Robert Redford Part 10

Moore recalls her first meeting with Redford at the Wildwood office newly sited on the Paramount lot as a square dance. "It was all very formal, and I had to pinch myself to remember that this was the the Robert Redford. Then something I hadn't expected occurred. He said, without apology, that he was concerned that my fame as TV's Mary Richards, whom he enjoyed, would destroy believability for the Beth role." Moore had read Guest's novel the month it appeared and wanted the role because it touched her personal experience. The key relations.h.i.+p in her own life was an unresolved one with a remote and commanding father. "I thought, Well, okay, we're off to a good start, because he has no trouble about being honest." Robert Redford. Then something I hadn't expected occurred. He said, without apology, that he was concerned that my fame as TV's Mary Richards, whom he enjoyed, would destroy believability for the Beth role." Moore had read Guest's novel the month it appeared and wanted the role because it touched her personal experience. The key relations.h.i.+p in her own life was an unresolved one with a remote and commanding father. "I thought, Well, okay, we're off to a good start, because he has no trouble about being honest."

After the first interview, Moore heard nothing for a month. Then the unlikeliest opportunity came up to replace Tom Conti in the long-running Broadway hit Whose Life Is It Anyway? Whose Life Is It Anyway? Gaines suggested Moore for the part, and Manny Azenberg, a good friend of Redford's since his Broadway days, endorsed her. Gaines's strategy, says Moore, was brilliant: "There was no doubt that Bob was interested in me. After that first interview he left me in a state of hope. But the reality was that he had Eisner to appease, and why would Paramount buy me? John Gaines said, 'Look, if Azenberg takes you, there will be this visible belief in you as a serious actor. You will be proving your credentials by taking on the legitimate stage.' For me, of course, it was a lot of pressure. Gaines suggested Moore for the part, and Manny Azenberg, a good friend of Redford's since his Broadway days, endorsed her. Gaines's strategy, says Moore, was brilliant: "There was no doubt that Bob was interested in me. After that first interview he left me in a state of hope. But the reality was that he had Eisner to appease, and why would Paramount buy me? John Gaines said, 'Look, if Azenberg takes you, there will be this visible belief in you as a serious actor. You will be proving your credentials by taking on the legitimate stage.' For me, of course, it was a lot of pressure. Ordinary People Ordinary People would come just before would come just before Whose Life Is It Anyway? Whose Life Is It Anyway? Was I tenacious enough for all that? Could I deliver for Was I tenacious enough for all that? Could I deliver for Ordinary People Ordinary People in the first place? But I had faith in myself. I was deeply inside myself at that time, which was the right place to be. I felt, If Redford can just go that final mile, I can handle it." in the first place? But I had faith in myself. I was deeply inside myself at that time, which was the right place to be. I felt, If Redford can just go that final mile, I can handle it."

Azenberg's judgment impressed Redford. After more reflection, he confirmed Moore's casting as Beth. Moore had little time to "organize the terrors" before flying with her a.s.sistant and hairdresser to Chicago, where they moved into a rented property in Lake Forest that would form the hub of production. Bit by bit Redford learned about the chaos in Moore's personal life: that her time in Lake Forest represented her first serious split with Tinker and the terminus of her marriage; that she had recently begun her first affair; and that her mind-set was both euphoric and depressed. "I didn't doubt Mary's strength as a woman and an actress," says Redford. "It was an advantage because I was attempting to project a character that I'd never seen in movies. I'd known many women like Beth in real life, people who cannot connect with their emotions. But only in real life. I felt we had new ground to cross."

Having studied so many directors up close, Redford knew that his point of entry to directing was to stay close to his actors. "I felt confident among actors. I felt I could relate in terms of rea.s.surance and creating the positivity in the environment an actor needs." A week of rehearsals began, in theater fas.h.i.+on, with the actors seated in a circle, with scripts in their laps.

Sutherland, whose headlining career had begun with Altman's M*A*S*H, M*A*S*H, expected the momentary uncertainties of a first-time director but found Redford clearheaded and diametrically unlike Pakula, who had directed him on expected the momentary uncertainties of a first-time director but found Redford clearheaded and diametrically unlike Pakula, who had directed him on Klute: Klute: "Bob totally handed trust to the actor. He'd learned that himself, the need for s.p.a.ce for the actor to find the role. I knew what I wanted to do with Jarrett, which is not to say he didn't. He did. But he gave me room." "Bob totally handed trust to the actor. He'd learned that himself, the need for s.p.a.ce for the actor to find the role. I knew what I wanted to do with Jarrett, which is not to say he didn't. He did. But he gave me room."

For Moore, the process was like working with a master engineer. "We walked through it with the utmost detail. There was time to investigate the role, and then to let it fly. He restricted nothing. The only direction he gave me, other than the gentle shaping of the character, was about my mannerisms. There were gestures that hung over from [her television character] Mary Richards: the hand slapping the thigh, the raised hand jabbing in emphasis of a line, the snap-quick turn of the head."

Tim Hutton, who had researched his role by reading books in the Children in Crisis series and by attending group therapy sessions at a mental inst.i.tution under an a.s.sumed name, believed he benefited best from daily walks with Redford in which the topics varied from cinematographic objectives to Hutton's struggle to overcome his father's death. "Bob understood everything," said Hutton. "It's hard to explain how secure you feel working with someone who knows your struggle and who knows how to help." In Moore's view, Hutton's comfort reflected the deeply personal connection Redford felt with the story. "We talked a lot about family. He gradually became open about his relations.h.i.+p with his father and how it impacted on him. He told me straight that he had great difficulty with his father's judgments and att.i.tude to him. There was no acrimony. There was a loving acceptance, but, as in my own case, I got the impression that there was also a desire to resolve that part of his emotional life once and for all. I suspected there was something of his father, in his eyes, in Beth."

In the eyes of Marcella Scott, Redford had "never divested himself of the need to impress Charlie. They seemed bound together by destiny." In 1979, Charlie retired from Standard Oil to settle permanently in a large, timbered house overlooking San Francis...o...b..y. They wrote and talked often, but Redford admits to ongoing sparring: "I didn't visit him during The Candidate The Candidate [filmed in nearby Marin County] and he resisted visiting Sundance for the longest time. When I finally arranged it for him, he complained about the alt.i.tude. I accepted that we were not of the same cut. But forgiveness wasn't the issue. Understanding was. He was a man bent out of shape by being exiled as a teenager, a man with self-worth problems, perhaps. But a good man." [filmed in nearby Marin County] and he resisted visiting Sundance for the longest time. When I finally arranged it for him, he complained about the alt.i.tude. I accepted that we were not of the same cut. But forgiveness wasn't the issue. Understanding was. He was a man bent out of shape by being exiled as a teenager, a man with self-worth problems, perhaps. But a good man."

