Jeffrey Donnell and Susan Liebeskind

[00:06] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: My name is Susan Liebeskind I am 60 years old. Today is Tuesday, December 17, 2019. I am at StoryCorps Atlanta. I'm interviewing Jeffrey Donnell who is my husband.

[00:18] JEFFREY DONNELL: I am Jeffrey Donnell I am 62. Today's date is Tuesday, December 17, 2019. I'm at St. Story Corps in Atlanta. I am Susan's spouse. Oh. My interview with partner is Susan Leibeskin. I am her spouse.

[00:35] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: There you go.

[00:36] JEFFREY DONNELL: She is my spouse.

[00:37] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Okay. All right. And so I'm in. I'm in charge. I'm the primary interviewer here. So we are here at my behest. We're going to talk about what movies. What movies mean to us. And I am going to read into the record the little story that I sent to the tiny love stories, because that's the only way it's ever going to get published. I know. So I will read that. It was hard for me to say everything I feel about this in 100 words or less, but I did. So it goes as follows. We met cute at the college film society when he mispronounced my surname su. When Ignatz lobs bricks at crazy cat and she falls in love, that he taught me how to run a film projector. The last remake of Beau Geste. I asked him out. Superman. Bet you don't remember that, Jeff. But he turned me down. We stayed friends. He visited me in New York City, and it worked out. An affair to remember. We'll still see any movie, anytime, anywhere. When he's beside me in the dark watching someone else's hill of beans on screen. I'm the luckiest woman on the face of the earth.

[01:37] JEFFREY DONNELL: Thank you.

[01:38] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yes, I.

[01:39] JEFFREY DONNELL: That was nice.

[01:40] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yes, I know I can.

[01:41] JEFFREY DONNELL: That's what this is all about.

[01:42] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's what this is all about. Getting it written. No, I wanted to talk about. You know, we are. We are here because movies brought us together, right? I mean, and I kind of wanted to talk about what. What movies really mean to both of us. You know, first of all, we. We did meet cute at the college film society. We both ran film board, which was still, I think, one of the best jobs I've ever had in my entire life. I don't know.

[02:03] JEFFREY DONNELL: You ran that for three years.

[02:05] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: I ran that for two years. I ran that for two years. And I was your successor. You're the one who. Who taught me how to project and all, you know, that was.

[02:14] JEFFREY DONNELL: Like I said, we showed movies for three years. Right?

[02:18] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Or I did. I worked. I worked after I graduated some, too. But, yeah, that's True, actually for four years. So I kept going with that. The six.

[02:26] JEFFREY DONNELL: So we owned that place for six years.

[02:28] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Between the two of us, I would say that's the case. And it really was tons of fun. I mean, in the pre VCR era, when you couldn't get any movie that you wanted to see on demand, the only way to get any movie you wanted to see on demand was to become the chair of the film society and then convince people to book the movie that she wanted to see. Which is why There are only 3 people in Ivan the Terrible. Right. And in the audience. In the audience, including you and the projectionist upstairs.

[02:55] JEFFREY DONNELL: I didn't see Ivan.

[02:56] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Well, you should have come. But anyway, I mean, that was just. I think that's one of the things by the time we got to Washu, when we both, you know, were interested in film board, I mean, obviously movies meant something to both of us. And so I'll ask you, like, what was the first. When did movies start to mean something to you in poor ancient little DeSoto, Missouri, where you had one movie theater?

[03:18] JEFFREY DONNELL: Well, you got to keep in mind. Yeah, I grew up in a town of 5,000 people, two hours away from a city that had more than one theater in it. And my hometown there was a drive in and an indoor theater, the Melba. Right, The Melba Theater and the Skyview Drive in. And there was. You only one of them operated at a time. The Melbourne was for winter, the drive in was for summer. And they. We would get one movie a month, I think is what it was. So it was kind of limited movie going, but you could see movies on TV on weekends. We had John Wayne movies every Saturday. Every Saturday I saw all the John Wayne movies. And you had other cheap old stuff. There was W.C. fields movie. There's lots of old movies, so. And occasionally there would be a Hollywood movie on tv, I think. I don't know if we saw Patton, but I know we saw the Battle of the Bulge on TV. All those old World War II movies. And my father and all those guys watched those movies and I would watch them. So I'd watch anything that was on tv and I'd sit there with my dad and he would smoke and drink and I would watch TV and it was really great. So I knew what was normal. I knew what a Hollywood movie looked like, and that was fine, that was fun. But I also read things and saw things in the newspaper and in magazines. There were movies that I didn't get to see that I wanted to see. And I was never going to get to see those in that town. So my whole objective in getting out of that town was so that I could see movies. My objective in life was to get out of a small town to go to a place where there was more than one movie theater. Oh, and by the way, I also had a car.

[04:59] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[04:59] JEFFREY DONNELL: So I could go to these movies.

[05:01] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Well, that's when you were. When you were 16. That's when you started going into St. Louis to see movies. Right. Or you just went to Sunset Hills.

[05:06] JEFFREY DONNELL: That. That would have been what would have happened if I could have done that. In fact, I couldn't do that until I was. When I got to college, I could go to movies because Film board, as you know, showed seven days a week.

[05:18] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's right.

[05:19] JEFFREY DONNELL: Seven days a week. Eight movies a week.

[05:23] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Eight movies a week, that's right, yes.

[05:25] JEFFREY DONNELL: So. So you could do that. I didn't have a car at Wash U until I was a sophomore. Right. So in summers after I was a sophomore, I would drive to St. Louis from my little hometown to go to movies. At the High Point, I would see. And they had foreign films.

