Transcripts For KQED Charlie Rose 20170501

Rose welcome to the program. We begin our series of conversations about president trumps first 100 days with Maggie Haberman of the New York Times and cnn. Whats fascinating about him its difficult to be a president , youre not going to have agreement on shared of facts with this president. We saw this a lot during the campaign. He will present numbers that are just not true about either crowd size or the effect of his policies or about when something took place. And when you challenge him on it, he will say well thats what i read somewhere or someone sent me that. Its never sort of his own domain and he doesnt own it, he doesnt take proprietary field for it. So a win is what he in his mind what he decides it is and that is his challenge right now is how do i tell people, how do i tell the public that a 100 day presidency, first period of high presidency where his poll numbers, personal Approval Rating has been around 40 pretty much give or take a few points. Where he has historic unpopularity and unfavorability where he has been stymied by a congress where his party has the majority, in both houses, how do i spell that as victory. Rose we continue with Sheila Nevins hbo documentary films her book is called you dont look your age and other fairy tales. Its hard to be a woman getting older thats working. Its hard to once have been saturdaysy and very pretty and suddenly see everything disappearing. Its hard the images of aging and women are so incredibly destructive to keeping it going. Rose and we conclude this evening with an appreciation of the oscar winning film director Jonathan Demme, he dyed this week at age 73. Sometimes people asked me well whats the common link in your movies or what have you. The only common link for me is ive loved the source material and i love the source material because its been my view beautifully written. Rose Maggie Haberman, Sheila Nevins and an appreciation of jonathan denial when we continue. Rose funding for charlie rose has been provided by the following and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. President trump mark his 100th day in office on saturday despite an ambitious agenda, he will that be celebrating any legislative victories. He does have a confirmation for Supreme Court justice. His Healthcare Plan has been pushed off to avoid another government shut down. Joining me now is Maggie Haberman of the New York Times and cnn. I want to start this about this, and this is what dillon buyers wrote in a cnn profile of you. Theres no reporter trump respects more than hairman. He inevitably turns to her to share his thinking and participate in interviews. He does so because in addition to having known her for so long he knows she matters and she will not treat him with kid gloves, will not be unfair. She commands washington and new york. She gets access to trump because he needs her not because she needs him. I dont know how the president would agree with dillons opening description, and i dont certainly want to speak for him. But i think two things are true. I think i have known him for a long time. I covered him at politico and i covered him at the new york post. Longevity matters with him and the familiar matters with him. But i also dont think anyone should make any mistake if i didnt have the prepositional phrase of the New York Times attached to my name, im not sure that i would be speaking to him as frequently. Hes fascinate by the New York Times and its a marvelous paper. Rose what is that about because he has said in front of audiences and ive been there i love the New York Times, its the jewel. Then the next thought out of his mouth is failing New York Times. He came to our offices on 40th street and 8th avenue a week or so, two weeks after he was elected. We were the first major interview that he did. And he came to us. We didnt go to him. And that was the subject of some debate too because he was scrapped and then he was put back on as often is the case with trump theres negotiation right up until the last second. He grew up in new york. He grew up in the outer boroughs, he still sees himself that way and you know this. He plopped himself down on fifth avenue in this giant black and gold tower he build 30 years ago and has never felt he has gotten the respect he believes he deserves. Hes always seen himself as this kid from queens clawing up the ladder. Rose somebodys always questioning whether hes worth this or hes worth that. And how he made it and did he come to this on his own. How much of this was given to him by his father fred trump versus how much he managed to create as a business unto himself and as a brand unto himself. And this question of legitimacy just exists throughout his career. Rose what is this win, win, win thing come from. It comes from his dad, who was, hes got two mentors and i sort of see them on either shoulder. One is fred trump his father who taught him essentially never give up, always win. And then roy cohen, the mccarthy era mccarthys lawyer. Exactly. Who taught him always be on offense and all press is good press. To be clear i dont actually think donald trump believes all press is good press although ive heard him say that a lot but he thinks press is important. Rose winning is what matters to him. Something is a win whether you actually won or not. The thing thats fascinating with him and its very difficult as a president , to be clear, youre not going to have an agreement on a shared set of facts with