Alan Pakula, the eternal a.n.a.lyst, adamantly believed Redford was engaging in some subtle personal transference with Ordinary People. Ordinary People. "When I read it, I said, Oh, I get it. The novel is about parental tyranny. The catalyst, the character causing the dysfunction, is the mother. Bob is moving some furniture here. He is co-opting the novel's dysfunctional family for his father's or his own and investigating himself at a critical time." Redford is emphatic that both Pakula and Moore were wrong. "It had nothing to do with my father or his or my family. These were simply types of people I'd met, people whose lives were sequestered in privilege and made you wonder, What goes on beneath that veneer?" "When I read it, I said, Oh, I get it. The novel is about parental tyranny. The catalyst, the character causing the dysfunction, is the mother. Bob is moving some furniture here. He is co-opting the novel's dysfunctional family for his father's or his own and investigating himself at a critical time." Redford is emphatic that both Pakula and Moore were wrong. "It had nothing to do with my father or his or my family. These were simply types of people I'd met, people whose lives were sequestered in privilege and made you wonder, What goes on beneath that veneer?"

Redford had made a decision back in 1962 as an actor never to get too caught up in the position of key lights or other technical markers during production. Now, as filming started, suddenly those technicalities were of paramount importance to him as a director. John Bailey, the young camera a.s.sistant from Downhill Racer, Downhill Racer, had graduated to cinematographer and was standing in front of him asking bewildering questions: "Do you want a Baby Junior on this, or a seventy-five ...?" Redford was frustrated. In his head, he already had the movie. It had come together first on paper, then while he drove around the North Sh.o.r.e looking for landscapes. He had instructed Phillip Bennett and Mike Riva, the art directors, about the empty lawns, trimmed topiary and stern houses he wanted. The landscape was in his mind, physically and spiritually. "But I got frustrated talking with John and the technicians, because I couldn't articulate it. Finally, I found myself tearing off strips of paper and drawing stick figures with light angles. Then it became easy, because I could literally 'paint' the movie. We went from there to the point that I created the storyboards, and John worked from them. It became a question of capturing that painted frame." had graduated to cinematographer and was standing in front of him asking bewildering questions: "Do you want a Baby Junior on this, or a seventy-five ...?" Redford was frustrated. In his head, he already had the movie. It had come together first on paper, then while he drove around the North Sh.o.r.e looking for landscapes. He had instructed Phillip Bennett and Mike Riva, the art directors, about the empty lawns, trimmed topiary and stern houses he wanted. The landscape was in his mind, physically and spiritually. "But I got frustrated talking with John and the technicians, because I couldn't articulate it. Finally, I found myself tearing off strips of paper and drawing stick figures with light angles. Then it became easy, because I could literally 'paint' the movie. We went from there to the point that I created the storyboards, and John worked from them. It became a question of capturing that painted frame."

For all the partic.i.p.ants, the unhesitating control Redford exercised over the production was impressive. To Donald Sutherland, such "mean-a.s.s economy in direction" was extraordinary for a first-timer, even a little discomfiting: "He didn't say a lot but he was very specific when he did comment, and I discovered that what he said was almost always correct. Every time he suggested a different way of doing something, suddenly the words and the scene came out right." The trick of empowerment by inviting limitless improvisation, the trick first gifted to him by Mike Nichols, was pa.s.sed on to all. Mary Tyler Moore found it joyous, but exhausting. "He allowed us to improvise whenever we wanted to. We knew what each scene was. His direction was, 'Try what feels good.' And if I felt something was only so-so and wanted another shot at it, he'd say, 'Try it whatever way.'" Moore averaged, she estimates, three or four takes per scene. "Paradoxically it felt tight, like whittling down a piece of wood to get to the point."

The precision with which Redford "saw" the Jarretts' world, Moore contends, is revealed in the one instance of multiple varied takes, in a solitary scene where Beth puts a cake in the refrigerator. Moore skipped over the scenes in read-throughs, but Redford had other thoughts about it. "It was about behavior," says Redford. "I wanted to capture this woman in an un.o.bserved moment and see her rhythm, how she copes, how she handles things. It was about her fastidious way, her uptightness, her weakness." Moore experienced it as pure h.e.l.l. "It was the bane of the production, and we tried every few days, every time we had a kitchen scene, to reshoot it. The scene had no dialogue. It was just me, as Beth, holding a cake with a circle of cherries around the top, looking at it, then adjusting the cherries and slipping the cake into the fridge. All I ever heard from Bob was, 'Mary, maybe we can try that cake scene again.' In the end, we shot it about twenty-five times, but still it didn't make it through to the final cut. I felt exhausted, naked, frustrated by that scene. I never understood while it was going on exactly what Bob was looking for. Later, I did. It was manifest in the book and in Alvin's screenplay and in the talks Bob and I had. What he was looking for was what the entire quest of the movie was for him: he was looking to capture the soul of Beth Jarrett in an unguarded moment. I felt he achieved that in the end."

The bleakness of the story was the main challenge for Redford. The t.i.tle, he decided, wasn't ironic. There was truth in the irreconcilable conflict of trauma survival and disabling guilt. No answers were posited. Berger, the psychiatrist, probes Conrad's depression, but the critical resolution, which, in the visual reenactment, confronts Conrad with the flashback of his brother's drowning, fixes nothing in any practical sense; instead, Conrad is obliged to accept a continuum: that what has occurred is irreversible and will rebound onward, affecting not just his life, but the lives of his parents, especially Beth, who abandons her family at the end of the story. "What I wanted was to deal with people who have concerns they cannot handle because they cannot define them," says Redford. "I was trying to say this is what happened, this is how it is, accept it. To achieve that, we tuned in to the finest twitches of the performances. A face that reacts in a scene saying, 'I know what this is about' is miles away from the look that says, 'I cannot comprehend this.' The actor's gesture is minimal, but everything is in the tiniest inflection. That's what we sought."

Of enormous importance, says Redford, was the decision to base the production on Chicago's North Sh.o.r.e, away from Hollywood. It allowed for intimacy and independence, two critical elements of his debut. Several people, including Diller and Pollack, had suggested they visit the location to consult, but he had said no. Three months later, convening with editor Jeff Kanew at Paramount to view the first a.s.sembly, Redford felt immensely satisfied with his decision. Stuart Rosenberg, an early viewer of the finished product, quite liked the movie. Sydney Pollack, for whom Redford organized a private screening, liked it, too, but disliked the depiction of Beth. To Redford he said plainly, "The woman doesn't work"-which, says Redford, might as well have been, "The movie doesn't work." Pollack believed Moore was "clumpy and obvious" and unable to rise above her Mary Richards image. Says Redford, "He felt I'd made a grievous error of judgment casting her. I was hurt, but I had belief. I knew I had a good cut; it worked beautifully with the Pachelbel. I finished the movie and then I headed for the hills."

