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[projector clicking]

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Downloaded from
YTS.MX

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♪

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Official YIFY movies site:
YTS.MX

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[quacking]

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[clicking, whirring]

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[cat meowing]

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[Kurt Vonnegut]
Listen.

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♪

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[explosions, rapid gunfire]

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[water splashing]

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[wind blowing]

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[chirping]

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♪

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[man]
Kurt Vonnegut told me once...

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we don't understand
the first thing about time.

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Before Dresden happened,

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he said he was walking in
the forest,

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put his head against
the trunk of a tree,

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and he saw everything
that happened.

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[whooshing]

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♪

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[heart beating]

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[chirping]

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[man] He really saw it all
before it happened.

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And he wasn't kidding, and he
wasn't speaking metaphorically.

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This is how he experienced...
his life.

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♪

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[Charlie Gibson]
Kurt Vonnegut,

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the author who became an oracle
for the baby boomer generation,

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has died.

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In the end, it was a head injury
that killed Kurt Vonnegut.

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He was 84.

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[clicking]

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[static]

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And now, back in 1970 with
electronic television,

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our last item tonight...

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[clicking]

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♪

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[man]
...is an interview with
a very funny

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and a very remarkable
writer.

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Kurt Vonnegut.

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[man] I can't think of a single
other American author

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even of half Vonnegut's age,

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who has all of his books
in print.

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[Morley Safer]
Young people snap up his books

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as fast as they are re-issued.

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He is suddenly a star,
a luminary,

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a guru to youth.

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♪ Time has come today

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[man] One of the pre-imminent
novelists,

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and I would say,
philosophers of our time,

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Kurt Vonnegut.

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Do you really know
the answers to everything?

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I haven't been stumped
very often.

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What would you like to know?

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-Well, I-- I--
-[audience laughs]

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[Kurt Vonnegut] Now,
what are my book about?

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I have written again and again
about ordinary people

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who have tried to behave
decently

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in an indecent society.

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Vonnegut has been the most
profound influence in my life.

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I think he's
the funniest person alive.

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You know, that's why George Bush
hates the Arabs

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-is they invented Algebra.
-[laughter]

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[laughing]

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[Morley Safer]
What do you think it is
that does make you

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so highly respected
by young people?

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I'm screamingly funny.

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You know, I really am
in the books.

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I think so.

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He is both incredibly funny

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and also dark and brooding
at the same time.

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My books are jokes,
mosaics of jokes,

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about serious matters,
about death, about disease,

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about war and
that sort of thing.

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He made literature fun.
that was huge.

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♪ Now the time has come

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♪ Time

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♪ There's no place to run

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He'll be read to understand
the 20th century

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the way you have to read
Mark Twain

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to understand
the 19th century.

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[man] Vonnegut was a prisoner
of war in Germany

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and he's been getting ready to
write a book about it.

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Now he's done it.

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[woman] Kurt Vonnegut's
Slaughterhouse-Five

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was an instant hit;

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an anti war novel that was
searing, satirical,

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strange and darkly funny.

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[man] The protagonist of
Slaughterhouse-Five

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Billy Pilgrim,
bounces around

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from time to time
in his life.

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[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Listen...

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"Billy Pilgrim has come
unstuck in time.

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"Billy has gone to sleep
a senile widower

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"and awakened on
his wedding day.

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"He's walked through
a door in 1955

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"and come out another one
in 1941.

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"He's gone back through
that door

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"to find himself in 1963.

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"He's seen his birth and
his death may times, he says,

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"and pays random visits to
all the events in between,

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and the trips aren't
necessarily fun."

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[man] Unstuck in time is
Billy Pilgrim's status

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in the novel
Slaughterhouse-Five.

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But it's also
Kurt Vonnegut's status

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as the writer.

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I'd say you and I are about
equally unstuck in time.

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♪ Time

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♪

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♪ Time

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♪

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[indistinct dialog]

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[sighs]

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Can you believe we're really
gonna do this again?

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What is this, the fourth,
fifth time?

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[man]
I think the fifth.

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I know the first interview
was in 2014.

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Then, about a year later, was
the stripey-shirt interview.

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That's the one where I cry.

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[chuckles]

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Then there was, what,
the editing room interview?

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Then the light blue shirt,
I think, was 2017.

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Every time, I thought it was
gonna be the last time.

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I didn't even want to be in
this film in the first place.

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This was gonna be a conventional
author documentary

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with interviews with Kurt,

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his family,

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you know, biographers
and scholars,

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but not me.

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I don't even like documentaries
where the filmmaker

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has to put himself
in the film.

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I mean, who cares?

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But when you take almost
40 years to make a film,

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you owe some kind of
an explanation.

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Full disclosure.

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I was 23 when
I first approached him

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about making this film.

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And I remember he was
just about to turn 60,

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and I would refer to him as
the old man.

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And a couple months ago,

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I turned 60.

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How fucked up is that?

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It all started for me at
the same time as it started for

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almost every Vonnegut reader
I've met,

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which is in high school.

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In my case,
Sunny Hills High School,

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Fullerton, California.

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[Kurt Vonnegut]
How many of you
have had the teacher

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at any level of your education

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who made you more excited
to be alive,

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prouder to be alive,

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than you had previously believed
possible?

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Hold up your hands, please.

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There's a door behind which
my life would sort of change

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when I was 16 years old.

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♪

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[Kurt Vonnegut]
Please say the name of
that teacher

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to someone sitting
next to you, please.

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[Bob Weide] Valerie Stevenson
was the name of the teacher

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who first led me to Vonnegut.

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I assigned a book to
the students to read, um,

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Breakfast Of Champions
by Kurt Vonnegut.

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This is the actual copy
that I, uh, read.

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Looking back now as an educator
of many years,

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I'm just sort of horrified
that I did it.

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It's a pretty edgy book,

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and iconoclastic.

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"To give an idea of
the maturity

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"of my illustrations for
this book,

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here is my picture of
an asshole:"

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Questioning authority--

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"...teachers of children in
the United States of America

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"wrote this date on blackboards
again and again,

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"and asked the children to...

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[Kurt Vonnegut]
"...memorize it with
pride and joy:

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"1492!

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"The teachers told the children
that this was when

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"their continent was discovered
by human beings.

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"Actually,
millions of human beings
were already living

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"full and imaginative lives
on the continent in 1492.

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"That was simply the year
in which sea pirates

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began to cheat and rob
and kill them."

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What high school kid isn't gonna
gobble this up and say,

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"I've found my author"?

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Nothing was the same after that.

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♪

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I jut became
somewhat obsessed.

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I just so connected to
his philosophies,

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and these serious issues being
handled in this comedic way.

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He was the guy
who made me think

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he thinks what I think
about the world.

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He came in at the beginning of
his senior year

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and proposed that he teach
a course in Vonnegut,

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and didn't seem to think that
that was an unusual thing.

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[chuckles] It was but
he set up his course

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very seriously,
Professor Weide,

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[Bob Weide]
I had probably a dozen students
in the class,

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and I graded them all
and gave assignments,

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and we all read his books.

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It was like having a very cool
Vonnegut reading club.

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But, um, that was
the beginning of it.

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♪

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[Kurt Vonnegut]
"If you find your life

206
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"tangled up with
somebody else's life

207
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"for no very logical reasons,
writes Bokonon,

208
00:09:44,322 --> 00:09:47,761
"that person may be
a member of your karass."

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00:09:48,936 --> 00:09:50,372
Okay, here's the first one.

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This is the one that got me
into all this trouble.

211
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"June 29, 1982.

212
00:09:55,203 --> 00:09:56,204
"Dear Mr. Vonnegut,

213
00:09:56,334 --> 00:09:57,684
"Earlier this year,
I produced

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00:09:57,814 --> 00:10:00,295
the above-named documentary
for PBS.

215
00:10:00,425 --> 00:10:02,776
"The Marx Brothers now have
their definitive documentary.

216
00:10:03,167 --> 00:10:05,517
"How about allowing
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.,
to have his?

217
00:10:05,648 --> 00:10:07,607
"If the documentary had your
authorization,

218
00:10:07,737 --> 00:10:10,914
I'm confident that
I could arrange for
financing immediately."

219
00:10:11,523 --> 00:10:13,525
I remind you,
I wrote that letter in 1982.

220
00:10:14,439 --> 00:10:18,139
So, I wrote him this letter,
and days turned into weeks,

221
00:10:18,661 --> 00:10:20,010
and I didn't hear back
and I thought,

222
00:10:20,141 --> 00:10:21,751
well, all right, that's that,
I gave it a shot.

223
00:10:24,667 --> 00:10:26,843
And then the day came
and there was a letter

224
00:10:26,974 --> 00:10:29,063
with that familiar handwriting
on it that you see in

225
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Breakfast Of Champions.

226
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I thought,
"Holy crap!"

227
00:10:32,370 --> 00:10:34,372
[stammers]
"It's him!"

228
00:10:35,025 --> 00:10:36,026
Ready?

229
00:10:37,898 --> 00:10:39,508
"Dear Robert Weide,

230
00:10:39,639 --> 00:10:41,989
"I've been out of town
for most of this summer,

231
00:10:42,119 --> 00:10:44,469
"and so read your friendly
letter of a month ago

232
00:10:44,600 --> 00:10:45,775
"only this morning.

233
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"It turns out I that

234
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"I already know something
of your work.

235
00:10:49,474 --> 00:10:52,608
"I saw
the Marx Brothers tribute
and liked it a lot.

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00:10:52,739 --> 00:10:54,088
"Who wouldn't?

237
00:10:54,218 --> 00:10:56,351
"I am honored by your interest
in my work,

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"and I will talk to you some,
if you like,

239
00:10:58,745 --> 00:11:01,573
"about making some sort of film
based on it.

240
00:11:01,704 --> 00:11:04,185
"But there is sure no great
footage to start with.

241
00:11:04,315 --> 00:11:06,274
"Anything that is any good
of mine

242
00:11:06,404 --> 00:11:09,320
"is on a printed page,
not film.

243
00:11:09,451 --> 00:11:12,889
"Maybe you have some ideas
as to what to do about that.

244
00:11:13,020 --> 00:11:14,238
"I don't.

245
00:11:14,369 --> 00:11:16,850
"Anyway, give me a ring
if you like.

246
00:11:16,980 --> 00:11:19,156
Cheers--
Kurt Vonnegut."

247
00:11:24,509 --> 00:11:26,555
[Bob Weide]
Oh, I'm guessing this--

248
00:11:26,686 --> 00:11:27,730
[man]
Doesn't have a label on it.

249
00:11:27,861 --> 00:11:28,905
[Bob Weide]
Doesn't have a label?

250
00:11:29,471 --> 00:11:31,125
Where's the-- Oh.
So this is '94.

251
00:11:31,255 --> 00:11:32,604
-Ninety-four. Right.
-This is the later stuff.

252
00:11:32,735 --> 00:11:34,345
That's the more
recent stuff, '94.

253
00:11:34,476 --> 00:11:36,086
We want the old stuff.

254
00:11:36,217 --> 00:11:37,261
-Eighty-eight. That's it.
-Okay. We'll go with this one.

255
00:11:37,392 --> 00:11:38,393
That's should be it.
Yeah, that's it.

256
00:11:39,350 --> 00:11:41,048
[whirring]

257
00:11:43,050 --> 00:11:44,486
[keyboard clacking]

258
00:11:44,834 --> 00:11:45,879
[man]
Here we go.

259
00:11:46,314 --> 00:11:47,489
[man]
Drop it.

260
00:11:48,359 --> 00:11:49,796
So, we're okay
from there, Bob.

261
00:11:49,926 --> 00:11:51,972
[Bob Weide]
This is the very first stuff
we shot

262
00:11:52,102 --> 00:11:55,192
on the first day
in, uh, 1988.

263
00:11:56,803 --> 00:11:57,891
There's Kurt.

264
00:11:59,283 --> 00:12:00,763
[indistinct dialog]

265
00:12:00,894 --> 00:12:02,983
There he is, laughing and
smiling and chatting away.

266
00:12:03,679 --> 00:12:04,811
Like he's still here.

267
00:12:04,941 --> 00:12:07,204
-[laughing]
-We'd gotten together

268
00:12:07,335 --> 00:12:10,642
quite a few times, uh,
since that initial letter.

269
00:12:18,738 --> 00:12:21,436
[Bob Weide]
But that day sitting on
the train across from him

270
00:12:21,566 --> 00:12:22,829
with the camera next to me,

271
00:12:22,959 --> 00:12:24,613
finally hit me that...

272
00:12:24,744 --> 00:12:26,963
my God, this film is
really gonna happen.

273
00:12:28,530 --> 00:12:29,618
-Are we going?
-[Bob Weide] Yeah.

274
00:12:29,749 --> 00:12:31,838
Yeah. My books are about
loneliness,

275
00:12:31,968 --> 00:12:34,231
and about people being driven
out of the Garden of Eden

276
00:12:34,362 --> 00:12:35,580
one way or another.

277
00:12:36,059 --> 00:12:38,279
The world's full of
lonesome old people

278
00:12:38,409 --> 00:12:39,889
and when trouble comes,

279
00:12:40,020 --> 00:12:42,196
they call either the police
or fire department.

280
00:12:42,326 --> 00:12:44,938
[laughs]

281
00:12:45,068 --> 00:12:48,202
Lonesome? Have no friends?
Dial 911.

282
00:12:48,332 --> 00:12:51,379
Uh, and that's not much of
a solution.

283
00:12:52,162 --> 00:12:54,643
And I say get
an extended family.

284
00:12:56,166 --> 00:12:57,689
[Bob Weide] We were going to
Buffalo, New York.

285
00:12:58,212 --> 00:13:00,344
Kurt had
a speaking engagement there

286
00:13:00,475 --> 00:13:02,085
at a Unitarian church.

287
00:13:02,216 --> 00:13:04,218
Kurt was an agnostic,
certainly,

288
00:13:04,348 --> 00:13:06,089
and a humanist,

289
00:13:06,220 --> 00:13:09,136
but to the extent that he
affiliated with any religion,

290
00:13:09,266 --> 00:13:10,702
it was Unitarianism,

291
00:13:10,833 --> 00:13:14,010
which is really more
community based than God based.

292
00:13:14,706 --> 00:13:17,753
[shouting] Perfectly capable of
projecting in a room this size.

293
00:13:17,884 --> 00:13:20,974
[laughing]

294
00:13:21,104 --> 00:13:24,020
This was the first of many
public appearances I would film,

295
00:13:24,151 --> 00:13:28,242
but the audiences were always
out the door, in the aisle,

296
00:13:28,372 --> 00:13:30,548
and they always ate out of
the palm of his hand.

297
00:13:30,679 --> 00:13:32,899
We are taught to be
enthusiastic,

298
00:13:33,029 --> 00:13:35,553
to pretend we know
what the good news is.

299
00:13:36,337 --> 00:13:39,514
Just think, here you are
two years old,

300
00:13:39,644 --> 00:13:41,342
and mommy
and daddy come up to you,

301
00:13:41,472 --> 00:13:42,647
they're all excited.

302
00:13:42,778 --> 00:13:44,388
Guess what's goin' on?

303
00:13:44,519 --> 00:13:47,130
-[gibberish]
-[laughter]

304
00:13:48,784 --> 00:13:51,221
It's your birthday!

305
00:13:52,396 --> 00:13:54,877
-[gibberish]
-[laughter]

306
00:13:55,008 --> 00:13:57,532
[Kurt Vonnegut]
But-- [laughs]

307
00:13:57,662 --> 00:13:59,273
What the hell's a birthday?

308
00:13:59,403 --> 00:14:01,753
[laughter]

309
00:14:01,884 --> 00:14:03,973
Why should it be
such good news?

310
00:14:05,279 --> 00:14:09,152
And so we pretend
all these enthusiasms.

311
00:14:09,283 --> 00:14:10,893
Uh... you know,

312
00:14:11,024 --> 00:14:13,417
the Buffalo Bills made it to
the Super Bowl.

313
00:14:13,548 --> 00:14:16,768
-[gibberish]
-[laughter]

314
00:14:16,899 --> 00:14:18,901
[applause]

315
00:14:19,032 --> 00:14:20,642
We are so grateful any time

316
00:14:20,772 --> 00:14:22,818
anybody tells
the truth about life

317
00:14:22,949 --> 00:14:24,994
and the basic truth
about life is,

318
00:14:25,125 --> 00:14:27,518
we don't know what
the good news is

319
00:14:27,649 --> 00:14:29,390
and what the bad news is,

320
00:14:29,520 --> 00:14:31,392
and one reason we would like
to go to Heaven

321
00:14:31,522 --> 00:14:35,222
is to ask somebody,
"Hey, what was the good news,

322
00:14:35,352 --> 00:14:38,225
and what was the bad news?"
[laughs]

323
00:14:38,355 --> 00:14:40,270
[applause]

324
00:14:40,401 --> 00:14:42,055
-[man] Like this.
-[laughter]

325
00:14:42,185 --> 00:14:43,491
[indistinct chatter]

326
00:14:47,974 --> 00:14:49,410
[tape fast forwarding]

327
00:14:49,540 --> 00:14:51,978
[snapping]

328
00:14:52,108 --> 00:14:54,676
[Bob Weide]
I was always filming on and off
with him over the years,

329
00:14:54,806 --> 00:14:57,070
just thinking, you know,
I'll figure this out later.

330
00:14:58,027 --> 00:14:59,159
[Bob Weide]
Now we're havin' fun.

331
00:14:59,289 --> 00:15:00,160
[chuckling]

332
00:15:00,290 --> 00:15:01,422
[snapping]

333
00:15:01,901 --> 00:15:04,860
[Bob Weide] In 1994,
we went to Indianapolis.

334
00:15:04,991 --> 00:15:06,253
It would be terrible if

335
00:15:06,383 --> 00:15:08,690
I don't even recognize
the house anymore.

336
00:15:09,604 --> 00:15:12,520
That's here Mr. Herman lived,
he was very mean.

337
00:15:13,086 --> 00:15:16,524
Oh, this is--
this is it.

338
00:15:16,654 --> 00:15:19,048
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"I took him to the
Indianapolis of my childhood.

339
00:15:20,615 --> 00:15:23,705
"I got out of my rented car,
I did it noisily.

340
00:15:24,706 --> 00:15:26,447
I slammed the door firmly.

341
00:15:27,056 --> 00:15:28,057
[snapping]

342
00:15:31,234 --> 00:15:34,977
Oh, yeah, that's Kurt Vonnegut
and that's Edith Vonnegut.

343
00:15:35,108 --> 00:15:37,153
And, of course, the house
was built in 1923

344
00:15:37,284 --> 00:15:38,415
when I was
one year old.

345
00:15:38,546 --> 00:15:41,592
♪

346
00:15:44,465 --> 00:15:46,423
Yeah. This is my room
all right.

347
00:15:47,642 --> 00:15:49,644
[Bob Weide]
Kurt, in your writing,

348
00:15:49,774 --> 00:15:52,299
there's much talk of
extended family.

349
00:15:52,429 --> 00:15:53,735
Where does this notion
come from?

350
00:15:53,865 --> 00:15:55,345
Well, I used to have one.

351
00:15:55,476 --> 00:15:58,522
♪

352
00:15:59,262 --> 00:16:01,134
There must have been
30 Vonneguts,

353
00:16:01,264 --> 00:16:04,050
all prosperous.
in the phone book here.

354
00:16:05,094 --> 00:16:08,489
[man] Kurt always said he
trusted his writing best

355
00:16:08,619 --> 00:16:11,622
when he sounded like a person
from Indianapolis, Indiana,

356
00:16:11,753 --> 00:16:13,711
which is what he was.

357
00:16:14,321 --> 00:16:16,671
His father and grandfather
were architects.

358
00:16:16,801 --> 00:16:19,717
Other relatives were, uh,
symphony conductors,

359
00:16:19,848 --> 00:16:21,981
and, uh, heads of libraries

360
00:16:22,111 --> 00:16:25,375
who had basically created
Indianapolis.

361
00:16:26,246 --> 00:16:28,335
And it's got Vonnegut
written all over it.

362
00:16:30,293 --> 00:16:32,208
[Kurt Vonnegut]
The family was built around

363
00:16:32,339 --> 00:16:33,775
the Vonnegut Hardware Company,

364
00:16:33,905 --> 00:16:36,430
which was a very successful
hardware store chain.

365
00:16:36,908 --> 00:16:41,130
One of my ancestors invented
the panic bar on doors.

366
00:16:41,261 --> 00:16:43,176
But if there is a fire,

367
00:16:43,306 --> 00:16:45,308
and you are jammed up
against the door,

368
00:16:45,439 --> 00:16:47,876
by a crowd-- Ahhh.

369
00:16:48,007 --> 00:16:49,138
[grunts]

370
00:16:49,269 --> 00:16:50,313
Flies open.

371
00:16:50,792 --> 00:16:53,099
And it must have saved
a hell of a lot of lives.

372
00:16:53,360 --> 00:16:54,709
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
Vonnegut was growing up

373
00:16:54,839 --> 00:16:56,537
in this beautiful house

374
00:16:56,667 --> 00:16:59,235
designed by his
architect father.

375
00:17:00,019 --> 00:17:02,673
People have very kindly
left this here all this time,

376
00:17:02,804 --> 00:17:04,936
and that's me,
my hand was pressed here,

377
00:17:05,067 --> 00:17:07,156
including a little bit of
my sweater.

378
00:17:07,591 --> 00:17:09,506
My sister, Alice,

379
00:17:09,637 --> 00:17:12,074
who's no longer among
the living.

380
00:17:12,205 --> 00:17:15,904
And this is my brother, Bernard,
who is nearly 80;

381
00:17:16,035 --> 00:17:18,820
atmospheric physicist who knows
more about tornadoes

382
00:17:18,950 --> 00:17:20,648
than anybody on Earth.

383
00:17:20,778 --> 00:17:22,041
And this is my mother.

384
00:17:24,260 --> 00:17:26,567
And this is my father.

385
00:17:28,134 --> 00:17:29,744
Doesn't make me sad at all,

386
00:17:29,874 --> 00:17:31,528
'cause it was such a happy time

387
00:17:31,659 --> 00:17:33,530
in the lives of
all these people.

388
00:17:35,619 --> 00:17:37,099
[Bob Weide] After spending
so much time with Kurt,

389
00:17:37,230 --> 00:17:40,102
I got fairly close with
his brother, Bernie.

390
00:17:40,233 --> 00:17:42,235
-[beep]
-Hi, uh, Bob,

391
00:17:42,365 --> 00:17:46,456
uh, this is
Bernie Vonnegut calling.

392
00:17:46,587 --> 00:17:47,979
In a closet,

393
00:17:48,110 --> 00:17:51,983
he had some old
16mm home movies

394
00:17:52,114 --> 00:17:53,550
of the Vonnegut family.

395
00:17:53,681 --> 00:17:55,465
[Bernie]
I found the film,

396
00:17:55,596 --> 00:17:57,511
or at least,
uh, some of it.

397
00:17:57,641 --> 00:18:01,254
and I, uh, hope, uh,
you received it.

398
00:18:01,558 --> 00:18:03,604
[Bob Weide] I took it down to
a post production facility

399
00:18:03,734 --> 00:18:04,996
had the stuff cleaned,

400
00:18:05,127 --> 00:18:07,042
and put it up to transfer it
to video tape.

401
00:18:07,521 --> 00:18:09,305
I couldn't believe
what I was seeing.

402
00:18:09,566 --> 00:18:11,090
[projector whirring]

403
00:18:11,220 --> 00:18:14,223
♪

404
00:18:16,095 --> 00:18:17,966
[Bob Weide] It was amazing,
crystal clear,

405
00:18:18,097 --> 00:18:19,533
black and white
home movies.

406
00:18:20,621 --> 00:18:23,319
The family dynamic
is on full display.

407
00:18:23,450 --> 00:18:25,191
Kurt's the baby brother,
of course,

408
00:18:25,321 --> 00:18:27,323
always demanding attention.

409
00:18:27,758 --> 00:18:31,110
He's either laughing or crying
or running around.

410
00:18:31,501 --> 00:18:34,287
And, uh...
a lot of dancing.

411
00:18:34,809 --> 00:18:37,246
[Kurt Vonnegut]
The youngest member
of each family

412
00:18:37,377 --> 00:18:39,030
is the family comedian,

413
00:18:39,422 --> 00:18:41,381
'cause it's the only way
the youngest one

414
00:18:41,511 --> 00:18:43,034
can get attention.

415
00:18:43,165 --> 00:18:45,863
And so I would make a joke,
and everybody would look,

416
00:18:45,994 --> 00:18:47,561
"Did he say that?"
you know,

417
00:18:47,691 --> 00:18:49,128
and did he mean it
and all that,

418
00:18:49,258 --> 00:18:51,391
and so I became
specialized that way.

419
00:18:52,174 --> 00:18:53,828
[Bob Weide] Bernard is
nine years older.

420
00:18:53,958 --> 00:18:55,482
It's funny,
when I knew Bernie,

421
00:18:55,612 --> 00:18:59,007
he was this rather serious,
retired academic,

422
00:18:59,138 --> 00:19:01,879
who was a world renowned
atmospheric scientist,

423
00:19:02,358 --> 00:19:03,838
uh, and rather stiff
on camera.

424
00:19:03,968 --> 00:19:07,146
This is an instant of which
I have no memory,

425
00:19:07,276 --> 00:19:11,585
but, uh, I was, uh,
very young.

426
00:19:12,281 --> 00:19:14,109
But here he is,
hamming it up,

427
00:19:14,240 --> 00:19:16,938
and, uh, quite
the snappy dresser.

428
00:19:17,591 --> 00:19:21,203
To Vonnegut readers,
his sister, Alice-- Allie--

429
00:19:21,334 --> 00:19:23,249
is almost a mythical figure,

430
00:19:23,379 --> 00:19:25,033
very important
in Kurt's life.

431
00:19:25,642 --> 00:19:28,645
He always writes about
how funny she is,

432
00:19:28,776 --> 00:19:30,038
and you see it.

433
00:19:30,647 --> 00:19:32,214
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Same jokes amused us both.

434
00:19:32,736 --> 00:19:34,912
So maybe she taught me
what was funny.

435
00:19:35,043 --> 00:19:38,089
♪

436
00:19:39,308 --> 00:19:41,005
This is my sister,
Allie's, room.

437
00:19:41,267 --> 00:19:44,226
The sleeping porch there
where, with her permission,

438
00:19:44,357 --> 00:19:48,317
we could sleep out on hot nights
in the summer time.

439
00:19:49,536 --> 00:19:53,017
She grew up to be six feet tall,
was a very beautiful blonde...

440
00:19:54,018 --> 00:19:56,151
uh, with terrible posture,

441
00:19:56,282 --> 00:19:58,936
because she was so embarrassed
about being tall.

442
00:20:01,200 --> 00:20:04,246
Yeah, and I really miss her
as we were extremely close.

443
00:20:06,509 --> 00:20:07,684
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
Allie Vonnegut was

444
00:20:07,815 --> 00:20:10,034
a constant presence
in his life.

445
00:20:11,297 --> 00:20:13,516
She substituted for
Kurt's mother.

446
00:20:13,647 --> 00:20:16,606
I think she gave him the love
and the nurturing

447
00:20:16,737 --> 00:20:18,347
that he was not given.

448
00:20:19,870 --> 00:20:22,699
Kurt's mother was
society bred,

449
00:20:22,830 --> 00:20:24,440
as his mother was distant,

450
00:20:24,571 --> 00:20:28,139
and really had her own
mental problems to deal with.