[05:40] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[05:41] JEFFREY DONNELL: And you'd saw all kinds of stuff, you know, so. So I'm going to tell you about movies that changed my world at Washu. And I'm going to ask you what movies change things for you. So I'm at Washu. I've seen John Wayne movies all my life in WC Fields. And I know what a normal Hollywood movie looks like. I know these things, Pat. And there was a German movie festival.

[06:08] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Ah, yeah.

[06:09] JEFFREY DONNELL: Remember that George. George Dolas program?

[06:11] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: George Dolas, yeah.

[06:12] JEFFREY DONNELL: And we showed the new German cinema.

[06:15] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: New German as of 1978.

[06:17] JEFFREY DONNELL: We went for the movies and we got. And we got the crowds. So I saw the Enigma of Casper Hauser, which was not like a John Wayne movie. And you know, I. My whole brain just turned inside out. I mean, that was just so different from anything I'd seen. And it was. It was. It was great. That same month I saw Pink Flamingos.

[06:44] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Wow.

[06:44] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah. Yeah. So it's a good year. My horizons got a little wider and I think that was good thing. That was what I went to college for. I didn't realize at the time that you go to college to do things. I thought you went to college to go to class. So I actually wasted my college experience. I used film where it was a job.

[07:04] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[07:06] JEFFREY DONNELL: So that's my story about movies that changed things for me. There were others that mattered. But what about you?

[07:14] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Well, no, I mean, I just think I Always grew up with movies because mom loves movies so much. And so we watched. We didn't. We had. First of all, we had more movie theaters in Ithaca, where I grew up.

[07:26] JEFFREY DONNELL: Cornell Cinema.

[07:26] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right, right. Well, there were all the theaters, but then there was also Cornell Cinema, which was, you know, Film Board, but for Cornell. And when I was about. I think when I was in high school, I started going off to see movies there. And again, that was the kind of things like you would see on Turner Classic now were the kinds of things we programmed at Film Board. There. They were.

[07:43] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah, you already knew that stuff. You already.

[07:45] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Exactly. And I remember going with mom, we went to see Singing in the Rain at Film Board. And at the end, you know, the scene where they're dancing or whatever. I think it was the Donald O'Connor and Gene Kelly and they're doing the Moses. Anyway, people stood up and applauded, and mom cried because she always does that, sort of. She was just so moved that everybody in the theater was so thrilled with that. But, you know, I had. Again, I was lucky because I had so much more access to movies. I do like to tell people that I saw Rocky Horror Picture show in its first release before anybody knew what it was. It came to the mall near the house and it was a driving snowstorm. And my sister and I went up to see it, which is weird in and of itself because we never did anything together. We were the only two people in the theater. And we said, what the heck is this? We had no idea. So, you know, we had all sorts of little weird experiences like that.

[08:37] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah, I didn't see Rocky Horror until I showed it when I was a junior at Washu.

[08:42] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And that was.

[08:43] JEFFREY DONNELL: And.

[08:44] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, go ahead.

[08:45] JEFFREY DONNELL: That was the craziest experience I'd had in a long time. I mean, you know, people had matches. I thought they were going to.

[08:52] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, they were stoned out of their minds. They had matches, they had newspapers.

[08:56] JEFFREY DONNELL: And it was.

[08:57] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And it's in that old theater at Brown Hall.

[08:59] JEFFREY DONNELL: Absolutely electric. I mean.

[09:01] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And you recall that I'm down there. That was one of the more embarrassing.

[09:04] JEFFREY DONNELL: Moments of the life I was unaware of.

[09:06] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: You were unaware of that? But, yes. So there was a. The guy who I'd met in my math class. I was a freshman. And there's a guy who I'd like, gone out a couple times with, and he said. He asked me. In fact, we went to see Rocky Horror Picture at the Varsity that fall of my freshman year. And Meat Loaf came in as a special thing. It's already become A thing right at that point. And Meat Loaf came racing into the movie theater on his motorcycle and everybody applauded. Whatever. So this guy Ed. I won't say his name in case he's out there, but Ed, say it.

[09:37] JEFFREY DONNELL: He could hear this sometimes.

[09:38] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Exactly. Poor Ed, wherever he is. Anyway, he, he was fascinated by it. So when it rolled around at Washu, for some reason we got it because he usually didn't have a non theatrical release.

[09:47] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah.

[09:47] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Ed asked me to go to the movies with him and I said okay. And I'm like, you know, he wasn't definitely my cup of tea, unlike you, my dear. But I said, well, I actually, I was going off to see one of Chris Dirks movies, the old American cinema. I saw Swing Time. I went to see swing time at 9 o'clock and then I said, I'll just meet you down at the movie theater at midnight, you know, for the.

[10:11] JEFFREY DONNELL: Because they're both musicals.

[10:13] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Well, you know, I had other things to do. So I get there and you know, walking down the long line of all these people who are in various states of inebriation for whatever their drug of choice was. And I'm looking and I'm looking and I don't see him. And all of a sudden this little vision in gingham says, oh, sue over here. And there's my date who is dressed up as little Nell and he's wearing like this green gingham dress. And the thing is, if you're going to do that, you got to shave the beard. You know, the beard just doesn't cut it. And I just wanted the floor to open up beneath me because I was just like, oh my God, what am I doing here? And my friend John Goldstein was there and he saw this was going on. He laughed hysterically. I said, john, get me out of here. He's just in stitches over the whole thing.