In January 1979, during the edit, Betty Webb, his grade school sweetheart, now a New Age counselor, visited with Bill Coomber's wife, Lucrecia, and found "a vastly changed man." Her memory was of the bright-eyed compet.i.tor, suave and determined to best any compet.i.tion. He was now soft-spoken, even "subdued." Redford, in fact, judged it otherwise. "There'd been a long buildup of emotional issues. By the time I had locked down Ordinary People, Ordinary People, which carried its own high toll, I was dumb with tiredness." which carried its own high toll, I was dumb with tiredness."

"After Ordinary People, Ordinary People, his Hollywood world became more accessible to us kids," says Shauna, who, at that point, was studying art at the University of Colorado at Boulder. "Previously he had kept us away from it. Now the boundary came down. It was as if, with the movie, he'd at last expressed his true art and that Hollywood was finally a positive thing." But Amy, just ten, still found an obstacle in the relentlessness of her father's fame: "It just got bigger and more demanding. I was arts oriented, too, and I wanted to work close to him. But with the time pressures on him, it was hard to get enough personal time." Within a few years, teenage Amy would break ranks, shave half her head, stud her ears with rings and flee to England to study acting "and objectify things for myself, to get a grip on real life and real people." Stan Collins saw Redford struggle to hold his family together. "But it wasn't like it used to be. They were a great family. He and Lola were terrific, affectionate people. They were incapacitated, though, by lack of time." his Hollywood world became more accessible to us kids," says Shauna, who, at that point, was studying art at the University of Colorado at Boulder. "Previously he had kept us away from it. Now the boundary came down. It was as if, with the movie, he'd at last expressed his true art and that Hollywood was finally a positive thing." But Amy, just ten, still found an obstacle in the relentlessness of her father's fame: "It just got bigger and more demanding. I was arts oriented, too, and I wanted to work close to him. But with the time pressures on him, it was hard to get enough personal time." Within a few years, teenage Amy would break ranks, shave half her head, stud her ears with rings and flee to England to study acting "and objectify things for myself, to get a grip on real life and real people." Stan Collins saw Redford struggle to hold his family together. "But it wasn't like it used to be. They were a great family. He and Lola were terrific, affectionate people. They were incapacitated, though, by lack of time."

Redford lamented the obligations of work and felt that "[Lola and I] were fulfilling our goals and, at the same time, measuring the distance between us." When Lola enrolled at G.o.ddard College in Vermont to restart her education and begin building an independent life-a situation that coincided with Ordinary People Ordinary People-the sense of finality was unavoidable.

In the spring, with The Electric Horseman The Electric Horseman playing to receptive audiences and playing to receptive audiences and Brubaker Brubaker set for a nationwide summer opening, Redford tried to balance himself by taking a road trip, exactly as he'd often done throughout the fifties and sixties. Supping with the kids in Denver, he decided to rent a car to drive solo to New York. "I wanted to recover normal human reality because set for a nationwide summer opening, Redford tried to balance himself by taking a road trip, exactly as he'd often done throughout the fifties and sixties. Supping with the kids in Denver, he decided to rent a car to drive solo to New York. "I wanted to recover normal human reality because Ordinary People Ordinary People brought me to that place. But there was no meeting the common man. There was just meeting the fan, the woman with the autograph book, the guy who knew the guy who knew your cousin, the endless handshakes, like I was one of those guys who walked on the moon." brought me to that place. But there was no meeting the common man. There was just meeting the fan, the woman with the autograph book, the guy who knew the guy who knew your cousin, the endless handshakes, like I was one of those guys who walked on the moon."

In high summer Ordinary People Ordinary People opened with a showcase western premiere in Provo. Mary Tyler Moore and Tim Hutton were among Redford's guests at Sundance for the weekend. Moore, battling the ravages of incipient alcoholism, stayed at the A-frame, which was now a guest lodge under the shadow of the Big House. Moore just wanted to sleep but "could not believe the social schedule Bob set up for us. It was worse than any movie call sheet. It was horse riding at 9:00 a.m. Swimming at 11:00 a.m. Tennis at 1:00 p.m. Go, go, go. I couldn't keep up. It was worrying. I wondered, How the h.e.l.l does he keep this pace?" opened with a showcase western premiere in Provo. Mary Tyler Moore and Tim Hutton were among Redford's guests at Sundance for the weekend. Moore, battling the ravages of incipient alcoholism, stayed at the A-frame, which was now a guest lodge under the shadow of the Big House. Moore just wanted to sleep but "could not believe the social schedule Bob set up for us. It was worse than any movie call sheet. It was horse riding at 9:00 a.m. Swimming at 11:00 a.m. Tennis at 1:00 p.m. Go, go, go. I couldn't keep up. It was worrying. I wondered, How the h.e.l.l does he keep this pace?"

Ordinary People had been made for $6 million and generated receipts of $115 million, an astonis.h.i.+ng success by any criteria. Pauline Kael continued to disapprove of Redford's work, chastising the director's emotional absence and the mood of "suburban suffocation," an extraordinary indictment, given the subject matter. But Jack Kroll in had been made for $6 million and generated receipts of $115 million, an astonis.h.i.+ng success by any criteria. Pauline Kael continued to disapprove of Redford's work, chastising the director's emotional absence and the mood of "suburban suffocation," an extraordinary indictment, given the subject matter. But Jack Kroll in Newsweek Newsweek applauded direction that was "clean and clear in style, drenched with seriousness and sensitivity." And Vincent Canby in applauded direction that was "clean and clear in style, drenched with seriousness and sensitivity." And Vincent Canby in The New York Times The New York Times welcomed a film "so good, so full of first-rate feeling, that it would be presumptuous for a critic to re-edit it." The awards followed. By January 1981 welcomed a film "so good, so full of first-rate feeling, that it would be presumptuous for a critic to re-edit it." The awards followed. By January 1981 Ordinary People Ordinary People was the acknowledged movie of the year, winning an award from the Directors Guild and snagging British Academy of Film and Television Arts nominations and, ultimately, six Academy Award nominations, among them for best director and best picture, contesting Polanski's was the acknowledged movie of the year, winning an award from the Directors Guild and snagging British Academy of Film and Television Arts nominations and, ultimately, six Academy Award nominations, among them for best director and best picture, contesting Polanski's Tess, Tess, David Lynch's David Lynch's The Elephant Man The Elephant Man and Scorsese's and Scorsese's Raging Bull. Raging Bull.

"When I saw the awards trail beginning, I caved in," says Redford. "I just didn't want it. What I was doing was about personal art, about exploring myself and my audience. I was very proud of the film but I did not desire accolades. It sounds churlish, but I was sated on accolades. There are only so many times you want to be told, 'This is the best thing since Gone With the Wind Gone With the Wind' or 'You are the best leading man since Moses.' I thought, Screw this! and disappeared."

