreciate the effort and maybe there's even a little subtext in the say, less. Because I think that understated is part of what Paul Newman does effectively and mm-hmm. Mystery is part of what Paul Newman does effectively.

But the only adjective I get here is great. Now, Paul Newman is great, but that is a boring adjective, and I, for posterity's sake, am deducting this four points. So I'm giving it a six outta 10. Where did you land?

Warburton: I'm giving it seven outta 10. I think that's a really interesting [00:10:30] point to be not safe for giving about.

We use the word great. I think that is a bit lazy. Yeah. There's a whole bunch of other a adjectives you, you could have used that would've been better. So the en, the enigmatic nature of that opening sentence, the O in the obit, I think is quite appetite. I like that. I like that for Paul Newman.

Osborne: Okay. Seven and a six.

Category two, five things I love about you here, Michael and I will develop a list of five things that offer a different angle on who this person was. And how they lived.

Warburton: I think you should lead. Okay. Well, I'll do my [00:11:00] best. So the first point I'd make, I guess, is about his. Darkness. Now, we've all got dark sides, part of the human condition, and it's certainly a part of the, the condition of artists and creatives.

In fact, it could be argued, it's a, a key element.

Archival: Mm.

Warburton: But what I like about Newman is that for me, he walked towards his darkness. You know, you can run towards your darkness and you can also. Run towards your darkness and have no idea about what you wanna do when you get there, you know? Do you embrace it?

Do [00:11:30] you fight with it? A couple of obvious contemporaries of his who ran towards their darkness. I don't think it had any sense of purpose in terms of why they were running towards their darkness and, and then when they got to their darkness, basically. It just screwed them up.

Osborne: Self-destructed. Yeah.

Warburton: Yeah, absolutely.

And that's Montgomery, Clifton, James Dean, you know, very much contemporaries.

Archival: I always used to like the exploration. In fact, I. On some occasions, I would, uh, [00:12:00] lock myself in a hotel room with a 12 pack of Budweiser, uh, just to see where I would go in this thing, you'll be happy to know that 90% of this discovery was useless, uh, although it seemed.

Eccentric and exciting at the time.

Warburton: He knew he had to engage with, converse with and to whatever degrees he could accept his darkness and his

Osborne: darknesses. I like the [00:12:30] distinction between running and walking here. You know? Um, 'cause it's a sort of. Patient step towards, for an artist, there's something compelling about that visual.

Warburton: Well, there's two elements to it. So it's not only the fact that he walks towards it, but I think he walks towards it with a sense of purpose. I think he wants to know more about himself in order to be, and we'll, we'll expand on this later. I'm, I'm sure, yeah. In order to be the truest, most authentic version of himself.

And if, and if the key. Task in life is to be oneself. And if that key [00:13:00] task is one of the hardest things to do in life, then I think you not only have to walk towards your darkness, you have to do so with purpose. And then once you get there, you have to engage with it. It's almost like he walked towards his darkness in the healthiest unhealthiest way possible, or the unhealthiest healthiest way possible.

There was balance and there was purpose to it, and I love that about the guy.

Osborne: The thing about him burning the tapes of his recordings. Mm-hmm. I mean, how does one discover oneself? I mean, some of it is through art and acting is so interesting that [00:13:30] way because we get to try on different aspects of our own personality and our own emotions, but then there's also other.

Paths towards self-reflection. And it is a conflicted journey for all of us to have burned the tapes, but, but the transcripts are still out there, kind of speaks to that inner conflict. Who am I and, and how do I even figure out who I am and how much of it is public and how much do I make available to the public?

And how much of it is like. Unanswerable because it is always unanswerable. Mm. My wife this morning, [00:14:00] she gets an email for like word of the Day and her Word of the day and it's callous. And I was like, I have no idea what that means. And she said, well, it means Misty, dim, obscure, dark. And I thought, oh Jesus, that's perfect for the Paul Newman episode today.

Mm-hmm. So I had a similar thing, cist. Alright. I think that lays the groundwork for us. I may go to my thing number two.

Archival: Hmm.

Osborne: I'm gonna go with his philanthropy, his. Turn towards being the salad dressing guy. It's unbelievable how successful that [00:14:30] business has been. You know, somewhere in the neighborhood of a half billion to a billion dollars have gone to charities.

I mean, this man gave a way a lot of money to this day. Paul Newman products are on the grocery store shelves, right? Some people know him more as the marinara guy than from the actor. He realized at some point that the. Adoration that he was drawing was powerful and that the best thing he could do would be to.

Turn it all back [00:15:00] around and give it all back away. And that's essentially the second half of his life. I mean, he continues to act, but his effort to create a model where we're gonna sell products in the grocery store and everything is gonna be given away is such an unbelievable legacy. It's simple and it's something everybody knows about him, but I wanted to call it out.

So that's my thing. Number two,

Warburton: there's a a quote that I really like that's always kind of with me, and the quote is very simply, this people say a lot. So I watch what they do. Newman was a doer, and I [00:15:30] think that the philanthropic side of him that you've just highlighted absolutely makes that abundantly clear.

For number three, it is the fact that he was a doer. And it was kind of interesting. I thought I knew a fair amount about Paul Newman, but in doing research for this, you know, you learn stuff. And one of the things I've realized whilst I was doing the research that is this, I have a very small kind of mini pantheon of heroes that Paul Newman wasn't in there.

The more research I did on him, the more I found out about him, the more I completely surprised myself and realized, [00:16:00] Hey th this guy's coming into my min Mini heroic pantheon. And I was really surprised by that. I wasn't expecting that because some of my other heroes are kind of what I believe are as kind of genius levels.

Osborne: Yeah, I know, I know you've talked about sellers and Mel Brooks and you Yeah.