451
00:20:29,053 --> 00:20:32,448
His father was not the warmest,
fuzziest guy in the world.

452
00:20:32,579 --> 00:20:33,710
He was a good father,

453
00:20:33,841 --> 00:20:35,973
but he was, uh,
a serious architect.

454
00:20:38,019 --> 00:20:40,543
[Kurt Vonnegut]
I wish my parents had been
happier than they were.

455
00:20:41,196 --> 00:20:44,591
And I think it was largely my
mother's unhappiness

456
00:20:44,721 --> 00:20:48,812
that, uh, made the depression
harder for all of us.

457
00:20:48,943 --> 00:20:51,989
♪

458
00:20:58,039 --> 00:20:59,214
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
He grows up in

459
00:20:59,345 --> 00:21:01,651
a very traditional,
supportive family.

460
00:21:01,782 --> 00:21:04,263
He has a happy childhood.

461
00:21:04,393 --> 00:21:06,221
Uh, but then,

462
00:21:06,352 --> 00:21:08,745
all the money
for it disappears

463
00:21:08,876 --> 00:21:10,269
during the Great Depression.

464
00:21:10,399 --> 00:21:13,228
♪

465
00:21:13,359 --> 00:21:15,361
Now, of course,
everybody in Indianapolis

466
00:21:15,491 --> 00:21:17,537
was quite depressed.

467
00:21:17,667 --> 00:21:19,365
Uh, nothing was being built,

468
00:21:19,495 --> 00:21:22,281
and so father finally
had to come home.

469
00:21:23,673 --> 00:21:25,632
But there was virtually
no work.

470
00:21:27,634 --> 00:21:29,462
Oh, I think he was
deeply embarrassed,

471
00:21:29,592 --> 00:21:32,203
and mother always felt that
there must be some way

472
00:21:32,334 --> 00:21:34,380
he could go out there
and get some money.

473
00:21:35,685 --> 00:21:38,775
Yeah. "Get out of her and
get me some money too.

474
00:21:38,906 --> 00:21:41,430
Why don't you do right
like some other men do?"

475
00:21:42,605 --> 00:21:44,781
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
They lost their family home,

476
00:21:44,912 --> 00:21:47,436
and had to go into
a rental property.

477
00:21:48,219 --> 00:21:50,526
[Kurt Vonnegut]
We moved out of here
when I was ten years old,

478
00:21:50,657 --> 00:21:52,006
and I really didn't give a damn.

479
00:21:52,136 --> 00:21:54,704
[chuckles]

480
00:21:54,835 --> 00:21:57,577
You know, I thought life was
pretty interesting wherever--

481
00:21:57,707 --> 00:21:59,840
wherever we were
gonna live next.

482
00:22:00,754 --> 00:22:02,843
Young Kurt was
taken out of, uh,

483
00:22:02,973 --> 00:22:04,932
private school,
put into public schools,

484
00:22:05,062 --> 00:22:06,673
and it took him out of
the bubble.

485
00:22:06,803 --> 00:22:08,239
He read comic books,

486
00:22:08,370 --> 00:22:10,198
he was immersed in
popular culture,

487
00:22:10,329 --> 00:22:12,331
and what it was like
to be a person

488
00:22:12,461 --> 00:22:14,507
not living in
a world of privilege.

489
00:22:15,159 --> 00:22:16,465
[Kurt Vonnegut]
When I was a child,

490
00:22:16,596 --> 00:22:18,772
and there were many
serious things going on,

491
00:22:18,902 --> 00:22:21,601
such as the Great Depression
and all that,

492
00:22:21,731 --> 00:22:24,255
it was Laurel and Hardy
who gave me permission

493
00:22:24,386 --> 00:22:26,954
not to take life seriously.

494
00:22:27,084 --> 00:22:30,305
And it turned out that
it as okay to, uh,

495
00:22:30,436 --> 00:22:32,089
laugh your head off.

496
00:22:32,220 --> 00:22:34,265
[laughing]

497
00:22:35,702 --> 00:22:37,617
Life was a very serious
business,

498
00:22:37,747 --> 00:22:40,707
and it inspired me to try
and write funny books,

499
00:22:40,837 --> 00:22:43,405
that this was a good thing to do
with a life is to be funny.

500
00:22:43,536 --> 00:22:46,582
♪

501
00:22:47,975 --> 00:22:50,020
[Gregory Sumner]
One of the luckiest breaks
for Kurt Vonnegut

502
00:22:50,151 --> 00:22:51,892
is that he went to
Shortridge High School,

503
00:22:52,022 --> 00:22:54,024
one of the finest high schools
in the country.

504
00:22:54,895 --> 00:22:56,636
[Kurt Vonnegut] It was an
extraordinary high school,

505
00:22:56,766 --> 00:22:59,813
it was better than any
university I ever went to.

506
00:23:00,335 --> 00:23:02,772
This is where I got my
foundation in chemistry,

507
00:23:02,903 --> 00:23:03,947
in ancient history,

508
00:23:04,078 --> 00:23:05,819
and this place had
a daily paper,

509
00:23:05,949 --> 00:23:06,863
The Shortridge Echo.

510
00:23:06,994 --> 00:23:08,561
My parents worked on it,

511
00:23:08,691 --> 00:23:11,477
so that's how long Shortridge
had had a daily newspaper.

512
00:23:11,607 --> 00:23:13,653
I learned to write for peers,

513
00:23:13,783 --> 00:23:15,481
as I would write something
in the paper,

514
00:23:15,611 --> 00:23:18,048
and the next day,
my fellow students would

515
00:23:18,179 --> 00:23:20,137
tell me what the hell
they thought about it.

516
00:23:20,268 --> 00:23:22,575
It was a swell experience
for me,

517
00:23:22,705 --> 00:23:26,143
because I learned to write
journalistic style;

518
00:23:26,274 --> 00:23:28,537
which was to be clear
and don't bluff,

519
00:23:28,668 --> 00:23:32,062
and also to say
as much as possible

520
00:23:32,193 --> 00:23:33,934
as quickly as possible.

521
00:23:34,064 --> 00:23:36,153
And my books are
essentially that way.

522
00:23:36,284 --> 00:23:38,678
I give away the big secrets in
the first page

523
00:23:38,808 --> 00:23:41,028
and tell people
what's going to happen.

524
00:23:42,595 --> 00:23:43,596
[snapping]

525
00:23:46,642 --> 00:23:49,993
Yeah, I suppose I knew about
one person in ten

526
00:23:50,124 --> 00:23:52,431
on this list of people
who died--

527
00:23:52,561 --> 00:23:56,391
classmates who died in, uh,
Second World War.

528
00:23:57,174 --> 00:23:59,829
Particularly,
close friend of mine was

529
00:23:59,960 --> 00:24:01,918
Hal Plummer,

530
00:24:02,049 --> 00:24:03,833
and he was just on
a training mission,

531
00:24:03,964 --> 00:24:06,706
he cracked up a plane
in San Francisco.

532
00:24:07,228 --> 00:24:08,838
Art Gipe.

533
00:24:08,969 --> 00:24:11,145
Yeah, he died of
spinal meningitis

534
00:24:11,275 --> 00:24:13,277
during basic training.
[laughs]

535
00:24:13,408 --> 00:24:17,673
Had one fraternity brother
at Cornell...

536
00:24:17,804 --> 00:24:22,156
uh, who was so excited upon
hearing that

537
00:24:22,286 --> 00:24:24,419
Pearl Harbor
had been bombed,

538
00:24:24,550 --> 00:24:25,986
he was taking a bath
and he somehow

539
00:24:26,116 --> 00:24:28,510
banged his head on a faucet
and died.

540
00:24:28,641 --> 00:24:31,078
[laughing]

541
00:24:32,688 --> 00:24:35,691
♪ [jazz]

542
00:24:41,567 --> 00:24:43,569
[indistinct chatter]

543
00:24:45,745 --> 00:24:48,487
[Kurt Vonnegut] Marge Murray
was my prom date,

544
00:24:48,835 --> 00:24:50,140
senior prom date.

545
00:24:50,271 --> 00:24:51,794
Wonderful dancer.

546
00:24:51,925 --> 00:24:53,753
Had blond, curly hair, too.

547
00:24:55,145 --> 00:24:56,625
[Bob Weide]
It was really interesting

548
00:24:56,756 --> 00:24:58,801
seeing Kurt interact with his
high school classmates.

549
00:24:58,932 --> 00:25:01,151
Many of them, I assume,
hadn't seen each other

550
00:25:01,282 --> 00:25:02,544
since they were 18,

551
00:25:02,936 --> 00:25:05,591
which I'm sure, for them,
didn't seem that long ago.

552
00:25:05,721 --> 00:25:08,202
[man] Yeah, well, my girlfriend
had me doin' this.

553
00:25:08,332 --> 00:25:09,508
You're too old to have
a girlfriend,

554
00:25:09,638 --> 00:25:10,857
don't bullshit me.

555
00:25:10,987 --> 00:25:12,423
[laughing]

556
00:25:12,554 --> 00:25:14,382
[Bob Weide]
This was the class of 1940.

557
00:25:14,513 --> 00:25:17,080
They had no idea what was
waiting just around the corner.

558
00:25:25,219 --> 00:25:26,829
I didn't know what the hell
they were talking about.

559
00:25:26,960 --> 00:25:27,917
You went through the ringer,
for cryin' out loud.

560
00:25:28,048 --> 00:25:29,049
Yeah.
What happened to you?

561
00:25:34,054 --> 00:25:36,709
I was in North Africa and they
sent me to China, Burma, India,

562
00:25:37,100 --> 00:25:38,711
and that's where it happened.

563
00:25:38,841 --> 00:25:40,408
-They really used you,
didn't they?
-They used me. Yeah.

564
00:25:43,063 --> 00:25:44,020
No, I couldn't

565
00:25:44,151 --> 00:25:45,282
-They have--
-I know.

566
00:25:45,413 --> 00:25:47,023
-They have no right to do that.
-I know.

567
00:25:51,506 --> 00:25:52,899
You're a real good guy,
I really like you.

568
00:25:53,029 --> 00:25:54,901
-Mustard gas? Where?
-Yeah. Well, we were...

569
00:25:55,031 --> 00:25:57,556
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Second World War
was fought by children.

570
00:25:58,208 --> 00:26:00,167
The movies give
the impression that

571
00:26:00,297 --> 00:26:02,909
war is fought by
middle-aged men.

572
00:26:03,605 --> 00:26:05,999
No, it's startling
how young soldiers are.

573
00:26:06,608 --> 00:26:08,262
[school bell rings]

574
00:26:09,959 --> 00:26:11,961
[explosions]

575
00:26:16,836 --> 00:26:18,881
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Anybody who's been in
the ground forces

576
00:26:19,012 --> 00:26:21,797
and been on the front lines...

577
00:26:21,928 --> 00:26:22,885
hates war.

578
00:26:23,016 --> 00:26:24,931
[explosions, rockets firing]

579
00:26:25,061 --> 00:26:26,933
[Kurt Vonnegut]
And I was involved in

580
00:26:27,063 --> 00:26:28,848
the biggest defeat of
American arms,

581
00:26:28,978 --> 00:26:31,024
which was the
Battle of the Bulge

582
00:26:32,591 --> 00:26:35,332
'Cause the Germans caught us
totally by surprise.

583
00:26:35,463 --> 00:26:36,899
They were all dressed in white,

584
00:26:37,030 --> 00:26:39,119
we were dressed in uniforms
the color of dog shit,

585
00:26:39,249 --> 00:26:40,947
and there was snow
all over the place.

586
00:26:41,077 --> 00:26:42,383
[laughter]

587
00:26:44,385 --> 00:26:47,214
And my whole division got
captured or wiped out.

588
00:26:48,519 --> 00:26:50,217
And after it was over,

589
00:26:50,347 --> 00:26:53,133
as far as you could see
going down the road,

590
00:26:53,263 --> 00:26:55,744
were American kids with
their hands up like this,

591
00:26:55,875 --> 00:26:58,094
'cause if you
took your hands down,
you'd get shot.

592
00:26:58,225 --> 00:27:01,271
♪

593
00:27:02,925 --> 00:27:04,971
[heartbeat]

594
00:27:05,406 --> 00:27:08,017
[Kurt Vonnegut]
What there is to see
is so nauseating

595
00:27:08,148 --> 00:27:11,151
so horrifying...

596
00:27:11,281 --> 00:27:13,370
you don't want to
hear about it anymore,

597
00:27:13,501 --> 00:27:15,242
you don't want to
talk about it.

598
00:27:18,941 --> 00:27:21,552
[train clacking]

599
00:27:26,079 --> 00:27:27,036
[bell clanging]

600
00:27:27,167 --> 00:27:28,734
[train whistle blows]

601
00:27:33,782 --> 00:27:36,306
[Kurt Vonnegut]
So all the captured Americans,
prisoners of war,

602
00:27:36,437 --> 00:27:37,917
were loaded on those trains

603
00:27:38,047 --> 00:27:40,267
and taken to the interior
of Germany.

604
00:27:49,363 --> 00:27:53,019
♪

605
00:27:56,370 --> 00:27:58,024
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"The skyline was intricate

606
00:27:58,154 --> 00:28:01,288
"and voluptuous and
enchanted and absurd.

607
00:28:01,418 --> 00:28:03,464
"It looked like a Sunday school
picture of Heaven

608
00:28:03,594 --> 00:28:05,684
"to Billy Pilgrim.

609
00:28:05,814 --> 00:28:09,513
"Somebody behind him
in the box car said Oz.

610
00:28:09,644 --> 00:28:12,473
"That was I.
That was me.

611
00:28:12,603 --> 00:28:15,868
The only other city I'd seen
was Indianapolis, Indiana."

612
00:28:17,608 --> 00:28:20,655
♪

613
00:28:20,786 --> 00:28:23,745
"The slaughterhouse wasn't
a busy place anymore.

614
00:28:23,876 --> 00:28:26,226
"The prisoners were taken to
the fifth building

615
00:28:26,356 --> 00:28:28,402
"inside the gate.

616
00:28:28,532 --> 00:28:30,578
"It had been built as
a shelter for pigs

617
00:28:30,709 --> 00:28:32,972
"about to be butchered.

618
00:28:33,102 --> 00:28:35,670
"Now it was going to serve as
a home away from home

619
00:28:35,801 --> 00:28:38,020
"for 100 American
prisoners of war.

620
00:28:40,022 --> 00:28:42,155
"The address was this:

621
00:28:42,285 --> 00:28:43,939
schlachthaus funf."

622
00:28:45,898 --> 00:28:48,509
[Bob Weide]
Uh, how was your division
put to work in Dresden

623
00:28:48,639 --> 00:28:49,945
when you first got there?

624
00:28:50,859 --> 00:28:52,165
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Privates, my division,

625
00:28:52,295 --> 00:28:55,255
uh, were put to work
in small factories.

626
00:28:56,865 --> 00:29:00,042
The Germans all explained to us
this is an old city,

627
00:29:00,869 --> 00:29:03,263
'cause it had a very long
art history,

628
00:29:03,393 --> 00:29:05,439
and many people
all over the world

629
00:29:05,569 --> 00:29:07,484
were sentimental
about Dresden,

630
00:29:08,398 --> 00:29:10,792
and so they never
expected to get hit.

631
00:29:12,794 --> 00:29:14,796
[engines roaring]

632
00:29:19,714 --> 00:29:21,760
[siren blaring]

633
00:29:27,896 --> 00:29:30,681
[engines roaring]

634
00:29:30,812 --> 00:29:32,945
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Billy Pilgrim was down in
a meat locker

635
00:29:33,075 --> 00:29:35,469
"on the night that Dresden
was destroyed.

636
00:29:35,599 --> 00:29:38,037
[explosions]

637
00:29:43,042 --> 00:29:45,784
"There were sounds like
giant footsteps above.

638
00:29:48,656 --> 00:29:52,225
"Those were sticks of
high explosive bombs.

639
00:29:52,355 --> 00:29:54,662
The giants
walked and walked."

640
00:29:54,793 --> 00:29:56,795
[heartbeat]

641
00:30:08,241 --> 00:30:10,156
[wind blowing]

642
00:30:10,286 --> 00:30:13,072
[metal clanking]

643
00:30:13,507 --> 00:30:14,725
[Kurt Vonnegut]
We all came out

644
00:30:14,856 --> 00:30:16,727
and we all looked around
at the same time.

645
00:30:20,557 --> 00:30:22,429
And the city was gone.

646
00:30:22,559 --> 00:30:25,214
♪

647
00:30:31,394 --> 00:30:33,396
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Dresden was like
the moon now,

648
00:30:33,527 --> 00:30:34,876
"nothing but minerals.

649
00:30:35,007 --> 00:30:36,443
"The stones were hot.

650
00:30:38,314 --> 00:30:40,795
"Everybody else in
the neighborhood was dead.

651
00:30:42,101 --> 00:30:43,406
"So it goes.

652
00:30:44,320 --> 00:30:46,540
[Kurt Vonnegut]
What really destroyed the city

653
00:30:46,670 --> 00:30:49,282
were the thousands of
very small fire bombs,

654
00:30:49,412 --> 00:30:51,284
and started so many fires

655
00:30:51,414 --> 00:30:53,764
they couldn't begin to
deal with them all.

656
00:30:54,678 --> 00:30:57,725
It created one big column
of flame,

657
00:30:57,856 --> 00:31:00,467
uh, roughly the same diameter
as the city.

658
00:31:00,597 --> 00:31:02,817
It generated tornadoes,

659
00:31:02,948 --> 00:31:05,472
and consumed
everything organic.

660
00:31:06,865 --> 00:31:09,780
Only prisoners of war
were allowed in there

661
00:31:09,911 --> 00:31:11,957
to, uh, start digging out
bodies,

662
00:31:12,087 --> 00:31:13,349
and that's what we did.

663
00:31:13,480 --> 00:31:16,526
♪

664
00:31:27,146 --> 00:31:31,237
I know what it's like to carry
the bodies of civilians

665
00:31:31,367 --> 00:31:33,892
while the Germans
watched silently.

666
00:31:36,242 --> 00:31:39,375
I didn't feel, uh,
particularly badly

667
00:31:39,506 --> 00:31:40,637
when I did it.

668
00:31:44,424 --> 00:31:46,121
I didn't feel much of anything.

669
00:31:52,693 --> 00:31:55,348
[train clacking]

670
00:31:59,874 --> 00:32:01,789
[Bob Weide] I think in the past
you've sort of downplayed

671
00:32:01,920 --> 00:32:05,836
that being like a major, pivotal
moment of your life.

672
00:32:05,967 --> 00:32:07,621
What-- What is
the truth as to

673
00:32:07,751 --> 00:32:09,144
living through
something like that?

674
00:32:10,189 --> 00:32:12,060
It was a great adventure
of my life

675
00:32:12,191 --> 00:32:13,757
and certainly something
to talk about.

676
00:32:13,888 --> 00:32:15,542
Indeed, I was there.

677
00:32:16,195 --> 00:32:18,284
The neighborhood dogs,
when I grew up,

678
00:32:18,414 --> 00:32:21,069
uh, had far greater--
[laughs]

679
00:32:21,200 --> 00:32:24,812
influence on what I am today
than-- than, uh,

680
00:32:24,943 --> 00:32:27,162
the mere firebombing
of Dresden.

681
00:32:28,207 --> 00:32:30,731
[Edie Vonnegut]
I think Kurt--
Yeah, he's full of it.

682
00:32:30,861 --> 00:32:33,777
He's seen too much,
you know, and he's--

683
00:32:33,908 --> 00:32:35,214
just living through
Dresden,

684
00:32:35,344 --> 00:32:37,912
and his sister dying
and all his friends,

685
00:32:38,043 --> 00:32:40,959
and seen too much anyway.

686
00:32:42,221 --> 00:32:44,440
No, I don't--
Did he really say that?

687
00:32:44,571 --> 00:32:48,183
You should see when he laughs at
the most inappropriate times,

688
00:32:48,314 --> 00:32:50,403
but it-- it seems right
somehow.

689
00:32:50,794 --> 00:32:52,753
Definitely his way of
sublimating.

690
00:32:58,106 --> 00:32:59,325
What, "so it goes?"

691
00:32:59,455 --> 00:33:00,543
[Bob Weide] Yeah,
let's talk about that.

692
00:33:02,241 --> 00:33:03,329
[typewriter clacking]

693
00:33:03,459 --> 00:33:04,852
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"On an average,

694
00:33:04,983 --> 00:33:08,247
"324,000 new babies
are born into the world

695
00:33:08,377 --> 00:33:09,422
"every day.

696
00:33:09,552 --> 00:33:11,293
"10,000 persons,
on an average,

697
00:33:11,424 --> 00:33:12,555
will have starved
to death

698
00:33:12,686 --> 00:33:14,340
or died from
malnutrition."

699
00:33:14,470 --> 00:33:15,950
-[bell dings]
-"So it goes.

700
00:33:16,081 --> 00:33:17,952
"They were all being killed
with their families.

701
00:33:18,083 --> 00:33:20,041
"So it goes.
He tore himself to pieces...

702
00:33:20,172 --> 00:33:21,825
"...throwing up
and throwing up.

703
00:33:21,956 --> 00:33:23,305
"So it goes.
...and every day,

704
00:33:23,436 --> 00:33:25,481
"my government gives me
a count of corpses...

705
00:33:25,612 --> 00:33:27,614
"So it goes.
...tried and shot...

706
00:33:27,744 --> 00:33:29,398
"So it goes.
...the champagne was dead,

707
00:33:29,529 --> 00:33:30,443
"So it goes.
So it goes.

708
00:33:30,573 --> 00:33:31,661
"So it goes.

709
00:33:32,271 --> 00:33:33,533
So it goes."

710
00:33:34,142 --> 00:33:37,885
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
It's intoned 100 times
in the novel.

711
00:33:38,016 --> 00:33:40,279
Vonnegut did it to
make it iconic.

712
00:33:40,409 --> 00:33:43,760
Death is so common,
so inevitable,

713
00:33:43,891 --> 00:33:47,590
we can't go to pieces
every time there's a death

714
00:33:47,721 --> 00:33:50,419
or we ourselves will just be
incapable of living.

715
00:33:50,550 --> 00:33:53,422
So you have to just sort of
shrug your shoulders

716
00:33:53,553 --> 00:33:55,381
-and say--
-"So it goes."

717
00:33:55,511 --> 00:33:57,426
I think it's a mantra
in his head.

718
00:33:57,557 --> 00:34:00,081
I think that's how he--
he copes.

719
00:34:03,432 --> 00:34:04,868
Through that book.

720
00:34:05,173 --> 00:34:06,479
He didn't talk about it.

721
00:34:06,609 --> 00:34:09,047
Yeah, that--
I found out about it...

722
00:34:09,177 --> 00:34:10,526
from
Slaughterhouse-Five.

723
00:34:10,787 --> 00:34:12,659
Horrible descriptions of
what was happening

724
00:34:12,789 --> 00:34:13,921
or going on around him.

725
00:34:14,661 --> 00:34:16,880
And it was very light, you know,
the way he wrote it.

726
00:34:18,012 --> 00:34:20,406
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Laughter was a--
was a great relief

727
00:34:20,536 --> 00:34:21,842
day after day,

728
00:34:21,972 --> 00:34:24,453
and it would have been
embarrassing to cry--

729
00:34:25,541 --> 00:34:27,021
cry day after day.

730
00:34:28,588 --> 00:34:31,460
I've said that it-- it--
I prefer laughter to crying

731
00:34:31,591 --> 00:34:34,550
because there's less cleaning up
to do afterward.

732
00:34:34,681 --> 00:34:36,770
Also, you can
shut it down faster.

733
00:34:37,597 --> 00:34:40,513
This business of the stuff
that happened to me in Dresden

734
00:34:40,643 --> 00:34:42,254
really had no impact

735
00:34:42,384 --> 00:34:46,127
is the same person who is
completely traumatized by it.

736
00:34:46,562 --> 00:34:48,564
It all went very fast,
you know,

737
00:34:48,695 --> 00:34:50,436
marvelous
once I was able to see

738
00:34:50,566 --> 00:34:52,264
in such a short time,

739
00:34:52,394 --> 00:34:54,135
and I wouldn't have missed it
for anything.

740
00:34:57,312 --> 00:34:59,575
[Nanny Vonnegut]
It is painful for him
to remember things.

741
00:35:00,272 --> 00:35:01,795
Memory is painful.

742
00:35:07,627 --> 00:35:10,020
I think he's doing lots of
artwork now, that helps.

743
00:35:10,151 --> 00:35:11,674
Drawing.

744
00:35:11,805 --> 00:35:12,806
[slide projector clicking]

745
00:35:12,936 --> 00:35:14,503
Bob, this is
Kurt Vonnegut.

746
00:35:14,634 --> 00:35:17,593
I just wanted to tell you
I sent via Federal Express

747
00:35:17,724 --> 00:35:19,552
a whole bunch of pictures
I made

748
00:35:19,682 --> 00:35:22,163
for an art show of mine
back in 1980.

749
00:35:22,294 --> 00:35:24,426
I thought you might be able
to use them

750
00:35:24,557 --> 00:35:26,820
some way in the film.

751
00:35:26,950 --> 00:35:29,649
If not, send them
right back to me. Bye.

752
00:35:36,830 --> 00:35:37,961
[Bob Weide]
How would you describe

753
00:35:38,092 --> 00:35:39,224
the artwork of
Kurt Vonnegut?

754
00:35:39,354 --> 00:35:40,399
[Kurt Vonnegut]
God, I don't know.

755
00:35:40,529 --> 00:35:42,270
I think-- I think, uh,

756
00:35:42,401 --> 00:35:44,316
what's such--
such a relief about it

757
00:35:44,446 --> 00:35:46,796
is that I don't have to say
what it's about.

758
00:35:46,927 --> 00:35:48,276
[chuckles]

759
00:35:48,407 --> 00:35:51,149
A friend of mine said,
"You're the only author

760
00:35:51,279 --> 00:35:54,587
who's paintings, uh,
look just like what you write."

761
00:35:58,199 --> 00:36:01,637
My books...

762
00:36:01,768 --> 00:36:03,900
are aggressively unreal.

763
00:36:05,206 --> 00:36:08,427
They make the reader
accept a premise,

764
00:36:08,557 --> 00:36:12,039
and unreasonable premise,
and then keep going.

765
00:36:12,170 --> 00:36:13,823
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Billy Pilgrim could not sleep

766
00:36:13,954 --> 00:36:15,564
"on his daughter's
wedding night,

767
00:36:15,695 --> 00:36:17,871
"though he knew there was
a flying saucer

768
00:36:18,001 --> 00:36:20,047
"from Tralfamadore
up there.

769
00:36:20,178 --> 00:36:22,658
He would see it soon enough
inside and out.

770
00:36:22,789 --> 00:36:23,964
and he would see, too,

771
00:36:24,094 --> 00:36:26,009
where it came from
soon enough."

772
00:36:26,401 --> 00:36:29,404
♪

773
00:36:38,239 --> 00:36:39,806
[Bob Weide]
In '94, we made a trip to

774
00:36:39,936 --> 00:36:42,243
Lake Maxinkuckee
in northern Indiana

775
00:36:42,374 --> 00:36:44,376
where the whole extended
Vonnegut family

776
00:36:44,506 --> 00:36:45,681
all had cottages.