this president sometimes. And we saw this a lot during the campaign. He will present numbers that are just not true about either crowd size or about the effect of his policies or about when something took place. And when you challenge him on it, he will say well thats what i read somewhere or someone sent me that and its never society of his own domain and sort of his own domain and feel a proprietary to it. How do i tell the public the first 100 days of my presidency where his personal Approval Rating has been around 40 pretty much give or take a few points. Where he has historic unpopularity and unfavorability, where he has been stymied by a congress where his party has the majority. How do i in both houses, how do i spell that as victory. Rose he first says, and interesting that you pointed this out. The first time he says this is an artificial landmark, artificial standard. Then the next thing he does, everything he can to make himself look goodbye the judgment of hes smart enough to know. Look, he is a smart man, and this is something that i think he gets dinged for. I dont think that a series of interviews that he gave this past week necessarily served him well. He gave a bunch of hundred day interviews where he said some things that candidly made my jaw drop and ill get to later. But i think hes aware it is an important marker that gets used and hes also very numbers affixed. Hes very sort of visual learner is the term you hear used about kids. I dont know if hes a visual learner but he does really like numbers and graphics and charts. Rose and he likes television too. He likes teleinvestigate. Rose he likes to listen to things rather than read things. Right. He likes to take things through his ears and see sort of a picture and thats how he absorbs. He knows the immediate yeah is awk sellsed with the hundred day marker. To be clear it is not wrong. It is a silly metric and its not an appropriate metric in a lot of ways in this point in history but it is still one that gets used. Rose because it got used a long time ago. It started with fdr. It is worn out as utility but it is still the benchmark by which you can sort of do a concurrent with other president s. Rose does he know if the facts are wrong that he is lying. So i dont want to profess to be in his head, but when i have interviewed him, there are times when it seems clear to me he knows that what he has just set is not true. And then there are other times where im not sure that he knows. So as a for instance, and he did this in an interview with someone recently who was not me. But he will sometimes change the number of something hes just described. So the 59 tom hawk missiles who were dropped in syria been became 79 in the next sentence. I was on the phone with him once i 2011, they all blur together, it might have been 2015. He switched, he increased his worse by a certain amount from one sentence to the next. I dont know if he knew he was doing it. But there are other teams he will Say Something and when you call him on it hell acknowledge its not quite right. The challenge with him charlie, youre never really going to know which is which. For instance take what happened this past week with nafta and him claiming that he was on the brink of withdrawing the u. S. From nafta. Never mind that he cant just summarily do that but he suddenly at the last minute pulled back by canada and mexico rushing at him and the cabinet secretary. Were never going to know how much of that was him really being there or whether maybe he never really was going to do it and it was brinkmanship. Rose he also talks about things as if hes always the greatest. Everything is the best, greatest. Now that comes out of his book in one instance. Yes, art of the deal is in there. Rose so its just a strategy for him. I think thats light. Look, i think some of it is its attack particular. Hes a very unusual combination of incredibly confident and incredibly insecure. And sometimes rose a lot of people like it. Everything is heightened with him. Not that its unusual to have it with him, bill clinton had that too. In fact there are elements of this presidency, not all certainly but stylistically there are elements of his presidency i think the closest recent modern analogue is bill clinton just in terms of seeking constant outside input and so forth. Rose other than clinton, hes the best Political Animal theyve ever seen. I mean hes remarkable in being able to, see it makes people feel like hes speaking just to them. Rose its the conversation in the room rather than a speech. Its why hes so good a twitter. People felt like when he was tweeting for the last several years, he really came through and he was speaking just to them. He says enormously controversial things. His words have hoped foment a lot of anger and a lot of hate. He has said and done things for which he has refused to you a paul gize and which he did not create the political divide but he has certainly exact baited it and he has shown no it pulse to reach across the aisle. Whats missed in the all of the description of that is oneonone or in his ram eyes he can be very charmy, he can be very funny. He is very quick. And that is why rose hes hes very interested in engaging you on the details of his live and he will usually retain some of them, not always. But he is very good for somebody where empathy doesnt seem to roll off the way were used to it with paul tigz and i do think hes struggled with this, he does seem to be focused on whoever hes focused