After attending a benefit at the Northwestern Hospital Inst.i.tute of Psychiatry in Chicago, an invitation that arose from the new friends.h.i.+ps he formed making Ordinary People, Ordinary People, Redford joined the Brokaws for a long-scheduled six-day skiing trip across Colorado, Utah and Idaho. "I was in terrible shape, drained and emotional from the movie and the end of my marriage. The ironies were terrible. My family had been there from the start. They'd suffered so much waiting for me to do what I wanted to do. And then came the big fulfillment...and then Redford joined the Brokaws for a long-scheduled six-day skiing trip across Colorado, Utah and Idaho. "I was in terrible shape, drained and emotional from the movie and the end of my marriage. The ironies were terrible. My family had been there from the start. They'd suffered so much waiting for me to do what I wanted to do. And then came the big fulfillment...and then this. this."

At Sun Valley in Idaho the depression fogged his thinking. "I was skiing harder and faster, and I pitched myself against this impossible run, going all the way, from top to bottom. I skied it too fast and crashed, a full three-hundred-and-sixty-degree tumble."

He smashed his nose and collarbone and suffered multiple lacerations and a severe head wound. Semiconscious, he refused to go down the mountain on the first-aid toboggan and insisted-"stupidly"-on skiing down. Transferred comatose by ambulance to the hospital in Sun Valley, he remembers being wheeled into X-ray, pa.s.sing out, then waking up to the sight of a pretty nurse gabbling about the announcement on the radio that Ordinary People Ordinary People was a hot favorite for six Academy Awards. "She was excited. She wasn't interested in my injuries anymore. It was that icon thing. And then those questions started: 'What's Mary Tyler Moore really like?'" was a hot favorite for six Academy Awards. "She was excited. She wasn't interested in my injuries anymore. It was that icon thing. And then those questions started: 'What's Mary Tyler Moore really like?'"

As soon as he recovered and could travel, he left for a soul retreat, a Native American festival in New Oraibi, Arizona, to which he had been invited. Two nights later he was in a Hopi kiva, bandaged up like a mummy, for the Powamu winter solstice bean dance. Still in pain, he found the environment once again restorative in the familiar Zen way. Without any conscious effort, it seemed, the company, the chanting, the talk elevated him to what he calls "a transcendental state of release that brought me away from the pain and anxieties of the world. I lost all the confusion and negativity of my thinking. It was like before, that feeling of going beyond 'the now' to a higher place. Next thing I knew, I was mellowed out and feeling well again. I thought, This is where I need to be, this place of roots. I need to work my way back here."

In March, Redford agreed to attend the fifty-third Academy Awards ceremony. Norman Jewison produced a running homage called "Film Is Forever" that punctuated the evening with memories from Gish to Gable and a tribute to Henry Fonda, which was presented by Redford. Duly, the awards came, to Hutton for best supporting actor (winning over Judd Hirsch, also nominated), to Sargent for best adapted screenplay, to Redford as best director, and for best picture. Mary Tyler Moore was nominated in the leading actress category, and though she lost to Sissy s.p.a.cek for Coal Miner's Daughter, Coal Miner's Daughter, she felt "vindicated." Redford took his award from Lillian Gish but found himself "weirdly unmoved. Probably it had to do with the cynicism I'd shared with the guys at the CU frat house, watching the Academy Awards on TV and making fun of the pomposity. When my turn came, I was thinking, So this is it! The big night." The acceptance speech for best picture was unscripted and longer than he intended: "I just didn't think I was going to see this, but I'm no less grateful. I would like to express my debt to the directors I've worked with in the past, for what I've learned from them, consciously and unconsciously. And I couldn't go much further without expressing what for me is the greatest grat.i.tude, and that keys around the word 'trust.' I really am grateful for the trust I received from this terrific cast-Mary, Donald, Tim, Judd and Liz. I love them, and appreciate their love, too." she felt "vindicated." Redford took his award from Lillian Gish but found himself "weirdly unmoved. Probably it had to do with the cynicism I'd shared with the guys at the CU frat house, watching the Academy Awards on TV and making fun of the pomposity. When my turn came, I was thinking, So this is it! The big night." The acceptance speech for best picture was unscripted and longer than he intended: "I just didn't think I was going to see this, but I'm no less grateful. I would like to express my debt to the directors I've worked with in the past, for what I've learned from them, consciously and unconsciously. And I couldn't go much further without expressing what for me is the greatest grat.i.tude, and that keys around the word 'trust.' I really am grateful for the trust I received from this terrific cast-Mary, Donald, Tim, Judd and Liz. I love them, and appreciate their love, too."

Within days he was in therapy, considering his future. "People consult therapists for the inevitable questions," says Redford, "and most boil down to, 'What have I done wrong?' I was no different." Twenty years later he would find a better perspective on the failure of his marriage in the writings of the social philosopher James Hillman. In The Soul's Code, The Soul's Code, Hillman implies that the tendency to cherish family and children is a smoke screen that denies the true responsibility of fulfilling one's own destiny, which is the key to all balance in existence. Citing appalling statistics regarding the abuse of children globally, Hillman talks of "a fatherless culture with dysfunctional children." In Hillman's writings, Redford would find a rationale for what he calls "the drift" of his life. Jamie, in a better position than most to evaluate, would later find "a thorough enlightenment" in Hillman. "My father, like everyone else, had a capacity for self-absolving denial," says Jamie. "But there's no denying that, if he did err as a parent, he erred for 'the calling.' What he got from Hillman was an understanding that intellectually endorsed what he was and how he was." Redford insists that the therapy was no palliative: "I was prepared to take criticism. You have to, to get enough out of it to move forward." Carol Rossen believes the therapy was "not to recover what was lost, but to reconcile himself to the losses incurred and those to come." Hillman implies that the tendency to cherish family and children is a smoke screen that denies the true responsibility of fulfilling one's own destiny, which is the key to all balance in existence. Citing appalling statistics regarding the abuse of children globally, Hillman talks of "a fatherless culture with dysfunctional children." In Hillman's writings, Redford would find a rationale for what he calls "the drift" of his life. Jamie, in a better position than most to evaluate, would later find "a thorough enlightenment" in Hillman. "My father, like everyone else, had a capacity for self-absolving denial," says Jamie. "But there's no denying that, if he did err as a parent, he erred for 'the calling.' What he got from Hillman was an understanding that intellectually endorsed what he was and how he was." Redford insists that the therapy was no palliative: "I was prepared to take criticism. You have to, to get enough out of it to move forward." Carol Rossen believes the therapy was "not to recover what was lost, but to reconcile himself to the losses incurred and those to come."

What was certain was that he had embarked on a new road, emerging from the straitjacket of superstardom with a grand new plan in mind.

PART FOUR.

Canyon Keeper

We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time.

T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets Four Quartets

18.

Sundance.