Warburton: And Maya Angelou and, you know, Wells and Muhammad Ali, people like that. Yeah. They, they were at genius levels in, in terms of their craft. I still don't think even now that that Newman was at genius levels in any of the areas he worked in.

Osborne: But it's not about intellect, it's about something else.

Warburton: Well, it's about. [00:16:30] Doing, and this is my point, he did a lot. He didn't just talk about it. He did a lot. And I, I suddenly found myself looking at, looking at Newman sort of 360 degrees and I just went, you know what the definition of a hero to me is not that you are an inspiration, you have to be many things, but I'm looking at you Paul Newman, and I'm going, you are an inspiration actually.

Osborne: So what do you have in mind there? Are you thinking about race car driving? Are you thinking about his role in rescuing the actor studio? I mean, the thing is like, he's very active behind the scenes. There's almost a restless energy. I mean, I, I guess it's all of those things, [00:17:00] but, you know, what do you, what do you really have in mind that points you to, we ought to talk about this guy as a.

Possible hero.

Warburton: So it is the fact that he wasn't only an actor, he was a producer, and he was a pioneer in that regard. He was also a director. He was nominated for an Oscar as a director for Rachel. Rachel. A lot of people don't know that. Yeah, he obviously was a hugely committed vocal political activist.

He was a racer and ended up being a race team owner with Nevan Ha. Obviously a lot of people knew about his philanthropic side via Newman's own. This guy had a, [00:17:30] a marriage that lasted half a century, which when you are one of the most attractive, sexiest, handsome, lusted after and famous men in the world in Hollywood, working with some of the most beautiful women in the world is kind of.

Incredible that he had a marriage that lasted half a century. I'm not saying for a second, it was perfect.

Osborne: No, no. And we'll get to that later. We'll get to that later. Yeah. Get to that later. We'll,

Warburton: that later. Yeah. Absolutely. But it's incredibly, he had a 50 year marriage. It is a very, very full life. But I think also it's, it's [00:18:00] not just that.

It's why all the things that Newman did and did to the nth for me, he did as an, as a pure, authentic expression of himself. And I love the dude for that. Love it. Yeah.

Archival: What makes some actors political and some not. I suppose if you get into all the complicated reasons, it's uh, it sounds kind of pretentious or academic or whatever it is.

It's, uh, and what it finally boils down was a couple of things is that you count up your number of children and I think the political commitment [00:18:30] somehow with me grew every time I had another child. And also I think, uh, it's convenient for some people to stay out of a hassle. There's something in me that digs the hassle and, uh, I get involved in that.

Osborne: Let's take a break for a second, Michael. 'cause I, I wanna ask, like you and I have talked a little in this conversation that there is a little bit of a generational divide. Not every young person knows Paul Newman. If you were to introduce top three, top Paul Newman movies, like what would be the three you'd choose?

Butch Cassidy seems a natural one.

Warburton: Uh, [00:19:00] yeah, I, I, I'd have that as my middle, I think to scan like the entirety of his career, which, you know, across five, six decades, I think I would go. With the hustler.

Osborne: Yeah. That's the one that loops out to me. The hustler was one of my first loves that I think I started smoking cigarettes because of the hustler.

I'm serious. And I definitely learned how to play pool because of the hustler. I love. Yeah,

Warburton: man, it's,

Osborne: it's kinda like Casablanca in a way, right? It's like it's captures a moment in time and a sort of atmosphere that's a little seedy [00:19:30] and a little mysterious, but also it's cool. It's super cool. That

Warburton: is such a great call in terms of.

Atmosphere, feeling vibe, and it's got that in absolutely spade. So I think I'd go the hustler. I think I'd go Butch Cassy and the Sundance kid. And then do you know what? It's quite difficult because he gets really rich in terms of his performances via life experience and God knows what towards the end of his career.

So actually there's some beauties to choose from. I'm gonna go for nobody's fault.

Osborne: Oh, interesting. [00:20:00] It's been ages since I've seen that one. I remember him being like charming grandpa in that. Right. And there's, I mean, he is like a real blue collar guy. Mm-hmm. Right. It's, and it's upstate New York and it's a little bit of like time passing him by kind of story.

Warburton: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. Okay. It's, it's a beautiful. Beautifully deft, rich, honest performance. He's got a fantastic cast around him as watchable as ever in 1994 and kind of magnetically so, but in a very different way to [00:20:30] the hustler of Butcher Cassidy.

Osborne: The only other one that's really leaping out for me, and maybe it's just my personal experience with it, is cool hand Luke, uh, that was, you know, there's not a lot of movies I watched with my father, but he made me sit down and watch.

Cool hand, Luke. I think the fact that it also is quoted in Guns N Roses, civil War. What we have here is a failure to communicate. Mm-hmm. I remember listening to that and the Guns N Roses song and being like, oh, they ripped that from Cool Hand, Luke g and r into Paul Newman, who's [00:21:00] Paul Newman. People love that quote.

Good old Strother

Warburton: Martin. Yeah. Fantastic.

Archival: What we've got here is. Failure to communicate. Some man you just can't reach.

Warburton: Awesome script. As soon as you mentioned Cool Hand Luke, the, the, the amount of guilt that washed over me. But I mean, this is the problem, you know, with picking your top three, your top one, whatever, because that is an immense movie that is such a, and the love out there for that [00:21:30] movie's.

Huge. Michael. Huge.

Osborne: Well, it's, it's, it's not an easy list to put together of like, these are the three to four or whatever movies, you know, you young person should watch to understand porn. Mm. But unlike a lot of movies, you know, pre 1970, like there are some. Old movies with Paul Newman that will hold your attention.

Part of it is performance. A lot of it is his charisma. I think he also had an eye for good scripts.

Warburton: He chose well on the whole. Yeah, he

Osborne: chose

Warburton: really well. True.

