And by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Please welcome Andrew Garfield back to the gram author of true story breathe who survived on a breathing machine for nearly four decades and became disability rights pioneer here now a clip from the film breathe. Do you have any idea of the risk . Yes, i do. The risk he is might die. Can go on live hearing or possibly die. Yeah. What are we waiting for . How demanding it must have been for you to play this character and you said tavis i was honored, lucky to play this chashl character, tell me why. I never saw it as an acting challenge but a living challenge same way as robin must have because he was adjectin athlete captain in the army, drove cars and planes a was a leader. He understood the world physically. Its how he connected to people, to the world. At the age of 28 he was struck with poliohen he was paralyzed from neck down and his challenge from then on is how do i live now. How do i go on . How do i make sense of this . First he renounced god but i would argue he became far more spiritual because he needed to, but he might disagree with me but as an actor i never felt burdened by it only incredibly lucky to attempt to understand the sacrifices he had to live with in order to carry on iving. In order to carry on being there for his wife, for his new born son and family and friends and not only that for himself and understanding that he still has value even though he was a disabled person. That journey was an amazing one internally for him to go only. Just an honor. Of course it is inarguably. Every human being has value. We are all here for a very specific purpose. Its our job to find out what that is. Its a strange thing. The paralysis reveal fed to rob what his value is and was on tell me about andrew renounce ing god yet becoming more spi t spiritual. I think he had a limited idea of what god was. When polio hit he blamed god for this because he was a devout christian and he decided god doesnt exist if there is a god that would do this to me i dont want to know him. That was his spective. Then i would argue he became a much deeper more deeply in the mystery of spiritualality it and of faith and the miracle of life. He fell in love with life in a deeper way. With people in a deeper way. He was able to seat divine in each person in a much more sincere way in part because he couldnt turn away anyone who stood in fronthim that was engaging him. He had no choice but to fall in love with them. He had theift to look very, very deep into people because he had no choice but to do that. He could see every crevice of a persons soul. Any evidence he ever came back around on that. No but he in fact the person that spoke at his Memorial Service a btiful service, at the time was archbishop of cantberry and they were very Close Friends and would have long debates to the wee hours of the morning about god, faith and christianity you could access that speech he gave at the Memorial Service its a beautiful thing. And he basically says that robin was the most spiritual person he knew even though he would deny it if he were here. No he never did come back around but he reconciled the new situation. He accepted. He surrounded. He thought im going to make the most of and treat each breath as a miracle. What greater spirituality is that and treat each human being as a miracle. What prompted him to become the advocate he was. Its one thing to be strict in this way, another thing to leave the hospital bed as he did for four decades, traveling the world being an advocate for disabled community. What was that about . Yeah i mean it wasnt about any heroic impulse or gesture. It was about his own longing for a rich life. His own longing for a certain standard of life. His own longing to feel the ocean and salt water of the ocean on his feet and wind in his ha driving down country road and to meet and know as many human beings as possible and soon as he, because he was the guinea pig, the pioneer for disabled people in the sense anyone living on a ventilator with a breathing apparatus enabling him to stay alive, anyone on that kind of technology was sequestered to the hospital and he was like i cant, this is no life, im in prison here and i choose to break free and i will risk it. I will absolutely risk it and he managed to keep on living. And then they developed a new wheelchair with a ventilator on the back. He longed to live life. He realized he was still alive after a good number of years and living an incredibly rich and adventurous, exciting life. He thought why am i only able to do this. I have friends still at the hospital. It was at truistic but kind of selfish in a beautiful way, i want to live and now i know i can i want every single other person in my situation to live to. Because they are all me. And i am them. And in fact you are them as well. This could happen to anybody. He was awake to that reality. He wasnt born with this condition. It was, it hit him later in life. Yeah. I hear your joy in playing this as an actor whatas the challenge . Well the challenge with any character is how do i make believe that i am that person. And that is my situation and how do i honor that experience. And very specifically not just being a disabled person generally