Several of the directors who worked with Redford recognized the barrier he had crossed with Ordinary People Ordinary People and speculated about his prospects. Most insightful was Michael Ritchie, who, despite his disappointment at being overlooked for and speculated about his prospects. Most insightful was Michael Ritchie, who, despite his disappointment at being overlooked for All the President's Men, All the President's Men, continued to cheer his old friend as a film formalist in the European tradition, "more interested in signs and ideas within a movie than plots and actors." The summary shone a light on Redford's direction. In the resolution of therapy, Redford himself saw his career as parallel tracks, starting from the same point, but serving separate aims. The acting drew on primitive instinct, with the economy of verbalism and gesture that Robert Pirsig noted, and achieved a solid audience connection. The directing, half hewn in projects like continued to cheer his old friend as a film formalist in the European tradition, "more interested in signs and ideas within a movie than plots and actors." The summary shone a light on Redford's direction. In the resolution of therapy, Redford himself saw his career as parallel tracks, starting from the same point, but serving separate aims. The acting drew on primitive instinct, with the economy of verbalism and gesture that Robert Pirsig noted, and achieved a solid audience connection. The directing, half hewn in projects like Downhill Racer Downhill Racer and now fully formed, reflected an urge to break new ground. He did not see himself as European influenced, nor did he favor heavy intellectualization of his work. He liked Truffaut's work but was skeptical of G.o.dard and much of the neorealist and New Wave work. All this made him a generalist; he didn't like to label his endeavor. But it was clear that anarchic ambition was at work. Some aspect of contemporary cinema rankled, and he found himself straining for another approach, another perspective. and now fully formed, reflected an urge to break new ground. He did not see himself as European influenced, nor did he favor heavy intellectualization of his work. He liked Truffaut's work but was skeptical of G.o.dard and much of the neorealist and New Wave work. All this made him a generalist; he didn't like to label his endeavor. But it was clear that anarchic ambition was at work. Some aspect of contemporary cinema rankled, and he found himself straining for another approach, another perspective.

Out of such an instinct, in the heady months of the creation of Ordinary People, Ordinary People, the transition from Sundance the resort to Sundance the arts laboratory was made. One minor incident, says Redford, set the wheels in motion. Attracted as he was to experimental work, he was interested in the student films shown at the low-key United States Film and Video Festival staged in Salt Lake City by the Utah Film Commission since 1976. Created by his brother-in-law Sterling Van Wagenen and commission chairman John Earle, the festival was supported by Warners' vice president Mark Rosenberg, by director George Romero and by the actress Katharine Ross. In 1978, Redford accepted the invitation to become honorary chairman, seeing his function, as with similar posts, as that of being a media magnet. But sitting in a tiny theater off Temple Square watching a 16 mm road movie called the transition from Sundance the resort to Sundance the arts laboratory was made. One minor incident, says Redford, set the wheels in motion. Attracted as he was to experimental work, he was interested in the student films shown at the low-key United States Film and Video Festival staged in Salt Lake City by the Utah Film Commission since 1976. Created by his brother-in-law Sterling Van Wagenen and commission chairman John Earle, the festival was supported by Warners' vice president Mark Rosenberg, by director George Romero and by the actress Katharine Ross. In 1978, Redford accepted the invitation to become honorary chairman, seeing his function, as with similar posts, as that of being a media magnet. But sitting in a tiny theater off Temple Square watching a 16 mm road movie called The Whole Shootin' Match The Whole Shootin' Match by Texan Eagle Pennell, Redford had an epiphany. "I got to thinking, No one else is going to see this little gem. It seemed a crime to me. I imagined myself in Pennell's shoes, the way I'd felt all those years ago in a freezing apartment in Florence. At the time Wildwood was dug into setting up by Texan Eagle Pennell, Redford had an epiphany. "I got to thinking, No one else is going to see this little gem. It seemed a crime to me. I imagined myself in Pennell's shoes, the way I'd felt all those years ago in a freezing apartment in Florence. At the time Wildwood was dug into setting up Ordinary People, Ordinary People, with all our resources and contacts working for us. I decided, There is an inequity. This guy needs some help." with all our resources and contacts working for us. I decided, There is an inequity. This guy needs some help."

He invited Sterling Van Wagenen to Sundance to discuss a radical idea. Sterling recalls being surprised by the summons. He had had little contact with Redford beyond get-togethers at the Van Wagenen family home on Center Street during the sixties but had, he says, grown up idolizing his brother-in-law while remaining mostly distant from the film business. In his youth, says Van Wagenen, "film was for me War of the Worlds War of the Worlds and and The Day the Earth Stood Still. The Day the Earth Stood Still." In the early seventies, Van Wagenen encountered two formative influences: critic George Steiner and the British theater director Jonathan Miller. At Brigham Young University, Van Wagenen read Steiner's Language and Silence, Language and Silence, which postulated the value of art in politics. Shortly after, in his early twenties, he fell into the job of a.s.sistant to Miller, who was directing a production of which postulated the value of art in politics. Shortly after, in his early twenties, he fell into the job of a.s.sistant to Miller, who was directing a production of Richard II Richard II at the Los Angeles Music Center. Chafing from the narrow-mindedness of the local culture, says Van Wagenen, he was transformed in Los Angeles. He decided on a career in the arts in Utah, which led to his cofounding the film and video festival with Earle. at the Los Angeles Music Center. Chafing from the narrow-mindedness of the local culture, says Van Wagenen, he was transformed in Los Angeles. He decided on a career in the arts in Utah, which led to his cofounding the film and video festival with Earle.

As Van Wagenen drove his little Beetle to Redford's office at the base of Timpanogos, he imagined chitchat about festival selections. Instead, Redford bluntly suggested a plan to merge the festival with his own half-defined "arts community," perhaps like Yaddo, the famous Saratoga Springs colony that had nurtured writers like John Cheever, Truman Capote and scores of Pulitzer winners. Redford was highly enthused, says Van Wagenen, envisioning a new horizon, with opportunities to drag Hollywood into Utah and stir up support for local writers and out-of-state students who wanted to tell stories on film, but lacked resources. Van Wagenen suggested that the model not be Yaddo, but George White's Eugene O'Neill Theater Retreat in Connecticut, where new and traditional plays were experimentally performed and critiqued by visiting dramaturges for the benefit of writers, directors and actors. "But I don't take credit," says Van Wagenen. "Bob knew what he wanted. He said, 'That's it, that's exactly how it should begin. Now we know what we want to build, let's get on and just do it.'"