on. Part of whats fascinating for people about that is hes a celebrity. They know him as a celebrity so it feels like the sun is shining on you. This is a description people have given to me on these rallies where he focused on them. That was a huge asset. Rose how long does he want to be president. I think before he wrote the art of the deal. Rose bush 41 we now know for example someone would go talk to him about being the Vice President running mate. Theres some belief hes been interested in the presidency for far longer than 1987, 88. But that is the first time clear publicly he was doing anything that looked political in that regard. But its funny, i mean to understand him, people really do need to read the art of the deal which i dont want to sound its a promo for. It is really all there. The first person who said that to me was newt gingrich. I had read the book already but gingrich read all of his books as a way to understand him and it was effective. But trump is very much born of a certain moment in new york city of the 19 80, 1990s and hes this strange amalgamation of ed koch and rudy giuliani, these hyper engaged hyper social different types of governing styles, mayors. Ed koch is how am i doing mayor. Trump does another version. Rose people like general mattis a law. Somehow the military those guys that have done well and women as well have done well and who seem like winners. Hes very attracted to and seems to give them the capacity to influence him even to make decisions on the spot. I think that has been the part thats been a relief to people. If you look at wins this president has had in the first hundred days there are not many that you can point to there are really protein as opposed to carbons. Of these eos in the carbon category. Rose nice way to put it. But in addition to getting the Supreme Court justice through, although they had turn to the senate rules, he has really empowered Tillerson Mattis mick master. Mick master and kelly to a much greater degree and he has allowed himself to be influenced by them. The concern was, i mean trump isnt admiring of the military. Theres almost a fetishic thing about generals. Rose figures of authority. He does. Rose he said the same thing about put continue and about cc and same thing about people like that. There was really notice and concern understandably in the campaign when he was continuing to praise authoritarians. Weve never seen this in modern day rose about fascism. Correct. Our system is not used to this, and so the concern was does somebody who has such a predeelection for making the military big and making the military grand and strength and decent characteristics, what does that mean about how he will govern and really not that much. With Foreign Policy he has governed rose because he chose people that reflected that point of view. And those who didnt like flynn are gone. Well flynn is, look flynn was gone because ostensibly he lied to the president. Rose at the same time he had a sort of attitude about the military because he had os tensibly been fired. Correct. And he had played to as one person in the west wing had described this to me that flynn played what they considered to be trumps worst instinct. That having been said trump and other advisors in the west wing had long ago begun to lose faith in flynn well before the issue and lying to the president. Rose how did they lose faith. They felt he was erratic and controlling. Frankly some of the same reasons that obamas advisors have complained with him. There was an incident when he was working on the transition, flynns son became a problem and had to be fire and the president doesnt like firing people despite the youre fired tag line. The president doesnt like absorbing negative press because of other people. Theres a lot of things flow this way. Rose dont bring your rain on to me. Correct. Regardless whether he brings rain on to other people, he doesnt want their rain on him. So flynn used up a couple of his lives by the time he was down. Rose heres what intrigues me about him. He is constantly reaching out by phone and by personal conversation, whatever the means, to ask people what do you think of this, what do you think of that, what should i do. And thats married with what he sees on television and what he sees on television informs him. Those are his primary means of absorbing information and intelligence im asking that. No, its the truth. Im actually trying to process and add to what you said, if what you said is correct. One of the things that was challenging for his National Security brief early on was getting him to absorb briefing and then to the table and then to the opening the book. And he requested a change where the presentations would have lots of charts and graphs. Thats what he prefers, as i said before, he likes the visual piece. Rose part of his he sees the degree to which sort of robert costa had a great line once, i forget who said it to but trump is television. There is something to that. It really all kind of flows through him. He sees things in terms of how it will play on a medium. And for him, the quickest way to absorb something is almost through like the sheen it leaves, the residue it leaves. So he prefers television and he prefers conversation. He had, he does deserve some credit with this. Its not that he went half cocked in syria. You can have a conversation about obamas syria policy but thats not going to do much about the future. Rose in this case there was so many people around the