[10:58] JEFFREY DONNELL: So anyway, and that's what friends are for.

[11:00] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's what friends are for. So that's Rocky Horror. So maybe in a way that's one of the movies that changed my life.

[11:05] JEFFREY DONNELL: And I was upstairs, right?

[11:07] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And you were upstairs, obliterating, drinking it all in, projecting.

[11:10] JEFFREY DONNELL: Well, I was having my own head turned inside out.

[11:12] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: But no, I mean, I think movies have just always meant, you know, I just loved going to Cornell cinemas. I would, you know, first, you know, things being free or whatever. I would go to the midnight movies by myself. When I was late in high school, I remember that's where I saw the Groove Tube, which was another movie that changed my life along with the Groove tube. That was the time I saw the preview for Viva Zapata with Marlon Brando.

[11:34] JEFFREY DONNELL: Ripped from the fabric of life.

[11:35] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Ripped from the fabric of life. Something that sticks with us. But, you know, all these things, movies are just so wound around just little vignettes or things. When I started watching movies late at night with Peter, Brother Peter, I mean, we discovered the Marx Brothers together. And again, we didn't do that much stuff together. But I remember hanging out with him one night at home, and we turned on the channel out of New York and they were showing Duck Soup, and we thought, this is great. This is absolutely great.

[12:01] JEFFREY DONNELL: Peter, who spoke of the Arnold Schwarzenegger.

[12:03] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Over at the Schwarzenegger. Oh, yes.

[12:06] JEFFREY DONNELL: At the video store.

[12:07] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Indeed.

[12:08] JEFFREY DONNELL: They didn't give him a look or anything.

[12:09] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. So, you know, I mean, so I.

[12:11] JEFFREY DONNELL: Always enjoyed talking you in the film board office because you knew all this stuff and that I had.

[12:15] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: You didn't know that I was just like this idiot.

[12:17] JEFFREY DONNELL: You were on the. You know, this is like the horizon of what I know. And then you've. You're across that horizon explaining me what you're giving a map. Here's what it's saying. Here's what's out there. Yeah. I want to get. I want to get more from you.

[12:27] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. Well, that's nice.

[12:28] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah.

[12:29] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Again, we're here because of the movies. After 40 years or whatever, you look.

[12:33] JEFFREY DONNELL: Through those catalogs and you. Oh, and you had something to say about half the movies.

[12:38] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. And actually, I wasn't, you know, making it up. I actually knew I had. You know, I read a lot.

[12:43] JEFFREY DONNELL: If you were making it up, you would have to be awfully good. I figured that was.

[12:45] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Well, I'm good. That was for real, you know, so. But it's been fun. And, you know, I think I come from such a long line of people who love movies. I mean, mom loves movies. I think my grandfather before loved movies, too. When we went to Telluride a couple years ago and they had the. The restored Charlie Chaplin, it wasn't the bank Dick. Or was it the bank Dick?

[13:07] JEFFREY DONNELL: It was the. It wasn't the bank robbery, the bank.

[13:12] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Robbery, or just the bank, but there was a Charlie Chaplin film that had been restored by Serge Bromberg. And we're all sitting there laughing, and I just had the sense of. I bet my grandfather went to this movie and laughed. And I thought, oh, that's just so Wonderful to have 100 years on still to be laughing at the same kind of.

[13:30] JEFFREY DONNELL: And it was still hilarious.

[13:31] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And it was still hilarious. And I think it's. It's nice that, you know, be it the Stockholm syndrome or whatever, you know, that our son Teddy likes movies every bit as much as we do. I mean, that has been so satisfying to pass that along, you know, to go to Telluride with him the first time. And, you know, he wanted. We watched five hour German silent Der Nibelungen, right. You know, with breaks in the middle for beer and bratwurst. And he, like, couldn't get enough of it. I thought, we have raised this child, right? We've set him free in the world.

[14:01] JEFFREY DONNELL: Or imprisoned him.

[14:02] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, or imprisoned him or something like that. But let's see. I mean, you know, again, though, movies were, you know, part of. But you, you know, we can talk about your connection to the movies. Your cousin Frank. We should throw this in for your brother about Frank Wilcox.

[14:17] JEFFREY DONNELL: Cousin Frank, my father's cousin was. Showed up in movies. Frank Wilcox was. He grew up. He was born like 1918. 1920. 1915.

[14:31] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: 20. Yeah, I've read. I've read his Wikipedia.

[14:35] JEFFREY DONNELL: He was born in desoto.

[14:36] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Oh, that's right.

[14:37] JEFFREY DONNELL: He was born in our little town.

[14:38] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yes.

[14:39] JEFFREY DONNELL: And his family. His family moved to Atchison, Kansas, which is where he grew up. And then he wandered out to California. Frank looked really good in a suit. He looked.

[14:47] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: He really dresses up as Suit. Suit.

[14:48] JEFFREY DONNELL: And he enjoyed hanging out with people. So he hung out on lots and he got lots of bit parts. He died in the first reel of fighting 69th. I believe he died early in. They had died with their boots on. He died with his boots on. Frank, he was like a judge. He would be in movies where he'd have a line or two. He was in Showboat. He had no lines, but he held his cards beautifully. So Frank was. And he was on the Red Skelton show fairly often.

[15:15] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: He was also in north by Northwest.

[15:17] JEFFREY DONNELL: He was.

[15:17] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Remember when we went to New York after, You know, we were.