777
00:36:47,248 --> 00:36:49,424
Just seeing these places

778
00:36:49,555 --> 00:36:52,993
brought it home
in a way that, uh...

779
00:36:53,123 --> 00:36:54,821
that really humanized him
for me.

780
00:36:55,996 --> 00:36:59,217
He was opening up about
his experience in Dresden,

781
00:36:59,652 --> 00:37:01,044
his childhood,

782
00:37:01,175 --> 00:37:04,134
seeing the place where he
actually came up with

783
00:37:04,265 --> 00:37:06,006
the idea of Tralfamadore.

784
00:37:07,399 --> 00:37:09,183
I had never read about it
in any book,

785
00:37:09,314 --> 00:37:13,622
he'd never written about it,
but... he, um...

786
00:37:13,753 --> 00:37:15,145
he showed me
where it happened.

787
00:37:16,973 --> 00:37:18,584
This platform here is--

788
00:37:18,714 --> 00:37:20,673
my father designed it
and had it built,

789
00:37:20,803 --> 00:37:22,501
and the family would
gather out here,

790
00:37:22,631 --> 00:37:24,067
particularly at night.

791
00:37:24,198 --> 00:37:26,331
And one night,
cousin Richard

792
00:37:26,461 --> 00:37:29,856
was naming the different stars
and constellations,

793
00:37:29,986 --> 00:37:32,946
and nobody knew whether he was
telling the truth or not.

794
00:37:33,076 --> 00:37:34,643
[chuckles]
And he would say,

795
00:37:34,774 --> 00:37:38,952
"Oh, there is Arcturus and there
is Andromeda and so forth.

796
00:37:39,082 --> 00:37:42,172
And so there was a lull
in the conversation,

797
00:37:42,303 --> 00:37:45,915
and I must have been about
ten years old, I think,

798
00:37:46,046 --> 00:37:50,964
and so I all of a sudden
pointed up to the sky

799
00:37:51,094 --> 00:37:54,228
and said,
"There is Tralfamadore.

800
00:37:54,359 --> 00:37:57,666
♪

801
00:37:57,797 --> 00:38:00,887
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"It was a flying saucer
from Tralfamadore.

802
00:38:01,017 --> 00:38:03,803
"The saucer was
100 feet in diameter

803
00:38:03,933 --> 00:38:05,892
"with portholes
around its rim.

804
00:38:06,022 --> 00:38:08,111
"It came down to
hover over Billy,

805
00:38:08,242 --> 00:38:09,896
"and to enclose him
in a cylinder

806
00:38:10,026 --> 00:38:11,289
of pulsing purple life."

807
00:38:11,419 --> 00:38:13,856
[applause]

808
00:38:13,987 --> 00:38:15,554
Where am I?

809
00:38:15,684 --> 00:38:17,991
[man] Welcome to the planet
Tralfamadore, Mr. Pilgrim.

810
00:38:18,731 --> 00:38:19,732
Oh, Finland.

811
00:38:20,907 --> 00:38:23,170
-Tralfama--
-[man] Tralfamadore.

812
00:38:24,824 --> 00:38:25,825
How did I get here?

813
00:38:25,955 --> 00:38:27,696
There is no "how,"
Mr. Pilgrim.

814
00:38:27,827 --> 00:38:29,089
There is no "why."

815
00:38:29,219 --> 00:38:31,265
The moment simply is.

816
00:38:31,396 --> 00:38:33,702
[Kurt Vonnegut]
I experimented with
the science fiction idea

817
00:38:33,833 --> 00:38:35,530
using it for relief...

818
00:38:36,314 --> 00:38:40,013
is to get some distance from
an atrocity of this sort

819
00:38:40,143 --> 00:38:43,973
to see how much it really
matters in the long view,

820
00:38:44,104 --> 00:38:46,976
and, uh, the science fiction
thing seemed to work.

821
00:38:47,542 --> 00:38:49,065
And it seemed to be amusing,

822
00:38:49,196 --> 00:38:51,024
and it seemed to lighten
the whole enterprise,

823
00:38:51,154 --> 00:38:52,721
so I kept it in.

824
00:38:52,852 --> 00:38:54,114
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Later in life,

825
00:38:54,244 --> 00:38:55,898
"the Tralfamadoreans
would advise Billy

826
00:38:56,029 --> 00:38:58,684
"to concentrate on
the happy moments of his life,

827
00:38:58,814 --> 00:39:00,599
"and to ignore
the unhappy ones;

828
00:39:00,729 --> 00:39:02,383
"to stare only at
pretty things

829
00:39:02,514 --> 00:39:04,603
as eternity
failed to go by."

830
00:39:04,733 --> 00:39:07,780
♪

831
00:39:10,217 --> 00:39:12,132
[Bob Weide]
Most authors impart
life lessons to

832
00:39:12,262 --> 00:39:14,439
the readers
in their books.

833
00:39:14,569 --> 00:39:16,789
Kurt gave me life lessons
in his living room.

834
00:39:17,485 --> 00:39:20,358
We would talk about
almost anything.

835
00:39:21,837 --> 00:39:23,970
Kurt was very interested
in my dating life.

836
00:39:24,100 --> 00:39:25,928
He'd ask me about what kind of
girls I was meeting,

837
00:39:26,059 --> 00:39:29,149
and he loved living vicariously
through a younger person

838
00:39:29,279 --> 00:39:30,280
who was still in
the open market.

839
00:39:31,499 --> 00:39:34,067
I met Linda in '94,
which was the same year

840
00:39:34,197 --> 00:39:35,721
that Kurt and I were in
Indianapolis,

841
00:39:35,851 --> 00:39:36,809
it was later that year.

842
00:39:36,939 --> 00:39:39,333
Vonnegut adored Linda.

843
00:39:39,464 --> 00:39:43,206
[narrator]
"Dear Romeo: and believe
me that is some Juliet!

844
00:39:43,337 --> 00:39:46,035
Go for it! That redhead
is a keeper."

845
00:39:46,166 --> 00:39:47,515
'Cause he'd say to me,
"When are you gonna get married?

846
00:39:47,646 --> 00:39:48,908
When are you gonna
marry that girl?"

847
00:39:49,038 --> 00:39:50,910
I said, uh,
"Well, I don't know.

848
00:39:51,040 --> 00:39:52,955
"I kind of feel I'm ready but,
you know,

849
00:39:53,086 --> 00:39:55,784
I think if we get married,
I'm probably ruling out kids."

850
00:39:55,915 --> 00:39:59,222
I was in my late 30s.

851
00:39:59,353 --> 00:40:01,877
Now, Linda's age is
a state secret.

852
00:40:02,008 --> 00:40:04,924
I can't say, but she's got
a few years on me.

853
00:40:05,054 --> 00:40:07,535
If we wanted kids, we would have
had to get on that right away.

854
00:40:07,666 --> 00:40:09,189
And Kurt said,
"Uh-huh."

855
00:40:10,451 --> 00:40:11,626
But I could see him
working on it,

856
00:40:11,757 --> 00:40:14,673
you know, like--
like a math problem.

857
00:40:14,803 --> 00:40:17,284
Thought about if for a while
and then he looked at me
and he said,

858
00:40:17,415 --> 00:40:18,546
"You don't need kids."

859
00:40:19,634 --> 00:40:22,507
I said, "Oh, okay.
Well, that's sorted."

860
00:40:23,203 --> 00:40:25,640
[man] This ceremony calls you
a lot of different names,

861
00:40:25,771 --> 00:40:27,816
man and woman...

862
00:40:27,947 --> 00:40:29,992
husband and wife,
bride and groom,

863
00:40:30,123 --> 00:40:32,908
but the most beautiful words are
the ones I recited in Hebrew

864
00:40:33,039 --> 00:40:35,911
which refer to both of you
as lovers and friends.

865
00:40:38,871 --> 00:40:41,221
[no audible dialog]

866
00:40:41,351 --> 00:40:44,398
♪

867
00:40:48,054 --> 00:40:50,622
[narrator]
"Dear Linda and Bob,

868
00:40:50,752 --> 00:40:54,103
"I've just FedExed
your wedding present.

869
00:40:54,234 --> 00:40:58,064
"It is a pair of
Victorian candlesticks

870
00:40:58,194 --> 00:41:03,069
"They are identical with a pair
I inherited from my father.

871
00:41:03,199 --> 00:41:06,812
"I have since given their like
to each of my children.

872
00:41:08,596 --> 00:41:11,817
"They have become
our family totem.

873
00:41:14,341 --> 00:41:16,430
Be happy. Kurt."

874
00:41:16,561 --> 00:41:19,564
♪

875
00:41:34,970 --> 00:41:36,581
[door creaking]

876
00:41:40,802 --> 00:41:43,152
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Our cottage was sold
to a stranger

877
00:41:43,283 --> 00:41:45,328
"at the end of
World War II.

878
00:41:45,459 --> 00:41:47,679
"The buyer put off taking
possession for a week

879
00:41:47,809 --> 00:41:49,376
"in order that I,

880
00:41:49,507 --> 00:41:52,466
"just married after being
discharged from the army,

881
00:41:52,597 --> 00:41:54,903
might take my bride there
for a honeymoon."

882
00:41:55,208 --> 00:41:58,254
♪

883
00:42:00,648 --> 00:42:02,868
"My bride, who's
name was Jane Cox,

884
00:42:02,998 --> 00:42:05,174
"had me read
The Brothers Karamazov

885
00:42:05,305 --> 00:42:06,698
"during our honeymoon.

886
00:42:06,828 --> 00:42:09,875
"She considered it the greatest
of all novels.

887
00:42:10,005 --> 00:42:12,181
"Jane was a writer too,
by the way.

888
00:42:13,095 --> 00:42:15,881
[Edie Vonnegut] Kurt and Jane
were big book lovers.

889
00:42:16,011 --> 00:42:18,057
He would give her a book and
she would give him a book

890
00:42:18,187 --> 00:42:19,885
it would be inscribed
on the day,

891
00:42:20,015 --> 00:42:22,670
and that was the anchor
in their relationship,

892
00:42:22,801 --> 00:42:24,411
it's a love of literature.

893
00:42:25,020 --> 00:42:28,110
I mean, I know it was,
I've read their love letters.

894
00:42:28,241 --> 00:42:32,288
[narrator]
"To Jane, whom I love
and shall love all my life.

895
00:42:32,419 --> 00:42:34,464
[continues reading]

896
00:42:40,949 --> 00:42:44,431
"Presented when we were too
young to even be engaged.

897
00:42:44,562 --> 00:42:45,737
Kurt."

898
00:42:46,041 --> 00:42:47,695
[Nanny Vonnegut]
My image of them
is very sweet

899
00:42:47,826 --> 00:42:49,828
'cause she's very
round and small,

900
00:42:49,958 --> 00:42:52,657
and he's very tall and--
and they loved each other.

901
00:42:52,787 --> 00:42:56,051
He was very, very romantic.
She loved that.

902
00:42:57,618 --> 00:42:59,402
I remember her,
when I was little,

903
00:42:59,533 --> 00:43:01,100
saying
there's no other voice,

904
00:43:01,230 --> 00:43:03,232
nobody who can talk
like this man.

905
00:43:03,581 --> 00:43:06,235
Really encouraged him to write,
and said, you have to do this.

906
00:43:07,759 --> 00:43:09,238
[narrator]
"Beloved,

907
00:43:09,369 --> 00:43:10,588
"from your loving me,

908
00:43:10,718 --> 00:43:12,415
"I've drawn
a measure of courage

909
00:43:12,546 --> 00:43:15,201
"that never would have
come to me otherwise.

910
00:43:15,331 --> 00:43:18,421
"You've given me the courage
to be a writer.

911
00:43:18,552 --> 00:43:21,773
"That much of my life
has been decided.

912
00:43:21,903 --> 00:43:23,905
"Regardless of my epitaph,

913
00:43:24,036 --> 00:43:27,996
to be a writer will have been
my personal, ultimate goal."

914
00:43:28,954 --> 00:43:31,347
Kurt and Jane's first son
was born.

915
00:43:31,478 --> 00:43:33,045
He was named for Mark Twain,

916
00:43:33,175 --> 00:43:35,874
and things became
quite different for Kurt.

917
00:43:36,352 --> 00:43:37,527
He needed a job.

918
00:43:38,441 --> 00:43:40,356
And here's where his
older brother, Bernard,

919
00:43:40,487 --> 00:43:41,531
came to the rescue.

920
00:43:42,881 --> 00:43:45,884
♪

921
00:43:49,931 --> 00:43:50,976
[snapping]

922
00:43:52,064 --> 00:43:55,067
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
Bernard was already
a world famous physicist

923
00:43:55,197 --> 00:43:58,636
working in the research
laboratory at General Electric.

924
00:43:58,766 --> 00:43:59,898
[Ginger Strand]
At GE labs,

925
00:44:00,028 --> 00:44:01,900
Bernard and his colleagues
discovered

926
00:44:02,030 --> 00:44:04,119
a new way
of seeding clouds

927
00:44:04,250 --> 00:44:05,643
with the chemical,
silver iodide,

928
00:44:05,773 --> 00:44:07,949
in order to make
rain or snow.

929
00:44:08,558 --> 00:44:11,779
He was as big a celebrity
in his own field

930
00:44:11,910 --> 00:44:14,086
as his little brother
would become later.

931
00:44:14,347 --> 00:44:17,567
Bernard heard that
the GE News Bureau
was looking for

932
00:44:17,698 --> 00:44:21,702
men to write, uh, publicity,
and Kurt took it.

933
00:44:24,574 --> 00:44:28,056
Kurt and Jane moved to
Alplaus, New York.

934
00:44:28,187 --> 00:44:30,189
Most of the people
who lived in Alplaus

935
00:44:30,319 --> 00:44:31,843
worked for General Electric.

936
00:44:32,713 --> 00:44:34,933
GE was a world unto itself.

937
00:44:35,063 --> 00:44:37,631
It had not only a huge factory,

938
00:44:37,762 --> 00:44:41,722
but the extensive research lab
that Bernard worked in.

939
00:44:41,853 --> 00:44:44,899
[Kurt Vonnegut]
It was one hell of
a good company.

940
00:44:45,421 --> 00:44:48,250
It was the United States
at its best.

941
00:44:48,381 --> 00:44:49,730
[Ginger Strand]
Kurt's job was to

942
00:44:49,861 --> 00:44:51,427
go around the company

943
00:44:51,558 --> 00:44:55,170
and learn about all these
fantastic scientific advances

944
00:44:55,301 --> 00:44:57,085
that the company was making.

945
00:44:57,216 --> 00:44:59,958
So he really was seeing
the future.

946
00:45:03,178 --> 00:45:04,571
Although he kept it a secret,

947
00:45:04,702 --> 00:45:07,617
he had a desk at home
and was working very hard

948
00:45:07,748 --> 00:45:11,447
to compose stories on evenings
and weekends.

949
00:45:11,578 --> 00:45:13,928
He and Jane studied
magazines together

950
00:45:14,059 --> 00:45:17,497
to try to figure out what
editors might want to buy.

951
00:45:17,627 --> 00:45:19,978
[man] He was writing,
writing, writing,

952
00:45:20,108 --> 00:45:22,850
and finally he had
something to write about.

953
00:45:22,981 --> 00:45:24,156
You'll get a kick out of this.

954
00:45:24,286 --> 00:45:26,332
It shows step-by-step
automation.

955
00:45:26,462 --> 00:45:29,030
♪

956
00:45:30,466 --> 00:45:33,339
[Kurt Vonnegut]
My father and my brother
were both technocrats,

957
00:45:33,469 --> 00:45:35,820
and thought that engineers could
straighten out the world,

958
00:45:35,950 --> 00:45:37,604
and I believed that
for a long time.

959
00:45:38,039 --> 00:45:40,868
General Electric showed me
a milling machine

960
00:45:40,999 --> 00:45:43,131
which was being run
by punch cards

961
00:45:43,262 --> 00:45:45,220
that could do it better than
a man could.

962
00:45:45,830 --> 00:45:47,179
But they were ashamed.

963
00:45:47,614 --> 00:45:49,268
They were worried about
what they'd done

964
00:45:49,398 --> 00:45:51,009
and they felt guilt
about it,

965
00:45:51,139 --> 00:45:54,664
and the whole emphasis now is
throwing people out of work.

966
00:45:55,709 --> 00:45:57,667
I was so optimistic about
science

967
00:45:57,798 --> 00:45:59,017
during the Great Depression

968
00:45:59,147 --> 00:46:02,847
that I almost believed that,
uh, by 1945,

969
00:46:02,977 --> 00:46:04,413
we would have cornered God,

970
00:46:04,544 --> 00:46:06,111
taken a color photograph of him,

971
00:46:06,241 --> 00:46:08,722
and printed it on the cover of
Popular Mechanics.

972
00:46:08,853 --> 00:46:11,464
-[laughter]
-And, uh, instead, of course,

973
00:46:11,594 --> 00:46:13,771
we-- we dropped a bomb
on Hiroshima.

974
00:46:14,946 --> 00:46:18,950
After seeing what
scientific truth could do,

975
00:46:19,080 --> 00:46:20,560
I lost interest in truths,

976
00:46:20,690 --> 00:46:23,650
and I've been trying to think up
neat lies ever since.

977
00:46:23,781 --> 00:46:25,870
[tyepewriter clacking]

978
00:46:26,435 --> 00:46:28,742
[Ginger Strand] Kurt had had
the idea for a novel

979
00:46:28,873 --> 00:46:30,657
about a GE like company.

980
00:46:30,788 --> 00:46:33,747
He began working on what would
become Player Piano,

981
00:46:33,878 --> 00:46:35,401
which he saw as the novel

982
00:46:35,531 --> 00:46:38,143
that would make his
literary reputation.

983
00:46:38,665 --> 00:46:41,799
It's about a future
in which machines

984
00:46:41,929 --> 00:46:44,236
have entirely replaced
human beings.

985
00:46:44,366 --> 00:46:47,805
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
People, by not having
meaningful work to do,

986
00:46:47,935 --> 00:46:50,242
begin to think their lives
themselves

987
00:46:50,372 --> 00:46:51,852
are not meaningful.

988
00:46:51,983 --> 00:46:55,377
But he realized he could
never hope to publish this novel

989
00:46:55,508 --> 00:46:58,380
and continue working at GE.

990
00:46:58,511 --> 00:47:01,601
♪

991
00:47:01,862 --> 00:47:04,038
The work he had to do was,
you know,

992
00:47:04,169 --> 00:47:07,259
sitting in a cubicle
typing up public relations.

993
00:47:08,086 --> 00:47:10,566
[Ginger Strand]
GE very much wanted to
tell you how to think,

994
00:47:10,697 --> 00:47:11,872
so as he worked there,

995
00:47:12,003 --> 00:47:14,570
he grew more and more
uncomfortable,

996
00:47:14,701 --> 00:47:17,008
with the job of
company man.

997
00:47:17,138 --> 00:47:19,532
And it was, in fact,
Jane who convinced him

998
00:47:19,662 --> 00:47:21,926
to take himself seriously
as a writer.

999
00:47:23,014 --> 00:47:24,929
Kurt's advance for
Player Piano

1000
00:47:25,059 --> 00:47:27,105
was $2500.

1001
00:47:27,540 --> 00:47:29,368
It as a good pay out,

1002
00:47:29,498 --> 00:47:31,457
but a novel takes
a year to write.

1003
00:47:31,587 --> 00:47:34,721
It was a much better living
to write short stories,

1004
00:47:34,852 --> 00:47:37,202
which he could crank out
in a couple of weeks.

1005
00:47:37,332 --> 00:47:41,336
He set himself this goal
of selling five

1006
00:47:41,467 --> 00:47:43,730
before he would allow himself
to quit his job.

1007
00:47:46,211 --> 00:47:47,995
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Writing for the magazines

1008
00:47:48,126 --> 00:47:51,216
they told me an awful lot about
how to tell a story.

1009
00:47:51,346 --> 00:47:53,348
[typewriter clacking]

1010
00:47:54,697 --> 00:47:56,264
I would mail off a story,

1011
00:47:56,395 --> 00:47:58,092
and then wait for
the money to come

1012
00:47:58,223 --> 00:47:59,702
and the money
wouldn't come.

1013
00:48:01,879 --> 00:48:03,968
The story would come back
instead,

1014
00:48:04,098 --> 00:48:06,144
and they would tell me
what was wrong with it.

1015
00:48:07,797 --> 00:48:10,844
♪

1016
00:48:11,453 --> 00:48:12,933
[Nanny Vonnegut]
And it was slow going.

1017
00:48:13,064 --> 00:48:15,544
You wouldn't believe the piles
of rejection letters,

1018
00:48:15,675 --> 00:48:17,198
piles, I mean, this thick.

1019
00:48:18,504 --> 00:48:19,984
[Ginger Strand]
His father never thought

1020
00:48:20,114 --> 00:48:23,422
he would have it in him
to make a living as a writer.

1021
00:48:23,552 --> 00:48:25,641
He probably needed to prove it
to himself

1022
00:48:25,772 --> 00:48:28,731
that he would, in fact,
be able to support his family.

1023
00:48:28,862 --> 00:48:31,734
In spite of the rejection
letters that piled up,

1024
00:48:31,865 --> 00:48:34,389
Jane was
incredibly encouraging.

1025
00:48:34,824 --> 00:48:36,304
[Edie Vonnegut]
She's writing to editors,

1026
00:48:36,435 --> 00:48:38,959
please read this,
it's my husband,

1027
00:48:39,090 --> 00:48:42,136
and no one knows it now,
but he's very gifted.

1028
00:48:42,702 --> 00:48:44,399
[Nanny Vonnegut]
They were very passionate,
long letters,

1029
00:48:44,530 --> 00:48:46,314
like, you don't even know
what you gave up.

1030
00:48:46,445 --> 00:48:49,143
She was fierce, just saying
this man is a genius.

1031
00:48:49,274 --> 00:48:50,710
[Mark Vonnegut] I mean,
she believed in him

1032
00:48:50,840 --> 00:48:52,277
in a way I don't think he did.

1033
00:48:52,625 --> 00:48:54,932
He would have given up
without her.

1034
00:48:55,062 --> 00:48:57,586
[Ginger Strand]
One day, while he was
still working at GE,

1035
00:48:57,717 --> 00:49:00,633
he came home and there
sitting on the piano

1036
00:49:00,763 --> 00:49:03,505
where Jane had put it
was a check for

1037
00:49:03,636 --> 00:49:05,464
the first short story
that he ever sold

1038
00:49:05,594 --> 00:49:08,206
Report on the Barnhouse Effect
for Collier's.

1039
00:49:08,336 --> 00:49:11,383
♪

1040
00:49:15,474 --> 00:49:16,997
[Bob Weide]
Why don't you explain
what that is.

1041
00:49:17,128 --> 00:49:22,263
Yeah. Well, this is a letter
dated October 28, 1949.

1042
00:49:22,829 --> 00:49:24,570
And I wrote it to my father.

1043
00:49:24,700 --> 00:49:27,355
[reading]

1044
00:49:27,486 --> 00:49:29,227
"I think I'm on my way.

1045
00:49:29,357 --> 00:49:32,360
[continues reading]

1046
00:49:34,362 --> 00:49:37,322
"I will then quit this
goddamn nightmare job,

1047
00:49:37,452 --> 00:49:39,498
"and never take another one
so long as I live,

1048
00:49:39,628 --> 00:49:40,586
"so help me God.

1049
00:49:40,716 --> 00:49:42,762
[continues reading]

1050
00:49:44,503 --> 00:49:46,853
"Love, K," which is
my family nickname.

1051
00:49:46,984 --> 00:49:50,944
And father glued this to
a piece of Masonite

1052
00:49:51,075 --> 00:49:52,293
and varnished it,

1053
00:49:52,424 --> 00:49:55,993
and on the back of
this plaque, uh,

1054
00:49:56,123 --> 00:49:58,604
he has this Shakespearean
quotation.

1055
00:49:58,734 --> 00:50:01,476
"An oath, an oath,
I have an oath in Heaven:

1056
00:50:01,607 --> 00:50:03,957
Shall I lay perjury on my soul?"

1057
00:50:04,088 --> 00:50:07,134
♪

1058
00:50:08,048 --> 00:50:10,224
[Kurt Vonnegut]
There was an enormous
magazine industry,

1059
00:50:10,355 --> 00:50:12,922
which paid very high prices
for stories,

1060
00:50:13,053 --> 00:50:14,315
and they needed lots of them.

1061
00:50:14,446 --> 00:50:16,361
They paid tons of money
for them.

1062
00:50:16,491 --> 00:50:18,667
[Ginger Strand]
Short stories were
popular entertainment.

1063
00:50:18,798 --> 00:50:21,670
They really were
the television of the era.

1064
00:50:21,931 --> 00:50:23,411
[Kurt Vonnegut]
I had money piled up.

1065
00:50:23,542 --> 00:50:25,500
[laughing]

1066
00:50:25,631 --> 00:50:27,415
I'd never been this rich.

1067
00:50:27,850 --> 00:50:31,332
In a period of a few months,
I had made more money than

1068
00:50:31,463 --> 00:50:34,031
General Electric was prepared
to pay me all year.

1069
00:50:34,466 --> 00:50:35,945
[Ginger Strand]
It quickly became apparent

1070
00:50:36,076 --> 00:50:39,123
that they really had no reason
to stay in Schenectady.

1071
00:50:39,514 --> 00:50:43,170
At the end of 1950,
he handed in his notice to GE

1072
00:50:43,301 --> 00:50:45,912
and decided that he was
going to be a writer full time.

1073
00:50:47,000 --> 00:50:49,046
[birds chirping]

1074
00:50:51,483 --> 00:50:54,834
♪

1075
00:50:54,964 --> 00:50:56,575
[narrator]
"Dear Bob,

1076
00:50:56,705 --> 00:51:00,274
[reading]

1077
00:51:00,405 --> 00:51:03,582
"Have Edie show you
the underpass on route 6-A

1078
00:51:03,712 --> 00:51:05,975
"where she has painted angels.

1079
00:51:06,106 --> 00:51:08,500
"and the stone garage
in West Barnstable

1080
00:51:08,630 --> 00:51:11,677
"where I sold sops and
wrote Rosewater.

1081
00:51:11,807 --> 00:51:13,592
"And the Barnstable
Comedy Club

1082
00:51:13,722 --> 00:51:15,246
of which
I was once president

1083
00:51:15,376 --> 00:51:18,031
"and which inspired
Who Am I This Time?

1084
00:51:18,162 --> 00:51:20,425
"And the Madonna in
St. Mary's Church

1085
00:51:20,555 --> 00:51:23,384
"which I gave to the church
in memory of my sister

1086
00:51:23,515 --> 00:51:25,299
after our father died."

1087
00:51:27,301 --> 00:51:29,564
[Bob Weide]
Why don't we start
by getting us oriented

1088
00:51:29,695 --> 00:51:30,957
and just telling us
what is--

1089
00:51:31,088 --> 00:51:32,611
what is the significance of
where we are?

1090
00:51:34,874 --> 00:51:36,005
[Nanny Vonnegut]
This is Barnstable.

1091
00:51:37,877 --> 00:51:39,400
Sweet little town of
Barnstable.

1092
00:51:40,575 --> 00:51:42,708
This is where they
started their life.

1093
00:51:46,451 --> 00:51:48,670
[Edie Vonnegut]
Barnstable was
a great place to write

1094
00:51:48,801 --> 00:51:50,455
and he could get to
New York easily,

1095
00:51:50,585 --> 00:51:51,934
and meet editors.