Osborne: All right, well let's get back to it. I'll give you my number four. [00:22:00] I actually really like his insecurity. If you read the memoir and watch the documentaries and read what people say about him, he beats up on himself more than.

Almost anybody else and just about everybody close to him remarks on this. Here's why I like it. This is one of the most handsome guys of all time, certainly of the 20th century, right? This is why he's one of the last great movie stars and I was thinking like you strip away the fame and you strip away the good looks.

Two big things to take away, obviously, but if you just take those two things away, [00:22:30] I came away realizing like we all struggle with the same shit. And he really tries to lay that bare. There's a ordinariness about his story in a way. He says, you know, I'm not a true eccentric. His insecurity, which is the same sort of fear that all of us are dealing with, is kind of.

Shockingly normal. Like it's kind of a weird point to make, but do you know where I'm going with this? Like there's nothing in a way that extraordinary about the inner [00:23:00] self, even though there is extraordinary talent and it's a reminder of shared humanity for me. So maybe that's what I'm really trying to say.

His insecurity really is a display of our shared humanity,

Warburton: I think for all his drive and passion and focus, competitiveness, and even disarming charm. Newman also from what I can make out, genuinely loved his simple family life. I'll go, go even so far as to say genuinely needed the simple life. And so I, I, [00:23:30] I totally agree with you.

Yeah, I totally agree with you.

Osborne: I think that becomes, frankly, more true in the second half of his life after his son's death, and I want to talk about that in a little bit. I gotta think five that I'd like to propose for our five things I love about you. Let's hear it. Luck is an art. This comes up a few different times.

He is very conscious of how lucky he is. One, he's born an unbelievably handsome man. Also, there are some. Events in his life that really opened doors for him. One of 'em, [00:24:00] interestingly being James Dean's death, there were a series of movies that James Dean had been identified for and even cast in that after James Dean's untimely death and those two guys knew each other.

Once James Dean dies, Paul Newman starts landing those roles. You know, it's unfortunate, but that's just the reality of what was available. There are other ways in which he was lucky when he was in World War ii, I'm probably gonna mess this story up, but his squadron was called up at one point and they ended up going with somebody else because a pilot on a Navy [00:24:30] aircraft had an ear ache that morning, and then the one that went ended up being bombed to hell.

There was like hundreds of deaths. So he narrowly avoided death by pure luck in his service in World War ii. One other thing he says is, look, I was born white. I was born wealthy. And he's saying this at a time where a lot of white people don't recognize their own privilege. He says, luck is an art. I, I don't know how one creates luck, but I appreciate somebody.

[00:25:00] Like Paul Newman acknowledging the phenomenon of luck in the universe and saying, I didn't do anything to get all this.

Archival: Well, I have been asked on several occasions to try to explain what motivated me to help build the hole in the Wall Gang Camp, which is a camp for children with life-threatening diseases.

I wish I could claim that it had come from some extraordinary religious experience, an epiphany of some kind, but it didn't. I was trying to acknowledge, I think [00:25:30] luck. What a important. Part it is played in my life, the benevolence of it and the brutality of it in the lives of some children.

Osborne: To me it's more than anything a statement of shared humanity.

So luck is an art.

Warburton: A lot of very successful people will turn around and doff their cap to Lady Luck kind of ties in with a previous point I made in this category, which is that yes, lady Luck does play, but nearly. All of the people who were successful and [00:26:00] highlight the luck that they were lucky to enjoy, you can guarantee that 99.9% of them were doers.

Osborne: Alright, let's recap. So number one, you said, walks to his darkness. I love that. Number two, I said. Philanthropy. If we don't spend some time talking about that, then we're not doing Paul Newman justice. Number three. You said he's a doer. This is a man who demonstrates through his actions. Uh, number four, I said his insecurity, he beats up on himself more than anybody else, and I just love his [00:26:30] ordinary.

And number five, I went with luck is an art. Okay, great list. Let's take a break. Category three, one Love. In this category, we each choose one word or phrase that characterizes this person's loving relationships. First, we will review the family life data. Okay, there's two marriages. First to Jackie, 1949 to 1958.

Paul was 24 when they got married. 33 when they divorced. Uh, the second marriage, the far more famous one. Joan Woodward. They started an affair in [00:27:00] 1953, so there's about four or five years where Paul and Joan are together, but Paul and Jackie are still married. A lot of conflict in those years. Paul and Joan married in 1958, almost immediately after he got his divorce and they were together until his death in 2008.

So married about 50 years. He had three kids with each woman, all girls, except for his oldest son, Scott. Scott ODed. In 1978 and after he died, Paul Newman and Joan Woodward [00:27:30] started a recovery center in his name, and I have a lot I wanna say about that. I mean, this is one of these marriages that's like Hollywood royalty legend, and before the memoirs came out and before their, you know, the sort of renewed scrutiny of their lives a couple years ago, there were rumors of things being rocky behind the scenes, but the memoir and the documentary.

Really do kind of have a warts and all quality to them. It turns out there was some [00:28:00] infidelity. Not totally surprising, some really rocky moments. They did renew their vows in 1983 and personally, I think as they age, there is a little bit more truth to the beautiful marriage we see on screen. But the earlier years were rockier than maybe we knew.

What did you come up with for your one word or phrase?

Warburton: What I came up with was something that I don't think gets associated with Paul Newman enough, and that word is laughter. I think the guy was really, really funny. [00:28:30] I mean, even Joanne Woodward said many, many times that yes, he was handsome and sexy and all of that.

You know, half the women in the world wanted him, but the thing that separated him. From all of that was the fact that he, he could make a laugh. And this, I think is one of the key things, if not the key thing, maybe surprisingly, that kept, kept those guys together for half a century.