The first objective, said Redford, was National Endowment for the Arts backing, and this was swiftly achieved with a $25,000 grant to fund an exploratory workshop in April 1979, just twelve weeks after completion of Ordinary People. Ordinary People. This was followed by seminars in October and November, which were attended by Cathy Wyler, the daughter of director William Wyler, representing the NEA; Orion's vice president Mike Medavoy; United Artists vice president Claire Townsend; Howard Klein of the Ford Foundation; Czech filmmaker and exAmerican Film Inst.i.tute tutor Frank Daniel; Native American director Larry Littlebird and filmmakers Annick Smith, Victor Nunez, Robert Geller, Moctesuma Esparza and Sydney Pollack. Also attending were former congressman Wayne Owens; Redford's legal counsel Reg Gipson; Redford's constant personal a.s.sistant since This was followed by seminars in October and November, which were attended by Cathy Wyler, the daughter of director William Wyler, representing the NEA; Orion's vice president Mike Medavoy; United Artists vice president Claire Townsend; Howard Klein of the Ford Foundation; Czech filmmaker and exAmerican Film Inst.i.tute tutor Frank Daniel; Native American director Larry Littlebird and filmmakers Annick Smith, Victor Nunez, Robert Geller, Moctesuma Esparza and Sydney Pollack. Also attending were former congressman Wayne Owens; Redford's legal counsel Reg Gipson; Redford's constant personal a.s.sistant since Three Days of the Condor, Three Days of the Condor, Robbi Miller; and theater executive George White himself. "It was a very adventurous collection of people," says Van Wagenen, "and the composition of that team suggests Bob's outlook. It was he and he alone who mustered those heavyweight names. I certainly couldn't have done it. And he had a future game all mapped out in his mind. The NEA was for artistic credibility. Medavoy and Townsend were business credibility. The filmmakers were the think tank. George White was the great old sage. It was very sweetly tuned." Robbi Miller; and theater executive George White himself. "It was a very adventurous collection of people," says Van Wagenen, "and the composition of that team suggests Bob's outlook. It was he and he alone who mustered those heavyweight names. I certainly couldn't have done it. And he had a future game all mapped out in his mind. The NEA was for artistic credibility. Medavoy and Townsend were business credibility. The filmmakers were the think tank. George White was the great old sage. It was very sweetly tuned."

Redford felt himself rejuvenated by the new project. He attributes the fluidity of the organizational setup to Van Wagenen; Van Wagenen says it was Redford who sat in the NEA offices in Was.h.i.+ngton to make the pleas, who took the minutes of the meetings, who made the late-night phone calls to secure essential supporters, including cash investors. The financial champions, says Van Wagenen, were the NEA's Brian Doherty, Wall Streeter Dan Lufkin and Augie Busch of the Anheuser-Busch Brewery, all of whom contributed to the $100,000 seed capital. Redford personally contributed $100,000 a year over the next several years, "primarily to keep the doors open," says Reg Gipson, who contends the arrangement was "extremely fragile, living on the edge of a precipice really, in terms of a commonsense business plan."

The new Sundance Inst.i.tute board, handpicked by Redford, included Christopher Dodd, later chairman of the Democratic Party and a U.S. senator; Marjorie Benton of UNICEF and Save the Children; Bill Bradley; Frank Daniel; filmmaker Saul Ba.s.s and Gipson. Under their guidance an innovative schooling program was designed, to commence in the summer of 1981. The object of this program was not to launch a rival or remodeled film festival, but to develop a George Whitestyle summer lab for aspirant filmmakers, who could potentially take their work to the screens of the U.S. Film and Video Festival, and beyond. Admission to the lab would be a selection process from script submissions, headed by Frank Daniel. Successful candidates would then visit Sundance and rehea.r.s.e and film excerpts of their work under the supervision of volunteer established actors, directors and technicians. The work would be a.n.a.lyzed, debated, refined and reshot over several days.

"The success of this format was entirely dependent on the quality of what we called creative and technical advisers," says Redford, who immediately sought the involvement of a host of friends and a.s.sociates from film and theater, including Morgan Freeman, whom he'd met on Brubaker, Brubaker, Robert Duvall, Karl Malden, cinematographer Caleb Deschanel and writer Waldo Salt. Robert Duvall, Karl Malden, cinematographer Caleb Deschanel and writer Waldo Salt.

"It was footslog," says Reg Gipson, "not at all the overnight success some people have said. Bob was personally knocking on doors begging favors for a long, long time." Celebrity had rewarded him with positions in various boardrooms, among them the Museum of Modern Art's. At a MoMA benefit he targeted potential supporters. Actor Hume Cronyn recalls being b.u.t.tonholed by Redford. "He told me this fanciful story of how he wanted to create a film and theater group in the Southwest that would change contemporary movies," said Cronyn. "I didn't believe a word of it, but I was smitten." Thereafter, Cronyn volunteered for the regulation six years on the board, all the time working also as an adviser, a role he kept till the last years of his life.

Mich.e.l.le Satter, introduced to Redford by George White, was a Bostonian in her twenties who had organized outdoor festivals for her hometown Inst.i.tute of Contemporary Arts. Initially she was invited to conduct a study of marketing and distribution, a gesture, she says, that comprehensively shows Redford's long-term vision. "It seemed crazy back then, because we were all newcomers with no product of any kind to distribute. I wondered was I wasting my time, but the energy generated by Bob was seductive. He led, we followed." Satter became lab director.

The first Sundance Inst.i.tute lab took place over the month of June 1981, with a budget of $160,000 cobbled together from the NEA, Orion, Time Warner, the Ford Foundation, the Marjorie Benton Foundation, and Irene Diamond of the Diamond Foundation. By the standard that would shortly develop, it was primitive, just a handful of young tyros debating scripts in the mountain meadows with a bunch of seasoned pros, with the accent as much on theater-on account of the access to the on-site open-air theater-as film. Redford saw the immediate value of the process. "Half of the submissions were Third World themes. I'd seen so many minority films fail because of lack of finessing. Instantly, before our eyes, we saw how expert tutoring could address that. It was an issue of promoting confidence in aspiring filmmakers, as much as teaching technique." But his main preoccupation was the frantic a.s.sessment of so many new alliances, and a rearguard fight to silence the dissenters. "I never talked as much as I did that summer," he says. Gary Hendler, for one, was deeply suspicious of the venture, believing it to be a wasteful indulgence. "The trouble with Bob," he complained to Gipson, "is that he only listens to himself."

Shortly after the first lab, Brent Beck asked for a meeting with Redford in the log cabin administrative annex a short walk from the main meeting hall.

"It won't work," he told Redford.

"Why?"

Beck slid across the desk the receipts of the two-week lab, which was serviced entirely by resort catering and accommodation. "Because, the way it is, almost none of these people, advisers or benefactors, are paying guests. So every time you convene a planning meeting, or a lab, it'll put a terrible strain on resources."

"So?"

"We're still a business, Bob. It's the bottom line that counts."

Redford glanced at the receipts and pushed them back.

"It will work," he told Beck.

At the time, Pollack reported himself uplifted. "The spirit of Sundance reminds me of my early experiences, when I was constantly turned on," he told a visiting journalist. "I'm refres.h.i.+ng myself." Like Redford, he also believed the Sundance Inst.i.tute would work-but under one condition. "Utah is a beautiful place," he later said, "but there were obstacles beyond finance. The canyon is an hour by road from the Salt Lake City airport, and a long way from anywhere else. Those students and advisers would keep coming-but only if there was a hit product, something people could point to and say, 'That's different, and that came out of Sundance.'"

