Inside the Actors Studio

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Inside the Actors Studio
Logo
Format Talk show
Starring James Lipton
Opening theme Angelo Badalamenti
Country of origin United States
Language(s) English
No. of seasons 18
No. of episodes 239 (List of episodes)
Production
Running time 60 minutes; 120 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel Bravo
Original run August 14, 1994 (1994-08-14) – present
External links
Website

Inside the Actors Studio is a 13-time Emmy-nominated series on the Bravo cable television channel, hosted by James Lipton. It is produced and directed by Jeff Wurtz; the executive producer is James Lipton. The program, which premiered in 1994, is distributed internationally by CABLEready and is broadcast in 125 countries around the world reaching 89 million homes.[1] It is currently taped at the Michael Schimmel Center for the Arts at Pace University's New York City campus.[2][3][4]

Contents

[edit] About the program

James Lipton

The program began as a televised craft seminar for students of the Actors Studio Drama School, originally a joint venture of the Actors Studio and New School University in 1994, with Paul Newman, a former Actors Studio president as its first guest, and soon became Bravo's flagship program.[2] At first taped at the New School's Tishman Auditorium in Greenwich Village, New York City, blocks away from Actors Studio's home in the theater district in midtown Manhattan, and shifting subsequently to its present location, Michael Schimmel Center for the Arts at Pace University's New York City campus. The program is presented as a seminar to students of the Actors Studio Drama School at Pace University.

The show deliberately uses a slower pace in the interviews as compared with a typical celebrity interview, thus cameras usually record a couple of hours' of conversation, later edited to an hour, a trick used by Groucho Marx on his 1950s quiz show You Bet Your Life. The result, as a New York Times article puts it, "In Mr. Lipton's guest chair, actors cease being stars for a while and become artists and teachers." Though sometimes, some interviews go longer; Steven Spielberg's 1999 visit, for example, stretched to four hours, and was later shown as two episodes of one hour each. The interviews are guided by Lipton's trademark index-card questions known for well-researched details of guest's life, often startling some. On one such occasion, Billy Crystal told Lipton, "You know you're scary, don't you?"[2][3]

In May 2005, the contract between the Actors Studio and New School University was not renewed. Beginning with the twelfth season, in the fall of 2005, the program has been taped at the Michael Schimmel Center for the Arts at Pace University's New York City campus. The show now has a new set with a gritty backstage feel, designed by Will Rothfuss for Blair Broadcast Designs, and The Actors Studio Drama School at Pace University has re-opened in new facilities.

James Lipton with guest Angelina Jolie. The majority of the show is held as a one-on-one interview.

Since its premiere, Inside the Actors Studio has had over 200 guests, with Dustin Hoffman being the 200th guest in June 2006.[5] Of those guests, the very first having been Paul Newman, were succeeded by 74 Academy Award winners: 8 directors; four screenwriters; 61 actors and actresses; and two musicians. For its 200th show, James Lipton became the guest subject of the show. He was questioned by Dave Chappelle whom James picked personally. The show ended with Pace University provost announcing that the college is sponsoring a scholarship in Chappelle's name to his high school alma mater. Based on the show, James Lipton published a book titled "Inside Inside" in 2007.[1]

Reviewing the show, the Sunday Times TV critic said: "The format is simple and idiotically inspired. The Actors Studio is the New York drama school made famous by Stanislavsky and his method (although the series is now filmed elsewhere). These shows are thinly set-up masterclasses for students. The clever­ness is in the vanity it allows the guests, who are the very greatest and most self-regarding performers and creators of theatre and film. People who are too grand to talk to anyone will talk to Inside the Actors Studio. They believe they’re giving something back, offering precious pearls of insight to a new generation. And who doesn’t look good passing it on to adoring students? In truth, it’s just a chat show on satellite, but the veil of education and posterity is held decorously high, so everybody turns up and talks with a smile." [6]

While most of the show is a one-on-one interview conducted by Lipton, this is followed by the host submitting a questionnaire to the guest. The questionnaire concept was originated by French television personality Bernard Pivot on his show Apostrophes, after the Proust Questionnaire. The ten questions Lipton asks are:

  1. What is your favorite word?
  2. What is your least favorite word?
  3. What turns you on?
  4. What turns you off?
  5. What sound or noise do you love?
  6. What sound or noise do you hate?
  7. What is your favorite curse word?
  8. What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?
  9. What profession would you not like to do?
  10. If heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the pearly gates?


The program usually concludes with a question-and-answer session with the students.