Osborne: That's sustained their marriage.

Yeah.

Warburton: Yeah. It's funny doing, doing a bit of research for this. I, I found myself sort of thinking, I. Maybe there was a bit of a lost opportunity because in a lot of his [00:29:00] performances, in a lot of movies, he just injected naturally humor. It was just there.

Osborne: Yeah. It's a real question actually. I hadn't thought about it much, but I like that you're bringing it to this category.

'cause it's not hard to imagine a lot of humor behind the scenes within his family. No.

Warburton: I mean, you, you can see in interviews with the two of them, I wondered if, if his comedy was fundamentally a really private thing, something he really shared with Joanne. And the kids, whether it was or, and really, really close, tight friends.

Osborne: Yeah, that's a great one Michael, and [00:29:30] I'm glad you used this category to draw attention to his sense of humor. It's a thing to love about him, but it's also, I do think a thing that characterizes his family life. I. I went in a very different direction, so I asked Allison, this enlisted my wife's help for this category as well.

I said, what's a dish you order? That always looks really, really good, but then you eat it and you're like, I don't know if I would order that again, but you keep ordering it. And so she threw out a few. The first one that came to her mind was crab cakes. That [00:30:00] didn't do much for me. The next one she said was cinnamon rolls.

I seem to keep ordering cinnamon rolls and. They're just never quite as exciting as I want. Then she's looked at me and she goes, cherry pie, and I don't know why, and I'm gonna make more of this metaphor than there probably is, but I kind of like cherry pie. So here's how I see this in the Paul Newman One Love category.

First of all, cherry Pie is very American. It's also very 20th century and old fashioned. And there is something about this [00:30:30] marriage that on the outside. Looks like a very 20th century old fashioned cherry pie kind of marriage. It is also very attractive from the outside looking in. It's got the buttery texture and the red syrupy gooeyness that looks so enticing.

But here's where I kind of take a different turn with it. I think for me, the big unlock of understanding Paul Newman's biography was. Once I learned that his son OD'ed in 1978, [00:31:00] I couldn't get off of that and it became, for me, a real hinge point in his life. I have a very good friend who lost his son when his son was four years old to cancer.

I remember saying to him one time. I, I, I, I cannot imagine. And what he said was, no, uh, you can't imagine it. And in fact, don't even try. 'cause you'll drive yourself crazy trying to get there, and you won't come anywhere close. So don't bother. He also said something [00:31:30] else, the same friend, he said, when something like that happens to you, it leaves a, a scar that never heals up.

But you have a choice. And that choice is you can collapse inward or you can. Open your heart and explode outward. I realize this is a stretch with my whole cherry pie analogy, but that's kind of what I see with Paul Newman after his son dies. I see. Not a thoroughly selfish, you know, dark man. [00:32:00] Before that, although I think that there's a me of that, but after 1978 and in the second half of his life, his heart opens up, his acting becomes better, his philanthropy becomes predominant.

His willingness to be generous and to distance himself from the sort of Hollywood mythology I I see almost like a heart exploding, a cherry pie falling apart. And the last thing I'd say about my. [00:32:30] Cherry pie analogy again. I know it's kind of a reach to actually make the cherry pie taste as good as it looks.

Takes work. And that's clear in the marriage too. So cherry pie make of that what you will.

Warburton: One thing, you write a quick story where they, they had a huge row, a, him and Joan. And, uh, he said, right, that's it. I'm leaving. And he stormed out of the house and he got outside of the house, walked around the house, came back to the front door, knocked on it, and Joanne obviously [00:33:00] opened it and he said something to the effect of, well, there's nowhere else I want to go.

I. And, you know, the, the subtext are not even, subjects are certainly clear. You know, you are my girl, you're my lady. There's no one else I wanna be with. This is my home. My home is where you are.

Osborne: I mean, my one hesitation with cherry pie is like, I should stay away from food analogies. 'cause there's that famous quote of Paul Newman saying about infidelity, why go out for a hamburger when I've got a steak at home?

Joan Woodward apparently hated that quote, and so I'm like, Hey, maybe I shouldn't go with food. I'm going with food. So, cherry pie, [00:33:30] that's my one love. All right. Let's move on. Category four, net worth. In this category, Michael and I will write down our numbers ahead of time. We'll talk a little bit about our reasoning, and then we will look up the net worth number in real time to see who's closest.

Lastly, we will place this person on the famous and gravy. Net worth leaderboard. So this is kind of a hard one, right? Because there there's a period of time where Newman is a Alister, like he's a big time box office draw. Butch [00:34:00] Cassidy was huge. Tower Inc. Inferno Khan, Luke, I mean, over and over people are going to the movies toss see him.

At the same time, there's also this big turn towards philanthropy. So he's obviously giving a lot of it away. So I struggled with this a little bit, but uh, that was a little bit of my thinking leading into it. So, yeah, say he's

Warburton: a tough read in this regard, isn't he? You know, he could have amassed an absolute fortune.

He was savvy. He was street smart.

Osborne: That's the thing. Like this guy could be a billionaire if he wanted to be. Mm-hmm. But like, he's not greedy and that's kind of obvious. [00:34:30] So it was hard to land on a number. Anyway. Okay. Let's reveal. So Michael War Burton wrote down. 60 million. Interesting. Okay. Hmm. You are saying 120 million?

I am saying 120 million. Okay. I'll be interested to see where this lands. All right, let's look it up. Actual net worth number for Paul Newman. 80 million. Okay, so you're closer. Well done sir. Okay. I like that it's in between and you know, these are big numbers, obviously [00:35:00] unfathomable numbers for you and me.

Mm-hmm. But you know, we kind of honed in on the right answer.

Warburton: I'm good with that. I'm good with that because I reckon at that figure, he's been giving it away looking after people, all that stuff.