world have said for god sakes somebody do something because this is a crime against humanity. Its funny. For the president having two different positions about Syrian Refugees in 2015. At one point he said in the interview i think it was with bill owe reilly saying you had to let in the refugees. He had a quick refuriousal within a few days or weeks saying no i didnt mean that. Rose he feared some sense someone would come in and do something terrible. Convinced there was too much political danger taking that position when you were running very far to the right in a primary where you had to hang on to your base. The way to influence him to the point about visual, what he does respond to is if you tell him numbers, that tends not to move him the same way although i think anybody is moved by the number 400,000 deaths in a civil war. But hes moved by images. So the way to move him, people have said to me repeatedly is, showing him something. The images of his refugees, particularly these young children, particularly people in the migrant crises and children were drowning. I think he was responsive to that and then he changed. The question is, does he come back to that. Rose thats a little bit of ronald reagan. Thats exactly right. There are similarities there. Look, there are many difference, reagan among other things had been a governor. Rose he had four specific goals. He really understood how to keep the focus on one, two, three, four things. Thats right. Rose build up the military, rules the debt. He came in with sort of a map what he wanted to do. So did bill clinton. Bill clinton was much more centrist and not ideological the way trump came in but i never really had a clear sense of what trump wants to do other than sticking broadly to the theme hes been speaking about trade and other countries ripping us off. Rose thats what amazes me too. Two questions, one, did he come to some of these views because it was for him to the whitehouse because he had been a democrat, he had been all over the political map and endorsed people that the Republican Party, certainly the right and the Republican Party would find that, thats one question. Another question is how much of this has he really believed for a long time. I think china is one example of that. Thats right. China is definitely one example of that. More broadly that nato members are not paying their fair share in the free rider issue, we actually heard him talk. Rose same about south korea just yesterday. Absolutely. That harkened back he didnt quite say it during the campaign, the Editorial Board or my colleague david sanger and me but he did have the general concept that the u. S. Is everyones policeman. I think he felt that way broadly for a long time. Its easy to make that statement but it doesnt mean anything if youre not explaining what your areas of the case is and what your areas of emphasis should be and what areas of emphasis needs to be built all and the need for intich vention. The problem with trump during the campaign he has this speaking style and this has been getting himself in trouble al they hes been doing it less so. Some it is by design not by accident. Like the drain speaking style where he ends up in every bit around the bowl. At any different point in an interview that david sanger and i did with him about Foreign Policy and the campaign you could have come away thinking he was an interventionist or an isolationist. You just took the quote on their own because term contradictory. So i think he has this sort of set of base, i dont mean political base, impulses. But its almost like its not particularly well defined, you dont know exactly what it means. I dont know if he exactly knows what it means other than as a feeling. Rose he also seems to believe as other politicians have, if you put me in a room by myself with xi jinping. Thats exactly right. Theres a level of hubris to him, obama did the same thing. This president said something pretty similar. It does not work that way. He was very struck this week when he, i mentioned before about the jaw dropping quote. It was something that was seemingless now but striking for a president and especially a president in the first hundred days where he talked about how hard this is. Its really striking, much more work than his old job. A because he never actually does anything close to admitting vulnerability or frailty so that was striking. And there was an aspect of it that was sort of you know what, hes at least acknowledging that this is tougher than he had believed. The question is then what he does with that. But i can also understand why people would find it disquieting for a president to say. Rose they all say theres no particular skill, theres nothing that really prepares you for this job and when you get there what theyll say whats amazing in the white house is the rise to the oval office. The other stuff is before it gets to president. He doesnt turn off the ats part of the problem. Hes also, look, i think thats all true. I think the problem is that other president s have been certainly modern president s have been much more mindful of the impact of their word in this office. And he continues to sort of seem almost like this minor league who got called up and is figuring out exactly how this works. Rose learning on the job. I think so. Rose he has to if hes changing position. Hes changing position because of new facts, new intelligence. I think theres been a change at his level. I think it is sometimes two steps forward