[15:20] JEFFREY DONNELL: There was Frank.

[15:21] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, yeah, there was Frank. But that was the time we snuck off to New York and we went to that whatever place it was. 16 millimeter projector in the Upper east side, and they're showing north. That was the first time I saw north by Northwest.

[15:33] JEFFREY DONNELL: And there's Frank at a table across from Cary Grant having dinner with his mother.

[15:37] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right.

[15:39] JEFFREY DONNELL: Frank was in, I think, two or three frames of Singing in the Rain.

[15:45] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And of course, he was in Tear Gas Squad.

[15:48] JEFFREY DONNELL: Tear Gas Squad with George Reeves, for whom he was best man.

[15:53] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's right. That's right.

[15:54] JEFFREY DONNELL: Just in case you were Wondering about that. So Frank's existence was the biggest thing in my brother's life when we were kids. Oh, he was. Mr. Frank was Mr. Brewster on the Beverly Hillbillies. The oil man. Frank was the biggest thing in my brother's life, and I couldn't figure that out. I could never get over that. But we met Frank a time or two and he came.

[16:14] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, we wouldn't be great to go back in time and talk to him now being, as you know.

[16:18] JEFFREY DONNELL: Well, Frank knew all those big stars as real people, so he knew that Red Skelton was philandering. At least that's the story that he told us. I'm assuming that he wasn't lying. So, yeah, he has some yards to tell. And he blew through town a couple times and my brother was just goo goo eyed. But now, I mean, the basic sport is you watched movies on TV and you used.

[16:42] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: We hope we're going to see Frank.

[16:44] JEFFREY DONNELL: And text to family.

[16:44] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Well, yeah, what was the one? There was the Bogart movie where we saw him in recently. I can't remember what it was, but then we had. We took a screen picture of him.

[16:51] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah, Frank was an architect in Bogart's firm. And yeah, he was. He said like five. He said like two lines.

[16:56] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right. So that's really as close as we actually ever get to having a movie. Well, then there was my uncle, my great uncle, who was the ghostwriter for Errol Flynn's memoir, My Wicked, Wicked Ways. By the way, he still, people write about that as, oh, it's a terrific memoir. It's like my Uncle Earl wrote that.

[17:13] JEFFREY DONNELL: Just by the way Frank knew Errol Flynn. And he said, he said, oh, he just burned himself out.

[17:21] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Maybe he knew my uncle. Who knows?

[17:23] JEFFREY DONNELL: Who knows? I mean, he had a bar for a while.

[17:26] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: He could have done everything. But anyway.

[17:28] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah, so Frank's existence was really central to my brother's life for many, many years. And it's still a fairly important thing for us to do. I mean, Frank was a judge on Perry Mason. You watch Perry Mason, you're gonna see. You're gonna see Cousin Frank. Yep, from time to time.

[17:44] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. Let's see. I mean, other things about movies that you know. So I have a question for you. I mean, have you ever walked out on a movie?

[17:53] JEFFREY DONNELL: I have not walked out of a movie on my own volition. If I go to a movie, I'll stay. No, I'll walk out to be if somebody else is walking out.

[18:04] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Did I make you walk out on one?

[18:06] JEFFREY DONNELL: I think I'm dancing As fast as I can. You walked out. You. You didn't want to see the end of that, and so we walked out.

[18:11] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Was that with you?

[18:12] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yes.

[18:13] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Oh, okay. I remember that.

[18:14] JEFFREY DONNELL: And I thought, okay, I didn't. I wasn't too bothered by it. But, you know, I'll stick with just about anything, as, you know, since I watched the end of T Men.

[18:23] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's true.

[18:24] JEFFREY DONNELL: I. And I watched the end of Iron Finger, the. The worst Japanese action movie ever.

[18:31] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Okay.

[18:33] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah, yeah, I'll. I'll. I'll. I watch. I stayed with Pink Flamingos to the end. I'll do. I'll. I'll watch anything to the end.

[18:41] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Okay.

[18:41] JEFFREY DONNELL: I don't think there's any. Because, you know, you got to know what. You don't really understand what's good until you know it's really stupid.

[18:49] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[18:49] JEFFREY DONNELL: And I'm always in search of the stupidest, worst thing, and so far I haven't found it. But I'm getting. I feel like I'm getting close.

[18:57] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: I've. You know, again, all those years when we had the Variety club pass. You know, the.

[19:01] JEFFREY DONNELL: The basically 100 movies a year for five years.

[19:04] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right, the movie. Right, the movie pass. Before, you know, the movie pass thing came along. That was. Was it for five years. I remember the. The. When we were in grad school in around mid. In the mid-80s, when I was.

[19:14] JEFFREY DONNELL: When I was supposed to be writing my dissertation, I was. I was going to movies, right? Dan and I would see two movies every weekend, so we would. We would have more than 100 movies.

[19:24] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: You saw the entire 1980s teen film genre, Right?

[19:27] JEFFREY DONNELL: I saw Jean Claude Van Damme's first movie. I saw Bloodsport in a theater.

[19:32] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Wow, that's pretty great. I remember, like, we saw Siesta. Remember that one? You know.

[19:40] JEFFREY DONNELL: You know, that seemed pretty bad at the time, but now it doesn't seem.

[19:43] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Nearly as awful as I always wish that we had actually, you know, kept to some of our. My plan was that, you know, on New Year's Eve we should go back and say some of the worst lines that we. That were in the movies that we'd seen that near.