Osborne: You know, we've talked a little bit in the conversation about how younger audiences might not know who Paul Newman was.

This number helps capture his stature in the industry. But obviously if you're able to sell. Salad dressing, marinara sauce, popcorn. I mean, his likeness, his face had a tremendous amount of power and you know, this could have been much [00:35:30] higher. So, yeah, I kind of love this number, I gotta say. Alright, well let's put him on the famous eng gravy net worth leaderboard.

So this puts him in a three-way tie at position 17. He's tied with. Casey Kasem and Muhammad Ali, just below. Harold Ramis, our last episode, and just above Alex Trebek and Donna Summer.

Warburton: Okay, well done. Paul Newman. Well done Muhammad Ali in. Very well done. Casey Kasem.

Osborne: That's right. Okay. Next category. Little Lebowski, urban Achievers.

Archival: They're the little [00:36:00] Lebowski. Urban achievers. Yeah. The achievers. Yes. And proud. We are of all of them

Osborne: in this category, we each choose a trophy, an award, a cameo and impersonation or some other form of a hat tip that shows us. A different side of this person. I'll go first 'cause we actually haven't talked about this.

Paul Newman made Nixon's enemy list. For those of you who don't know, Nixon's Enemies List is the informal name of what started as a list of President Nixon's major political. Opponents, it got [00:36:30] into the hands of a journalist. If you look at this list, there is nobody else famous. I mean, nobody else we would recognize today.

It's mostly journalists. There's, uh, one Hollywood executive on there, but Paul Newman made it and he apparently took a tremendous amount of pride. The fact that he was on good on him. Nixon's enemies list. And this whole list was, I should say, you know, Nixon was a, you know, vindictive person, but he would attack political opponents.

And this list was like, this is who we're gonna go after. We're gonna try to bring the weight [00:37:00] of the state. We're gonna send IRS audits, we're gonna manipulate grants and federal contracts. I mean, it was, it was how Nixon went after his enemies. Tricky.

Warburton: Dicky. Yeah.

Osborne: This is the only movie star on Nixon's enemies list.

So that says something about. Paul Newman's Vocalness, like how much is out there on the campaign trail?

Archival: One of the biggest questions in this campaign is who our country belongs to. Does it belong to the big corporations like ITT and the oil interests who make large secret contributions and expect favors in return to [00:37:30] leaders of the Pentagon who insist that we pay more and more to big defense contractors, whether we like it or not?

Or does it belong to you and me?

Warburton: I mean, that is strange. I mean, again, he's like, there's, there's famous photos of him out there marching with, um, Charlton Heston, James Baldwin, Marlon Brando, you know,

Osborne: well, he was at the I Have a Dream speech, the March on Capitol. That's right. He is a very active figure, and I don't think anything ever came of this for Paul Newman other than I could see him.

Learning this information and his face like lighting up with a smile. I can see it. I can see it. I mean it, you know. [00:38:00] Okay. So what did you have for this category?

Warburton: What I've got was, um, in 1958, his wife, Joanne Woodward, had already won an Oscar. She was an Oscar winner for the Three Faces of Eve the year before.

She's, in some ways, a more serious actress, I think. Well, well, I think so, actually. I think that's a very fair. Thing to say, but there's a photo of the two of them at home. It's in one room with, with like they've got a bar in it. Anyway, Joanne Woodward behind the bar with her rest Oscar on the bar and next to her leaning on the bar with a bit of a sort of a playful sun and look on his face with the award that [00:38:30] Joanne Woodward, his wife had just presented him with, is Paul Newman with.

What Joanne called the, um, the no Oscar, and it stood right next to her actual Oscar and it's just fantastic. It's two people who were very competitive, very serious about what they did, lauded and awarded, taking the piss out of themselves, self-deprecating, having a laugh at both their expense, but particularly at Newman's and it just kind of flags up.

How important laughter was to the two of them and what a [00:39:00] great self-deprecating, funny guy, Paul Newman was just fantastic.

Osborne: The no Oscar, I love it. I mean, what it is interesting where their acting careers go because we could do a whole episode on Joan Woodward, who is, you know, as of this recording still with us, although suffering from Alzheimer's.

Mm. But like she winds up not becoming a stay at home mother, but being the primary caretaker. For the kids. Mm-hmm. And Paul sort of transitions from being a, I don't know, pretty boy actor or something, like a very handsome man into a more serious [00:39:30] actor as time goes on and he had what's like six, nine nominations or something, and then finally wins for color of money and.

What in somewhere in the eighties, right? That's right. Yeah. I think what I like about that little Adamowski urban achiever is not just like what it says at that moment in time for two of them, but also how that ages and changes, right? Like it establishes a timeline of their different careers. Yeah. I love that, man.

And to your point, I think it says something about their sense of humor. Okay. Next category, [00:40:00] words to live by and this category, we each choose a quote. These are either words that came out of this person's mouth or was said about them. What'd you have for this category?

Warburton: The quote is, A man with no enemies is a man with no character.

For me, this again relates to the desire for authenticity. Mm. That I think was a key part of Paul Newman and the way he lived his life. Again, we're back at that thing of if the hardest thing in life is to be yourself, if that's the. Key and maybe even primary [00:40:30] objective. Then he went about that, and I think this quote testifies to that really well.

Can I be honest? Mm-hmm.

Osborne: I'm not sure I relate to this one, but it's challenging me in a good way. Go on. I'm thinking about who are my enemies. My psychology is such that I want to blame systems rather than people for. My frustrations with the world, whether they be personal or professional or political or whatever.

I want to fight for a worldview [00:41:00] that says, systems screw up people, but that's the root cause of the troubles with our world. And so I wanna make the case that while people need to be shamed, punished, canceled, if you want to use that term. I guess I also wanna fight for forgiveness. And I guess maybe as I've listened to this quote, a man with no enemies is a man with no character.