In France, the show has been broadcast since 1999 on Paris Première, with French subtitles.[7]

[edit] In popular culture

The show has been good-naturedly lampooned for Lipton's paused and somewhat clipped delivery on Saturday Night Live, in which Will Ferrell portrayed Lipton interviewing himself as an annoyed guest, and on The Simpsons, where character Rainier Wolfcastle (a spoof of Arnold Schwarzenegger) shoots his interviewer and a dying Lipton croaks: "It has been both an honor and a privilege to eat your lead, sir."

[edit] Guests

Guest list for the show sorted alphabetically by first name.

[edit] A

[edit] B

[edit] C

[edit] D

[edit] E

[edit] F

[edit] G

[edit] H

[edit] I

[edit] J

[edit] K

[edit] L

[edit] M

[edit] N

[edit] O

[edit] P

[edit] Q

[edit] R

[edit] S

[edit] T

[edit] V

[edit] W

Cast notes
  1. ^ Bradley Cooper was the first guest to have attended the Actors Studio as a student.
  2. ^ James Lipton's episode was hosted by previous guest Dave Chappelle.
  3. ^ Kiefer Sutherland was the first guest ever on the show who is a descendant of an earlier guest (Donald Sutherland).

[edit] Ensemble guests

[edit] Declined/standing invitations

Question book-new.svg This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.
  • Gregory Peck repeatedly turned down Lipton's offer to be interviewed ever since the beginning of the show, but he finally agreed to do so. However, he died before his scheduled appearance in 2003.
  • Woody Allen, Howard Stern, Jack Nicholson, Leonardo DiCaprio, Chevy Chase, Daniel Day-Lewis, Denzel Washington, Bill Murray, Warren Beatty and Sean Connery all declined the chance to appear on the show. Any and all prospective guests that elude the opportunity to visit the Actors Studio are given a standing invitation every year.
  • When the program was based at New School University, Gary Oldman was selected as the most popular request for which guest should come visit the Actors Studio. As of 2011, he has not appeared on the show.
  • From the show's beginnings, Lipton had tried to persuade Marlon Brando and Katharine Hepburn to come on the show. Although they were both members of the Actors Studio, neither wanted to interrupt their retirement from show business. Hepburn died in 2003, and Brando died in 2004.

[edit] DVD releases

Select episodes of the show have been released by Shout! Factory. Three DVDs containing a single episode each feature Robin Williams, Johnny Depp, and Barbra Streisand. Two compilation sets were also released. Leading Men features Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Sean Penn, and Russell Crowe. Icons features Clint Eastwood, Paul Newman, Robert Redford, and Barbra Streisand.

[edit] Further reading

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b "Lipton takes readers inside ‘Inside the Actors Studio’". Msnbc.com. October 19, 2007. http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/21340777/. 
  2. ^ a b c WARREN BERGER (March 14, 1999). "All the School's a Stage; Stars Talk Shop and the Film Community Listens". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/1999/03/14/tv/all-the-school-s-a-stage-stars-talk-shop-and-the-film-community-listens.html. 
  3. ^ a b JAMES BARRON (September 22, 1996). "The Studio, A Place Of Legends". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/22/tv/the-studio-a-place-of-legends.html. 
  4. ^ Carnicke, Sharon Marie (2008). Stanislavsky in focus: an acting master for the twenty-first century. Taylor & Francis (Routledge). p. 52. ISBN 0415774969. http://books.google.co.in/books?id=gM6d8UpwkjwC&pg=PT66&dq=Inside+The+Actors+Studio&lr=&cd=15#v=onepage&q=Inside%20The%20Actors%20Studio&f=false. 
  5. ^ "Dustin Hoffman to be 200th guest on 'Inside the Actor's Studio'". USA Today. June 15, 2006. http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2006-06-15-hoffman-200th_x.htm. 
  6. ^ http://entertainment...icle7048349.ece
  7. ^ ALAN RIDING (September 10, 2002). "ARTS ABROAD; Venturing Outside Actors Studio (to Paris)". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/10/arts/arts-abroad-venturing-outside-actors-studio-to-paris.html?pagewanted=all. 
  8. ^ a b c "Bravo Writes a New Chapter with Development of Scripted Series and Live Weekly Topical Show". http://www.thefutoncritic.com/news.aspx?id=20090414bravo01. 
  9. ^ Dave Itzkoff (April 28, 2009). "James Lipton, Lover of “Family Guy”". The New York Times. http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/james-lipton-lover-of-family-guy/?hp. 
External videos
Inside the Actors Studio

[edit] External links

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