[19:55] JEFFREY DONNELL: I think just review the list of things that we saw and liked and didn't like. Yeah, Dan and I saw so many dip bad movies. I mean, in the 1980s, there weren't that many really good movies that I can remember. Top Gun was fun. That was nice. But there were all those action movies, Gollum and Globus from canon films. They just turned them out. They'd been In a theater for a week, gone next week. Same theater, different movie, same stupid action. They were just as dumb as kid and they were. The same damn movie took place in different countries, different socio economic groups, the same mayhem.

[20:35] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And I think that's the thing, you and I, we've seen so many movies that we can, we can sit there and kind of figure out oh yeah.

[20:42] JEFFREY DONNELL: This is one of those.

[20:42] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: I do remember doing that early on. I remember the man from Snowy River. I'm very proud of that one. You know, every. I never. I was like saying the line that.

[20:49] JEFFREY DONNELL: Wasn'T very nice of you but you.

[20:51] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Know, it makes me feel good. Right.

[20:52] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah. You knew the, you know, every line that was going to be said before it was said.

[20:55] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And I think that's, you know, one of the things that I, you know, kind of look for when I go to a movie now is, you know, I'm going to make. I want to see a movie that I haven't quite seen before that somebody sort of looked at things a little bit differently. And that's what's so fun about like Cinema Club.

[21:09] JEFFREY DONNELL: That was what was so great about the George Ellis Cinema. When was Glenn Circus.

[21:13] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Glenn Circus, yeah, Circus.

[21:15] JEFFREY DONNELL: Those movies were really, really different. I remember seeing Large. Yeah, well that happened. Rutger Hauer.

[21:22] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's right.

[21:23] JEFFREY DONNELL: Was in that, for gosh sakes.

[21:24] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's right. Yeah.

[21:26] JEFFREY DONNELL: And a French movie about, about stealing and everything like that. And there was almost no word spoken. It was all things. You didn't even have a point of view. It was just things. It was a fabulous movie. Yeah. Every weekend he'd have something different down there. It was really a lot of fun. And that's where you saw stuff that you just wouldn't see non Hollywood movies.

[21:48] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right. And I think that's the thing that we were very lucky to have. I mean first to work at Film Board and to, you know, basically to run our own movie theater. I would love to have done that as a job. I mean clearly it was not in the cards, but I had that. But then you came here in Atlanta and you know, with the Lafont Theaters and you know, and the Ellis Theater and everything, like there were so many movies you could go see. And I still like to go to the movies. I, you know, we watch, you know, we've been obsessively watching the Criterion Collection at home. But I like to go out to the movies. Like when. Remember when a couple years ago we went to see the documentary about Vivian Meyer?

[22:22] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yes.

[22:22] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And it was you and me and There was another lady in the theater. We started talking after the movie, and it was just fascinating to sit there and do that, to see it in a movie theater. And, you know, I should go on my usual rant about, you shouldn't have reclining chairs. You should be just comfortable. Uncomfortable. Comfortable enough that you're going to sit up straight and watch the movie and stay awake.

[22:40] JEFFREY DONNELL: I think you should be able to see the people in front of you.

[22:42] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[22:43] JEFFREY DONNELL: Their hair shouldn't get in the way of the screen, but you should be able to see them.

[22:46] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[22:46] JEFFREY DONNELL: Hopefully you should be with people instead of in.

[22:49] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, I think so, too. I mean, and not just the people that you choose, but just random people. You know, you go.

[22:54] JEFFREY DONNELL: You don't know. Do you remember seeing the Home in the World? It was. It was at Ansley. There was a little theater at Ansley that was. George Ellis actually was running that.

[23:03] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's right. That was only for a few years. Yeah. It was right next to where the Morrisons was. Yes. I don't remember.

[23:10] JEFFREY DONNELL: It was the first.

[23:11] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: I remember the theater. I don't remember.

[23:12] JEFFREY DONNELL: It was an Indian movie.

[23:13] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Okay.

[23:14] JEFFREY DONNELL: About. Well, I believe it was from the point of view of a woman. It was just very striking. Was very different. And she was unhappy with her role, as I recall, in society.

[23:28] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That movie was like about the size of the room that we're in now. Yeah. That was such a tiny little.

[23:32] JEFFREY DONNELL: But, you know, it was like bell and hill projections.

[23:34] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right. But like, the silver screen was a great place to see the movie. Screening room. Not.

[23:38] JEFFREY DONNELL: So I saw Koyaanisqazi there.

[23:40] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Did you?

[23:41] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yes.

[23:41] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Okay.

[23:42] JEFFREY DONNELL: That turned your. My brain inside that also.

[23:44] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. Yeah. I think that that was one of those crazy things. But. What. Oh, the Columbia. Did you ever go to the Columbia?

[23:53] JEFFREY DONNELL: We. I saw the Untouchables.

[23:54] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: We saw the Untouchables there. And Patty and I went. The Thanksgiving that your dad died, Hank was on call. Patty and I went to see Oklahoma.

[24:02] JEFFREY DONNELL: You saw Oklahoma there.

[24:03] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: The corn was. Was, like, way higher than an ele.

[24:06] JEFFREY DONNELL: Biggest screen ever saw.

[24:08] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: I know. It was so cool there. I was really sad when that theater went away.

[24:13] JEFFREY DONNELL: Oh, that was so great.

[24:14] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: What other. I'm trying to think there are any other important theaters. Like I said.

[24:18] JEFFREY DONNELL: Well, the Phipps Theater was pretty nice.