1096
00:51:52,065 --> 00:51:53,936
But he didn't have
a job, really.

1097
00:51:54,067 --> 00:51:56,939
He cut all his safety nets by
quitting General Electric

1098
00:51:57,070 --> 00:51:58,289
and coming here.

1099
00:51:59,986 --> 00:52:02,162
He was probably
the only writer in town.

1100
00:52:02,293 --> 00:52:04,425
♪

1101
00:52:04,556 --> 00:52:07,689
[Bob Weide]
Edie still lives in Cape Cod

1102
00:52:07,820 --> 00:52:10,214
in the house that the
Vonnegut family grew up in

1103
00:52:10,344 --> 00:52:11,476
in West Barnstable.

1104
00:52:12,129 --> 00:52:15,567
To me, it was thrilling just to
go and-- and film these sites,

1105
00:52:15,697 --> 00:52:19,875
to be able to look at the house
where Kurt Vonnegut lived.

1106
00:52:20,006 --> 00:52:23,052
♪

1107
00:52:34,890 --> 00:52:37,023
If someone had told
the high school me

1108
00:52:37,154 --> 00:52:39,547
that someday I'd spend
several nights in the room where

1109
00:52:39,678 --> 00:52:41,984
Kurt Vonnegut
wrote all those books,

1110
00:52:42,115 --> 00:52:43,856
I think my head
would have exploded.

1111
00:52:45,727 --> 00:52:47,033
There'd be hair everywhere.

1112
00:52:47,294 --> 00:52:50,297
♪

1113
00:52:54,693 --> 00:52:57,652
Okay.
This is Kurt's studio.

1114
00:52:58,914 --> 00:53:01,352
And when he couldn't write,
he would paint doors.

1115
00:53:01,656 --> 00:53:04,746
I remember it being just a mess,
papers everywhere,

1116
00:53:04,877 --> 00:53:07,227
and toxic with smoke.

1117
00:53:07,358 --> 00:53:09,708
He would play the worst music
on the radio.

1118
00:53:09,838 --> 00:53:11,840
Muzak. Elevator music.

1119
00:53:12,580 --> 00:53:14,321
-Do you remember that?
-[chuckles] Yeah.

1120
00:53:14,452 --> 00:53:15,888
-Horrible, annoying music.
-[Edie Vonnegut] It was hideous.

1121
00:53:16,018 --> 00:53:18,934
♪[Muzak]

1122
00:53:19,065 --> 00:53:22,895
[Edie Vonnegut]
He carved these words,
which are Thoreau's,

1123
00:53:23,025 --> 00:53:24,940
and it says,
"Beware of all enterprises

1124
00:53:25,071 --> 00:53:26,812
that require new clothes,"

1125
00:53:26,942 --> 00:53:28,509
which led all of us children
to think

1126
00:53:28,640 --> 00:53:29,771
we never had to get a job,

1127
00:53:29,902 --> 00:53:31,643
-don't you think?
-[chuckling]

1128
00:53:31,773 --> 00:53:34,863
Kurt would write, like,
all stooped over

1129
00:53:34,994 --> 00:53:36,561
on this low table.

1130
00:53:36,691 --> 00:53:38,084
Your posture's too good,
you know,

1131
00:53:38,215 --> 00:53:39,607
-it's gotta be
really bent there.
-Okay, and--

1132
00:53:39,738 --> 00:53:42,610
-And his knees were up here.
-His knees were up here,

1133
00:53:42,741 --> 00:53:43,829
and it was beautiful.

1134
00:53:43,959 --> 00:53:45,787
Also, he'd have
his ankles crossed,

1135
00:53:45,918 --> 00:53:47,398
he had really long legs,

1136
00:53:47,528 --> 00:53:49,574
and so he would be
all hunched over.

1137
00:53:49,835 --> 00:53:52,577
[clacking]

1138
00:53:52,707 --> 00:53:54,100
It had a-- a music to it,

1139
00:53:54,231 --> 00:53:57,930
it would stop and...
go fast and then stop

1140
00:53:58,060 --> 00:54:00,454
and... like that.

1141
00:54:01,760 --> 00:54:03,675
[typewriter clacking]

1142
00:54:03,805 --> 00:54:05,111
[Nanny Vonnegut]
He was funny

1143
00:54:05,242 --> 00:54:06,373
and we was always trying
to teach us stuff, too.

1144
00:54:06,504 --> 00:54:07,853
He was very smart.

1145
00:54:07,983 --> 00:54:09,855
He took a break once
and wanted to sit me down

1146
00:54:09,985 --> 00:54:11,987
and give me a little lesson
about life.

1147
00:54:12,118 --> 00:54:14,773
And he said, "As soon as you
think life is turning up roses,

1148
00:54:14,903 --> 00:54:16,035
it gonna turn to shit.

1149
00:54:16,165 --> 00:54:17,993
We're being racked up
by technology.

1150
00:54:18,124 --> 00:54:19,604
The magazines got
knocked out,

1151
00:54:19,734 --> 00:54:21,258
not by any
spiritual change

1152
00:54:21,388 --> 00:54:24,783
but by the invention of
practical television.

1153
00:54:25,218 --> 00:54:27,568
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
TV is now controlling
the entertainment industry,

1154
00:54:27,699 --> 00:54:29,614
and that's how Vonnegut
starts losing

1155
00:54:29,744 --> 00:54:31,050
his short story markets.

1156
00:54:31,180 --> 00:54:33,139
As he put it,
television came

1157
00:54:33,270 --> 00:54:35,924
and my cash cows all died.

1158
00:54:38,579 --> 00:54:39,885
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
Vonnegut realizes

1159
00:54:40,015 --> 00:54:41,930
he's gonna have to write novels
to make money.

1160
00:54:42,061 --> 00:54:45,717
The problem was, he could get
an advance for a novel,

1161
00:54:45,847 --> 00:54:48,633
2500 bucks, 3,000 tops,

1162
00:54:48,763 --> 00:54:51,331
that would take him
two years to write.

1163
00:54:51,462 --> 00:54:54,203
[Ginger Strand]
Player Piano
was published in 1952.

1164
00:54:54,465 --> 00:54:57,511
It pretty quickly disappeared
from the literary scene.

1165
00:54:57,642 --> 00:55:02,342
And then he spends 17 years
writing every day

1166
00:55:02,473 --> 00:55:05,345
and striving for
a literary reputation.

1167
00:55:05,476 --> 00:55:07,869
It wasn't practical at all
to be a writer.

1168
00:55:08,479 --> 00:55:10,959
Everyone else's fathers
had jobs.

1169
00:55:11,090 --> 00:55:14,006
I think Kurt and Jane
felt like bumpkins.

1170
00:55:14,136 --> 00:55:16,748
There weren't that many people
that Dad could talk to.

1171
00:55:16,878 --> 00:55:18,924
So he was
a little lonesome here.

1172
00:55:19,054 --> 00:55:20,839
Ultimately, I think it was
good for him.

1173
00:55:20,969 --> 00:55:22,884
I think he wrote
his best books here

1174
00:55:23,015 --> 00:55:25,452
because he didn't have
any distractions.

1175
00:55:25,583 --> 00:55:27,106
[Nanny Vonnegut]
He just always had
a story in his head.

1176
00:55:27,236 --> 00:55:30,327
You could tell. He was always
talking about it, an idea.

1177
00:55:30,588 --> 00:55:32,764
Just seeing what my--
the chapters in his life,

1178
00:55:32,894 --> 00:55:34,374
what he'd
already been through,

1179
00:55:34,505 --> 00:55:37,812
what he had survived at 20--
prisoner of war--

1180
00:55:37,943 --> 00:55:40,249
and then his--
his losing his sister.

1181
00:55:40,380 --> 00:55:42,382
[clicking]

1182
00:55:44,166 --> 00:55:45,994
[indistinct dialog]

1183
00:55:46,952 --> 00:55:50,042
[Kurt Vonnegut]
The way to achieve
artistic wholeness...

1184
00:55:50,172 --> 00:55:53,350
is to create for
one person... in mind.

1185
00:55:53,480 --> 00:55:55,221
And I thought about it
and realized

1186
00:55:55,352 --> 00:55:57,571
that I write with
my sister in mind.

1187
00:55:59,094 --> 00:56:02,141
♪

1188
00:56:09,409 --> 00:56:11,411
[Edie Vonnegut]
The situation was

1189
00:56:11,542 --> 00:56:13,848
that Kurt's sister, Allie,
had cancer.

1190
00:56:14,109 --> 00:56:16,895
So a tragedy was coming,
it was inevitable,

1191
00:56:17,025 --> 00:56:19,332
she had terminal cancer,
she had it everywhere.

1192
00:56:19,637 --> 00:56:21,116
And she was going to die.

1193
00:56:21,247 --> 00:56:22,727
She had four sons,

1194
00:56:22,857 --> 00:56:25,817
and her husband, Jim, was gonna
take care of the boys.

1195
00:56:25,947 --> 00:56:28,254
And the horrible thing
that happened

1196
00:56:28,385 --> 00:56:31,344
was he would commute on
a train to Manhattan,

1197
00:56:31,475 --> 00:56:34,042
and his train went over
an open drawbridge.

1198
00:56:34,739 --> 00:56:35,957
And he drowned.

1199
00:56:37,437 --> 00:56:39,787
♪

1200
00:56:39,918 --> 00:56:42,964
But Allie was in the hospital.
She wasn't supposed to die

1201
00:56:43,095 --> 00:56:45,227
for another month or
maybe two months.

1202
00:56:46,359 --> 00:56:48,883
And the nurse gave her
the newspaper.

1203
00:56:50,842 --> 00:56:53,018
And she knew that Jim
was on that train.

1204
00:56:55,368 --> 00:56:57,239
She died two days later.

1205
00:56:58,719 --> 00:57:01,722
♪

1206
00:57:03,594 --> 00:57:05,247
[Nanny Vonnegut]
I don't think he can,
even now,

1207
00:57:05,378 --> 00:57:06,771
get his arms around it.

1208
00:57:09,034 --> 00:57:12,559
I think Allie's death was
the biggest loss of his life.

1209
00:57:12,690 --> 00:57:15,693
♪

1210
00:57:17,303 --> 00:57:20,262
[Kurt Vonnegut] Sadness is
an interesting emotion.

1211
00:57:21,133 --> 00:57:23,788
You really don't know how
anything's gonna hit you.

1212
00:57:25,529 --> 00:57:27,835
And I can't bear to look at
photo albums,

1213
00:57:27,966 --> 00:57:29,837
'cause they just make me
terribly sad.

1214
00:57:34,233 --> 00:57:38,193
I-- I think of all that's gone
and will never come back.

1215
00:57:38,324 --> 00:57:41,370
♪

1216
00:57:42,676 --> 00:57:43,938
[Nanny Vonnegut]
If you look at the films,

1217
00:57:44,069 --> 00:57:45,592
she's very protective
of him,

1218
00:57:45,723 --> 00:57:48,377
and is hovering over him
and just adored him.

1219
00:57:49,074 --> 00:57:52,338
I mean, that was just the purest
type of love there is.

1220
00:57:53,861 --> 00:57:56,908
♪

1221
00:57:57,822 --> 00:57:59,824
[Edie Vonnegut]
Kurt had to drive up there

1222
00:57:59,954 --> 00:58:02,435
and see Allie
before she died.

1223
00:58:03,131 --> 00:58:06,091
And she was able to say,

1224
00:58:06,221 --> 00:58:07,745
"Keep my boys together."

1225
00:58:09,529 --> 00:58:12,532
♪

1226
00:58:16,231 --> 00:58:19,800
The gesture that Kurt made
to take all four of us,

1227
00:58:19,931 --> 00:58:21,976
was really extraordinary.

1228
00:58:22,673 --> 00:58:24,544
I can't imagine anybody else
doing it.

1229
00:58:24,675 --> 00:58:25,937
He really did it.

1230
00:58:27,591 --> 00:58:29,201
[Mark Vonnegut]
He came back with the kids,

1231
00:58:29,331 --> 00:58:30,681
two dogs
and a pet rabbit.

1232
00:58:31,464 --> 00:58:34,598
And, uh, changed
everybody's life.

1233
00:58:37,557 --> 00:58:39,820
[Edie Vonnegut]
And it seems like
destiny now.

1234
00:58:39,951 --> 00:58:42,693
Over night, our house
went from being

1235
00:58:42,823 --> 00:58:46,000
a quiet place with three
well behaved kids,

1236
00:58:46,131 --> 00:58:48,960
to seven kids out of control.

1237
00:58:49,787 --> 00:58:52,790
♪

1238
00:58:53,660 --> 00:58:55,532
There was a lot of
running around,

1239
00:58:55,662 --> 00:58:56,968
playfulness and activity

1240
00:58:57,098 --> 00:58:58,752
and horrible practical joking.

1241
00:58:59,797 --> 00:59:01,102
[Jim Adams]
It wasn't long after
we moved over there

1242
00:59:01,233 --> 00:59:02,669
when I started raising hell.

1243
00:59:02,800 --> 00:59:05,672
We'd break into houses,
we'd break windows,

1244
00:59:05,803 --> 00:59:08,762
we'd make bombs and blow up
doors in mailboxes.

1245
00:59:08,893 --> 00:59:11,112
I thought it was terrific fun.

1246
00:59:11,243 --> 00:59:12,505
We were
one-stop shopping for

1247
00:59:12,636 --> 00:59:14,333
the Barnstable
police department.

1248
00:59:14,681 --> 00:59:16,553
They would just pull into
the driveway

1249
00:59:16,683 --> 00:59:18,772
and try to figure out
which kid had done it.

1250
00:59:18,903 --> 00:59:21,079
All the other kids
loved it over there

1251
00:59:21,209 --> 00:59:23,037
because it was just like
free-for-all.

1252
00:59:23,168 --> 00:59:24,299
[Nanny Vonnegut]
It was just total chaos

1253
00:59:24,430 --> 00:59:25,387
from my point of view,

1254
00:59:25,518 --> 00:59:26,563
and it was just great chaos.

1255
00:59:26,693 --> 00:59:28,826
[chuckles]
We were running wild.

1256
00:59:28,956 --> 00:59:31,176
And he was writing
through all this.

1257
00:59:31,306 --> 00:59:34,527
[Edie Vonnegut]
Kurt's studio was off
the end of the house.

1258
00:59:34,658 --> 00:59:37,443
And he would come out
and just, "Shut up!"

1259
00:59:37,574 --> 00:59:39,401
"Shut up.
Shut up."

1260
00:59:39,532 --> 00:59:41,142
"All you kids, shut up!"

1261
00:59:43,492 --> 00:59:45,016
[Kurt Adams]
He was moody.

1262
00:59:45,146 --> 00:59:46,844
-[Steve Adams] He was scary.
-[Kurt Adams] Scary moody.

1263
00:59:46,974 --> 00:59:49,760
He'd come storming out of
his study and, ooh.

1264
00:59:49,890 --> 00:59:51,631
You never knew what
you were gonna get.

1265
00:59:51,762 --> 00:59:53,938
You had to be
sort of on guard

1266
00:59:54,068 --> 00:59:56,897
so as not to get his wrath.

1267
00:59:57,594 --> 00:59:59,813
[Bob Weide]
Is there any way that you
would describe him as

1268
00:59:59,944 --> 01:00:02,686
-cuddly or...
-[laughs]

1269
01:00:03,774 --> 01:00:04,818
No.

1270
01:00:06,777 --> 01:00:09,127
I don't think he wanted too much
cuddling. [chuckles]

1271
01:00:10,215 --> 01:00:11,869
He cuddled with the dog.

1272
01:00:13,697 --> 01:00:16,700
[Edie Vonnegut]
Kurt would roll around with
Sandy on the kitchen floor,

1273
01:00:16,830 --> 01:00:19,267
and I remember always being
a little jealous.

1274
01:00:19,398 --> 01:00:22,183
Why doesn't he wrestle with me
like that? [chuckles]

1275
01:00:24,621 --> 01:00:25,709
[Mark Vonnegut]
He said to us sometimes,

1276
01:00:25,839 --> 01:00:27,536
"Please let me off
the father hook,"

1277
01:00:27,667 --> 01:00:29,277
which is not a good thing
to say to your children,

1278
01:00:29,408 --> 01:00:31,540
but... [laughs]

1279
01:00:31,671 --> 01:00:33,151
nobody's perfect.

1280
01:00:34,021 --> 01:00:36,415
[Nanny Vonnegut]
It was so intense
what he was doing.

1281
01:00:37,416 --> 01:00:40,114
As family, you learn how to
stay clear.

1282
01:00:40,680 --> 01:00:42,813
My mother was a huge force.

1283
01:00:42,943 --> 01:00:45,816
She was his gatekeeper
and guarded that door.

1284
01:00:45,946 --> 01:00:47,339
She sort of
trapped him in there

1285
01:00:47,469 --> 01:00:49,036
and said,
"You have to do this."

1286
01:00:49,341 --> 01:00:50,734
Really encouraged him to write.

1287
01:00:51,691 --> 01:00:54,433
[Jim Adams] Jane was always
washing clothes,

1288
01:00:54,563 --> 01:00:56,043
vacuuming, sweeping.

1289
01:00:56,174 --> 01:00:58,655
Kurt was not a sharer of
domestic duties.

1290
01:00:58,916 --> 01:01:00,047
Kurt didn't do anything.

1291
01:01:00,178 --> 01:01:01,396
He'd come out,
he'd make a sandwich,

1292
01:01:01,527 --> 01:01:04,095
or he'd go on walks,
chew on paper,

1293
01:01:04,225 --> 01:01:05,923
and be scary,
really scary,

1294
01:01:06,053 --> 01:01:08,360
and-- and Jane was
scared of him, too.

1295
01:01:09,187 --> 01:01:10,536
Everybody was scared of him.

1296
01:01:12,581 --> 01:01:15,367
[Edie Vonnegut]
I could tell when he was having
a good day and a bad day.

1297
01:01:15,497 --> 01:01:17,674
Definitely. 'Cause he just
wouldn't talk to you.

1298
01:01:18,457 --> 01:01:20,067
And he would be smoking
and, you know,

1299
01:01:20,198 --> 01:01:21,765
his head coming through
that door.

1300
01:01:21,895 --> 01:01:23,897
You just didn't mess with him
'cause it wouldn't be fun.

1301
01:01:24,028 --> 01:01:26,857
I mean, there were times when
he would be just incredibly fun.

1302
01:01:26,987 --> 01:01:29,381
♪

1303
01:01:29,511 --> 01:01:31,035
[Nanny Vonnegut]
Oh, when he had
a good writing day,

1304
01:01:31,165 --> 01:01:33,341
he'd be really happy, it was
kind of a manic lifestyle.

1305
01:01:33,472 --> 01:01:35,909
And we'd have these
wonderful music times

1306
01:01:36,040 --> 01:01:38,825
where we'd all be pounding on
music and singing.

1307
01:01:41,045 --> 01:01:43,525
-He'd be doing poetry and--
-He'd be right there,

1308
01:01:43,656 --> 01:01:44,701
right there.

1309
01:01:45,919 --> 01:01:47,704
[Jim Adams] The next day,
it'd just all turn to shit,

1310
01:01:47,834 --> 01:01:49,749
and he's back in his study
and he doesn't want to have

1311
01:01:49,880 --> 01:01:51,229
anything to do with
anybody and...

1312
01:01:52,752 --> 01:01:54,667
[typewriter clacking]

1313
01:01:54,798 --> 01:01:56,974
[Steve Adams]
Kurt may not have been
an attentive father

1314
01:01:57,104 --> 01:01:59,803
or father figure,
but I do understand it.

1315
01:01:59,933 --> 01:02:02,849
He was-- He was a writer,
and that's what he was.

1316
01:02:02,980 --> 01:02:05,025
And he had all this crap
going on in his head.

1317
01:02:05,156 --> 01:02:08,899
And therefore, when he's going
from the study to the kitchen,

1318
01:02:09,029 --> 01:02:10,291
what's going on in his mind

1319
01:02:10,422 --> 01:02:12,293
are the books that
everybody's loving.

1320
01:02:12,424 --> 01:02:14,426
[typewriter clacking]

1321
01:02:16,080 --> 01:02:18,691
[Edie Vonnegut]
I had no sense of
who he was at all,

1322
01:02:18,822 --> 01:02:20,693
I don't think,
until I read something.

1323
01:02:21,694 --> 01:02:25,045
And it just amazed me that
this man lived downstairs.

1324
01:02:26,090 --> 01:02:27,352
I just loved it.

1325
01:02:28,135 --> 01:02:31,486
It's pretty remarkable that
by the mid 1960s,

1326
01:02:31,617 --> 01:02:33,184
he'd written
Sirens of Titan,

1327
01:02:33,314 --> 01:02:34,794
a mind-blowing
space opera,

1328
01:02:34,925 --> 01:02:37,579
that made a lot of people wonder
what drugs he was on.

1329
01:02:37,710 --> 01:02:40,191
Mother Night,
great morality tale.

1330
01:02:40,321 --> 01:02:41,540
Cat's Cradle,
which made him

1331
01:02:41,670 --> 01:02:43,324
a cult figure on
college campuses.

1332
01:02:43,455 --> 01:02:45,413
This is all pre
Slaughterhouse-Five.

1333
01:02:45,544 --> 01:02:47,720
You know, Slaughterhouse-Five
is okay for me.

1334
01:02:47,851 --> 01:02:49,809
But Cat's Cradle
and Sirens of Titan

1335
01:02:49,940 --> 01:02:51,680
today remain my
favorite books.

1336
01:02:51,811 --> 01:02:53,334
[man]
He really emerged as a writer

1337
01:02:53,465 --> 01:02:55,641
and I have to think it was
because there were no prospects.

1338
01:02:55,772 --> 01:02:57,382
Who cares?
None of this stuff is--

1339
01:02:57,512 --> 01:02:59,253
is being published as
paperback originals.

1340
01:02:59,384 --> 01:03:02,169
It's disappearing before it
even hits the stands,

1341
01:03:02,300 --> 01:03:04,476
you know, so why not
just go for it?

1342
01:03:04,606 --> 01:03:06,173
It had never occurred to me that

1343
01:03:06,304 --> 01:03:07,653
someone could write a comedy
about the end of the world.

1344
01:03:08,132 --> 01:03:10,134
[Kurt Vonnegut reading]

1345
01:03:20,535 --> 01:03:23,669
I loved him for being fantastic
and creating religions

1346
01:03:23,800 --> 01:03:26,454
and talking about
God's travel plans.

1347
01:03:26,585 --> 01:03:28,630
[Nanny Vonnegut]
My mother was
so excited about those.

1348
01:03:28,761 --> 01:03:30,676
I mean, she could not believe
how great these were,

1349
01:03:30,807 --> 01:03:32,460
and it was slow going.

1350
01:03:32,591 --> 01:03:34,941
[Mark Vonnegut]
Jane would do anything
to help Kurt along,

1351
01:03:35,072 --> 01:03:36,943
to the point of
going to bookstores

1352
01:03:37,074 --> 01:03:39,816
and under a fake name
ordering his books.

1353
01:03:40,164 --> 01:03:42,906
You could tell that these were
not big financial boons

1354
01:03:43,036 --> 01:03:46,039
because he had to accept,
like, a sexy cover

1355
01:03:46,170 --> 01:03:48,737
for Sirens of Titan when
there's no sex in the book,

1356
01:03:48,868 --> 01:03:50,827
so here you would
write a novel

1357
01:03:50,957 --> 01:03:53,264
and you would get
less than $1,000.

1358
01:03:53,394 --> 01:03:57,050
When I was 12, he sincerely
and utterly came to me

1359
01:03:57,181 --> 01:03:58,965
and asked if he could
borrow $100

1360
01:03:59,096 --> 01:04:01,446
that I had saved up from
my paper route.

1361
01:04:02,447 --> 01:04:04,144
I had money and he didn't.

1362
01:04:04,710 --> 01:04:07,844
The normal answer, uh,
for most people

1363
01:04:07,974 --> 01:04:10,455
would have been to get
a good paying job.

1364
01:04:12,544 --> 01:04:15,503
My favorite one is where he got
a job for Sports Illustrated.

1365
01:04:15,939 --> 01:04:17,897
He wouldn't do the job.

1366
01:04:18,028 --> 01:04:20,900
He would be given a chore
to talk about a horse race.

1367
01:04:21,031 --> 01:04:23,772
[Mark Vonnegut]
And he was given the assignment
of writing about

1368
01:04:23,903 --> 01:04:25,513
this horse that broke away,

1369
01:04:25,644 --> 01:04:29,430
and Kurt sat there all morning,
and then he typed out...

1370
01:04:29,561 --> 01:04:31,824
[Edie reading]

1371
01:04:32,912 --> 01:04:34,783
And then leave.
Did you hear that story?

1372
01:04:34,914 --> 01:04:37,351
His attempts to work
regular jobs

1373
01:04:37,482 --> 01:04:38,483
didn't go well.

1374
01:04:38,613 --> 01:04:41,529
♪

1375
01:04:41,660 --> 01:04:42,966
[Kurt Vonnegut]
When I went broke
as a writer,

1376
01:04:43,096 --> 01:04:45,098
I got an automobile dealership,
you know.

1377
01:04:45,229 --> 01:04:48,536
It was one of the first Saab
dealers in the United States.

1378
01:04:48,841 --> 01:04:50,625
[Edie Vonnegut]
We had a red one
and he used to

1379
01:04:50,756 --> 01:04:53,280
put my mother on the hood
and take pictures of her.

1380
01:04:53,411 --> 01:04:55,065
People wouldn't
pay for their cars

1381
01:04:55,195 --> 01:04:57,328
and he'd have to go
and repossess them.

1382
01:04:57,458 --> 01:05:00,157
I don't think he was
a really good car salesman.

1383
01:05:00,461 --> 01:05:01,723
[man]
How'd you hold the line?

1384
01:05:01,854 --> 01:05:03,682
-We screwed them on the radio.
-[laughing]

1385
01:05:03,812 --> 01:05:06,032
We, uh--
[laughing]

1386
01:05:07,338 --> 01:05:08,730
[Mark Vonnegut]
I don't think

1387
01:05:08,861 --> 01:05:10,123
he could have stayed
employed if he had wanted to

1388
01:05:10,254 --> 01:05:13,083
at Sports Illustrated,
GE or any other job.

1389
01:05:13,213 --> 01:05:14,780
He was meant to be
a writer and, I think,

1390
01:05:14,911 --> 01:05:16,651
for his own mental health,
he had to write.

1391
01:05:17,130 --> 01:05:19,132
[typewriter clacking]

1392
01:05:21,656 --> 01:05:24,616
Well, he was not
selling Saabs at all

1393
01:05:24,746 --> 01:05:26,096
'cause no one came in.

1394
01:05:26,226 --> 01:05:28,402
He took his typewriter
down there and he wrote

1395
01:05:28,533 --> 01:05:31,275
God Bless You,
Mr. Rosewater
in that building.

1396
01:05:33,407 --> 01:05:35,627
♪

1397
01:05:35,757 --> 01:05:38,543
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater
was written when Kurt

1398
01:05:38,673 --> 01:05:40,893
was at the low point
of his career.

1399
01:05:41,024 --> 01:05:43,461
And the book is just
money obsessed.