It's challenging to me. It's not to say I don't have enemies and maybe I need to get more honest with myself about who my enemies are 'cause they're probably out there. But it [00:41:30] challenges me.

Warburton: Well, actually, I'll tell you what, lemme point something out you're saying there. So you said two words out there.

Now that guy, because of his famous celebrity, was. Out there. Yeah. He's got very few places to hide, even if indeed he wanted to hide and he didn't. So for instance, 19th on Nixon's enemies list, who wouldn't wanna be a, an enemy of Nixon? He was justifiably proud of that. And he was an enemy of Nixon because he stuck his neck out.

Osborne: I mean, it's about fighting on some level and what are you fighting for? And he was a fighter. He did stick his neck out [00:42:00] and he did take risks and he tried to parlay his power into social good in a lot of different places. I'm asking can I make that apply to me and what needs to be true about my life so that that's true.

Let me say this, Michael. These are good words. I'm glad you brought this up. I'm realizing that certain insecurities are coming up as I'm looking at these words.

Warburton: Interesting.

Osborne: But that's the point, man. That's the point of this show. Yeah,

Warburton: exactly. You know, reflections mirror up to oneself. Who are we? What are we?

Enemy is a strong word. Look, I've been an actor since the age of 11, so [00:42:30] that's, you know, nearly 47 years. So I've been around a long time and there are some people that I've fallen out with. There are people who I, I'm pretty certain over the course of 47 years, won't like me or will say bad things about me or still are.

Yeah. Hey, hey man. The truth is I see that shit coming at you online too. Yeah, exactly. I, I've been trolled. The point is there are some people like Newman with Nixon. I'm glad you are my enemy. You are a dick. Yeah. So, yeah,

Osborne: I guess the other thing I'd say about this one, Michael, is the flip side of that is that if you don't have [00:43:00] enemies, then you may be bending over backwards to get people to like you.

And I think that that's something about what this is in response to is this is coming from Paul Newman, one of the most likable people of all time, you know, or one of the most likable people of the 20th century men wanted to hang out with him and women wanted to be with him. And what he's saying is, yeah, you should have enemies.

So it's not just the quote, it's the horse's mouth. Well, hell, okay. Having talked about that, my words to live by is a little bit less potent, but here's what I got. He said, the trick of living is to [00:43:30] slip on and off the planet with the least fuss you can muster. I'm not running for sainthood. I just happen to think that in life we need to be a little like the farmer who puts back into the soil what he takes out.

You know, it's funny, based on the conversation we just had about having enemies and fighting, what I see again in the second half of Paul Newman's life is he becomes a channel. Things are coming in, wealth is coming in, adoration is coming in, a mythology is coming in, power is coming in, and [00:44:00] he sees it as his moral and spiritual obligation.

For it to go right back out. For it to come in through the farm and out through the grocery store aisle actor studio is struggling. I'm gonna step in with James Lipton and rescue this son of a bitch everywhere I can. I need to be a channel for positive change. I need to put back into the soil what I've taken out.

It gets back to the luck and gratitude point I was making earlier. What could be

Archival: better than to hold your hand out to people who are less fortunate than you are? [00:44:30] That's simply the way I look at it.

Osborne: Let's move on. Category seven, man In the Mirror. This category is fairly simple. Did this person like their reflection?

Yes or no? This is not about beauty, but rather a question of self-confidence versus self-judgment. I. I think that this is a total coin toss. I think you could go either direction and in a way we have hinted at, but have not yet talked about the darkness enough inside Paul Newman. I'm gonna make the case that the answer is no.

He [00:45:00] doesn't care for his reflection, and here's the case. First of all. His kids all agree. He is something of a functioning alcoholic. I've known very high functioning alcoholics, and when I've caught them in moments of solitude, I see a self-loathing. I see pain that is a little inescapable. I think his drinking tamps down as he ages, but he never goes to Betty Ford and he never swears off drinking, and it's something that everybody remarks upon.

So that is one piece of evidence because I do think alcoholism. Functioning or [00:45:30] otherwise is defined by self-loathing.

Archival: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Osborne: I think the race car driving thing, on one hand it looks awesome. It is also to me a sign of self-destructiveness. He is a flying down the racetrack at unkindly speeds and the wrong turn could end everything.

I get the adrenaline rush. I'm not a racing or car guy, but I can see the allure. I see some self-destructiveness in his passion for race car driving. I [00:46:00] also think more than anything else, he at times talks about his conflicted relationship with his own handsomeness. I think he becomes a little more comfortable in his skin.

I. With age as his beauty fades. I think his beauty can distract from who he is on the inside. And I think he wants who he is on the inside to be seen, and I think he struggles for that to happen. So that's my case for, no, he does not like himself in the mirror. But where did you go with this category? I, I'm trying to think

Warburton: how to, to [00:46:30] place this.

I'm gonna echo what you're saying to a certain degree. I think Newman did. 'cause he was a dichotomy. He did and he didn't like his own reflection. And this might sound ridiculous, but I'm gonna go with it anyway. Actually, the two strands connected and whereas as one, so when Newman looked in the mirror, what did he see?

He saw and he called himself this, and I absolutely love it, his own words. He called himself a decorative little shit. And I think when he looked in the mirror, [00:47:00] yeah, he saw decorative. I'm not stupid, I've got great eyes. I'm a handsome mother pretty damn good. But I think he knew and he could see it in his eyes.

But hey, I'm a little shit as well. I, I've got the little shit inside of me and don't you forget it. And you know what? I don't necessarily love the way I look. I'm down with it. I'm cool with it. Yeah. But I really like the fact I'm a little bit of a shit.

Osborne: It sounds like Jerry.