[24:20] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yes, that's right. We went to see Lawrence of Arabia and Omar Sharif, you know, he's this little tiny dot, and he just, like, rides up for, like, 25 minutes on the screen.

[24:29] JEFFREY DONNELL: Well, it's a big theater and the screen was really really wide.

[24:32] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And that's where we saw the first commercial in a movie. When we saw that co commercial, we just, uh. Oh, all over. Yeah, that's. That was. Yeah. Too bad. But, you know, like I said, I love going to the Cinema Club. Kind of gives us some of the feel. I think there's some of the stuff that people talk about afterwards is always really interesting. I'm really. That's been a lot of fun to discover.

[24:58] JEFFREY DONNELL: You know, it's different stuff. I mean, you go to a movie, you want to see something you haven't seen before, and you still can. There's still really, really cool, interesting things.

[25:08] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. And that's by going to Telluride, and I hope we get to go next year. We don't get shut out. But going to Telluride has been so much fun because the way people. Everybody who is.

[25:17] JEFFREY DONNELL: They want to talk.

[25:18] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: They want to talk about the movies and, you know, so you'll start talking to complete strangers. What did you see? What did you like? What didn't you like? And I just think that is just so much fun. You don't see that really here. When I went to the film festival in Chapel Hill this year, since we didn't get to go to Telluride, and it wasn't the same thing, it was like, Okay, I watched 18 movies in four days, but I couldn't get anybody to talk to about them. And I thought.

[25:42] JEFFREY DONNELL: So that was, like, at a multiplex.

[25:45] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, a really nice multiplex. In Chapel Hill. Suburban Chapel Hill. And it was a lovely theater. They had a lot of.

[25:53] JEFFREY DONNELL: So it wasn't on the campus or anything like that?

[25:54] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: No, no, no, no. But it was just.

[25:57] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yes. It's like you're going to the movie in the afternoon, right?

[26:00] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. After morning all the way through. But, you know, I just couldn't get anybody to engage, you know, So I realized as much as I like to go to movies, a lot of it is talking about it with somebody, you know, preferably you. Because we have this. We have this shared, you know, cinematic database. You will. Of all the movies we've seen over 40 years. You know, it is a solitary experience, but it's also a shared experience, too.

[26:27] JEFFREY DONNELL: We went to that movie in Chicago. There was a Chicago Film festival one time when we were. Oh, was that Fort.

[26:33] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[26:34] JEFFREY DONNELL: Fort Tryon. Was that the movie that we saw?

[26:36] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yes. With the irritating. Yeah.

[26:38] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah. But I mean, it was. It's. You'll realize, I mean, you want to be away from your ordinary life.

[26:47] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Mm.

[26:48] JEFFREY DONNELL: Or you'll be distracted by your ordinary life, I mean, it's very hard to put down your ordinary life and just be enjoying. Just be part of the movie.

[26:56] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's why I don't really like to watch movies as much at home. Because my ordinary life is like, okay, I really should be folding laundry or I should be doing something else or I need to run. You know something. I can't walk away from it.

[27:06] JEFFREY DONNELL: The phone will ring and you got to pick up a phone.

[27:08] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right, right, Exactly.

[27:10] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah. If you can go to another place just to watch movies, that's.

[27:14] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's.

[27:15] JEFFREY DONNELL: Then you're just gonna watch the movies. It's really, really.

[27:17] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Speaking of ordinary life, do you feel like there is a movie you've ever seen that kind of captured what it's like to be you, for example, or you just don't?

[27:24] JEFFREY DONNELL: No, I have not seen movies that actually were about me or people like me that I can tell. I mean, when I go to a movie, I see strangers doing weird things. I mean, it's always seems that way to me. I mean, I didn't see ordinary people, but I didn't see for a long time Ordinary people. Yeah, but when I saw them, you know, those were people who had lives that they were not like the life that I lead. So no, I don't look for myself in movies.

[27:52] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: I don't.

[27:53] JEFFREY DONNELL: I don't.

[27:53] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Why do you don't go look for them, but do you do encountered them by mis.

[27:56] JEFFREY DONNELL: And I don't see those people. So, I mean, when you talk about.

[28:00] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Well, what about Nebraska?

[28:02] JEFFREY DONNELL: I have sat in a room with people like. But. But my father was not like Bruce Dern. Bruce Dern? Yes. My father was not like Bruce Dern immersively.

[28:14] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Your dad liked movies?

[28:16] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah, he liked movies. He didn't like to go to movies. If movies would come to him, that was fine. So if they were on TV, if it was a World War II movie, he was there. He and all of his buds would be in front of their TV sets, then they would compare notes later. So the Battle of the Bulge showed on tv, that movie with Henry Fonda and everybody else and telling Savalas and, you know, my father had bridge club and all of his buddies were veterans. So, you know, at bridge club, you know, you know, at bridge table, it's a big card table, and there was a coaster for drinks, There was an ashtray, and there was a little bitty container with nitroglycem tablets. So you could smoke and take out nitro and keep drinking. But those guys would sit around and they'd say, did you see that movie? Did you see that Battle of the Budget, Les? You were in the Ardennes. Were those really Tiger tanks? No, those British Mark one day, I mean, that's, that's what it was like. They would, they would, they would act. Well, they were. It was like they, this gave them a chance to talk about what they'd done and what they'd seen.

[29:20] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Well, like Letterman used to do, you know that flash dance from a welder's point of view. Well, her technique left a little something to be tired, you know, those guys.