speaking but this particular person who happened to be disabled. How do i honor that very, very specific soul in that very, very specific situation and it was never you know, a physical challenge. There were vocal things that were difficult. Talking on the breathing machine was a tricky machine and getting the taupe of that right. The timber of that right. And making se that it was all just incredibly believable and truthful so an audience cannot be aware they were just watching a story unfold. Going to ask the other of you, i assume when you get a chance to em body the life of a character like this, at the end of filming there must be some take aways for you personally from having had the opportunity to play this character what did you take away from playing ro n robin . Im still processing that because its so profound i got to play him and be him for that period of time and the ripples that created are still working on me. Its like a great poem you keep going back to or a great novel you want to stay hanging out with. I feel the same way in several other roles. To be honest every single project ive done i feel they are all revealing things to me about myself. But life. About how i want to live. When i read the script i saw a template of how i want to live. Because we all face adversity. We all have certain pair proposal sills, limitations. That hold us back from living a full, fully expressed version of this self. Limitations. That hold us back from living a full, fully expressed version of this self. That hold us back fro full, fully expressed version of this self. Lls, limitations. That hold us back from living a full, fully expressed version of this self. And i saw a man found a way to create beauty and i thought i want some of that. There must be particular joy. Mkto bring that character to the screen. Especially someone like robin nobody knows about. Stevphen hawkings say genius mid and robin is a more humble genius. He understood the pleasure irs joys of being alive. He was a living example of the pleasure of what it is to breathe, the pleasure of knowing people, the pleasure of throwing a party, drinking great food, drinking great wine, being in nature all the Simple Pleasures of the absurd miracle of being here. And the fact not many knew about him drew me to play him. I want people to know about him. Flieinally, his son say producer, speaking of a tribute to your father. Yeah, you can feel in the film hes in love with his father and mother his mother is still around Diane Cavendish a force of nature still. And i mean, what better way to honor your dad than to tell his story and make sure as many people as possible know about the remarkable nature of his life and story because its inspiefrii inspirin inspiring, i think. We need that right now. We need reminders of the sacredness of life, of what were doing here. Do we ever. Yes. Ill leave that alone. Thank you andrew. St of breathe up next actress Jennifer Jason ally lee has had a long career as a teen star from fast times at ridgemont high to latest in Hateful Eight heres a clip for lbj. Your mother didnt turn her back on you because she didnt love you. She just couldnt stand to sigh when you werent at your best. Youre gonna be all right. Youre a good man president kennedy did wonderful things for man kind not the least of which was choosing you do be his successor. A man of great ideas. Now the man needs a man who can deliver. First of all you nailland that actress for starters, secondly i love that scene because its rare that we see lbj in tender moments. Hes so afraid and vulnerable and i think thats something rob really wanted to show and lady rd was his opportunity to show that side of him. Yeah, yeah, because weve seen actress play her on screen so many times, how did you approach your particular turn . I Read Everything i could read, looked at every video i could find and photographs, the way she held herself. What i felt most helpful was recordings of theirs, their phone conversations, they are so intimate. You really get a sense of the marriage how much he leaned on her what a force she was in a kind and loving way she was his strongest critic. And they were really a team. You know. That marriage. She was she was instrumental in his presidency and his entire politic proposal career. Politic politic proposal career. We we know she was part of his greatest critic what do you mean by that. Theres a funny recording, very sweet recording where she calls him after, i think it was maybe his second press conference, a very early one, and she basically critiques it. She says where he seemed stiff and he took too long. Saying the message didnt make enough eye contact with the people. Then she gives him praise in the things he does really well. But shes not, whats the word when shes not soft pedaling it in anyway. Shes really being very direct and straight forward with him and he really takes it in. Theres something about how much he leaned on her and trusted her and took her ce. Then other conversations you could hear online where there was a big scandal involving jenkins a very, very close friend of theirs and she wanted to make a Public Statement saying they support him and he was on the tarmac and she didnt care she wanted to make a