and two steps back or one step forward and two steps back. That tweet he put out earlier believing his office had been dugged or whatever it was, trump tower had been bugged. That was tweet was a dangerous experience for him because they spent the whole government basically ground to a halt from three weeks trying to reverse engineer justification for that tweet. And there are other issues rose going in search of something that would indicate even if it wasnt it wasnt exactly what he said it was close enough because thats what people believe. Rose then susan rice came forward. He said look this is what i meant. That actually quickly disappeared because syria happened and syria happened the evening of that interview that susan rice gave where she says i didnt leak anything. Although she did acknowledge some unmasking although she said this is part of the job and sort of nothing unusual or nefarious has been done. There is a bigger debate that i think is important and significant about the way in which intelligence is used. That is part of the whole Edward Snowden debate has been about for sell years but that cant be justifying for turning an investigation into whether there was collusion between russian officials trying to influence the 2016 election and the trump campaign. To be clear theres not been proof of anything but that is what this is all about. So i think the president finally came to realize just based on the reporting, im not speculating here. Ive been told he came to realize that 2456s, he had bitten off a bit more than he could chew. Rose when did he realize do you think . About right before syria. And then i think after syria he has been a bit more sober. He has seemed less frustrated. He has seemed less aggravated. I think hes very lonely at the whitehouse. Rose thats my next question that came up while you were saying that. Whats 2 hours with donald trump like. When does he go to bed, who is there in terms of around the whitehouse, does he have an aide there or have they gone home to their suburban homes. His family, his wife is not there most of the time. Shes in new york. They speak every day. Rose of course. No, no, i just mean shes actually a very influential presence. Rose she is. Explain that because i think most people dont know that. People i think are confused with her disinterest in the lime light is shyness. Shes not shy. Hes just not interested. Shes a model, shes mrs. Trump, shes been inside magazines. Its not interesting to her. Shes pretty self assured in my experiences with her and shes really focused on raising her son. So i think thats her life. But what she does do is talk to him about staff moves. She does talk to him about how shes seeing Television Coverage play out or whats appearing in newspapers or what need back shes hearing from some friends. She often asks him to be more careful with twitter and this is an ongoing scene and shes acknowledged that publicly. As far as his day he starts out watching many hours of mork television. Rose three, four, five. Between five and six. To be clear this is just based on what were told. He watches it for a while. Eventually comes and watches it in the residents, he comes down to the oval office. Rose around 7, 8, 9, Something Like that. He comes down to the office between 9 and 10 is my understanding unless theres an earlier meeting. There was an effort earlier on to put earlier and earlier meet, on his calendar to keep him from tuning him. Keep him off twitter and keep him off cable. The problem was he would watch Something Like cable and he would talk back to the television on twitter, the way you would have somebody write an angry letter to the newspaper if they werent the president. And so in this case hes the president. He would come down, do oval office events. His oval office is incredibly free wheeling. His set up, just to demonstrate, this is the resolute desk. He then put four chairs ringed around it which is exactly what he has in trump power. He did that very early on. Hes got one picture behind him and thats of his father fred trump. He has no other pictures behind him. Theres Andrew Jackson in there and so on and so forth. And then he peaks in on tv throughout the day. He generally tries to catch sean spicers press briefing which he watches. I was going to say its become mustsee tv. Throughout the day theres phone calls and meetings. Usually hes done around 6 or 6 30. Hes eating dinner so that takes up time. His soninlaw and his daughter eye veronica are his advisors but they have kids. Jared kushner is said to be there until nine. Hes alone at night and has stopped doing late night tweeting rose ive heard and maybe through your reporting hes not tweeting but hes on the phone. Constantly watching television. Hes on the phone. He still has his old cell phone and sometimes he will make a call on it. He still tries to use a secure line as far as i understand. I believe he uses the old android for tweeting, basically. But he still talks to a lot of old friends. This is why you cant ever completely be a gatekeeper for this man because youre just never going to be able to control everything thats coming down. Rose is he a curious man. He is not an intellectually curious man that sense that he does not really read books. He does not know history particularly easily. You constantly hear him say things like who knew healthcare could be this hard. Most people knew it could be this hard and certainly people who worked on it. Rose like bill clinton. Exactly. Or