[29:27] JEFFREY DONNELL: Wouldn'T have done that. We don't run out of gas.

[29:31] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's why I'm insufferable. When you go to see movies about, you know, computer stuff, it's like, that's not. That code's not going to compile. I mean, imagine if you will, you know, when the net came out and all, you know, Laurie and all of my grad school buddies, we went to see that and we're just sitting there. That's not a legitimate email address, you know, we're having. It's like. Well, I think when we went to see the Social Network, Teddy was like, move, I don't want to sit next to you.

[29:54] JEFFREY DONNELL: You were checking code.

[29:55] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Of course.

[29:56] JEFFREY DONNELL: You all check code.

[29:58] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, yeah.

[29:58] JEFFREY DONNELL: Which I think is just a bit.

[30:00] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Because it's the thing, you know, you.

[30:02] JEFFREY DONNELL: Have to, you have to show it's what you know.

[30:04] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right, right, exactly. Let's see.

[30:07] JEFFREY DONNELL: So, yeah, so movies, they have a relationship with reality, but it's not direct. I mean, it gives you a chance to talk about reality, but it's, it's not your reality. I don't think space movies. No, not my reality. 2001. No, not my reality. It's just something else to think about.

[30:24] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. Well, do you have, and I'm going to tell you, don't ask me this because I don't think I could answer it, but do you have a favorite movie? I mean, is there something. I mean, other than In Harm's Way, which you always have to sit and watch and then call your mother in law when it's on TV to see if she happens to have seen it a thousand times.

[30:40] JEFFREY DONNELL: It's easier to ask which movies can you not turn off or do you.

[30:43] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Have trouble turning off?

[30:45] JEFFREY DONNELL: I have trouble turning off Ben Hur, you know, Hollywood movies, but it's a really good one. I can turn off an awful lot of gangster movies, but Ben Hurst, hard to turn off. I can actually turn off Lawrence of Arabia after the intermission. After they've taken Acaba, it kind of tails off.

[31:09] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: See, I can't. What can I. I cannot turn off Ferris Bueller. I always have to watch that. That's one. Miss Congeniality, actually, is one that I'll always sit and watch. Maybe my cousin Vinnie, you know, some of the things that just, you know, you know what's coming. You're still going to see the same jokes and you're still going to laugh the same way.

[31:29] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah. I have trouble turning off Mean Streets. I've only seen it a couple of times. I would have trouble turning that off. I've gotten to the point, turn off Death Boat now. I can do that.

[31:38] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Okay. Because, you know, they're all gonna die.

[31:40] JEFFREY DONNELL: Well, you see it enough times and you can see the artifice. You can actually see where all the. All the parts fit together or where they kind of plaster them together and so forth.

[31:48] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. I mean, that's the thing I don't want to get. You know, I love going to see movies again. Sometimes I think, at least I am. Maybe not you. I'm a little jaded about something. And some of the movies, I know, they're really good and I'm delighted they're made, but it's like, okay, I can see. I know what's going to come. You know, the next line, and I know where the plot points are. And, you know. Or, you know, in the case of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, when you see the flamethrower in the beginning of the movie, you know it's going to be used at the end.

[32:16] JEFFREY DONNELL: As Chekhov said, when you see a flamethrower in real one, it's got to be used in reel three. Yes, that's correct.

[32:21] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right, exactly.

[32:22] JEFFREY DONNELL: I mean, I don't.

[32:23] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: But I don't think. I don't think I'm there.

[32:24] JEFFREY DONNELL: I'm jaded because I think, you know, if a movie gets actually made and somebody actually watches it, maybe even pays money for it, that's a huge success. I didn't really understand what an operation it is to get a movie made.

[32:37] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, I kind of.

[32:38] JEFFREY DONNELL: I kind of get that now. I've not made a movie, but I realize, wow, that's a big. There's a lot of people involved. So, I mean, making a lousy movie is actually not all that easy to do.

[32:49] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Well, I think. What was it? The Escape Artist. Right. Which, you know, we haven't seen the original Escape. It's not the Escape Artist.

[32:56] JEFFREY DONNELL: The Room.

[32:57] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: No. Is that the one? Yeah, the Room. Tommy Wiseau. Yeah.

[32:59] JEFFREY DONNELL: We need to see is the movie. And I forget what the thing with that they may. That they lately made. I forget the name of the movie.

[33:08] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, I know that when you're talking about. I'm drawing a blank on the escape.

[33:10] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah.

[33:10] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. But I thought it was something like that.

[33:12] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah. So making a B movie like Frank Wilcox was in, that's probably. That's kind of hard to do.

[33:19] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[33:20] JEFFREY DONNELL: Tim Holt, all those westerns.

[33:21] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, Tim Holt there he was in the Magnificent Ambersons.

[33:24] JEFFREY DONNELL: What's up with that?

[33:25] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, I mean, I think that's fun, you know, spotting and you know, I love the trivia aspect of it. Right. I like, you know, knowing that I know the particular crazy actor who. You know. And Dodie does that too. Mom does that also. She'll sit there and say, oh, there's so and so. You know, you kind of. It's fun to have the database in your head as opposed to go look it up. But I mean, you know, I think the other thing that, you know, not only was there film board that formed our tastes and you know, like I said, gave us the best jobs that we ever had, but I think all those movies that Chris Dirks used to show, you know, all the modern or the classics of the American screen, you know, because he remembered he used to. He used to.

[34:02] JEFFREY DONNELL: He brought the black and white movies. Yeah.