Warburton: Yes. He did like his reflection.

I think he did, but from both sides at the same time.

Osborne: He got [00:47:30] there both through the front door and through the back door.

Warburton: Definitely. Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. Again, another reason to love Paul new. Yeah. As far as I'm concerned.

Osborne: That's great. All right. Category H, coffee cocktail, or cannabis. This is where we ask which one would we most want to do with our dead celebrity.

You go first here.

Warburton: Okay. Interesting. When we did Philip Seymour Hoffman, it was like, you know, I don't, I don't drink anyway. No particular reason. Yeah. No dark reason. It makes me very boring, but I just don't never have Yeah, you're not a drug guy. Yeah. I think I've got stoned a couple of times at drama school, but, and uh, it's not too late,

Osborne: Michael.

[00:48:00] You can take it. There's all sorts of things on the street. Yeah.

Warburton: I'm feeling like tur turning to it nowadays. The world as it is, let me tell you. Yeah. Um, but with Philipi more Hoffman, it's like, dude, let's go for a coffee. I need you sober. I wanna get down with you. I wanna drill into you. Let's talk man.

But Newman. Is different. So I want to go and get stoned with Paul Newman. Okay, I want to get high with Paul Newman. There's a very famous photo of him in a t-shirt in shorts, no shoes holding for beers, and the T-shirt says, get really stoned. I want to get really [00:48:30] stoned with Paul Newman.

Osborne: Yeah, I think of this as the wake and bake picture.

He looks like somebody on a Saturday morning. Who stepped out to drop the beer bottles in the garbage bin outside and is going back in to hit the bong and watch cartoons with a bowl of cereal.

Warburton: Look, he looks like shit. Yeah, he's carrying four beers and he's saying, get really stoned. I want to get stoned with Paul Newman.

Osborne: Love it. Great answer. Okay. I struggled because I think about this category in two ways. One is what's the vibe, what's the hangout? And you really just spoke to the [00:49:00] vibe hangout. So there's a part of me that definitely is like, I'd like to get snowed with Paul Newman somewhere in the mid seventies and just laugh.

The other part is always like, what are my lingering curiosities here? One other question would I really like to put to this guy? I think one thing that's so. Interesting about Paul Newman is because he has so much natural charisma and because he's so camera friendly and he almost is like at some point out of answers, like what is there to say, you know what?

I did all these interviews. [00:49:30] I'm burning them. There's nothing to say here. There's no grand statement about who I am and what it's all about. That where I can explain my. Magnetism. So I, I don't have a lot of lingering questions for Paul Newman. I went with coffee. I think it is more the elder statesman, Paul Newman, that I'm interested in.

Mm-hmm. And I think I would probably want to ask him some questions really about his political life. I kind of would want to know what he wants for us. What he wants for all of us. There's a [00:50:00] certain sort of challenge with somebody who has this kind of charisma where everybody is looking at him all the time and he's wanting to turn that mirror outward, and he can only do it so effectively, but I think he wants to, and I, I think what my friend said to me once upon a time about what it's like to lose a child, I wonder.

If he would agree with that and if he would add to it and elaborate on it. And I think him coming to know himself was his whole journey, and I think he gets there. I think he aligns with his inner and outer self as he [00:50:30] approaches the final stages of his life, but, but I feel like there's more words of wisdom there, and there's maybe even an understanding of his own personal tragedies.

I can imagine Paul Newman turning

Warburton: around to us on mass and saying, Hey, you know what? Just be yourselves. Go figure that out. I don't know how to get you there. Only you can get you there anyway. No, no one else can. I had a, a, a teacher at drama school taught the likes of Danny Lewis and Tony Hopkins, Jr.

White, all those guys. And at the end of every lesson he would turn around and a very thick Jewish [00:51:00] Prussian accent. And, um, Rudy would also always turn around and just say, alright, find out. And basically he'd just be saying, look, I've given you what I know. Go off and make of it what you will. And I'd like the idea of Newman turning around and saying basically a similar thing to all of us.

You know what? I can only speak for myself. I've only lived for myself. I've tried to do right by myself and those others that I've cared about. Maybe that's something to bear in mind. It's not all about you, but go [00:51:30] find out for yourself.

Osborne: All right. That brings us to category nine, the Vander Beek, the final category named after James VanDerBeek, who famously said, in varsity Blues, I don't want your life.

In that varsity blue scene, James makes a judgment that he does not want a certain kind of life based on a single characteristic. So here Michael Warburton and I will form a rebuttal to anyone skeptical of how Paul Newman lived. It's always helpful to start with the counter argument. What is James saying when he says, I don't want your life, Paul Newman.

You know, [00:52:00] obvious thing is the loss of a child. I don't want your life because I don't wanna lose a child, and that makes a lot of sense to me.

Archival: Mm-hmm.

Osborne: I do think that back to my cherry pieology of how one deals with that pain and what one does with that pain is maybe what's more important because we don't get to decide who we lose and who we keep In this world, death is random and, uh, death is

Warburton: part of life, you know?

Osborne: Yeah. It's part of life and it's unpredictable. I also do think that this is always the case on famous and gravy. The weight of [00:52:30] celebrity. The weight of fame looks always awful, looks especially awful here. People are so curious about this guy and in his case, it seems to be adding to his own mindset of I am also curious about me and I only have so much to say.

All I can do is try and turn it into art. So those are some counter arguments. The arguments for why you would want this life. What stands out to you most? What's like the most important thing? Maybe

Warburton: I can sum it up in just a, a few, a few words. Really. Paul [00:53:00] Newman, he can turn round to all of us, to everyone and say, you know what?