1400
01:05:43,591 --> 01:05:45,593
[narrator reading]

1401
01:05:55,734 --> 01:05:59,825
It's like if a book were written
by a starving man,

1402
01:06:00,652 --> 01:06:02,436
what would the subject be?
Food. [chuckles]

1403
01:06:03,655 --> 01:06:05,874
[Gregory Sumner]
One thing that's interesting
and important about

1404
01:06:06,005 --> 01:06:07,398
God Bless You,
Mr. Rosewater,

1405
01:06:07,528 --> 01:06:11,141
is the introduction of
the character Kilgore Trout.

1406
01:06:11,271 --> 01:06:14,796
[narrator]
"Trout, the author of
87 paperback books.

1407
01:06:14,927 --> 01:06:16,407
"was a very poor man,

1408
01:06:16,537 --> 01:06:19,714
and unknown outside
the science fiction field."

1409
01:06:20,977 --> 01:06:22,717
[man]
Who is Kilgore Trout?

1410
01:06:23,283 --> 01:06:24,893
That's a--
That's a big one.

1411
01:06:25,024 --> 01:06:27,026
He does appear
and reappear

1412
01:06:27,157 --> 01:06:29,420
in many of Vonnegut's books.

1413
01:06:30,551 --> 01:06:32,597
Kilgore Trout is different
in every book.

1414
01:06:33,076 --> 01:06:34,947
So he's not a very
consistent character

1415
01:06:35,078 --> 01:06:37,689
but he is consistently
a science fiction writer.

1416
01:06:39,734 --> 01:06:41,258
[Gregory Sumner]
Trout was based on

1417
01:06:41,388 --> 01:06:44,696
an actual science fiction writer
named Theodore Sturgeon.

1418
01:06:45,523 --> 01:06:46,698
You can get the pun there.

1419
01:06:47,742 --> 01:06:50,006
Vonnegut met him when he was
down on his luck

1420
01:06:50,136 --> 01:06:53,052
up at the Cape writing for
a penny a word.

1421
01:06:53,183 --> 01:06:55,272
So he admired Sturgeon
but he also saw--

1422
01:06:55,402 --> 01:06:57,361
look at the life he's living.

1423
01:06:57,491 --> 01:06:59,363
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Trout's employer
and co-workers

1424
01:06:59,493 --> 01:07:01,321
"had no idea
that he was a writer.

1425
01:07:01,452 --> 01:07:03,454
[continues reading]

1426
01:07:09,286 --> 01:07:11,505
I think, psychologically,
Kilgore Trout

1427
01:07:11,636 --> 01:07:13,594
is what I thought
I might become.

1428
01:07:15,466 --> 01:07:18,077
One woman said that Kilgore
in the different books

1429
01:07:18,208 --> 01:07:21,559
represents my
psychological state.

1430
01:07:22,473 --> 01:07:26,129
I think it's pretty clear that
he's an alter ego of Kurt's.

1431
01:07:26,259 --> 01:07:28,914
He's a doppelganger,
a dark twin.

1432
01:07:29,567 --> 01:07:32,135
[Kurt Vonnegut]
I don't mind people
calling me Kilgore.

1433
01:07:32,265 --> 01:07:34,311
Most authors will say that,
you know,

1434
01:07:34,441 --> 01:07:36,400
laymen are so stupid
to think that

1435
01:07:36,530 --> 01:07:38,445
I'm talking about
my own life.

1436
01:07:38,706 --> 01:07:41,318
My position is it's all I have
to talk about,

1437
01:07:41,448 --> 01:07:43,450
and, uh-- uh--

1438
01:07:43,581 --> 01:07:46,627
I'll take full responsibility
for having experienced

1439
01:07:46,758 --> 01:07:48,194
every event in any book.

1440
01:07:50,283 --> 01:07:51,676
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
In 1965,

1441
01:07:51,806 --> 01:07:53,504
when even
the novels weren't selling,

1442
01:07:53,634 --> 01:07:57,073
he had to submit to
the worst humiliation

1443
01:07:57,203 --> 01:07:59,771
any human being can suffer.

1444
01:07:59,901 --> 01:08:02,861
He had to come to Iowa
to teach college.

1445
01:08:03,383 --> 01:08:05,385
-[cow bells clanking]
-[mooing]

1446
01:08:07,170 --> 01:08:10,216
♪

1447
01:08:10,521 --> 01:08:12,305
[man] If you're not
making enough money

1448
01:08:12,436 --> 01:08:13,959
to support yourself
as a writer,

1449
01:08:14,090 --> 01:08:15,613
and you need to have
a teaching job,

1450
01:08:15,743 --> 01:08:17,528
a job in Iowa
is a really good one.

1451
01:08:18,572 --> 01:08:21,575
Most of the other MFA students,
they hadn't read him.

1452
01:08:21,706 --> 01:08:24,970
They had written him off on
the basis of his reputation

1453
01:08:25,101 --> 01:08:27,015
or lack thereof,

1454
01:08:27,146 --> 01:08:29,148
and I thought he was
fascinating.

1455
01:08:29,496 --> 01:08:32,456
It was very compelling to me
to be in the presence of

1456
01:08:32,586 --> 01:08:33,848
someone who said,

1457
01:08:33,979 --> 01:08:37,330
"It's not just all right
to be an entertainer

1458
01:08:37,461 --> 01:08:39,637
and a serious writer,

1459
01:08:39,767 --> 01:08:41,465
but if you're going to be
serious,

1460
01:08:41,595 --> 01:08:43,467
you better also be entertaining.

1461
01:08:45,251 --> 01:08:47,514
[Nanny Vonnegut]
And we had a crummy
little house we rented,

1462
01:08:47,645 --> 01:08:50,474
and Andre Debus was
one house next to us.

1463
01:08:51,518 --> 01:08:54,913
For the first time,
he met other writers,

1464
01:08:55,043 --> 01:08:56,915
uh, of his stature.

1465
01:08:57,045 --> 01:08:59,265
Nelson Algren,
Richard Gates,

1466
01:08:59,396 --> 01:09:01,224
Vance Bourjaily.

1467
01:09:01,354 --> 01:09:03,313
He suddenly felt like, oh,

1468
01:09:03,443 --> 01:09:06,664
he was part of
the writing community.

1469
01:09:07,708 --> 01:09:10,189
[Gregory Sumner]
It became two of
the happiest years of his life.

1470
01:09:10,320 --> 01:09:13,061
It led to the breakthrough of
him discovering

1471
01:09:13,192 --> 01:09:14,802
how to use his own voice
in fiction.

1472
01:09:15,803 --> 01:09:17,892
Hanging around these other
creative people,

1473
01:09:18,023 --> 01:09:19,720
they gave him some ideas about

1474
01:09:19,851 --> 01:09:22,462
how you can tell
a rather untellable story.

1475
01:09:23,942 --> 01:09:26,205
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"I taught in the afternoon.

1476
01:09:26,336 --> 01:09:28,033
"In the mornings,
I wrote.

1477
01:09:28,164 --> 01:09:30,383
"I was not to be disturbed.

1478
01:09:30,514 --> 01:09:33,125
I was working on my famous book
about Dresden."

1479
01:09:33,256 --> 01:09:35,867
[typewriter clacking]

1480
01:09:40,872 --> 01:09:42,395
"Listen:

1481
01:09:42,526 --> 01:09:43,831
"Billy Pilgrim has come...

1482
01:09:43,962 --> 01:09:46,007
[typewriter clacking]

1483
01:09:49,750 --> 01:09:51,230
[Bob Weide]
When it came time
to sit down

1484
01:09:51,361 --> 01:09:52,927
and write your book
on Dresden,

1485
01:09:53,058 --> 01:09:55,539
didn't you find some difficulty
in recalling?

1486
01:09:58,498 --> 01:10:01,197
♪

1487
01:10:01,327 --> 01:10:03,286
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"When I got home from
the Second World War,

1488
01:10:03,416 --> 01:10:05,070
"23 years ago,

1489
01:10:05,201 --> 01:10:07,507
"I thought it would be easy
for me to write about

1490
01:10:07,638 --> 01:10:09,292
"the destruction
of Dresden,

1491
01:10:09,422 --> 01:10:11,119
"since all I would have to do
would be to

1492
01:10:11,250 --> 01:10:12,773
"report what I had seen.

1493
01:10:12,904 --> 01:10:14,819
"And I thought, too, that it
would be a masterpiece

1494
01:10:14,949 --> 01:10:16,951
"or at least make me
a lot of money.

1495
01:10:17,082 --> 01:10:20,520
"But not many words about
Dresden came from my mind then.

1496
01:10:20,651 --> 01:10:22,957
"And not many words
come now, either,

1497
01:10:23,088 --> 01:10:25,656
"when I've become an old fart
with his memories

1498
01:10:25,786 --> 01:10:26,918
and his Pall Malls."

1499
01:10:27,484 --> 01:10:29,964
[Bob Weide] He was always
working his way up to

1500
01:10:30,095 --> 01:10:31,575
Slaughterhouse-Five,

1501
01:10:31,705 --> 01:10:34,491
and he just couldn't find
the key.

1502
01:10:34,621 --> 01:10:36,057
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"When I was
somewhat younger

1503
01:10:36,188 --> 01:10:38,234
"working on my famous
Dresden book,

1504
01:10:38,364 --> 01:10:41,498
"I asked an old war buddy
named Bernard V. O'Hare

1505
01:10:41,628 --> 01:10:42,977
if I could come to see him."

1506
01:10:43,108 --> 01:10:45,241
[David Ulin]
O'Hare's wife, Mary,
she says,

1507
01:10:45,371 --> 01:10:49,201
"You're gonna write a book
that is going to glorify war,

1508
01:10:49,332 --> 01:10:50,898
"and people are going to
read it and think

1509
01:10:51,029 --> 01:10:52,944
it's fine to send all
these kids off to war."

1510
01:10:53,074 --> 01:10:55,251
And it's an eye-opening moment
for Vonnegut.

1511
01:10:57,775 --> 01:11:00,778
The war in Vietnam is not like
these other wars.

1512
01:11:01,909 --> 01:11:05,086
[Lyndon Johnson]
Yet war is always the same.

1513
01:11:05,435 --> 01:11:09,221
It is young men dying in
the fullness of their promise.

1514
01:11:12,093 --> 01:11:13,834
[David Ulin]
Mary O'Hare,
she shamed him and said,

1515
01:11:13,965 --> 01:11:15,662
"Write about what
really happened.

1516
01:11:17,142 --> 01:11:18,448
You were babies."

1517
01:11:22,190 --> 01:11:23,540
[Kurt Vonnegut]
I would hate to tell you

1518
01:11:23,670 --> 01:11:25,150
what this lousy little book
cost me,

1519
01:11:25,281 --> 01:11:27,718
in money and anxiety
and time.

1520
01:11:28,675 --> 01:11:31,809
When you go through
all the various drafts

1521
01:11:31,939 --> 01:11:34,420
and iterations of
Slaughterhouse-Five
through the years,

1522
01:11:34,551 --> 01:11:37,380
you become very aware of
Vonnegut's struggle

1523
01:11:37,510 --> 01:11:38,642
and his perseverance.

1524
01:11:39,469 --> 01:11:41,906
He's trying everything
to get it right.

1525
01:11:43,037 --> 01:11:45,213
Some drafts are written
first person,

1526
01:11:45,344 --> 01:11:47,955
sometimes it's Vonnegut's
point of view,

1527
01:11:48,086 --> 01:11:50,610
sometimes it's a made up name.

1528
01:11:51,307 --> 01:11:53,483
Sometimes the narrator
is already dead,

1529
01:11:53,613 --> 01:11:55,180
and narrating from the grave.

1530
01:11:55,311 --> 01:11:57,182
Billy Pilgrim's name
keeps changing.

1531
01:12:00,751 --> 01:12:02,622
The title of the book
keeps changing.

1532
01:12:04,363 --> 01:12:07,279
He's constantly auditioning
different openings for the book,

1533
01:12:07,410 --> 01:12:10,151
different prefaces
and forwards.

1534
01:12:11,065 --> 01:12:13,764
He's often doodling and
drawing on the pages

1535
01:12:13,894 --> 01:12:15,505
as if to clear his head.

1536
01:12:17,245 --> 01:12:19,378
At one point, he gives up
trying to write it

1537
01:12:19,509 --> 01:12:20,553
as a novel altogether,

1538
01:12:20,684 --> 01:12:22,512
and he tries to write it
as a play.

1539
01:12:22,903 --> 01:12:25,645
In-- In one version, uh,
middle-age Billy Pilgrim

1540
01:12:25,776 --> 01:12:28,213
receives a crank phone call
from a drunken Vonnegut

1541
01:12:28,344 --> 01:12:29,954
who taunts Billy
by telling him

1542
01:12:30,084 --> 01:12:32,696
he's a fictional character in
a book Vonnegut is writing.

1543
01:12:32,826 --> 01:12:35,481
And remember, this is, you know,
in the days before computers,

1544
01:12:35,612 --> 01:12:37,265
so he's not
cutting and pasting.

1545
01:12:37,396 --> 01:12:39,964
Every new attempt is
a page one rewrite.

1546
01:12:40,268 --> 01:12:41,922
Sometimes he's
halfway through the novel

1547
01:12:42,053 --> 01:12:43,620
before he starts
all over again.

1548
01:12:43,750 --> 01:12:46,231
Sometimes he changes course
after an opening paragraph.

1549
01:12:46,666 --> 01:12:48,494
But he just won't give up.

1550
01:12:48,799 --> 01:12:52,846
You just see him persevering
and rewriting again and again,

1551
01:12:52,977 --> 01:12:55,066
and he just can't
crack the code.

1552
01:12:56,589 --> 01:12:59,636
It's like he's not just trying
to get a bead on the book;

1553
01:12:59,766 --> 01:13:01,812
it's almost like he's
trying to purge

1554
01:13:01,942 --> 01:13:04,205
the whole Dresden experience
from his soul

1555
01:13:04,336 --> 01:13:05,381
once and for all.

1556
01:13:06,512 --> 01:13:08,471
And just when you think
Dresden

1557
01:13:08,601 --> 01:13:10,690
is about to claim yet
one more victim...

1558
01:13:13,214 --> 01:13:14,172
he nails it.

1559
01:13:14,302 --> 01:13:17,349
♪

1560
01:13:21,048 --> 01:13:24,400
[Edie Vonnegut]
In 1969 when
Slaughterhouse-Five came out,

1561
01:13:25,139 --> 01:13:26,924
that was the big kaboom.

1562
01:13:27,054 --> 01:13:28,491
The current idol of
the country's

1563
01:13:28,621 --> 01:13:30,362
sensitive and
intelligent young people,

1564
01:13:30,493 --> 01:13:32,451
is 47 years old.

1565
01:13:32,582 --> 01:13:34,845
Slaughterhouse-Five
was the breakthrough

1566
01:13:34,975 --> 01:13:38,109
because it was the right place
at the right time.

1567
01:13:38,239 --> 01:13:41,591
It was in the ugliest phase of
the Vietnam War

1568
01:13:41,721 --> 01:13:45,508
in the ugliest phase of our
domestic crises at home.

1569
01:13:46,378 --> 01:13:48,032
[Morley Safer]
His gentle fantasies of peace

1570
01:13:48,162 --> 01:13:51,165
and his dark humor are
as current among the young

1571
01:13:51,296 --> 01:13:53,864
as was J.D. Salinger's work
in the 1950s.

1572
01:13:54,299 --> 01:13:55,779
[Edie Vonnegut]
Fans would come to the door,

1573
01:13:55,909 --> 01:13:57,694
and wanting to know if
he lived here,

1574
01:13:57,824 --> 01:13:59,304
and they would end up
coming in,

1575
01:13:59,435 --> 01:14:02,002
and sometimes they'd stay
for three or four days.

1576
01:14:04,178 --> 01:14:05,789
[Nanny Vonnegut]
The sudden money coming in

1577
01:14:05,919 --> 01:14:07,530
was a total shock.

1578
01:14:08,139 --> 01:14:09,619
And he just couldn't
believe it.

1579
01:14:09,749 --> 01:14:11,098
I remember at the dinner table,
he said,

1580
01:14:11,229 --> 01:14:13,492
I have money coming out of
my ears. [laughs]

1581
01:14:14,101 --> 01:14:16,974
It was, like, fun and new,
like he had arrived.

1582
01:14:17,104 --> 01:14:19,542
♪

1583
01:14:19,672 --> 01:14:22,066
[Edie Vonnegut]
All of our friends wanting to
come over and visit,

1584
01:14:22,196 --> 01:14:24,024
'cause Lifemagazine
was here.

1585
01:14:24,155 --> 01:14:27,245
♪

1586
01:14:27,811 --> 01:14:30,074
This is the biggest thing that
came to this town.

1587
01:14:30,814 --> 01:14:32,903
And then when that
article came out

1588
01:14:33,033 --> 01:14:34,992
there was these big pictures
of our kitchen,

1589
01:14:35,122 --> 01:14:37,908
and our father
getting a haircut and...

1590
01:14:38,038 --> 01:14:40,693
me standing there with
a paintbrush.

1591
01:14:40,824 --> 01:14:43,479
It was just extraordinary.

1592
01:14:45,959 --> 01:14:48,179
[Nanny Vonnegut]
And I was getting attention,
Edie was getting attention,

1593
01:14:48,309 --> 01:14:50,790
everybody loved us because
we were with this doofus,

1594
01:14:50,921 --> 01:14:52,836
our father.
[laughs]

1595
01:14:52,966 --> 01:14:54,707
[Jim Adams] Norman Mailer
came to the house

1596
01:14:54,838 --> 01:14:57,275
and Jane was
excited about that.

1597
01:14:57,405 --> 01:14:59,320
I'll never forget, she came into
the kitchen and,

1598
01:14:59,451 --> 01:15:01,061
"Jimmy, you got any pot?"

1599
01:15:01,192 --> 01:15:02,759
[laughing]

1600
01:15:02,889 --> 01:15:04,195
[Nanny Vonnegut]
Peter Fonda,

1601
01:15:04,325 --> 01:15:06,066
he wanted to buy
the rights to Cat's Cradle,

1602
01:15:06,197 --> 01:15:07,938
so he made a pilgrimage.
[laughs]

1603
01:15:08,068 --> 01:15:09,113
We couldn't believe it.

1604
01:15:09,243 --> 01:15:11,071
It was just after
Easy Rider,

1605
01:15:11,202 --> 01:15:14,640
and I had a girlfriend
that didn't really think
I was that great.

1606
01:15:14,771 --> 01:15:16,468
But I told her,
"Hey, listen,

1607
01:15:16,599 --> 01:15:18,905
Peter Fonda's gonna be
over at our house.

1608
01:15:19,036 --> 01:15:20,951
She says, "Really? Okay."
And we-- we all came back,

1609
01:15:21,081 --> 01:15:23,475
and we all sat around and we're
talking with Peter Fonda,

1610
01:15:23,867 --> 01:15:25,782
and it-- it did the trick.

1611
01:15:25,912 --> 01:15:27,305
[laughig]

1612
01:15:27,435 --> 01:15:28,524
Thanks, Kurt.

1613
01:15:28,654 --> 01:15:30,221
[man] Do you mind being
middle-aged?

1614
01:15:30,351 --> 01:15:31,831
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Yes, I mind.
I think a terrible mistake

1615
01:15:31,962 --> 01:15:33,180
has been made somehow.

1616
01:15:33,311 --> 01:15:35,400
I suspect that I'm
21 years old,

1617
01:15:35,531 --> 01:15:37,489
that I've been
misclassified,

1618
01:15:37,794 --> 01:15:41,362
somehow,
or time has slipped.

1619
01:15:41,493 --> 01:15:43,495
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
When he paperback of
Slaughterhouse-Five came out,

1620
01:15:43,626 --> 01:15:46,846
all the previous novels were
reissued in a uniform edition.

1621
01:15:46,977 --> 01:15:49,457
It was just making it clear that
Slaughterhouse-Five

1622
01:15:49,588 --> 01:15:51,068
did not exist in a vacuum.

1623
01:15:51,198 --> 01:15:54,332
This spoke for 20 years of
a writing career,

1624
01:15:54,462 --> 01:15:58,510
and a coherent, very interesting
human being behind them.

1625
01:15:58,641 --> 01:16:00,164
[Morley Safer]
Vonnegut spends
most of his time

1626
01:16:00,294 --> 01:16:02,862
in he tranquility of
Cape Cod where he lives.

1627
01:16:02,993 --> 01:16:04,560
But now he can be found
in New York

1628
01:16:04,690 --> 01:16:06,692
in a theater in
Greenwich Village

1629
01:16:06,823 --> 01:16:08,738
agonizing over his new play,

1630
01:16:08,868 --> 01:16:10,740
Happy Birthday,
Wanda June.

1631
01:16:10,870 --> 01:16:13,438
♪

1632
01:16:13,569 --> 01:16:15,962
[Nanny Vonnegut]
That was a big family excitement
going to that opening,

1633
01:16:16,093 --> 01:16:18,312
to be in New York City and
getting all dressed up.

1634
01:16:18,791 --> 01:16:20,619
Oh, my mother was so proud.

1635
01:16:20,750 --> 01:16:22,752
It was just very exciting.

1636
01:16:23,100 --> 01:16:25,929
I knew he would be great,
but I never envisioned,

1637
01:16:26,059 --> 01:16:27,974
like, that kind of movie star
type of thing,

1638
01:16:28,105 --> 01:16:29,497
people wanting to take
your pictures.

1639
01:16:29,628 --> 01:16:30,803
That was fun.

1640
01:16:30,934 --> 01:16:32,109
That was a lot of fun.

1641
01:16:32,762 --> 01:16:34,328
But it wasn't
a lot of fun when--

1642
01:16:34,459 --> 01:16:35,721
when he didn't want to
come home.

1643
01:16:36,548 --> 01:16:39,856
♪

1644
01:16:40,117 --> 01:16:42,423
[Edie Vonnegut]
There was a woman
photographing him

1645
01:16:42,554 --> 01:16:44,643
and they started
a relationship.

1646
01:16:45,252 --> 01:16:47,254
And she was a lot younger
than my mother.

1647
01:16:47,690 --> 01:16:50,344
[camera shutter clicking]

1648
01:16:51,389 --> 01:16:53,260
And he stayed with her.

1649
01:16:54,305 --> 01:16:56,002
And eventually married her.

1650
01:16:57,351 --> 01:17:00,267
And left my mother here
on the Cape.

1651
01:17:00,398 --> 01:17:02,661
[man on P.A.]
...for Toronto
now boarding flight one.

1652
01:17:02,792 --> 01:17:03,880
[snapping]

1653
01:17:04,010 --> 01:17:05,272
[indistinct dialog]

1654
01:17:06,404 --> 01:17:09,233
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Big problem has probably
been noticed in this church.

1655
01:17:09,363 --> 01:17:11,235
A lot of people are
getting divorced.

1656
01:17:11,670 --> 01:17:13,150
What's the trouble?

1657
01:17:13,280 --> 01:17:14,934
Well, the people who are getting
divorced don't know why.

1658
01:17:15,456 --> 01:17:17,720
I don't know, I really--
I love you a lot.

1659
01:17:18,198 --> 01:17:20,157
'Cause I love you more than
when we were married.

1660
01:17:20,897 --> 01:17:22,289
But something's wrong.

1661
01:17:24,074 --> 01:17:26,467
♪

1662
01:17:26,598 --> 01:17:28,121
[Kurt Vonnegut]
I like the house,
I like the kids,

1663
01:17:28,252 --> 01:17:29,906
and it's gonna be
a terrible strain on the kids,

1664
01:17:30,036 --> 01:17:30,994
but I'm sorry.

1665
01:17:31,124 --> 01:17:33,083
I just can't go on this way.

1666
01:17:33,910 --> 01:17:35,476
I can't describe
what's wrong,

1667
01:17:35,607 --> 01:17:37,435
all I know is
something's wrong.

1668
01:17:39,872 --> 01:17:41,526
[Nanny Vonnegut]
He always keeps
repeating to me,

1669
01:17:41,657 --> 01:17:43,920
watch out for
the empty nest syndrome.

1670
01:17:44,050 --> 01:17:46,226
It's devastating when
all the kids are gone.

1671
01:17:46,357 --> 01:17:49,534
And I think he couldn't handle
the quiet around here.

1672
01:17:51,318 --> 01:17:54,017
[Kurt Adams]
It was pretty clear that
Kurt's famous now,

1673
01:17:54,147 --> 01:17:57,585
and he's left his drab life
behind on Cape Cod.

1674
01:17:57,716 --> 01:18:00,197
and now he's living
the celebrity life

1675
01:18:00,327 --> 01:18:02,460
in the fast lane
of Manhattan.

1676
01:18:03,766 --> 01:18:06,246
[Edie Vonnegut]
It must have been
a very heady time for him.

1677
01:18:06,725 --> 01:18:09,597
His books selling,
movies being made,

1678
01:18:09,728 --> 01:18:12,122
It must have just been
incredibly seductive.

1679
01:18:14,167 --> 01:18:16,561
[Mark Vonnegut]
I wish it didn't hurt him
in the way it hurt him,

1680
01:18:16,692 --> 01:18:18,606
but, um,
I think fame is

1681
01:18:18,737 --> 01:18:21,087
a horrible destructive thing
to do to people.

1682
01:18:22,393 --> 01:18:25,222
[Jim Adams]
It wasn't until he died that
I stopped doing this,

1683
01:18:25,352 --> 01:18:27,050
but I thought that
I hated him.

1684
01:18:27,659 --> 01:18:29,617
I hated the way
he treated Jane.

1685
01:18:29,748 --> 01:18:31,750
Jane supported him
and loved him,

1686
01:18:31,881 --> 01:18:34,231
and did everything in her power
to back him up,

1687
01:18:34,361 --> 01:18:36,712
and, uh...

1688
01:18:36,842 --> 01:18:38,148
he threw it all away.

1689
01:18:40,759 --> 01:18:43,980
[Nanny Vonnegut]
My parents were partners in
this for 20 years,

1690
01:18:44,110 --> 01:18:47,331
and I don't think my mother
ever expected that

1691
01:18:47,461 --> 01:18:49,028
she wouldn't
always be part of it.

1692
01:18:49,159 --> 01:18:51,901
She was the kind of woman who
wanted to meet everybody.

1693
01:18:52,031 --> 01:18:54,033
You know, she wanted to meet
John Updike,

1694
01:18:54,164 --> 01:18:56,819
and Doctorow and
George Plimpton,

1695
01:18:56,949 --> 01:18:59,212
she would have been perfect at
all those cocktail parties.

1696
01:18:59,343 --> 01:19:01,519
Here they had finally
worked to this point,

1697
01:19:01,649 --> 01:19:03,477
and she was waiting to,
you know,

1698
01:19:03,608 --> 01:19:05,262
enjoy the benefits, too.

1699
01:19:06,306 --> 01:19:08,787
The beauty of Jane is
she was not devastated.

1700
01:19:08,918 --> 01:19:10,833
She thought this would
all end fine,

1701
01:19:10,963 --> 01:19:14,053
and, uh, to a certain extent,
she was right.

1702
01:19:14,184 --> 01:19:15,402
[Edie Vonnegut]
In the end,

1703
01:19:15,533 --> 01:19:17,143
she found
a wonderful man to live with.

1704
01:19:20,625 --> 01:19:21,974
[Nanny Vonnegut]
She was not bitter at all,

1705
01:19:22,105 --> 01:19:26,022
and always, uh,
believed in him as a writer,

1706
01:19:26,152 --> 01:19:27,327
was so proud of him

1707
01:19:27,458 --> 01:19:29,242
every time he came out with
a new book

1708
01:19:29,373 --> 01:19:30,635
when they weren't married.