barack obama as has hillary clinton. Hes curious about a certain discreet set of tonics and issues. Rose its great to have you here. Thank you for having us. Rose Maggie Haberman of the energy times and cnn. New york times and cnn. Back in a moment. Rose Sheila Nevins is here. She was here at a time when few people knew of the premium cable channel. Since then shes overseen a revolution of Television Documentaries bringing taxicab confessions, crimes from syria, and the jinx. On her watch hbo documentary film has garn you ared a total of 65 prime time emmy awards, 46 pee deed awards and 26 academy awards. Heres a look at her at work from cbs sunday morning. We sat in on a session for a new documentary nevins commissioned by alexandra pelosi. Its a reading of the constitution, the declaration of independence and the bill of rights. Come on guys, this is great. Is it true that your basic criterion is not boring. Is that number one. Absolutely. This is fine. Im not bored yet. Im a little bored. Shes the patron soinlt of documentaries. Is she really as tough as ive heard she is. Shes honest. Do you quake. Youre going to hear it from her or a critic. Who do you want to hear it from. I want to get it from the theres no softening the blow. Rose she has a new book called you dont look your age and other fairy tales. It is, she says, either an expose, a memoir or an obituary your im pleased to have Sheila Nevins back at this table. Welcome. Its been a while. Why did you decide to write this and what is this. Its a sort of fly memoirs. Theres imagery characters and sheila. I dont know its things i never talked about. Its hard to get a woman thats getting older thats working. Its hard to have once been sassy and very pretty. And suddenly see everything disappearing. Aging and women are so incredibly destructive to keeping it going. Rose you wanted to write about this because these were things you thought about, wrote about and cared about. Yes because i was afraid of age and i knew many women they could say anything, they could talk about affairs, they could talk about kids ailments but they couldnt talk about how old they were. Rose listen to this. Heres some of the people who read. Audrey mcdonald, meryl streep, diane von furstenberg, floor yeah steinem, lesley stahl. You think they care about it too. Or some of them willing to age gracefully and live with it . I think every single one of these women, maybe diane is an exception, a european she can carry with her. Everyone is concerned with losing what they have because theyre aging. Thats the face lift and botox and thats what we all fall for. I have a line in the book about the sales woman says to me you look young in that, makes a sale. Horrifying. Rose are you happy you did these things you did in order to make sure that you look like you feel. Yes. Rose youre happy. Theyre saying go. Theyre saying go because its true. Its hard to be truthful about certain things. I decided not to anyone. Im simply old but im not student, im not senile, im not walking with a walker. Rose and the spirit you have is the same as the spirit you had when you walked into hbo many years ago except you have more power and money. I have more money. I have as much power, im still a woman you know. I would say i am much more efficient about ideas than i kwr50d to be used to be. I had to stay up all night because of one word. When was it too late or early to call the producer. Why hadnt i told him or her beforehand. Now i can sleep. I dont agonize as much. Rose beyond aging, beyond death. Theres one story thats called the giant named turette. Talk about that turette syndrome. Ill cry. My son has turette. In my generation, i was afraid to do anything that women would do. I was afraid to say i have to leave to take my son to the doctor. I was afraid to say, you know, im traveling somewhere to find some new medication. I would say, i cant be here because of da da da da. It was impossible to be a woman and a mother in the workplace. Because you want to play an equal game. And guys dont say im going home to take my kid to the doctor. Have you ever heard a man say that in the workplace . Rose no. My son is 37 years old, so im talking about a culture of 30 years ago when the kid was seven or eight you did not dare say that. A man did not dare say that. First there were not that many women in the workplace at that level 30 years ago. Rose what makes you cry about david, your son, having turettes syndrome the fact about you or about hip. Interesting question. Maybe a little of both if im really truthful. Angry because i had to care for him so much of the time. And sad because he was bullied and life was so difficult for him. And i felt rose the pain he felt because of it. I didnt know the pain but i felt it. I would never know somebodys elses pain but i felt pain on his behalf. Rose theres another advice to women in male dominated workplace. A list comprising a list of rules by a former Vice President in a leading if its an anonymous story it has nothing to do with me charlie, it has to do with an anonymous woman. Rose is it in the book. Its in the book. Rose then we can talk about it. Youre tough. Rose a list of rules written by a former yes. Rose what are the rules, do you remember. Laugh at jokes that arent funny. Rose please your bosses. Say i never thought of that even though you thought of it before. Never say youre taking your kids to the doctor, always say you have an appoint outside the office. Never be a mother, never be a woman. Be