statement and he was like no you cant and two hours later she made the statement. Made it anyway. Yeah. Over the years, with a chance to play historic figures, whats the joy in doing that for you and the challenge in doing that for syou . I think they are sort of the same thing. I mean the joy is that its an incredible challenge. And you have a huge weight and huge responsibility approaching it because it is a real person and want to do that person justice and be as honest as you can and really capture them and because they actually exist theres a lot of material to help you find your way there but its also very difficult because people can look at the real person canaand can look at you see where it feels right and where it doesnt feel right. Yeah. Talk about working with woody. Oh, hes incredible to work with. Hes, i mean, ive been such a ge fan for so long. You know when you first meet someone that youve admired for a very long time but never had that actual working relationship you dont know what to expect and hes so welcoming doesnt even come close. He really is so inclusive of everyone he works for and his wife is cooking for everyone and theyre inviting you over and suddenly youre getting on a bike after 13 years and youre riding through a park with him. Hes an incredible magician. Honestly if you could ever get woody harrellson to do a card trick for you will blow your mind. We text each other in their voices and using their phrases for one another. Yeah. Theyre an incredible couple woody and laura. They really brought me into their family, it was nice because i was on my own so it was lovely to be part of that. Are you one the actors you get to set you dont come out of character . It depends. Depends on the roll and how tricky the accent. What about this one . I stayed in this accent because it was very tricky so it was easier to talk in it all the time and listen to it all the time. Now whats so great apple has ear pods, they didnt have them when we were shooting this but this last thing i did Patrick Melrose novels i could actually listen to the pop music of the 60s or whatever i needed to listen to to actually help me inform the scene and is completely hidden by your hair, theres times you can do that, its great especially to have an accessent to hear it or a music of the period whatever influences you. Was there something particular about that period that you liked, wished you could have experienced at the level they experienced it there are periods of time if i could go back in time id like to go back and check certain. Which ones . I was born in the mid 60s but i was such a baby i feel sometimes i missed out on so much by not being of age in the 60s to see so much happen. Oh, so much change, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Im okay. No back to the future for you. When i was younger i was in love with fitzgerald and wanted to live in that period but not so much. You realize when you get older how much change happens within your own lifetime and its ha to imagine going back to the rote airy phone. Seem lies like a lot of work. Da da da one, da da da two, these are crazy times were living in. Im not sure i want to be here in this madness. Yeah at least go back two years ago. Yeah. I take your point. Ha, ha. I got that. As an artist how are you navigating these crazy times. I feel were in really crazy times right now. Ke never before. You look how much Linden Johnson got accomplished and all of the great a lot of us associate him with the vietnawar and thats the lovely thing about this film is how many great incredible bills he passd. Voting rights, civil rights, medicaid, pbs, npr, all that. Head start. Sure. It goes on and on and on. Clean water act. Clean air agility. Clean air act. All that stuff. And look today, things hes trying to strip away. And all things obama put in place hes trying to strip away. I think its a very frightening time were living in and im completely addicted to the news. Im not im sort of a private person but i have very Strong Political beliefs, does mean i speak out about it all the time. I do think this is a frightening time. I hadnt thought about it but its fascinating parallel when you see the movie lbj to consider how much they did get done in those difficult times in how Little Congress doesnt pass anything these days. And he would he came from the senate and understood how it works. He also understood politics. It helps to know what the job is. Yeah, yeah, ill leave that right where it is. The movie lbj with woody harrellson and Jennifer Jason leigh. Thanks for coming on the program. Thank you for having me. Thats the show as always keep the faith. For more information on the show visit tavis smiley on pbs. Org. Join me next time with conversation with social justice advocate on passage next time, see you then. And a contributions from your pbs station from viewers like you, thank u. Today on americas test kitchen, dan uncovers the secrets to the perfect roast rack of lamb, jack challenges chris to a tasting of dijon mustard, julia cooks the ultimate roasted brined turkey, and bridget prepares root vegetable gratin. Americas test kitchen is brought to you by dcs. Dcs manufacturers of professionally styled indoor and outdoor kitchen equipment