1709
01:19:31,592 --> 01:19:33,681
She'd be laughing, you know,
sitting in the backyard

1710
01:19:33,812 --> 01:19:36,162
and just shaking her head,
like, guy's still got it.

1711
01:19:36,293 --> 01:19:38,121
[chuckles]
He's so funny.

1712
01:19:38,861 --> 01:19:40,993
They were in touch
to the end.

1713
01:19:41,124 --> 01:19:44,170
♪

1714
01:19:45,911 --> 01:19:47,565
But this chapter

1715
01:19:47,695 --> 01:19:49,915
being on the Cape
as a whole family...

1716
01:19:50,046 --> 01:19:51,308
was over just like that.

1717
01:19:53,832 --> 01:19:55,921
[woman] I want you to tell me
that you loved me once.

1718
01:19:56,530 --> 01:19:57,880
Oh, for Christ's sake.

1719
01:19:58,010 --> 01:20:00,534
I mean it. I must have that
and so must Paul.

1720
01:20:01,013 --> 01:20:04,016
Tell him that
he was conceived in love

1721
01:20:04,147 --> 01:20:06,018
even if you hate me now.

1722
01:20:06,845 --> 01:20:09,369
Tell us both that
somewhere in our lives

1723
01:20:09,500 --> 01:20:10,806
was love.

1724
01:20:11,545 --> 01:20:12,982
[Bob Weide]
In 2001,

1725
01:20:13,112 --> 01:20:14,853
my wife, Linda, and I were
on the phone with Kurt.

1726
01:20:14,984 --> 01:20:16,812
I remember Linda
saying to Kurt,

1727
01:20:16,942 --> 01:20:18,465
"What do we gotta do
to get you out here?"

1728
01:20:18,596 --> 01:20:19,902
Kurt said,
"Well, I'll come out if

1729
01:20:20,032 --> 01:20:21,555
"Bob directs Happy Birthday,
Wanda June,

1730
01:20:21,686 --> 01:20:23,688
and if you play Penelope."

1731
01:20:23,819 --> 01:20:25,777
Stay or go,
talk or sulk,

1732
01:20:25,908 --> 01:20:27,387
laugh or cry as you wish,

1733
01:20:27,518 --> 01:20:28,736
do whatever seems
called for.

1734
01:20:28,867 --> 01:20:30,477
My mind is gone.

1735
01:20:30,608 --> 01:20:32,479
-[laughter]
-Bye!

1736
01:20:32,610 --> 01:20:34,220
[applause]

1737
01:20:34,351 --> 01:20:35,831
[Bob Weide]
Linda was sensational
in it, of course.

1738
01:20:35,961 --> 01:20:39,182
But we hit a bit of a snag
because...

1739
01:20:39,312 --> 01:20:42,446
a few weeks before we opened,
in the middle of rehearsal,

1740
01:20:42,576 --> 01:20:45,188
came September 11, 2001.

1741
01:20:45,318 --> 01:20:49,540
And so he apologetically said
that he wasn't gonna make it up.

1742
01:20:57,156 --> 01:21:00,420
Yeah, after 9/11, he wasn't
a big fan of flying,

1743
01:21:00,551 --> 01:21:02,248
so usually when we
got together

1744
01:21:02,379 --> 01:21:04,076
it was in New York,
which was fine with me.

1745
01:21:04,207 --> 01:21:06,992
♪

1746
01:21:07,123 --> 01:21:10,213
There were a lot of lunches,
a lot of walks on the east side.

1747
01:21:10,822 --> 01:21:12,824
And fans would always
recognize him,

1748
01:21:12,955 --> 01:21:14,391
and come up to him and say,
"Oh, Mr. Vonnegut,

1749
01:21:14,521 --> 01:21:15,566
I've read all your books,"

1750
01:21:15,696 --> 01:21:17,829
or "Your work has
saved my life."

1751
01:21:17,960 --> 01:21:19,570
And I'd be with him
thinking,

1752
01:21:19,831 --> 01:21:21,180
"Why am I with him?"

1753
01:21:21,746 --> 01:21:22,790
I should be that guy.

1754
01:21:23,487 --> 01:21:25,358
And he would always
engage them,

1755
01:21:25,489 --> 01:21:27,883
he would always ask their name
and where they're from.

1756
01:21:28,013 --> 01:21:31,103
He was sort of
the anti Salinger writer.

1757
01:21:31,234 --> 01:21:33,627
But by this time,
he was something of a
New York landmark.

1758
01:21:33,758 --> 01:21:36,500
He had lived in the city
longer than he had in

1759
01:21:36,630 --> 01:21:38,328
Indianapolis or Cape Cod.

1760
01:21:38,632 --> 01:21:40,286
Ever since he moved there
in 1970

1761
01:21:40,417 --> 01:21:41,679
when his first marriage
went bust.

1762
01:21:41,809 --> 01:21:44,856
♪

1763
01:21:44,987 --> 01:21:48,773
♪ Yeah, this is
a mean old world ♪

1764
01:21:48,904 --> 01:21:52,124
♪ Baby, to live in
by yourself ♪

1765
01:21:52,690 --> 01:21:54,735
[Gregory Sumner]
The '70s were
a tough time for him.

1766
01:21:54,866 --> 01:21:56,476
Divorce,
sudden celebrity,

1767
01:21:56,607 --> 01:21:58,130
sudden fame and wealth.

1768
01:21:58,261 --> 01:22:00,263
He's sort of almost having
a nervous breakdown

1769
01:22:00,393 --> 01:22:03,005
in a culture that is having
a nervous breakdown.

1770
01:22:03,135 --> 01:22:06,095
♪ Someday, someday,
baby ♪

1771
01:22:06,225 --> 01:22:09,315
♪ I'll be six feet
in my bed ♪

1772
01:22:09,446 --> 01:22:10,751
[man on TV]
Bruce Jenner.

1773
01:22:10,882 --> 01:22:12,014
Wheaties is
the breakfast of champions.

1774
01:22:12,144 --> 01:22:13,624
He didn't quite know
where he was going

1775
01:22:13,754 --> 01:22:15,060
after Slaughterhouse-Five.

1776
01:22:15,191 --> 01:22:16,757
It has been proved

1777
01:22:16,888 --> 01:22:20,848
that if a writer is blocked,
is unable to write,

1778
01:22:20,979 --> 01:22:23,808
the psychological consequences
are terrible.

1779
01:22:23,939 --> 01:22:26,028
Frequently,
nervous breakdowns.

1780
01:22:26,419 --> 01:22:27,986
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
Everybody was hanging on

1781
01:22:28,117 --> 01:22:29,596
every word he was writing.

1782
01:22:29,727 --> 01:22:31,990
No matter what he wrote,
it was gonna go to number one

1783
01:22:32,121 --> 01:22:34,384
on The New York Times
best seller list.

1784
01:22:34,514 --> 01:22:35,733
And all of a sudden,

1785
01:22:35,863 --> 01:22:38,344
having this responsibility
locked him up.

1786
01:22:38,910 --> 01:22:40,477
He thought he could have

1787
01:22:40,607 --> 01:22:42,870
Breakfast of Championswritten
in a year and a half.

1788
01:22:43,001 --> 01:22:44,829
It took him four years.

1789
01:22:47,832 --> 01:22:48,746
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"This is a tale of...

1790
01:22:48,876 --> 01:22:50,922
[continues reading]

1791
01:22:58,277 --> 01:23:01,802
[Gregory Sumner]
It's such a relentless
interrogation of our

1792
01:23:01,933 --> 01:23:06,372
junk history and our junk
culture in the early '70s.

1793
01:23:06,503 --> 01:23:07,939
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"We Americans require

1794
01:23:08,070 --> 01:23:09,506
"symbols which are
richly colored

1795
01:23:09,636 --> 01:23:11,203
"and three dimensional
and juicy,

1796
01:23:11,334 --> 01:23:13,466
"which have not been
poisoned by great sins

1797
01:23:13,597 --> 01:23:15,164
"our nation has committed,

1798
01:23:15,294 --> 01:23:17,688
"such as slavery and genocide,
and criminal neglect,

1799
01:23:17,818 --> 01:23:20,082
or by tin-horned
commercial greed and cunning."

1800
01:23:20,212 --> 01:23:21,953
[Gregory Sumner]
He tells you
right at the beginning

1801
01:23:22,084 --> 01:23:24,042
I'm trying to get the junk
out of my mind

1802
01:23:24,173 --> 01:23:27,959
the debased language and
the lies and the racism.

1803
01:23:28,090 --> 01:23:29,700
All the poisons that
I've taken in,

1804
01:23:29,830 --> 01:23:31,049
I want to get rid of them.

1805
01:23:31,180 --> 01:23:33,182
[Kurt Vonnegut singing ditty]

1806
01:23:42,191 --> 01:23:45,846
For me, the real effect of
Breakfast Of Championswas

1807
01:23:45,977 --> 01:23:49,459
the use of the art,
the use of the drawings.

1808
01:23:49,589 --> 01:23:52,070
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Kilgore Trout's nation
was by far the richest

1809
01:23:52,201 --> 01:23:54,116
"and the most powerful country
on the planet,

1810
01:23:54,246 --> 01:23:55,856
"and it disciplined
other countries

1811
01:23:55,987 --> 01:23:57,902
"by threatening to shoot
big rockets at them

1812
01:23:58,033 --> 01:24:00,557
"or to drop things on them
from airplanes,

1813
01:24:00,687 --> 01:24:03,821
"and still the people went on
fucking all the time.

1814
01:24:03,951 --> 01:24:06,041
Fucking was how babies
were made."

1815
01:24:06,345 --> 01:24:08,173
He was blurring lines,

1816
01:24:08,304 --> 01:24:10,436
but he was doing it in ways
that were funny,

1817
01:24:10,567 --> 01:24:11,655
that were accessible.

1818
01:24:11,785 --> 01:24:13,787
thinking beyond what
one would assume

1819
01:24:13,918 --> 01:24:15,485
could be done on the page.

1820
01:24:15,615 --> 01:24:16,964
[Kurt Vonnegut]
In my new book,

1821
01:24:17,095 --> 01:24:18,923
I confront Kilgore Trout.

1822
01:24:19,054 --> 01:24:21,230
I finally acknowledge that I did
invent him,

1823
01:24:21,360 --> 01:24:23,841
and he had imagination enough
to know that

1824
01:24:23,971 --> 01:24:26,800
maybe he was somebody
in somebody else's book.

1825
01:24:26,931 --> 01:24:28,976
[Kurt Vonnegut reading]

1826
01:24:39,552 --> 01:24:42,903
Since anything I say in writing
happens to him,

1827
01:24:43,034 --> 01:24:44,644
because he is my creation,

1828
01:24:44,775 --> 01:24:46,820
and I give him his freedom,
and this is, uh--

1829
01:24:46,951 --> 01:24:48,909
I will never use him
in a book again.

1830
01:24:49,040 --> 01:24:50,563
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"I'm approaching
my 50th birthday,

1831
01:24:50,694 --> 01:24:52,391
Mr. Trout," I said.

1832
01:24:52,522 --> 01:24:54,437
"I'm cleansing and
renewing myself

1833
01:24:54,567 --> 01:24:56,830
"for the very different sorts
of years to come.

1834
01:24:56,961 --> 01:25:00,138
"I'm going to set at liberty
all the literary characters

1835
01:25:00,269 --> 01:25:03,402
"who have served me so loyally
during my writing career.

1836
01:25:03,533 --> 01:25:05,622
"You are the only one
I am telling.

1837
01:25:05,752 --> 01:25:08,581
"Arise, Mr. Trout,
you are free.

1838
01:25:08,712 --> 01:25:09,800
You're free."

1839
01:25:10,496 --> 01:25:12,237
[David Ulin] I mean,
it's a remarkable moment

1840
01:25:12,368 --> 01:25:14,761
He as the, kind of,
creator of those stories

1841
01:25:14,892 --> 01:25:16,415
was as important to the stories

1842
01:25:16,546 --> 01:25:18,678
as the characters
he was writing about.

1843
01:25:19,636 --> 01:25:21,638
[Kurt Vonnegut reading]

1844
01:25:27,165 --> 01:25:28,558
"You're afraid you'll
kill yourself

1845
01:25:28,688 --> 01:25:30,037
the way your mother did,
I said."

1846
01:25:30,168 --> 01:25:32,083
[typewriter clacking]

1847
01:25:32,214 --> 01:25:33,432
"I know, I said."

1848
01:25:34,651 --> 01:25:35,695
[snapping]

1849
01:25:36,566 --> 01:25:38,568
[birds chirping]

1850
01:25:46,837 --> 01:25:49,187
Would have been 1943,
I guess.

1851
01:25:53,235 --> 01:25:54,888
She died in this house.

1852
01:25:55,019 --> 01:25:58,065
♪

1853
01:25:59,980 --> 01:26:01,373
[Kurt Vonnegut]
It was Mother's Day.

1854
01:26:01,721 --> 01:26:04,420
My sister and I,
uh, found her.

1855
01:26:05,595 --> 01:26:06,944
It was upstairs.

1856
01:26:07,466 --> 01:26:09,251
Indeed, she was dead.

1857
01:26:10,382 --> 01:26:11,818
It was a Marilyn Monroe thing,

1858
01:26:11,949 --> 01:26:13,994
it was a combination of
pills and alcohol.

1859
01:26:14,125 --> 01:26:15,431
A lot of pills.

1860
01:26:15,779 --> 01:26:18,477
Suicide is supposedly
a disgrace,

1861
01:26:18,608 --> 01:26:21,393
and whenever I've said that
my mother killed herself,

1862
01:26:21,524 --> 01:26:24,788
other relatives would say,
no, no, it didn't happen.

1863
01:26:25,310 --> 01:26:27,225
It was a family secret.

1864
01:26:27,965 --> 01:26:30,924
She never recovered from
profound unhappiness.

1865
01:26:32,143 --> 01:26:33,797
And it was too damn bad.

1866
01:26:36,495 --> 01:26:38,018
[Bob Weide] What then
became of your father

1867
01:26:38,149 --> 01:26:39,455
after your mother's death?

1868
01:26:40,195 --> 01:26:42,632
[Kurt Vonnegut]
He didn't like life
very much after that.

1869
01:26:44,329 --> 01:26:47,376
Certainly, the starch went
out of him pretty much.

1870
01:26:47,767 --> 01:26:49,465
As it should have,
I mean, you know,

1871
01:26:49,595 --> 01:26:52,381
people can stand so much
and no more.

1872
01:26:54,644 --> 01:26:58,213
To have you wife
dislike life that much,

1873
01:26:58,561 --> 01:27:01,477
you know, he-- he was
principle maker of her life.

1874
01:27:02,304 --> 01:27:05,307
♪

1875
01:27:06,960 --> 01:27:09,136
He wound up all alone here.

1876
01:27:12,444 --> 01:27:15,012
It's too bad that one of us
couldn't have stayed with him.

1877
01:27:19,190 --> 01:27:20,235
That's about it.

1878
01:27:22,672 --> 01:27:25,414
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Arise, Mr. Trout,
you are free.

1879
01:27:25,544 --> 01:27:27,242
"You're free.

1880
01:27:27,372 --> 01:27:29,418
"His voice was
my fathers' voice.

1881
01:27:29,548 --> 01:27:33,248
"I heard my father
and I saw my mother.

1882
01:27:33,378 --> 01:27:35,511
"My mother stayed
far, far away,

1883
01:27:35,641 --> 01:27:38,340
"because she had left me
a legacy of suicide.

1884
01:27:40,167 --> 01:27:42,474
"Here was what Kilgore Trout
cried out to me

1885
01:27:42,605 --> 01:27:43,910
"in my father's voice:

1886
01:27:45,216 --> 01:27:46,261
"'Make me young.'

1887
01:27:50,177 --> 01:27:51,266
"'Make me young.'

1888
01:27:54,660 --> 01:27:56,009
'Make me young.'"

1889
01:28:00,362 --> 01:28:03,365
♪

1890
01:28:08,979 --> 01:28:10,981
[Kurt Vonnegut]
A writer is very fortunate

1891
01:28:11,111 --> 01:28:13,723
in that he can cure himself
every day.

1892
01:28:13,984 --> 01:28:16,639
Uh, if he is able to write
every day,

1893
01:28:16,769 --> 01:28:20,947
he has done himself some sort of
great psychological favor.

1894
01:28:21,078 --> 01:28:22,297
[narrator]
"Dear Robert,

1895
01:28:22,427 --> 01:28:23,994
I'll be going to England
for two weeks,

1896
01:28:24,124 --> 01:28:25,648
to hustle
Deadeye Dick.

1897
01:28:25,778 --> 01:28:26,910
[bell dings]

1898
01:28:27,040 --> 01:28:28,477
"Dear Bob,

1899
01:28:28,607 --> 01:28:32,002
I hack away at a new novel
calledGalapagos.

1900
01:28:32,132 --> 01:28:34,309
-[bell dings]
-"Dear Whyaduck,

1901
01:28:34,439 --> 01:28:36,833
"Yes, I've finished
another book,

1902
01:28:36,963 --> 01:28:38,182
" Hocus Pocus.

1903
01:28:38,313 --> 01:28:40,315
"I don't know if
I like it or not.

1904
01:28:40,445 --> 01:28:42,882
"At least it isn't about
World War Two.

1905
01:28:43,013 --> 01:28:44,231
"That's an improvement.

1906
01:28:44,362 --> 01:28:45,363
[bell dings]

1907
01:28:46,930 --> 01:28:48,235
-Huh?
[man] You gonna read--

1908
01:28:48,366 --> 01:28:50,629
I don't think anybody else is,
I might as well,

1909
01:28:50,760 --> 01:28:52,501
-because--
[laughter]

1910
01:28:54,241 --> 01:28:56,548
God, it's so boring,
there's so much--

1911
01:28:56,679 --> 01:28:58,681
[laughter]

1912
01:28:59,856 --> 01:29:02,685
A lot of people got off the
Kurt Vonnegut band wagon,

1913
01:29:02,815 --> 01:29:04,774
I don't think they read him
as much after

1914
01:29:04,904 --> 01:29:06,253
Breakfast Of Champions.

1915
01:29:06,384 --> 01:29:09,126
I can see his latter novels
as a reflection of

1916
01:29:09,256 --> 01:29:11,084
what's happening in
Kurt Vonnegut's life.

1917
01:29:11,215 --> 01:29:12,999
The books become
more personal.

1918
01:29:13,130 --> 01:29:15,872
He has this dream of
extended family

1919
01:29:16,002 --> 01:29:17,787
as the thing we'd most lost.

1920
01:29:17,917 --> 01:29:20,093
and the thing we most need
to re-create.

1921
01:29:20,398 --> 01:29:22,792
Some of it worked,
some of it didn't.

1922
01:29:25,708 --> 01:29:28,798
When he sort of stumbled a bit
in some of his '70s work,

1923
01:29:28,928 --> 01:29:30,756
they were so happy
to crush him.

1924
01:29:30,887 --> 01:29:32,497
He as so hurt by it.

1925
01:29:34,107 --> 01:29:35,457
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
Kurt Vonnegut said,

1926
01:29:35,587 --> 01:29:37,937
"Enduring the critical
reception to Slapstick

1927
01:29:38,068 --> 01:29:40,113
"he felt like he was
sleeping on his feet

1928
01:29:40,244 --> 01:29:41,898
in a boxcar in Germany
again."

1929
01:29:42,551 --> 01:29:45,554
They took that book as
the occasion to attack

1930
01:29:45,684 --> 01:29:47,164
all of his work, to say,

1931
01:29:47,294 --> 01:29:49,732
"See?
We were right all along.

1932
01:29:49,862 --> 01:29:52,604
He's a bad writer
from start to finish."

1933
01:29:52,735 --> 01:29:54,519
I read a number of reviews,

1934
01:29:54,650 --> 01:29:58,001
and have watched
the critics turn.

1935
01:29:58,349 --> 01:30:00,525
We live decade by decade now,

1936
01:30:00,656 --> 01:30:03,702
and, uh, people write books
about this decade

1937
01:30:03,833 --> 01:30:05,312
and then the next decade,

1938
01:30:05,443 --> 01:30:09,404
and I belong to the '60s,
I guess, and not the '70s.

1939
01:30:10,274 --> 01:30:11,667
People dismissed him,

1940
01:30:11,797 --> 01:30:15,148
or wrote about him as
an easy writer.

1941
01:30:15,497 --> 01:30:17,934
As anyone who's tried to write
knows,

1942
01:30:18,064 --> 01:30:20,197
it's not easy to be
easy to read.

1943
01:30:20,937 --> 01:30:22,808
[Gregory Sumner]
The accessibility of his style,

1944
01:30:22,939 --> 01:30:24,767
which I think is a strength,

1945
01:30:24,897 --> 01:30:26,856
it's become a badge of shame.

1946
01:30:26,986 --> 01:30:28,945
Just because
a junior in high school

1947
01:30:29,075 --> 01:30:31,121
can read Cat's Cradle
and enjoy it

1948
01:30:31,251 --> 01:30:32,601
and get something out of it

1949
01:30:32,731 --> 01:30:34,472
that doesn't make it not
profound.

1950
01:30:35,560 --> 01:30:38,215
Vonnegut was championed by
the people,

1951
01:30:38,345 --> 01:30:39,651
not by the critics.

1952
01:30:41,087 --> 01:30:42,175
[woman]
Ladies and gentlemen,

1953
01:30:42,306 --> 01:30:43,568
Mr. Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

1954
01:30:43,699 --> 01:30:46,353
[cheering, applause]

1955
01:30:49,095 --> 01:30:51,881
[David Ulin]
As the novels maybe
became less fulfilling

1956
01:30:52,011 --> 01:30:53,317
in a certain sense,

1957
01:30:53,448 --> 01:30:55,928
he was able to move into writing
those speeches,

1958
01:30:56,059 --> 01:30:59,105
and addressing the material
that way.

1959
01:31:00,672 --> 01:31:02,761
The most sensible and
constructive thought

1960
01:31:02,892 --> 01:31:04,371
we can hold on this day,

1961
01:31:04,502 --> 01:31:08,158
is that we are not members of
different generations.

1962
01:31:08,288 --> 01:31:10,726
We are also close together
in time

1963
01:31:10,856 --> 01:31:12,597
that we should
think of ourselves

1964
01:31:12,728 --> 01:31:14,207
as brothers and sisters.

1965
01:31:14,338 --> 01:31:16,993
Whenever my children complain
about the planet to me,

1966
01:31:17,123 --> 01:31:19,778
I say, "Shut up,
I just got here myself."

1967
01:31:19,909 --> 01:31:21,911
[laughter, applause]

1968
01:31:25,131 --> 01:31:27,046
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
He wanted to
keep himself current

1969
01:31:27,177 --> 01:31:29,135
to let people know
he was still there

1970
01:31:29,266 --> 01:31:30,789
standing behind his ideas.

1971
01:31:30,920 --> 01:31:34,140
The two experiences
that will try you most

1972
01:31:34,271 --> 01:31:36,621
are loneliness and boredom.

1973
01:31:36,882 --> 01:31:39,145
We are all so lonesome
so much of the time

1974
01:31:39,276 --> 01:31:41,496
because we were meant to live
in extended families,

1975
01:31:41,626 --> 01:31:44,977
to have dozens or even hundreds
of relatives near by.

1976
01:31:45,108 --> 01:31:48,807
Do what you can to get
yourselves extended families

1977
01:31:48,938 --> 01:31:51,941
no matter how arbitrary
they may be.

1978
01:31:52,071 --> 01:31:54,726
We all need more people
in our lives,

1979
01:31:54,857 --> 01:31:58,164
and they do not have to be
high grade people, either.

1980
01:31:58,295 --> 01:32:00,602
They can be imbeciles
'cause what matters--

1981
01:32:00,732 --> 01:32:02,995
-[laughter]
-Is numbers.

1982
01:32:03,126 --> 01:32:04,736
Good lord, I certainly
wish you well.

1983
01:32:04,867 --> 01:32:06,869
[applause]

1984
01:32:07,783 --> 01:32:11,047
As my generation of critics
sort of came up,

1985
01:32:11,177 --> 01:32:13,919
I think Vonnegut began to be
taken much more seriously,

1986
01:32:14,050 --> 01:32:15,921
and I think that's probably true
in academia as well,

1987
01:32:16,052 --> 01:32:17,575
that, you know,
he began to be taught,

1988
01:32:17,706 --> 01:32:19,142
he began to be
sort of regarded as

1989
01:32:19,272 --> 01:32:20,665
a kind of touchstone
in a certain way

1990
01:32:20,796 --> 01:32:22,319
because we all
grew up with him.

1991
01:32:22,449 --> 01:32:24,800
[Kurt Vonnegut]
As I told you,
I studied anthropology,

1992
01:32:24,930 --> 01:32:27,411
and I had to give it up.

1993
01:32:27,542 --> 01:32:29,848
I just couldn't stand
primitive people,

1994
01:32:29,979 --> 01:32:31,110
they were so stupid.

1995
01:32:31,241 --> 01:32:33,286
[laughing]

1996
01:32:34,461 --> 01:32:35,898
[Nanny Vonnegut]
If go l-- see him speak,

1997
01:32:36,028 --> 01:32:38,727
and I see the--
the auditorium is packed,

1998
01:32:38,857 --> 01:32:41,643
and out the doors,
it-- it staggers me,

1999
01:32:41,773 --> 01:32:43,906
but I really do have to
share him with the whole world.

2000
01:32:44,036 --> 01:32:47,039
♪

2001
01:32:49,738 --> 01:32:51,696
[Nanny Vonnegut]
He invited me on
a trip to Indianapolis

2002
01:32:51,827 --> 01:32:53,306
to have a family outing.

2003
01:32:53,437 --> 01:32:55,395
You know, I thought it was
gonna be the two of us.

2004
01:32:56,179 --> 01:32:58,050
And then at the last minute,
he said,

2005
01:32:58,181 --> 01:33:00,575
"Oh, by the way, they're
shooting a documentary.

2006
01:33:01,227 --> 01:33:02,925
I was so angry.

2007
01:33:03,055 --> 01:33:05,101
I actually wouldn't have gone on
that trip if I had known that.

2008
01:33:06,406 --> 01:33:09,148
But turned out,
it was... all right.

2009
01:33:09,671 --> 01:33:10,672
[snapping]

2010
01:33:12,195 --> 01:33:13,936
-Oop!
-[laughter]

2011
01:33:14,066 --> 01:33:17,026
[Nanny Vonnegut]
I had never seen him
so at ease.

2012
01:33:17,330 --> 01:33:21,073
They had found each other as
the subject and the filmmaker.

2013
01:33:21,378 --> 01:33:22,858
It felt like a friendship.

2014
01:33:24,773 --> 01:33:27,427
[laughter]

2015
01:33:29,038 --> 01:33:31,606
I was happy to see my father
enjoying himself.

2016
01:33:32,563 --> 01:33:33,782
-[man 1] Mark.
-[man 2] Marker.

2017
01:33:33,912 --> 01:33:37,307
...and said,
"There is Tralfamadore."

2018
01:33:37,437 --> 01:33:39,135
[Bob Weide]
Can you just do that line
one more time.

2019
01:33:39,265 --> 01:33:41,877
-Up your ass. What the--
-[laughing]

2020
01:33:44,053 --> 01:33:45,620
[steady tone]

2021
01:33:45,750 --> 01:33:47,709
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"She had me read
The Brothers Karamazov

2022
01:33:47,839 --> 01:33:49,406
during our honeymoon."