a guy. Rose youre writing a poem called mentor you ask. Tell me about that. I dont think its a poem, its a story about do you know how everybody always says who is your mentor. Rose yes. Did you have a mentor. Rose sure. I did. Well my mentor was revenge, does that sound horrible. Because im such a sweet pea. Rose you want to get revenge. Once again person. Rose was that a life no, im not a macbethian kind of character, but i was rejected at yale. Rose tell us. You went to yale. I went to bernard majored in english and went to yale and majored in directing at the drama school. I was in a moot court thing at the Yale Law School and i felt sort of wildly madly in love with a harvard law student who was there. Rose sure. Madly, madly. I think that happens once, you think . Rose it certainly happens once. I would like to think it happens more than once. I think it probably happens once. So i went to this young mans house and i had to meet his mother. She was a very blue blood person, i was not. I was the daughter of a postal clerk and a communist mother, card holding. She said to me very clearly arent there any interesting jewish men for you at the law school here. And i never saw him again. And she has really been a mentor in many ways. The pain motivated me to show her i could do it. Is that odd. Do you think i need a psychiatrist. Rose well, you know what i think about all of that. Whatever gets you through the night is good. What about the day. Rose the day too. Theres a poem about your friend larry framer. Love of my life. Rose great friend of this show as you know. I certainly do. Rose can i read the poem. I had to know him to choose film segments of his life. He was sick and in hospital so i forced myself to make bedside visits. This led to an adoration of this gay icon who survived all the vul gairities of a lifer transplant hiv and 891 years of passionate living. Your homage to larry framer. He had no fear. None. Rose of embarrasment. None, none. Rose he was presented to say this is what i believe in and i will do everything i can to bring it to your attention. And he was presented to say youre not doing enough. I mean that is a great thing to be able to say. Hes a hero. I have to mentor. I have a gay hero, i have a husband i have a job and im on your show. What else could anyone want. Rose you have hit the all. So tell me about today. Is it today because of the explosion of hbo and original programming, and other places now and streaming and all of that. How is it different for you . Or is it just better and more opportunities because there are more vehicles. I would say its more difficult to stand out in a crowd. Rose theres so much. Theres so much product and it makes your selection of product much more specific. And you have to save yourself and watch this, am i talking to myself. There was a time when youre the only kid on the block youre the best kid on the block but with a lot of kids on the block you got to play a different kind of ball. I think that i fight harder for standout products and projects. Rose did you ever want to be on don hewitt asked me to be on camera and it terrified me because i didnt really i didnt think i would be good at it. Rose you didnt care no. But i remember him saying youre the only one who turned me down. I said im not comfortable. I were e about what i look and what i said. Rose do you like or dislike narrators. I dont like narrators. I dont like anything in between the story and the viewer. I think that the story should talk directly theres something wrong. That doesnt mean we dont put cards in or tell you what date is or where youre going were not furious in that way but i really dont feel i feel that the viewer is invited as the narrator so to speak to put the pieces together themselves. I always felt that way. I always felt narrator was intrusive. Rose the biggest test for you was does it bore you. Yes. Dont you. Rose well of course i do. I also want to know if it excites me, if its compelling to me. Thats the opposite of being boring. Rose what have you missed that you dont have. Thats a good question. What have i anied any missei dont have. Rose you had children, you had career, you had money, you had friends, you have respect. Yes. Rose all that. Time. Time. More time. More time. Rose you think sometime is slipping away. Yes. Rose you know youre on the other side. You know youre on the other side you just count backwards. They show a picture thats 102 years old, i dont want to be that person. Even if i made it to 102, i dont want to be there. Time is so precious, its a cliche but ive wasted a lot of time worrying about one word, one sentence, cut back cuts. You have too . Its horrifying. Rose i know. Its like the metronome. Rose i dont know of anybody that doesnt sort of agonize. Theres nobody thats good at what they do hat doesnt really agonize over it. Now they may limit the agony to it over a limited period of time and knowing that another 25 hours might not make it that much better or make you any more sure. But everybody i think who cares is always agonizing is this the right choice or not. Because making films is a series of choices. Yes, it is. Rose thats what its about. Yes. Rose this actor or that actor, this story, that story. When i was here 15 years ago it was the same table and same chairs but were not the same, are we. Rose no. See. Rose if you dont look your age then there are fairy tales. The one and only Sheila Nevins. Back in a moment. Stay with us. Rose Jonathan Demme is