The formation of the inst.i.tute took place against a background of new political upheaval. Ronald Reagan was in office, with a huge mandate, and Carter was out. Redford needed to make new connections, find new financial angles to further his concomitant environmental goals. He decided that the inst.i.tute must embody a sister activist agency, and to this end he met with Gary Beer, a point man for his friend Ted Wilson, who had expertise in out-of-state PAC environmental groups. Redford and Beer clicked fast. "His style was against the grain," says Redford. "Immediately I thought, This is energy I can work with. We're in new territory here, and we need people who are ready to go against the tide." In time, Redford would see his choice of Beer as a mistake. Though Beer was unquestionably skilled at raising money, he had not, in Redford's view, the true sensitivity to the arts and environment that Sundance needed. For the moment, though, the glove fit. Born in New York and based in Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C., Beer knew Utah life inside out, having previously consulted for both the State of Utah and Governor Scott Matheson. "I was inured to the conservatism of Utahans," says Beer, "which put me ahead of the game in Redford's eyes. So we hit the ground running with this ambitious new Inst.i.tute for Resource Management that would parallel the arts group under the Sundance Inst.i.tute banner."

Redford had already engaged Hope Moore, a Carter ally from the Department of the Interior, as his environmental adviser. By the time Beer joined, Moore had in place a tentative graduate program for environmental studies at the University of Was.h.i.+ngton, a template educational scheme that Redford hoped would spread across the country's campuses. Beer saw it was doomed, through lack of maintenance funds. "All Bob had achieved amounted to establis.h.i.+ng a community of like-minded people. This was crucial, obviously. But it was nothing without money to spread the word."

Beer relocated to Utah and worked alongside Van Wagenen, who welcomed a national operator with savvy instincts and solid pragmatism. For Beer, Van Wagenen was a family insider who could help him to a better understanding of his new boss. What emerged for all was a rapid growth in development that unfolded with the grace of good chess playing. "It wasn't straightforward," says Beer. "It was learn as you go. I discovered about Bob that he wasn't the radical he professed himself to be. On the contrary, he, too, was a pragmatist. He'd gone to war with Southern Cal Edison and ended up winning over Howard Allen. Once, Allen was his sworn enemy. By the time the Kaiparowits row was over, Allen was in Bob's camp. He'd been reeducated. From that, Bob learned the benefits of diplomacy. Howard Allen was welcomed into the Sundance family, which was a stroke of genius, because he opened up access to the corporate community, which got a lot of things moving for me."

The IRM was officially launched in the fall of 1982. Robert Wood, Carter's secretary of housing and urban development, was chairman. Wayne Owens, Ted Wilson, Stewart Udall and Howard Allen were among the princ.i.p.als. Chris Dodd and California congressman George Miller, straddling action committees, joined Beer in fund-raising duties.

Redford spent the year sharpening his political game. In April, he was on the campaign trail with Ted Wilson, who challenged Orrin Hatch for the Utah Senate seat. For three months, says Wilson, Redford sidelined all his arts work in order to accompany him on the stump. "He was the lifeblood of my campaign," says Wilson. "Hatch had the fiscal advantage, raising $4 million, against my $1 million. But most of what I raised was thanks to Bob. He drove it, and he didn't do it from behind a desk. He did it just like those scenes in The Candidate, The Candidate, joining me at street-corner rallies in places like Ogden and Provo. He was tireless." When they traveled together, says Wilson, all they did was scheme. "His objective was symbiosis," says Wilson. "Central to my politics was environmental review and new control mechanisms for the energy industry. Bob saw my election essentially as a tool for his own aims." Though Wilson failed in his bid, he saw Redford's objective harden: "He told me, 'At some point soon there will be a conservation crisis. As a nation we'll be forced to face the consequences of bad energy policies. We need a better information system to get ready for that day.' There's no two ways about it: he was visionary regarding energy and environment." joining me at street-corner rallies in places like Ogden and Provo. He was tireless." When they traveled together, says Wilson, all they did was scheme. "His objective was symbiosis," says Wilson. "Central to my politics was environmental review and new control mechanisms for the energy industry. Bob saw my election essentially as a tool for his own aims." Though Wilson failed in his bid, he saw Redford's objective harden: "He told me, 'At some point soon there will be a conservation crisis. As a nation we'll be forced to face the consequences of bad energy policies. We need a better information system to get ready for that day.' There's no two ways about it: he was visionary regarding energy and environment."

The previous spring, the National Committee for Air Quality had filed a shocking impact report that triggered marathon congressional debates about the enforcement of environmental laws. Then the NRDC launched the first coordinated scheme of legal actions against industrial polluters under its own Citizen National Enforcement Program. Redford joined the battle, seeking meetings with energy companies, landowners and local authorities all across the Southwest.

By 1982 America was deep in recession, with unemployment above 10 percent and interest rates sky-high. Beer observed Redford extend himself even at this time of economic downturn, digging deep into his own pockets, working with Indiana congressman Phil Sharp, another environmentalist, and drifting away from the world of movies and art. In his only major magazine interview of the era, Redford told journalist George Haddad-Garcia that he might direct another film, might star in two more.

But in truth the grip of the movies was unshakable. It was a calling to do with storytelling and polemic, with making people ruminate and infer and choose. It pressed upon him all the time, in his long insomniac nights of obsessive reading and now in the Sundance Inst.i.tute, with the student labs bustling with activity at the end of his garden. After months of finance meetings and political rallies he found himself, once again, lured back to a movie. The previous year Barry Levinson, director of the recent Diner, Diner, had come to a.s.sist at the June lab and asked Redford, in return, to consider a role in his follow-up project. Sharing a flight to Los Angeles after a second lab session, Redford suggested Levinson forget the work he was developing and look instead at a script by Roger Towne, based on Bernard Malamud's 1952 novel, had come to a.s.sist at the June lab and asked Redford, in return, to consider a role in his follow-up project. Sharing a flight to Los Angeles after a second lab session, Redford suggested Levinson forget the work he was developing and look instead at a script by Roger Towne, based on Bernard Malamud's 1952 novel, The Natural. The Natural.