2023
01:33:49,536 --> 01:33:50,755
[Bob Weide]
Would you go back to,
"She had me read"?

2024
01:33:50,886 --> 01:33:53,366
-[Kurt Vonnegut] Oh, shut up.
-[laughter]

2025
01:33:55,760 --> 01:33:57,327
[Bob Weide] You know,
when you're a Vonnegut fan,

2026
01:33:57,457 --> 01:33:59,982
you run into so many other
people who love Vonnegut,

2027
01:34:00,112 --> 01:34:01,723
who've read all of his works,

2028
01:34:01,853 --> 01:34:04,160
but I find that for the masses
who haven't read his books,

2029
01:34:04,290 --> 01:34:06,510
that Kurt eventually became

2030
01:34:06,641 --> 01:34:09,034
so much a part of
our culture

2031
01:34:09,165 --> 01:34:11,036
uh, pop culture,

2032
01:34:11,167 --> 01:34:13,038
that there are these people who
know him for these odd things,

2033
01:34:13,169 --> 01:34:16,781
like there were a series of
commercials done for coffee

2034
01:34:16,912 --> 01:34:18,130
It's called
The Coffee Achievers.

2035
01:34:18,261 --> 01:34:20,916
[man] You are the new
American society.

2036
01:34:21,046 --> 01:34:23,135
The movers and the shakers.

2037
01:34:23,266 --> 01:34:25,964
♪ Hold on tight
to your dreams ♪

2038
01:34:26,095 --> 01:34:28,097
And then there's what,
in some ways,

2039
01:34:28,227 --> 01:34:30,577
the most memorable thing
that Vonnegut's ever done.

2040
01:34:30,708 --> 01:34:33,015
You've got a major paper
comin' up on Kurt Vonnegut.

2041
01:34:33,145 --> 01:34:34,669
You haven't even read
any of the books.

2042
01:34:34,799 --> 01:34:35,887
[sighs] I tried.

2043
01:34:36,018 --> 01:34:37,236
[knocking]

2044
01:34:38,150 --> 01:34:39,412
I don't understand
a word of it.

2045
01:34:39,543 --> 01:34:41,545
So how you gonna write
the paper then, huh?

2046
01:34:43,242 --> 01:34:44,983
Hi. I'm Kurt Vonnegut.

2047
01:34:45,114 --> 01:34:46,593
I'm looking for
Thornton Melon.

2048
01:34:48,247 --> 01:34:51,033
Uh, wanna come in?

2049
01:34:51,163 --> 01:34:53,949
When I was in high school
and making my way through

2050
01:34:54,079 --> 01:34:55,167
Vonnegut's canon,

2051
01:34:55,298 --> 01:34:56,865
eventually, I read
Mother Night,

2052
01:34:56,995 --> 01:34:59,868
and I remember
closing that book,

2053
01:34:59,998 --> 01:35:02,044
and decided right then and there
in high school

2054
01:35:02,174 --> 01:35:04,873
that I wanted to make a movie
out of this book.

2055
01:35:07,179 --> 01:35:09,355
And I did, 20 years later.

2056
01:35:10,052 --> 01:35:12,619
Kurt gave me the rights to
the book on a handshake,

2057
01:35:12,750 --> 01:35:15,666
and I wrote the screenplay to
Mother Nighton spec.

2058
01:35:15,797 --> 01:35:18,669
Took five years
'til we got it made.

2059
01:35:18,800 --> 01:35:21,324
The director of the film
was my best friend,

2060
01:35:21,454 --> 01:35:23,108
Keith Gordon.

2061
01:35:23,239 --> 01:35:24,675
Coincidentally, Keith had his
own connection with Vonnegut

2062
01:35:24,806 --> 01:35:26,503
because Keith used to be
an actor.

2063
01:35:27,069 --> 01:35:29,158
And Keith played
Rodney Dangerfield's son

2064
01:35:29,288 --> 01:35:30,420
in Back To School.

2065
01:35:30,550 --> 01:35:32,552
Hey, Keith.
Sorry we're late.

2066
01:35:32,683 --> 01:35:34,380
Welcome.
Thank you for doing this.

2067
01:35:34,511 --> 01:35:36,252
-Thank you.
-I appreciate it.

2068
01:35:36,382 --> 01:35:38,733
[Bob Weide]
Kurt came up to Montreal
to visit the set one day.

2069
01:35:38,863 --> 01:35:41,126
We were trying to figure out
a way to use him.

2070
01:35:42,649 --> 01:35:45,696
♪

2071
01:35:49,178 --> 01:35:51,963
[man] It wasn't the fear of
death that froze me.

2072
01:35:52,094 --> 01:35:54,879
I had taught myself to
think of death as a friend.

2073
01:35:55,010 --> 01:35:58,013
♪

2074
01:36:08,327 --> 01:36:09,807
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Congratulations,

2075
01:36:09,938 --> 01:36:11,896
we're honored to have had
anything to do with it.

2076
01:36:12,027 --> 01:36:13,028
Bye.

2077
01:36:14,856 --> 01:36:16,553
[Bob Weide] Of course,
it didn't make a dime.

2078
01:36:16,683 --> 01:36:18,773
[chuckles]
Nobody went to see it.

2079
01:36:19,469 --> 01:36:20,731
I remember Kurt said to me,

2080
01:36:20,862 --> 01:36:23,168
"Well, maybe you just wrote
a lousy script."

2081
01:36:24,126 --> 01:36:25,649
And I said, "Well, you know
what they say:

2082
01:36:25,780 --> 01:36:27,520
Garbage in, garbage out."

2083
01:36:28,434 --> 01:36:30,785
Throughout all of this,
I always had other jobs.

2084
01:36:31,089 --> 01:36:32,525
I mean,
I had bills to pay.

2085
01:36:32,656 --> 01:36:35,702
♪

2086
01:36:38,923 --> 01:36:40,316
After the Marx Brothers film,

2087
01:36:40,446 --> 01:36:42,187
I did several more
documentaries.

2088
01:36:42,318 --> 01:36:44,059
mainly on comedians
that I loved.

2089
01:36:44,320 --> 01:36:45,887
Every time I took
another gig,

2090
01:36:46,017 --> 01:36:47,714
there's always
a tinge of guilt

2091
01:36:47,845 --> 01:36:49,804
that I wasn't finishing
my Vonnegut film.

2092
01:36:50,413 --> 01:36:52,154
One day in 1998,

2093
01:36:52,284 --> 01:36:53,808
I got a call from my friend,
Larry David.

2094
01:36:53,938 --> 01:36:57,072
♪[ Curb Your Enthusiasmtheme]

2095
01:37:00,597 --> 01:37:02,077
Get in the car.

2096
01:37:02,207 --> 01:37:03,339
-Are you my Caucasian?
-I'm your fuckin' Caucasian.

2097
01:37:03,469 --> 01:37:04,514
-All right!
-Yeah!

2098
01:37:04,644 --> 01:37:06,951
-Here, watch this.
-Ow! [groans]

2099
01:37:07,082 --> 01:37:09,171
-[clattering]
-Shit!

2100
01:37:09,301 --> 01:37:11,695
Bob, this is Kurt.
I thought you were a failure.

2101
01:37:11,826 --> 01:37:14,872
How wrong I was.
Hooray.

2102
01:37:16,091 --> 01:37:18,180
[Bob Weide]
I had no idea at the time

2103
01:37:18,310 --> 01:37:19,921
that that would then
lead to a series

2104
01:37:20,051 --> 01:37:21,705
called
Curb Your Enthusiasm.

2105
01:37:21,966 --> 01:37:23,533
After ever season,
I kept saying, that's it,

2106
01:37:23,663 --> 01:37:24,795
I'm leaving, I'm leaving,
I'm leaving.

2107
01:37:24,926 --> 01:37:26,753
Okay, now
the Vonnegut documentary.

2108
01:37:31,149 --> 01:37:33,108
♪

2109
01:37:33,238 --> 01:37:35,371
[narrator]
"Dearest Whyaduck,

2110
01:37:35,501 --> 01:37:38,374
"Where indeed is your
Slaughterhouse-Five?

2111
01:37:39,679 --> 01:37:41,812
"Have you considered
cutting off an ear

2112
01:37:41,943 --> 01:37:43,858
and sending it to
a prostitute?

2113
01:37:44,989 --> 01:37:46,730
These things take time.

2114
01:37:48,427 --> 01:37:50,908
[Bob Weide]
This is all stuff that he
sent me over the years.

2115
01:37:51,039 --> 01:37:53,258
Whenever he would do, like,
a speech at a college,

2116
01:37:53,389 --> 01:37:55,043
or anything on TV,

2117
01:37:55,173 --> 01:37:57,219
he would always have them make
a VHS tape and send it to me.

2118
01:37:57,872 --> 01:38:00,265
He started to think of me
as his archivist.

2119
01:38:00,396 --> 01:38:01,919
Hi, Bob, this is Kurt.

2120
01:38:02,050 --> 01:38:03,834
I just want to make sure
the address is still right.

2121
01:38:03,965 --> 01:38:06,315
There's videotape
I'd like to send you.

2122
01:38:07,751 --> 01:38:10,058
We are here on Earth
to fart around.

2123
01:38:10,449 --> 01:38:13,278
And don't let anybody
tell you any different.

2124
01:38:13,409 --> 01:38:15,411
[laughter, applause]

2125
01:38:17,108 --> 01:38:20,590
It's like Harpo Marx's coat,
it's just bottomless.

2126
01:38:20,720 --> 01:38:22,157
Uh, How To Get
A Job Like Mine,

2127
01:38:22,287 --> 01:38:24,899
Distinguished Speakers
Series, 2003.

2128
01:38:25,029 --> 01:38:26,901
If you really want to
hurt your parents,

2129
01:38:27,031 --> 01:38:30,034
and you don't have nerve enough
to become a homosexual...

2130
01:38:30,165 --> 01:38:32,819
[laughter]

2131
01:38:35,039 --> 01:38:37,389
...the least you can do is go
into the arts.

2132
01:38:37,520 --> 01:38:39,609
[laughter, applause]

2133
01:38:42,046 --> 01:38:43,830
[Bob Weide]
I didn't want to do
a bait and switch.

2134
01:38:43,961 --> 01:38:46,355
I didn't want him to think
that I had said,

2135
01:38:46,485 --> 01:38:47,617
"Hey, I'm a big a fan of yours,

2136
01:38:47,747 --> 01:38:48,923
I'd like to make
a film on you,"

2137
01:38:49,053 --> 01:38:50,402
and then we'd become friends,

2138
01:38:50,663 --> 01:38:53,188
and then that I would just
ditch the film.

2139
01:38:53,318 --> 01:38:55,799
But no matter how much time
I'd put in,

2140
01:38:55,930 --> 01:38:58,454
I never seem to get any closer
to the finish line.

2141
01:38:59,585 --> 01:39:01,500
I should say I'm not
the only one

2142
01:39:01,631 --> 01:39:03,850
who was stuck in the mud
on a long term project.

2143
01:39:05,200 --> 01:39:07,115
Well, this--
this very morning,

2144
01:39:07,985 --> 01:39:11,336
I mailed off the last 30 pages
of a book.

2145
01:39:11,771 --> 01:39:13,469
[woman] Is there a title for
your new book yet?

2146
01:39:13,599 --> 01:39:15,732
Yeah, it's called, uh,
Timequake.

2147
01:39:16,472 --> 01:39:18,474
And, uh...

2148
01:39:18,604 --> 01:39:21,607
But that's pretty good,
I'm-- I'm 73 years old

2149
01:39:21,738 --> 01:39:23,131
and, uh...

2150
01:39:24,436 --> 01:39:26,351
I didn't think I'd last
this long, you know?

2151
01:39:26,482 --> 01:39:28,092
[chuckling]

2152
01:39:28,223 --> 01:39:29,659
[David Ulin]
Timequake was a struggle
for him to write

2153
01:39:29,789 --> 01:39:32,314
because he had said
it was gonna be his last book

2154
01:39:32,444 --> 01:39:34,011
that he was gonna retire,

2155
01:39:34,142 --> 01:39:35,186
so I think he didn't want to
end his career on a kind of

2156
01:39:35,317 --> 01:39:37,058
half-assed resign note.

2157
01:39:38,494 --> 01:39:40,583
Basically,
the Timequake is at--

2158
01:39:40,713 --> 01:39:42,411
in 2001 there is a timequake

2159
01:39:42,541 --> 01:39:45,936
which is a kind of earthquake
in the time continuum.

2160
01:39:46,067 --> 01:39:48,547
where the universe resets
ten years,

2161
01:39:48,678 --> 01:39:50,985
and everything goes back
to 1991,

2162
01:39:51,115 --> 01:39:54,727
and everyone has to go through
the ten years again.

2163
01:39:54,858 --> 01:39:58,079
I remember him telling me
back in the, uh, early '90s

2164
01:39:58,209 --> 01:39:59,428
that he was working on
this book,

2165
01:39:59,558 --> 01:40:01,212
and then I'd say,
"How's the book coming?"

2166
01:40:01,343 --> 01:40:02,997
and he says, "Oh, I don't think
it's ever gonna get finished.

2167
01:40:03,127 --> 01:40:04,781
I'm not really blocked.

2168
01:40:04,911 --> 01:40:08,089
I'm, uh, writing stuff
I don't like.

2169
01:40:08,219 --> 01:40:10,613
I had a book scheduled
to be published,

2170
01:40:10,743 --> 01:40:11,875
I just didn't like it.

2171
01:40:12,006 --> 01:40:13,137
[David Ulin]
He had finished

2172
01:40:13,268 --> 01:40:14,356
a conventional version
of the novel,

2173
01:40:14,486 --> 01:40:15,922
he had fulfilled
the contract,

2174
01:40:16,053 --> 01:40:17,402
and then he said

2175
01:40:17,533 --> 01:40:19,883
he didn't want to go out
like Mick Jagger--

2176
01:40:20,014 --> 01:40:22,407
[laughs]
playing Satisfaction,

2177
01:40:22,538 --> 01:40:24,235
you know, for
the eight millionth time.

2178
01:40:24,366 --> 01:40:26,281
So he went in and,
you know, he had a better idea

2179
01:40:26,411 --> 01:40:27,934
and he went in and
changed the whole book.

2180
01:40:28,065 --> 01:40:29,936
[Bob Weide] And when he
finally sat down and wrote

2181
01:40:30,067 --> 01:40:31,764
the final version of
Timequake,

2182
01:40:31,895 --> 01:40:35,638
it was a book about him
trying to write this novel.

2183
01:40:35,768 --> 01:40:39,033
So you'd have a passage from
the body of the story

2184
01:40:39,163 --> 01:40:41,905
and then you'd have a passage
of Kurt telling you

2185
01:40:42,036 --> 01:40:45,822
the difficulty he was having
in writing this book.

2186
01:40:45,952 --> 01:40:47,476
[Gregory Sumner]
Vonnegut finished
Timequake,

2187
01:40:47,606 --> 01:40:50,044
turned it in sheepishly
to the publisher,

2188
01:40:50,174 --> 01:40:51,871
and said it's a disaster,
it didn't work.

2189
01:40:52,002 --> 01:40:53,569
Nobody's gonna
want to read it.

2190
01:40:53,699 --> 01:40:55,745
[applause]

2191
01:41:00,010 --> 01:41:03,231
They had an opening at
the Borders flagship store.

2192
01:41:03,492 --> 01:41:05,233
The line was around the block.

2193
01:41:06,234 --> 01:41:08,845
Very interesting to me how he
continually kind of thought

2194
01:41:08,975 --> 01:41:10,412
they're not gonna like
what I'm doing,

2195
01:41:10,542 --> 01:41:12,196
and then they have, like,
a record crowd turned out,

2196
01:41:12,327 --> 01:41:14,155
and people still love Vonnegut.

2197
01:41:14,285 --> 01:41:17,332
I actually have an idea for
one more book.

2198
01:41:17,462 --> 01:41:19,508
[laughter]

2199
01:41:19,812 --> 01:41:22,032
-But I--
-[applause]

2200
01:41:23,686 --> 01:41:26,297
It's about my
homosexual relationship

2201
01:41:26,428 --> 01:41:27,777
-with O.J. Simpson.
-[laughter]

2202
01:41:31,911 --> 01:41:33,087
[woman]
Mr. Vonnegut,

2203
01:41:33,217 --> 01:41:34,566
I drove from Cincinnati
to meet you--

2204
01:41:34,697 --> 01:41:36,133
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Oh, I heard about
you people.

2205
01:41:36,264 --> 01:41:37,961
I was wondering if I could get
a picture with you?

2206
01:41:38,092 --> 01:41:39,789
-[Kurt Vonnegut] Of course.
-[camera shutter clicks]

2207
01:41:39,919 --> 01:41:41,051
Oh, thank you so much.

2208
01:41:41,834 --> 01:41:43,271
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
Vonnegut shows that

2209
01:41:43,401 --> 01:41:45,838
it's not the final book
that's the point,

2210
01:41:45,969 --> 01:41:48,102
it's the struggle
to write the book,

2211
01:41:48,232 --> 01:41:49,842
and that's the text.

2212
01:41:49,973 --> 01:41:53,194
The point is not the end,
it's the journey.

2213
01:41:53,455 --> 01:41:56,458
♪

2214
01:41:56,588 --> 01:41:59,287
[Bob Weide] I think most critics
and scholars agree that

2215
01:41:59,417 --> 01:42:01,245
the best thing about
Timequake

2216
01:42:01,376 --> 01:42:03,552
is that I'm in it.

2217
01:42:05,467 --> 01:42:07,469
[narrator reading]

2218
01:42:09,601 --> 01:42:11,212
[Bob Weide]
Vonnegut write about

2219
01:42:11,342 --> 01:42:13,866
a farewell clambake
for Kilgore Trout,

2220
01:42:13,997 --> 01:42:16,042
and he mentions all the people
in attendance.

2221
01:42:16,608 --> 01:42:18,044
And they're all his friends.

2222
01:42:18,610 --> 01:42:20,221
[narrator reading]

2223
01:42:25,356 --> 01:42:26,575
[Bob Weide]
And there I am.

2224
01:42:26,705 --> 01:42:28,403
[narrator]
"They were Robert Weide,

2225
01:42:28,533 --> 01:42:31,014
"who in the summer of 1996

2226
01:42:31,145 --> 01:42:33,408
is making a movie of
Mother Night."

2227
01:42:33,538 --> 01:42:36,150
I remember sending Kurt
a fax the next day

2228
01:42:36,280 --> 01:42:38,630
thanking him for including me
in the book.

2229
01:42:40,545 --> 01:42:42,634
I-- I think I took it all
in stride.

2230
01:42:46,203 --> 01:42:48,074
Yeah, finding myself in
a Vonnegut book

2231
01:42:48,205 --> 01:42:49,380
was a pretty happy thing.

2232
01:42:50,468 --> 01:42:52,644
The sad thing about
Timequake

2233
01:42:52,775 --> 01:42:55,299
is that Kurt suffered
another loss

2234
01:42:55,430 --> 01:42:56,735
right before he
finished the book.

2235
01:42:56,866 --> 01:42:58,389
[answering machine beeps]

2236
01:42:58,520 --> 01:43:00,826
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Hi, Bob, it's, uh,
Friday morning.

2237
01:43:00,957 --> 01:43:05,091
Uh, Bernie died at 10:00
Eastern Standard Time here,

2238
01:43:05,222 --> 01:43:06,876
it's utterly peaceful.

2239
01:43:07,006 --> 01:43:08,312
I thought you'd like to know.

2240
01:43:08,443 --> 01:43:10,793
[laughing]

2241
01:43:12,664 --> 01:43:17,234
Uh, his ashes are going to be
scattered over Mount Greylock

2242
01:43:17,365 --> 01:43:20,063
where the first
cloud seeding experiment

2243
01:43:20,194 --> 01:43:22,805
with dry ice
was performed.

2244
01:43:22,935 --> 01:43:24,459
He loved that idea.

2245
01:43:24,589 --> 01:43:25,590
Bye.

2246
01:43:28,027 --> 01:43:29,986
[narrator]
"I was the baby
of the family.

2247
01:43:31,857 --> 01:43:33,903
[narrator reading]

2248
01:43:38,560 --> 01:43:40,039
[Bob Weide]
After Timequake,

2249
01:43:40,170 --> 01:43:43,391
I found myself with a question
which sounds rhetorical,

2250
01:43:43,521 --> 01:43:45,871
but I was wondering about
a literal answer.

2251
01:43:46,916 --> 01:43:49,397
What happens when
a writer stops writing?

2252
01:43:50,485 --> 01:43:52,356
[waves crashing]

2253
01:43:52,487 --> 01:43:55,141
[seagulls squawking]

2254
01:44:03,106 --> 01:44:05,064
When I was
a neighbor to Kurt

2255
01:44:05,195 --> 01:44:07,589
in Sagaponack
in Long island,

2256
01:44:08,111 --> 01:44:10,113
he frequently came to visit.

2257
01:44:10,635 --> 01:44:12,985
And often when I would
get up in the morning,

2258
01:44:13,116 --> 01:44:14,248
and I get up early,

2259
01:44:15,074 --> 01:44:16,206
Kurt would be there.

2260
01:44:16,728 --> 01:44:18,339
He'd be on the porch.

2261
01:44:18,991 --> 01:44:22,778
Um... waiting for somebody
to get up.

2262
01:44:23,474 --> 01:44:25,737
Waiting to come in
and have a cup of coffee.

2263
01:44:26,434 --> 01:44:29,263
Uh, and another Pall Mall.

2264
01:44:30,612 --> 01:44:33,354
When I asked, "How long
have you been here?"

2265
01:44:34,311 --> 01:44:36,574
"Oh, I've just had a butt
or two," he would say,

2266
01:44:36,705 --> 01:44:38,620
or I just-- I just got here.

2267
01:44:39,621 --> 01:44:41,100
There were enough butts
out there,

2268
01:44:41,231 --> 01:44:43,625
so you had to believe...

2269
01:44:43,755 --> 01:44:45,844
he'd arrived
when it was still dark.

2270
01:44:47,629 --> 01:44:49,848
♪

2271
01:44:49,979 --> 01:44:51,502
[man] Mr. Vonnegut,
thanks for coming by.

2272
01:44:51,763 --> 01:44:52,764
Oh, my pleasure.

2273
01:44:52,895 --> 01:44:54,331
How's life?

2274
01:44:54,853 --> 01:44:57,029
Well, it's practically over,
thank God, I'm--

2275
01:44:57,160 --> 01:44:58,857
-[laughing]
-Heaven's sakes.

2276
01:44:58,988 --> 01:45:00,294
I'm practically 83.

2277
01:45:00,424 --> 01:45:01,947
There won't be
that much more of--

2278
01:45:02,078 --> 01:45:03,862
for me to put up with,
I don't t think.

2279
01:45:05,299 --> 01:45:07,562
[Morley Safer]
When Kurt got older
and more cranky

2280
01:45:07,692 --> 01:45:08,911
and falling apart,

2281
01:45:09,041 --> 01:45:10,695
which I'm going through myself
right now,

2282
01:45:11,696 --> 01:45:14,177
he used to say
we live too long.

2283
01:45:14,873 --> 01:45:16,527
We really live too long.

2284
01:45:18,181 --> 01:45:21,576
Some of you may know about
my class action suit.

2285
01:45:21,706 --> 01:45:23,360
against Brown Williamson.

2286
01:45:23,882 --> 01:45:27,408
It's uh-- They're manufacturers
of Pall Mall cigarettes

2287
01:45:27,538 --> 01:45:28,974
in Louisville.

2288
01:45:29,105 --> 01:45:32,848
And-- [clears throat] I have
been chain smoking these

2289
01:45:33,501 --> 01:45:35,459
since I was 14 years old.

2290
01:45:37,113 --> 01:45:39,768
And on their package,
they promised to kill me.

2291
01:45:39,898 --> 01:45:42,553
[laughter]

2292
01:45:45,513 --> 01:45:47,906
And I'm about to turn 83.

2293
01:45:48,037 --> 01:45:50,082
[laughter, applause]

2294
01:45:51,910 --> 01:45:54,130
[man] He had a totally
fulfilled career.

2295
01:45:54,260 --> 01:45:56,567
Totally fulfilled life.
That's why it's haunting.

2296
01:45:57,089 --> 01:45:58,439
You know, you've done what
you're gonna do,

2297
01:45:58,569 --> 01:46:00,179
and now you're just
hangin' around

2298
01:46:00,310 --> 01:46:02,573
to find out what
specialist you see next week.

2299
01:46:04,096 --> 01:46:05,054
[man]
So there he is,

2300
01:46:05,184 --> 01:46:07,230
he's not working
on a major book,

2301
01:46:07,361 --> 01:46:09,450
he was quite lonely.

2302
01:46:09,580 --> 01:46:10,625
and he would reach out.

2303
01:46:10,755 --> 01:46:13,671
It was almost like
somebody, um,

2304
01:46:13,802 --> 01:46:16,805
in a prison cell
in a funny way.

2305
01:46:16,935 --> 01:46:18,720
You know, he would send
these faxes.

2306
01:46:19,895 --> 01:46:22,419
Anything he wanted to write
he could have gotten published,

2307
01:46:22,550 --> 01:46:24,769
but these were just
little things for his friends.

2308
01:46:24,900 --> 01:46:26,292
Oh, here's a favorite one
of mine.

2309
01:46:27,076 --> 01:46:29,121
[reading]

2310
01:46:32,124 --> 01:46:34,823
That's from a Martian Visitor.
Look at this.

2311
01:46:34,953 --> 01:46:36,999
[reading]

2312
01:46:40,350 --> 01:46:41,917
Look at this one.
Here's a simple one.

2313
01:46:42,221 --> 01:46:44,093
[reading]

2314
01:46:44,833 --> 01:46:47,923
♪

2315
01:46:48,445 --> 01:46:49,881
[Bob Weide] The things that
were depressing him

2316
01:46:50,012 --> 01:46:51,100
were no secret.

2317
01:46:51,492 --> 01:46:54,103
There was his
domestic situation,

2318
01:46:54,233 --> 01:46:55,409
as he referred to it.

2319
01:46:56,497 --> 01:46:58,063
We had a lot of conversations,

2320
01:46:58,194 --> 01:47:00,457
and there were a lot of faxes
about his second marriage,

2321
01:47:00,588 --> 01:47:04,287
which was not exactly playing
out happily ever after.

2322
01:47:06,289 --> 01:47:08,509
He was also outraged
about how we were

2323
01:47:08,639 --> 01:47:10,206
poisoning the environment,

2324
01:47:10,336 --> 01:47:12,948
and the inevitable
consequences of that.

2325
01:47:13,949 --> 01:47:15,211
But there was one other thing.

2326
01:47:15,516 --> 01:47:17,343
The last thing I ever wanted...

2327
01:47:18,257 --> 01:47:19,824
was to be alive...

2328
01:47:20,129 --> 01:47:21,478
when the three most important,

2329
01:47:21,609 --> 01:47:24,002
most powerful people on
the face of the Earth...

2330
01:47:25,482 --> 01:47:27,441
were named Bush,
Dick and Colin.

2331
01:47:27,571 --> 01:47:29,617
[laughter]

2332
01:47:30,748 --> 01:47:34,709
[Bob Weide]
He was not a big fan of
the Bush administration.

2333
01:47:35,013 --> 01:47:36,275
Either one, actually.

2334
01:47:36,406 --> 01:47:39,061
Um, and especially
the war with Iraq.