the oscar winning director of such films like silence of the lambs and philadelphia died in his home in new york city. He was 73. He came up in an air awe of low budget feasmsz learning his  joy Jonathan Demme became a filmmaker. I adored movies so much as a kid right away. I remember the first scene from a hop along cassidy movie with my First Encounter with the Television Set instantly hooked and then seen moves like Treasure Island and going all the time and all the time. Some of how i want to be a veterinarian but i bombed out of chemistry and i wound up writing Movie Reviews for the college pain. Rose heres what they said about you. You kept a notebook. Between the first movie you saw all the way through college. Every movie you kept a little personal review as to when you saw it, who you saw it with and what the movie was about and whether you liked it or not. And a star rating too, charlie. Youve been digging deep havent you. Rose there is a lot of stuff i want to talk b you got out and started making Movie Reviews. Your father a family hotel at miami beach. Rose then big joe levine comes down there from embassy picture. And your father introduces you and you showed him a review of your film zulu. Mr. Levine told my dad your sons a critic bring the review to the house boat which was across the street and i showed up one day with my little scrapbook of clippings. I had favorably reviewed zulu and he literally with a cigar poked me and said you got good taste, kid. You can come work for me. I went into the service for a while, came out and called up and he gave me a job. Suddenly i was working in the movie business, which was ridiculous. I couldnt believe that i could actually you had no dream to be a director. None whatsoever. Rose you were happy to be a publicist. Yes, i loved it. Then i met roger courtman and he was starting world pictures and he needed scrims. He said to me jonathan you write press releases why dont you write a motorcycle movie. I came up with my friend joe who is the greatest storyteller i ever met, we wrote a script and i showed it to roger. He said this is pretty good joe, you direct commercials. Yes. I tell you what, joe, you direct and tom you can produce it. Suddenly were like 24 years old or Something Like that and were off to california to make our motorcycle movie. Rose corman gave guys thats one of his greatness. Roger is an extraordinary amazing great guy that you could ever come across. Rose what makes him that. Its the Oprah Winfrey thing i think a little bit. Hes got tremendous enthusiasm and also a big ego and a desire to succeed. And i love about roger one of the many things hes so quotable and one of the things he used to tell the new directors, he would say now listen as a director, youre 40, 45 artist and 65 businessman. Never forget that. Youve got to be a businessman. People are going to invest money in your movies and youve got to repay that investment. He said if you get carried away youll find yourself out of work. Rose when silence of the lambs came to you, did you have some sense of this movie was going to become what it did . Did you know because of the hopkins performance, because of jodys performance, because of the script you had there, that this had all the potential to be one of the classic american films. I was, i knew it had the potential to be a splendid movie. I knew ted wrote where a great script from a great great great book. Tom harris is such an extra writer and i knew we had a great cast. And i knew was going to work his magic. I was confidence we were going to have a terrific picture. When youre making these things, all you know is, all i know is the one thing that my movies have in common is ive always been really excited by their potential as movies. And the belief that if we can make a movie that winds up exciting other people as much as the potential exsites me, maybe it will be contagious. Sometimes people ask me well whats the common link in your movies or what have you. The only common link in the movies for me is i have loved the source material. Ive loved the source material because its been my view beautifully written. And whether thats the humor of married to the mob for me or the extraordinary human tapestry of beloved or what was in the script of philadelphia or the certain kind of america as we approach the millennium. The writing has been exceptional. When you make a movie youve got to live with these things for two years if youre the director. Its a long process and its got to continue to feed you and its got to continue to interest you in order to be able to really kind of deliver Something Worthy of all that effort. Rose you were going to Say Something about talkie i was thinking of that as a rocky performance. I made a couple documentaries about haiti and my cousin who is a big troublemaker in new york. Rose what would you do if you didnt make movies. Open a bookstore. Maybe even open a movie theatre and show movies. But i love making films, and rose the joy is . One of the joins is getting together with a whole community of extraordinarily gifted people. And pooling your ideas and your efforts together with a collective goal of making something extremely special for people to look at. Rose Jonathan Demme died at age 73. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications captioned by Media Access Group at wgbh access. Wgbh. Org rose funding for charlie rose has been provided by and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Youre watching pbs