I was myself. And that's a life worth living. Mm. Now you made some salient points about when did he become himself? Yeah. How did he get there? When did he get there? All valid questions. And yet by the same token, I'll say not who cares, as long as you get there before you die. Preferably not with your last breath, because you know the, the earlier you get there, hopefully the more good and the more you can eat [00:53:30] behind for other people.

Osborne: Well,

Warburton: but the main thing is, bro, go. Sorry, you were gonna say something. Sorry, Mike.

Osborne: Well, I was just gonna say, I mean, I do think that, that question of are you your authentic self that exists? Throughout the duration of a life, but a question becomes more complex. It's almost like you can picture a straight arrow going from left to right up and that you have variability ups and downs on either side of that line.

And the question is, am I returning to the experience of trying to [00:54:00] arrive at my authentic self? Right. And, and the. Tools for how you do that change as you age. And as life goes on, they change with relationships, they change with your relationship to art. They change as you come to see your darkness in different ways.

So what, I guess the point I'm trying to make is that it seems like that is a. Through line of Paul Newman's internal experience. There's mystery about himself from the get go, but the efforts and ideas to understand that mystery change and [00:54:30] evolve over the course of his life. But I am very with you that there's a striking authenticity about him.

I mean, that, that word is so overused these days, but when you watch him and study him and listen to him, you don't pick up on a whole bunch of bullshit. And I think that that's, that's what that really means.

Warburton: We've gotta contextualize it. What he fundamentally did for a living was pretend to be other people lie, you know?

And yet for all of that and all the celebrity fame, power, [00:55:00] adulation, approbation, awards, all the other stuff that normally and should absolutely corrupt someone and have them move away from their real selves even more than they already had. It didn't with him. That is noble. That is noble shit, bro.

Osborne: It's desirable and there, and there are ways in which those of us who are not famous and never will be, can learn from that and take lessons from that.

Warburton: He could have

Osborne: and

Warburton: should have gone the way at some point, the, the, the [00:55:30] path of self-destruction. Yeah, he could have very, very easily gone that way. We, we are all born ourselves. It's just a degree to which we get lost along the way and how much we bother to try and find our way back. That's interesting.

Osborne: It has me thinking about the luck as art idea again, too. It's easy to look upon them as life and see all this luck and good fortune. It's also not so hard to see a lot of. Pain and tragedy. One thing about luck is art is what are you paying attention to? Are you noticing [00:56:00] the ways in which you're lucky?

And we all have that available to us. A any one of us could sit down and write a gratitude list and whatever crap is going on, I, I've got some things I should be grateful for. And, and maybe luck is an art is about what our attention is on,

Warburton: I, I've gotta say this, bro. I think he was delightfully and deliciously and wonderfully dichotomous.

I think he was. What I would want to be, which is he was as unselfish as he was selfish,

Osborne: and that's where I was going. This is the second point I'd make. I mean, if, if point number one is authenticity. [00:56:30] I think point number two is path to selflessness. That the way he does become a channel where what's coming in is going back out.

And that includes money, that includes wisdom, that includes generosity and that includes art. That, that I am going to take the signals of the universe and pass them through me and reflect them back. At everybody and give where I can. I, I believe very deeply in this principle, whatever you want in life, you've gotta give it away, you know?

And the more you give it away, the [00:57:00] more you open yourself up as that horseshoe shaped channel where it's coming in and going out,

Warburton: and

Osborne: that

Warburton: that is what life is all about. And that's how you leave behind. A legacy of value, a legacy of worth, and a legacy that will last. I, I, I heard someone talk about this the other day.

I've not heard it described so succinctly, and I think it's really great. They said, we die two deaths. The first death is when we die. The second is the last time that our name is spoken. And I think Paul Newman's name is gonna [00:57:30] be spoken for a long. Long time.

Osborne: You know, there's something great about being perfectly mysterious.

It gives us a lot to talk about and always will. And I do think that he's sort of perfectly mysterious in a way. So let's recap those arguments. So number one, we said authentic more than anything else. Uh, number two, you know, you're dichotomous. I think that you hit that point very well. And number three, a channel of gratitude and generosity.

So with that, James VanDerBeek, I'm Paul Newman, and you might want this life.[00:58:00]

So Michael Warburton. If listeners enjoyed this episode with Paul Newman, is there an episode from the famous Eng Gravy archives that you would recommend?

Warburton: It's Elizabeth Taylor. Elizabeth Taylor was a courageous lady. You know the quote, the famous quote from her is, I'm mother courage baby. I've been through it all.

She was a courageous lady, and I think Newman was courageous. There's something they shared that Elizabeth Taylor episode is a spanking brilliant one. Anyway, it's absolutely [00:58:30] fantastic. But I think if you like this, I think you'll like that. They're not dissimilar in many ways.

Osborne: Awesome. Episode 93, American Royalty with Elizabeth Taylor.

Okay, I'm gonna go with episode 65. William Goldman. Goldman wrote Butch Casting The Sundance Kid. He also has a lot of insight into who Paul Newman was. His book, adventures in the Screen Trade is absolutely worth a read. If you enjoy this episode with Paul Newman, you might also like Father of the Bride, William Goldman, episode [00:59:00] 65.

Warburton: Great. Cool.

Osborne: Here's a little teaser for the next episode of Famous Andre. With a blend of science fiction philosophy and jokes he wrote about the banalities of consumer culture and the destruction of the environment. Um, Douglas Adams, not Douglas Adams. Love Douglas Adams. Hey and gravy. Listeners, we'd love hearing from you.

If you wanna reach out with a comment question or to participate in our opening quiz, email us at hello@famousandgravy.com. In our show notes, we include. All kinds of [00:59:30] links, including to our website and our social channels. Famous Eng Gravy was created by Amit Kippur and me, Michael Osborne. This episode was produced by Ali Ola, with help from Jacob Weiss.

Original music by Kevin Strang. Thanks and see you next time.