Redford had never forgotten the joy Tiger and Charlie found in baseball when he was a small child, or his own teenage fascination with Ted Williams, the left-handed (like himself) Boston Red Sox great. "I loved his individualism," says Redford. "He had no time for the media. His business was. .h.i.tting, period. When I watched Ted, I saw a man with a mission." Redford's occasional fantasy of portraying Williams in a movie came alive when he read Towne's adaptation. Over the years he had poo-pooed the baseball movies he'd seen. None, not Gary Cooper as Lou Gehrig in The Pride of the Yankees The Pride of the Yankees nor James Stewart in nor James Stewart in The Stratton Story, The Stratton Story, touched him at all. "Because I was a baseball player, I saw all the flaws, none worse than Tony Perkins in Alan [Pakula] and Bob's [Mulligan] touched him at all. "Because I was a baseball player, I saw all the flaws, none worse than Tony Perkins in Alan [Pakula] and Bob's [Mulligan] Fear Strikes Out, Fear Strikes Out, which was a poor depiction of the Red Sox's Jimmy Piersall." Apart from technical inaccuracies, no baseball movie had ever reflected the grandeur of the game for him. The Towne script, however, was onto something new. which was a poor depiction of the Red Sox's Jimmy Piersall." Apart from technical inaccuracies, no baseball movie had ever reflected the grandeur of the game for him. The Towne script, however, was onto something new.

Redford believed Malamud's source novel had a Swiftian dimension. It told the story of Roy Hobbs, a gifted midwestern kid who heads off to Chicago to try out for the Cubs, armed with Wonderboy, the bat he carved from a tree felled by lightning. En route he is seduced by Harriet, a strange siren who distracts him with tales and fables, then insanely shoots him. Recovered fifteen years later, Hobbs emerges from the shadows to become the star player of the New York Knights and win his choice of ladies. At this point, Malamud's fable about the corruption of heroes took a new turn in Towne's hands. In the novel, Hobbs falls for another venal woman, Memo Paris, niece of the team manager, and takes a bribe to throw the game of the season. But Towne introduced redemption in the angelic Iris, Hobbs's childhood sweetheart, who helps him overcome his injuries to right things.

Primarily based on the bizarre true-life story of Eddie Waitkus, the Philadelphia Phillies player whose career was cut short when he was shot by a crazed woman who then jumped out of a window, the novel also drew material from the 1919 World Series Black Sox scandal, where eight members of the Chicago White Sox threw games. On top of this, Malamud referenced an encyclopedia of fabled yarns, from the Fisher King to Orestes. Redford found the sources fascinating, "because I was convinced it was the only way to tell the Big Story of baseball. You could make a movie that would follow all the rules and maneuvers, but it would miss the symbolic scale of it all. Malamud's achievement, enhanced by Towne, was to introduce the mythic aspect."

Baltimore-born Levinson had evolved from television comedy writing in Los Angeles to scriptwriting for Mel Brooks's Silent Movie Silent Movie and and High Anxiety High Anxiety to the semiautobiographical to the semiautobiographical Diner. Diner. He, too, found the mythology of He, too, found the mythology of The Natural The Natural appealing. For appealing. For Diner, Diner, he had abandoned conventional narrative to tell his story through vignettes. The originality of Towne's approach, which emphasized Malamud's fancy, was, to him, hypnotic: "First of all, I was attracted by Bob's personal attachment. Secondly, I am a huge baseball fan, just like Bob. But more than anything, I was won over by Malamud's story and Towne's development of it. It was simply one of the best things I'd ever read. Towne took this intricate tale and turned it into an edifying story about goodness. Bob didn't have to convince me. I said, 'Yes, yes, this will do.'" he had abandoned conventional narrative to tell his story through vignettes. The originality of Towne's approach, which emphasized Malamud's fancy, was, to him, hypnotic: "First of all, I was attracted by Bob's personal attachment. Secondly, I am a huge baseball fan, just like Bob. But more than anything, I was won over by Malamud's story and Towne's development of it. It was simply one of the best things I'd ever read. Towne took this intricate tale and turned it into an edifying story about goodness. Bob didn't have to convince me. I said, 'Yes, yes, this will do.'"

A flood of creative ideas flowed between actor and director. Redford decided, as an homage, to adopt Ted Williams's number, 9. It was also decided that the photography by cinematographer Caleb Deschanel would take its cue from a character in the novel, Judge Banner, who refers to people in terms of darkness and light. The opposing female figures, the gunwoman Harriet and the bighearted Iris, would be depicted in darkness and iridescence, respectively. Hobbs's childhood would be shown in a two-color sepia-like palette that would emphasize the pale greens and burnt yellows of a summery Midwest. These conceptualizations were planned in detail with Redford and carefully hand-drawn before a foot of film was shot. "What Bob and I wanted from the movie was lightness and irony," says Levinson, "though most of the critics eventually chose to see it as a serious, even grim, piece of work."

Through June 1983 Redford prepared for the movie with a rigorous fitness routine that included weeks of batting practice with a team of semipro players. He phoned Ted Williams, who was fis.h.i.+ng in Nova Scotia and missed his call. Williams would later affectionately acknowledge Redford's homage and send him signed memorabilia. "It was the best place to be," says Redford, "full of childhood dreaming and hardball playing. After my long absence, I was ready for a good movie."

The Natural would fulfill the first part of a two-picture deal that Gary Hendler had brokered for him with Columbia two years before. But Hendler was no longer Redford's legal counsel-he was the president of a new movie company, TriStar, a partners.h.i.+p between divisions of Columbia, HBO and CBS, which had inherited would fulfill the first part of a two-picture deal that Gary Hendler had brokered for him with Columbia two years before. But Hendler was no longer Redford's legal counsel-he was the president of a new movie company, TriStar, a partners.h.i.+p between divisions of Columbia, HBO and CBS, which had inherited The Natural. The Natural. The men took a walk on the beach at Malibu to discuss Hendler's new role. They had been together for sixteen years, and Redford was happy to credit his friend with enormous help in building his career and holding on to Sundance. But he had doubts about Hendler's ability to move into moviemaking. "It seemed to me a no-win scenario for him," says Redford. "He was being asked to run a studio with no practical knowledge, and that, to my thinking, had to be the role of the fall guy." Hendler wanted Redford's blessing of support and, reluctantly, Redford gave it. "But it was a lousy decision by me. Gary had the look of trouble in his eyes and I feared he was headed for disaster. I felt a loyalty to him that if that's what he wanted, I felt that's what he should get to do. But it got awkward when this new role he played put unwanted pressure on me at the worst time." The men took a walk on the beach at Malibu to discuss Hendler's new role. They had been together for sixteen years, and Redford was happy to credit his friend with enormous help in building his career and holding on to Sundance. But he had doubts about Hendler's ability to move into moviemaking. "It seemed to me a no-win scenario for him," says Redford. "He was being asked to run a studio with no practical knowledge, and that, to my thinking, had to be the role of the fall guy." Hendler wanted Redford's blessing of support and, reluctantly, Redford gave it. "But it was a lousy decision by me. Gary had the look of trouble in his eyes and I feared he was headed for disaster. I felt a loyalty to him that if that's what he wanted, I felt that's what he should get to do. But it got awkward when this new role he played put unwanted pressure on me at the worst time."

Redford was in Buffalo, in upstate New York, on August 1, just settling into the first scenes of The Natural, The Natural, when he got a call from a distressed Shauna in Boulder. She was at the apartment that Redford had recently purchased for her near the CU campus and had just