2335
01:47:39,670 --> 01:47:40,671
Either one.

2336
01:47:41,063 --> 01:47:43,108
[explosions]

2337
01:47:47,156 --> 01:47:49,201
[Mark Vonnegut]
He truly believed in
the American dream.

2338
01:47:49,332 --> 01:47:51,900
He believed, uh, that
this could be wonderful

2339
01:47:52,030 --> 01:47:56,121
and I do think it was
the invasion of Iraq

2340
01:47:56,992 --> 01:47:59,473
that he said... it's over.

2341
01:48:00,125 --> 01:48:01,910
I don't' think there's
any question

2342
01:48:02,040 --> 01:48:04,782
but that experiencing war
had a profound effect.

2343
01:48:05,479 --> 01:48:09,178
And there's a certain resolution
in saying I've said it all.

2344
01:48:09,657 --> 01:48:11,746
You're testing yourself
to say it.

2345
01:48:11,876 --> 01:48:14,096
There wasn't any way he would
ever stop writing.

2346
01:48:16,272 --> 01:48:17,839
[man]
What he did,

2347
01:48:17,969 --> 01:48:21,712
which is very unusual for
a world famous writer to do,

2348
01:48:21,843 --> 01:48:24,498
he started writing
occasional essays

2349
01:48:24,628 --> 01:48:28,240
for a little magazine called
In These Times.

2350
01:48:28,371 --> 01:48:31,287
♪

2351
01:48:31,417 --> 01:48:34,029
[keyboard clacking]

2352
01:48:34,769 --> 01:48:36,640
My relationship
with Kurt began,

2353
01:48:36,771 --> 01:48:38,947
I, uh, asked him to do
an interview

2354
01:48:39,077 --> 01:48:40,470
for In These Times.

2355
01:48:40,601 --> 01:48:43,517
It was about Bush
and the war in Iraq.

2356
01:48:43,647 --> 01:48:46,868
In that, uh, first interview,
he used the phrase

2357
01:48:46,998 --> 01:48:48,696
"psychopathic personality."

2358
01:48:48,826 --> 01:48:50,828
[narrator reading]

2359
01:48:57,487 --> 01:49:00,055
"They cannot care
because they are nuts."

2360
01:49:00,795 --> 01:49:02,623
He was angry as
an American.

2361
01:49:02,753 --> 01:49:05,364
He was angry as a vet.

2362
01:49:05,495 --> 01:49:09,064
His own good name as an American
was being trashed.

2363
01:49:09,194 --> 01:49:12,763
When I saw a photograph
of the Iraqi kids,

2364
01:49:12,894 --> 01:49:16,985
with their hands up like this
having been shelled and bombed

2365
01:49:17,115 --> 01:49:18,726
until they were half-witted,

2366
01:49:19,683 --> 01:49:21,729
I said, those are
my brothers there.

2367
01:49:22,599 --> 01:49:25,341
And I didn't think it was
amusing or wonderful at all

2368
01:49:25,471 --> 01:49:29,301
to see kids in that situation.

2369
01:49:29,432 --> 01:49:31,565
[applause]

2370
01:49:31,695 --> 01:49:33,741
[Joe Bleifuss]
He wanted to speak out,

2371
01:49:33,871 --> 01:49:36,221
and so within a month of his
first interview,

2372
01:49:36,352 --> 01:49:38,615
he was sending me
things to publish.

2373
01:49:38,920 --> 01:49:41,226
He wrote about things that were
important to him,

2374
01:49:41,357 --> 01:49:42,924
but with every essay,

2375
01:49:43,054 --> 01:49:46,580
it would always bring in
a variety of things,

2376
01:49:46,710 --> 01:49:49,931
So sometimes Kilgore Trout
would just appear.

2377
01:49:51,759 --> 01:49:53,195
[Jerome Klinkowitz]
I doubt if he was paid for it,

2378
01:49:53,325 --> 01:49:55,066
and he just wrote
what was on his mind.

2379
01:49:56,198 --> 01:49:57,634
Turned out,

2380
01:49:57,765 --> 01:50:00,463
they were so good
that a small press,

2381
01:50:00,594 --> 01:50:03,379
Seven Stories Press
in New York collected them.

2382
01:50:03,509 --> 01:50:06,338
We canceled, at his request,
that book twice,

2383
01:50:06,469 --> 01:50:09,298
because he was afraid that what
if he did this little

2384
01:50:09,428 --> 01:50:11,256
kind of off-hand book at
the end of his life

2385
01:50:11,387 --> 01:50:13,563
that included criticizing
his government,

2386
01:50:13,694 --> 01:50:15,304
criticizing his country.

2387
01:50:15,434 --> 01:50:17,045
I mean, he really
thought about that,

2388
01:50:17,175 --> 01:50:18,916
and he was very
concerned about that.

2389
01:50:19,047 --> 01:50:22,093
♪

2390
01:50:23,312 --> 01:50:25,357
The book hit the best seller
list immediately,

2391
01:50:25,488 --> 01:50:28,317
and we sold
a quarter of a million copies
very, very quickly,

2392
01:50:28,447 --> 01:50:30,188
we could barely keep up with it.

2393
01:50:30,319 --> 01:50:31,973
This was Kurt's
first best seller

2394
01:50:32,103 --> 01:50:34,192
in about 10, 15 years.

2395
01:50:34,323 --> 01:50:36,412
All of a sudden, he's all over
the back page of

2396
01:50:36,542 --> 01:50:37,892
the New York Times
Book Review,

2397
01:50:38,022 --> 01:50:39,807
which had never been
his biggest fan,

2398
01:50:39,937 --> 01:50:42,331
saying this is just amazing.

2399
01:50:42,461 --> 01:50:45,334
As an adolescent,
he made my life bearable.

2400
01:50:45,464 --> 01:50:47,510
His latest is
A Man Without A Country

2401
01:50:47,641 --> 01:50:49,033
Please welcome to the show
Kurt Vonnegut.

2402
01:50:49,164 --> 01:50:51,427
[cheering, applause]

2403
01:50:51,688 --> 01:50:54,865
You know, I-- I always felt
in your writing

2404
01:50:54,996 --> 01:50:58,042
that you were admiring of man,

2405
01:50:58,434 --> 01:50:59,870
but disappointed in him.

2406
01:51:00,218 --> 01:51:03,091
Yes, well, I-- I think
we are terrible animals.

2407
01:51:03,221 --> 01:51:04,483
-and I think--
-[person laughs]

2408
01:51:04,614 --> 01:51:06,268
I think our planet's
immune system

2409
01:51:06,398 --> 01:51:08,531
is trying to get rid of us
and should.

2410
01:51:08,662 --> 01:51:09,880
-Uh--
-[applause]

2411
01:51:10,011 --> 01:51:11,621
You know, Mr. Vonnegut,
if I may,

2412
01:51:11,752 --> 01:51:14,929
it's sad for me to see you
lose your edge.

2413
01:51:15,059 --> 01:51:17,061
[laughter]

2414
01:51:20,456 --> 01:51:23,024
It was an opportunity for
people far and wide

2415
01:51:23,154 --> 01:51:25,026
to let him know how much
they loved him.

2416
01:51:25,156 --> 01:51:26,680
I don't think anybody realized

2417
01:51:26,810 --> 01:51:28,682
he was our greatest
living writer.

2418
01:51:28,812 --> 01:51:30,074
-Kurt Vonnegut.
-[cheering, applause]

2419
01:51:33,251 --> 01:51:35,166
[clicking]

2420
01:51:35,297 --> 01:51:38,343
♪

2421
01:51:40,302 --> 01:51:42,304
[projector clicking]

2422
01:51:51,008 --> 01:51:54,055
♪

2423
01:51:55,578 --> 01:51:57,885
Kurt was gonna be spending
the summer

2424
01:51:58,015 --> 01:52:00,931
at his summer place in
Sagaponack in Long Island,
New York,

2425
01:52:01,062 --> 01:52:02,672
he'd get out of the city
every year,

2426
01:52:03,325 --> 01:52:06,328
and asked me if I wanted to
come and hang out.

2427
01:52:06,937 --> 01:52:08,547
I said, "Yeah, you bet."

2428
01:52:09,984 --> 01:52:12,073
And I remember
my initial instinct was,

2429
01:52:12,203 --> 01:52:14,771
hey, this is great, I'll get
a small camera crew

2430
01:52:14,902 --> 01:52:16,033
and it'd be great
to see Kurt

2431
01:52:16,164 --> 01:52:17,818
sort of walking around
Sagaponack

2432
01:52:17,948 --> 01:52:20,037
and going to the post office
to get his mail every day,

2433
01:52:20,168 --> 01:52:22,039
and this'll be great for
the documentary.

2434
01:52:22,648 --> 01:52:24,955
And then soon after,
I realized

2435
01:52:25,086 --> 01:52:27,001
I-- I don't want to do that.

2436
01:52:28,219 --> 01:52:29,873
This is time for us to hang out.

2437
01:52:30,004 --> 01:52:31,614
I don't know if he's gonna feel
it's intrusive

2438
01:52:31,745 --> 01:52:34,138
to have a cameraman there to be
filming for the documentary

2439
01:52:34,269 --> 01:52:36,271
but suddenly I felt
it was intrusive.

2440
01:52:37,228 --> 01:52:38,708
It was kind of
a turning point for me

2441
01:52:38,839 --> 01:52:40,057
in the making of this film,

2442
01:52:40,797 --> 01:52:42,277
because prior to that,

2443
01:52:42,407 --> 01:52:45,019
I'd always been concerned that

2444
01:52:45,149 --> 01:52:49,327
the friendship might, um,
infringe on the film.

2445
01:52:49,850 --> 01:52:51,416
This was the first time
I realized that

2446
01:52:51,547 --> 01:52:53,331
things had flipped
so entirely now

2447
01:52:53,462 --> 01:52:54,768
that I was worried about

2448
01:52:54,898 --> 01:52:57,118
the film infringing on
the friendship.

2449
01:52:58,206 --> 01:53:00,861
And, um, that was
a realization for me

2450
01:53:00,991 --> 01:53:03,472
that I was maybe in trouble.

2451
01:53:03,602 --> 01:53:06,040
Because part of me had...

2452
01:53:06,780 --> 01:53:09,217
almost given up on the film
at that time.

2453
01:53:13,525 --> 01:53:15,484
[woman]
And the Emmy goes to...

2454
01:53:19,140 --> 01:53:21,882
uh, Robert Weide, uh,
Curb Your Enthusiasm.

2455
01:53:22,012 --> 01:53:24,014
[applause]

2456
01:53:25,799 --> 01:53:27,801
[Bob Weide]
Hey, Ma, this is for you
and for Dad.

2457
01:53:27,931 --> 01:53:29,280
and for, uh, my wife, Linda,

2458
01:53:29,411 --> 01:53:31,456
to whom I just lost
a $100 bet.

2459
01:53:31,761 --> 01:53:32,718
-[laughter]
-Um--

2460
01:53:32,849 --> 01:53:33,981
[answering machine beeps]

2461
01:53:34,111 --> 01:53:36,070
Hi, Linda, this is Kurt,

2462
01:53:36,200 --> 01:53:38,420
just thinking about how happy
you guys must be.

2463
01:53:38,550 --> 01:53:41,815
My goodness,
and how deservedly happy.

2464
01:53:41,945 --> 01:53:44,339
Wow, when somebody's happy,
I-- [chuckles]

2465
01:53:44,469 --> 01:53:45,949
Makes me happy too.

2466
01:53:46,080 --> 01:53:48,473
So crazy about you two,
I hope you love each other

2467
01:53:48,604 --> 01:53:50,127
as much as
I love both of you.

2468
01:53:50,824 --> 01:53:51,737
Bye.

2469
01:53:51,868 --> 01:53:54,871
♪

2470
01:53:59,658 --> 01:54:02,357
[Bob Weide]
In 2018,

2471
01:54:02,487 --> 01:54:06,491
Linda was diagnosed with
progressive supranuclear palsy,

2472
01:54:06,883 --> 01:54:08,015
or PSP.

2473
01:54:09,364 --> 01:54:11,366
Touch your nose,
go back and forth.

2474
01:54:11,801 --> 01:54:12,715
The other side.

2475
01:54:12,846 --> 01:54:14,151
Neither of us had heard of it

2476
01:54:14,282 --> 01:54:15,979
but that's because
it's very rare.

2477
01:54:17,154 --> 01:54:20,679
It's sort of a cousin
to Parkinson's,

2478
01:54:20,810 --> 01:54:23,334
but very aggressive
and very fast moving.

2479
01:54:24,205 --> 01:54:26,468
Her speech, her balance,

2480
01:54:26,598 --> 01:54:29,166
her walking
have all taken a hit.

2481
01:54:30,124 --> 01:54:32,517
Um, there's no known cure.

2482
01:54:33,388 --> 01:54:36,130
But she's participating in
some clinical trials

2483
01:54:36,260 --> 01:54:39,220
which hopefully will provide
some relief.

2484
01:54:41,657 --> 01:54:43,137
We never saw this coming.

2485
01:54:44,268 --> 01:54:46,792
But, you know...

2486
01:54:46,923 --> 01:54:48,446
what'd you ever see coming?

2487
01:54:51,885 --> 01:54:52,929
Fate happens.

2488
01:54:57,151 --> 01:54:58,195
[Kurt Vonnegut]
"Why me?

2489
01:55:00,110 --> 01:55:04,462
"That is a very earthling
question to ask, Mr. Pilgrim.

2490
01:55:04,593 --> 01:55:06,508
"Why you?
Why us, for that matter?

2491
01:55:06,638 --> 01:55:07,901
"Why anything?

2492
01:55:09,293 --> 01:55:12,601
"Because this moment
simply is.

2493
01:55:12,731 --> 01:55:15,212
"Have you ever seen bugs
trapped in amber?

2494
01:55:17,519 --> 01:55:19,347
"Well, here we are,
Mr. Pilgrim,

2495
01:55:19,477 --> 01:55:21,523
"trapped in the amber
of this moment.

2496
01:55:24,265 --> 01:55:25,657
There is no why."

2497
01:55:31,576 --> 01:55:32,795
[answering machine beeps]

2498
01:55:32,926 --> 01:55:35,711
Hi, Bob, this is Kurt
and, uh,

2499
01:55:35,841 --> 01:55:37,147
so exciting to know that

2500
01:55:37,278 --> 01:55:39,628
you are probably in this town
right now.

2501
01:55:39,758 --> 01:55:43,545
I look forward to seeing you
on Thursday if not before.

2502
01:55:43,675 --> 01:55:46,504
Anyway, do not play
Three-card Monte.

2503
01:55:46,635 --> 01:55:50,856
The people who
conduct these games
are criminals,

2504
01:55:50,987 --> 01:55:53,207
and, uh, there's no way
you can win.

2505
01:55:53,729 --> 01:55:56,036
♪

2506
01:55:56,166 --> 01:55:58,081
[Bob Weide] We had a dinner
just like any other dinner.

2507
01:55:58,516 --> 01:56:01,128
I had a little digital camera
with me,

2508
01:56:01,258 --> 01:56:03,260
and jut for fun, I took
a little-- [clicks tongue]

2509
01:56:03,391 --> 01:56:05,175
picture of him sitting at
the table.

2510
01:56:05,480 --> 01:56:09,179
And then we walked back to
his place on 48th Street.

2511
01:56:10,006 --> 01:56:11,834
So we said goodbye and I said,
"Oh, wait a minute.

2512
01:56:11,965 --> 01:56:14,010
Hold on.
Let me take a picture."

2513
01:56:14,315 --> 01:56:16,447
And I took a picture of him at
the bottom of the steps

2514
01:56:16,578 --> 01:56:17,927
looking at me.

2515
01:56:18,058 --> 01:56:20,451
And I don't know what compelled
me to do this,

2516
01:56:20,582 --> 01:56:22,976
because it wasn't anything did
on a regular basis.

2517
01:56:23,106 --> 01:56:25,195
To this day, it's not something
I do that often,

2518
01:56:25,326 --> 01:56:27,328
to say to another guy,
I love you,

2519
01:56:27,458 --> 01:56:28,764
but that's what came out of
my mouth.

2520
01:56:28,894 --> 01:56:31,593
I said, I love you, and
I probably added man.

2521
01:56:31,723 --> 01:56:33,029
I love you, man,

2522
01:56:33,160 --> 01:56:35,205
which takes the edge off of
the corniness.

2523
01:56:35,336 --> 01:56:37,077
Hey, love you, man.
Something like that.

2524
01:56:37,381 --> 01:56:38,817
Anyway, I said, I love you.

2525
01:56:39,122 --> 01:56:40,254
And he said,
"Love you, too."

2526
01:56:41,298 --> 01:56:42,473
Oh, isn't that nice.

2527
01:56:45,433 --> 01:56:47,130
That was the last time
I saw him alive.

2528
01:56:48,653 --> 01:56:51,656
♪

2529
01:56:51,787 --> 01:56:55,356
[Nanny Vonnegut]
My brother called to tell me
that Dad had fallen.

2530
01:56:55,878 --> 01:56:59,360
He hit his head and it--
it's really bad.

2531
01:57:00,622 --> 01:57:02,189
That day that he fell,

2532
01:57:02,319 --> 01:57:05,018
he called me,
we had a conversation.

2533
01:57:06,454 --> 01:57:07,933
And, um...

2534
01:57:08,064 --> 01:57:09,152
Oh, my God.

2535
01:57:11,633 --> 01:57:14,505
He called because there was
always among us

2536
01:57:14,636 --> 01:57:18,031
the worry about, you know,
cancer, breast cancer, whatever.

2537
01:57:18,161 --> 01:57:19,728
He said, "Darling--
[clears throat]

2538
01:57:21,686 --> 01:57:25,081
Um... sorry if I can
remember this right.

2539
01:57:26,822 --> 01:57:28,824
"Are your boobs okay?"
[laughs]

2540
01:57:30,782 --> 01:57:32,132
"Are your boobs okay?"

2541
01:57:33,133 --> 01:57:35,178
"Yes, Dad,
my boobs are fine."

2542
01:57:36,745 --> 01:57:37,963
"Okay, I love you."

2543
01:57:42,055 --> 01:57:43,056
Yeah.

2544
01:57:44,579 --> 01:57:46,494
[reporter] Author Kurt Vonnegut
has died.

2545
01:57:46,624 --> 01:57:48,061
He was one of the most
influential writers

2546
01:57:48,191 --> 01:57:49,671
of the 20th century.

2547
01:57:49,801 --> 01:57:51,586
He wrote classics such as
Slaughterhouse-Five,

2548
01:57:51,716 --> 01:57:52,978
and Cat's Cradle.

2549
01:57:53,109 --> 01:57:55,198
He was know for his
satirical commentary,

2550
01:57:55,329 --> 01:57:58,158
and he took aim at culture,
society and institutions.

2551
01:57:58,593 --> 01:58:00,725
Kurt Vonnegut was
84 years old.

2552
01:58:04,599 --> 01:58:06,557
[Kurt Vonnegut]
This is what I would like
to be read at my funeral

2553
01:58:06,688 --> 01:58:07,863
and I think maybe some of you

2554
01:58:07,993 --> 01:58:09,647
would like this to be read
at yours.

2555
01:58:10,474 --> 01:58:12,302
"I have finished my course.

2556
01:58:12,955 --> 01:58:16,001
"I have ceased to enjoy
and suffer.

2557
01:58:16,872 --> 01:58:19,353
"Please transfer your love
and your benevolence

2558
01:58:19,483 --> 01:58:21,224
"to your living fellow men.

2559
01:58:22,486 --> 01:58:25,054
"The memory of the one
as well as of the other

2560
01:58:25,185 --> 01:58:27,274
is appreciated and honored."

2561
01:58:27,404 --> 01:58:30,451
♪

2562
01:58:31,930 --> 01:58:33,932
[Bob Weide]
I keep above my desk

2563
01:58:34,063 --> 01:58:36,500
the Webster's Ninth New
Collegiate Dictionary.

2564
01:58:36,979 --> 01:58:39,416
And Kurt's name
is included in it.

2565
01:58:40,374 --> 01:58:41,766
And I love the fact that
it said,

2566
01:58:41,897 --> 01:58:45,292
"Kurt Vonnegut,
1922 to blank."

2567
01:58:49,861 --> 01:58:51,385
Here was empirical evidence,

2568
01:58:51,515 --> 01:58:53,300
here was verification that
he was still with us.

2569
01:58:55,606 --> 01:58:57,913
'Cause that second year
wasn't filled in yet.

2570
01:59:01,482 --> 01:59:03,397
Maybe by finishing this film,

2571
01:59:03,527 --> 01:59:06,269
it acknowledges that...

2572
01:59:06,400 --> 01:59:07,401
he's gone.

2573
01:59:09,054 --> 01:59:10,926
But I feel like I owe him this.

2574
01:59:13,102 --> 01:59:14,669
Hi, Bob, this is Kurt.

2575
01:59:17,150 --> 01:59:19,456
So grateful for
the documentary.

2576
01:59:22,285 --> 01:59:24,157
I wanted to thank you for
your friendship.

2577
01:59:27,290 --> 01:59:28,291
Love you.

2578
01:59:29,379 --> 01:59:30,380
Bye.

2579
01:59:31,729 --> 01:59:33,601
[laughing]

2580
01:59:35,646 --> 01:59:38,693
♪

2581
01:59:41,435 --> 01:59:42,784
[Bob Weide]
Are you gonna buy Pall Malls?

2582
01:59:42,914 --> 01:59:43,915
-You gotta by Pall Malls.
-[Nanny Vonnegut] Yeah.

2583
01:59:44,655 --> 01:59:47,049
Do you have Pall Mall?
Cigarettes?

2584
01:59:49,530 --> 01:59:50,574
[laughs]

2585
01:59:50,705 --> 01:59:52,402
I'm doing this
just to amuse you.

2586
01:59:52,533 --> 01:59:54,535
I know--
I haven't smoked since...

2587
01:59:54,665 --> 01:59:55,710
third grade.

2588
01:59:56,798 --> 01:59:59,844
♪

2589
02:00:06,590 --> 02:00:09,027
[Kurt Vonnegut]
When things are going
sweetly and peacefully,

2590
02:00:09,158 --> 02:00:12,509
please pause a moment
and then say out loud,

2591
02:00:14,119 --> 02:00:16,209
"If this isn't nice,
what is?"

2592
02:00:18,211 --> 02:00:19,255
Candlesticks.

2593
02:00:21,475 --> 02:00:23,303
That feeling that you get
when she's around,

2594
02:00:23,433 --> 02:00:24,913
when she's in the room,
when she's with you,

2595
02:00:25,043 --> 02:00:27,176
I'm the lucky guy who now
gets to feel that

2596
02:00:27,307 --> 02:00:28,525
for the rest of my life.

2597
02:00:28,656 --> 02:00:30,353
[applause, cheering]

2598
02:00:31,180 --> 02:00:32,616
[Kurt Vonnegut]
It's the impermanence...

2599
02:00:32,747 --> 02:00:34,314
of life.

2600
02:00:34,792 --> 02:00:36,533
I mean, this day is
as real as any day

2601
02:00:36,664 --> 02:00:38,231
we're going to live,

2602
02:00:38,361 --> 02:00:41,408
and yet we have an idea that
we're headed for other days,

2603
02:00:41,538 --> 02:00:42,713
even better days.

2604
02:00:42,844 --> 02:00:44,846
[cheering applause]

2605
02:00:47,283 --> 02:00:48,328
[Kurt Vonnegut]
And this is it.

2606
02:00:48,458 --> 02:00:49,764
This is all there is.

2607
02:00:50,417 --> 02:00:53,420
♪

2608
02:01:21,622 --> 02:01:22,884
[Bob Weide]
Vonnegut writes,

2609
02:01:23,014 --> 02:01:25,713
"The British mathematician,
Stephen Hawking,

2610
02:01:26,061 --> 02:01:27,323
"found it tantalizing

2611
02:01:27,454 --> 02:01:29,760
"that we could not remember
the future.

2612
02:01:30,195 --> 02:01:31,414
"But remembering the future...

2613
02:01:31,545 --> 02:01:34,330
[narrator]
"...is child's play for me now.

2614
02:01:34,461 --> 02:01:37,768
"I know what will become of
my helpless, trusting babies

2615
02:01:37,899 --> 02:01:40,336
"because they are
grown ups now.

2616
02:01:40,467 --> 02:01:43,296
"I know how my closest friends
will end up

2617
02:01:43,426 --> 02:01:46,995
"because so many of them
are retired or dead now.

2618
02:01:48,823 --> 02:01:51,173
"I say, be patient.

2619
02:01:51,304 --> 02:01:53,480
"Your future will soon
come to you

2620
02:01:53,610 --> 02:01:55,656
"and lie down at your feet,

2621
02:01:55,786 --> 02:01:58,485
"like a dog who knows
and loves you

2622
02:01:58,615 --> 02:02:00,095
"no matter what you are.

2623
02:02:03,751 --> 02:02:06,841
"And the dog of my future
lying at my feet

2624
02:02:08,364 --> 02:02:10,061
is snoring now."

2625
02:02:13,804 --> 02:02:16,851
♪

2626
02:02:52,321 --> 02:02:54,149
[Kurt Vonnegut]
Should I myself die,

2627
02:02:54,410 --> 02:02:55,672
God forbid--

2628
02:02:55,803 --> 02:02:57,195
[laughter]

2629
02:02:57,326 --> 02:02:58,849
I hope you'll say...

2630
02:02:58,980 --> 02:03:00,547
he's up in Heaven now.

2631
02:03:01,896 --> 02:03:03,637
That's my favorite joke.

2632
02:03:09,077 --> 02:03:10,513
[bird chirping]

2633
02:03:13,690 --> 02:03:17,302
♪

2634
02:03:24,527 --> 02:03:26,877
[Kurt Vonnegut]
I do believe
time repeats itself.

2635
02:03:27,312 --> 02:03:29,358
Our lives are somewhat
like pendulums

2636
02:03:29,489 --> 02:03:33,057
that we, uh, start at birth
and swing to death.

2637
02:03:33,188 --> 02:03:35,320
and back and forth
throughout all eternity.

2638
02:03:36,234 --> 02:03:39,324
and that would suit me if
I got the cycles of my life

2639
02:03:39,455 --> 02:03:40,804
through all eternity.

2640
02:03:41,370 --> 02:03:43,328
I don't want to die
and go away entirely,

2641
02:03:43,459 --> 02:03:45,592
I'd like to come back and
come back and come back

2642
02:03:45,722 --> 02:03:47,071
on almost any terms.

2643
02:03:47,202 --> 02:03:50,858
♪

2644
02:04:17,232 --> 02:04:20,191
♪

2645
02:04:47,915 --> 02:04:49,133
Oh, Jesus!

2646
02:04:49,264 --> 02:04:51,092
Oh, what a thing to say
in church.

2647
02:04:51,222 --> 02:04:52,659
[laughter]

2648
02:04:53,311 --> 02:04:55,444
[laughing]

2649
02:05:07,761 --> 02:05:10,764
♪

2650
02:05:11,939 --> 02:05:14,158
[laughter]

2651
02:05:20,077 --> 02:05:23,124
♪

2652
02:05:54,155 --> 02:05:55,635
[snapping]

2653
02:06:13,261 --> 02:06:14,305
Hooray!

2654
02:06:15,568 --> 02:06:17,004
Do it again.

2655
02:06:20,921 --> 02:06:22,009
[chirping]