[34:04] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And he would type out the cast list, you know, the stuff that you on the Internet movie database. Easy now you can look and see what. Somebody would sit around and watch the movies and go to the cast list and type everything up and cross it so that when he handed those things out, the cast.

[34:18] JEFFREY DONNELL: So he would look at the credits.

[34:19] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[34:20] JEFFREY DONNELL: And transcribe that.

[34:21] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Exactly, exactly. It's like, wow, that was quite. That was quite a labor of love. But you know, I mean, I'm grateful for those things. And you know, just doing the projection thing, you know, I still see the little dot in the upper right hand corner and it's like I start counting to seven. And when we did the perfect real changes and Chris said, yeah, okay, you did it. I couldn't tell there was a real change.

[34:41] JEFFREY DONNELL: Saturday Night Fever. You couldn't tell my real change?

[34:44] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: No, I couldn't tell change. Absolutely.

[34:46] JEFFREY DONNELL: I was perfect.

[34:47] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: That's. Yeah, I think I.

[34:48] JEFFREY DONNELL: And they were both projections were in focus like for the first time ever.

[34:52] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: But. Yeah, I mean, but I learned a lot and you know, I as a stupid, what, 21 year old kid when, you know, they having various movies picketed, you know, that was an experience oh, that's right. Yeah. Well, I don't know. I'll tell that story here.

[35:04] JEFFREY DONNELL: No, don't do that.

[35:04] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: But the Deer Hunter, remember the. Were you, were you in town?

[35:08] JEFFREY DONNELL: I was not in town when you guys showed the Deer Hunter. I saw the Deer Hunter.

[35:10] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And the Revolutionary Communist Youth Brigade decided halfway through the starts screaming in the middle of it, drowning. And I'm like, I called the campus police. I didn't know what to do. And they had. Oh, it was just, it was, that was, that was a big challenge for this stupid 21 year old kid. How do I get.

[35:26] JEFFREY DONNELL: That was a real thing.

[35:27] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, but you know, it's been, it's, it's been a blast. I mean, I think that's, I do, I think about that. The New Yorker cartoon. Right? You know, the two people walking out of the movie theater in the captions. Yeah, it was lousy, but it beat reality. You know, I mean, I think that's. Oh, yeah, that's, that's.

[35:42] JEFFREY DONNELL: I'll buy into that.

[35:43] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. I think that that's probably a lot of what it is that we, we respond to in movies. I mean, it's, it's like I said, it's a solitary experience to see it, but it's such a shared experience to talk about it afterwards or just to have the bond, you know, again, our bond. Because we have seen so many movies together.

[36:01] JEFFREY DONNELL: That's what we've done. Yeah, right. We don't go to movies.

[36:03] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right, but we have gone to movies. But we don't even have to, you know, we've got, we have a shorthand at this point. You know, you can just say, oh, you know, reference such and such a movie. And it just, there's so much tied into that. And I think that's, that's, that's been a, that's my small miracle in life to have that movie.

[36:18] JEFFREY DONNELL: There's the movie and all the stuff that was happening in your life that that movie is tangled up with.

[36:23] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right, right, exactly. And I, you know, like I said.

[36:26] JEFFREY DONNELL: Remember the movie's a way to remember all that other stuff.

[36:28] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Right. And just, you know, like I said, I've always enjoyed movies with, you know, with mom, with Pete, with you. I love watching movies with Teddy and I just, I love seeing him enjoy that as much as we have. He's got, he's got very good taste, which is slightly different than ours. He sees things different. In fact, he's always been very good at, you know, analyzing movies. He.

[36:48] JEFFREY DONNELL: Yeah, he picks that up actually much better than I Do.

[36:51] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: I think he does? I think he does.

[36:52] JEFFREY DONNELL: No, he picks up an awful lot of stuff that I. He picks it up the first time.

[36:56] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: And I pick it up more subtle than you things. He picks up more subtleties, I think, than you do.

[37:02] JEFFREY DONNELL: Oh, I'm terrible. Let's not be kidding about that. I'm terrible at it. I was a terrible English major. I was a terrible grad student and a terrible film critic. Aside from that. But I enjoy myself, so.

[37:12] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah.

[37:13] JEFFREY DONNELL: And I'm 62 years old and I don't care.

[37:15] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, there you go. But it has. It has been just a blast. So, you know, here's to another 40 years of movies or whatever, you know, and, like, when we're done, we can go. Hope. We can go watch the Irishman for. Actually, we have to wait for Teddy to come home to watch that. But from vacation. But.

[37:33] JEFFREY DONNELL: Well, there's a lot of stuff on Netflix that we can watch.

[37:36] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah. And when you have your. Your cataract removed tomorrow, I promise that I will sit there and I will read to you the subtitles on whatever. Bad Jack.

[37:43] JEFFREY DONNELL: Cruel Gun Story. Cruel Gun Story is the name of the movie.

[37:46] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Okay. That was not in Florence Nightingale's nursing description. She didn't have to read subtitles on bad Japanese gangster movies.

[37:53] JEFFREY DONNELL: But she would have done this had she been able to.

[37:56] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: Yeah, I think that's definitely the case. But, yeah, no, it's. It's been great. I've been. I'm very fortunate. So. And I think that's a good. That's a good stopping place.

[38:09] JEFFREY DONNELL: Are we done?

[38:11] SUSAN LIEBESKIND: I think we're done. Thank you, dear.

[38:14] JEFFREY DONNELL: Thank you.