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Itzhak Perlman and Alan Alda’s Friendship

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Itzhak Perlman and Alan Alda on “Garbage Pail Soup,” the similarities between acting and musicianship and getting older.

American Masters: Itzhak premieres nationwide Sunday, October 14 at 10 p.m. on PBS (check local listings) and will be available to stream the following day via pbs.org/americanmasters and PBS apps.

TRANSCRIPT

Now the problem this is that if I don't stand up I can't see what's in there.

Oy! Perfect.

I'm cooking for you.

What are you cooking?

I'm cooking a soup.

What kind of soup?

I call it Garbage Pail Soup Ha, ha! I have to go now.

That means everything in the garbage pail goes in the soup.

I heard. You heard? Alright.

This is Sera... this is really a great wine.

Well que sera, sera! I'm surprised you didn't say that.

Too obvious... too easy... You knew I had polio... No!

You didn't know I had polio?

It didn't affect you as far as walking and stuff like that?

See I had something you didn't have I bet I had the Sister Kenny treatment.

A lot of really painful massage and wrapping your muscles every all over your body with scalding hot blankets.

That I did not have. I had to smell smoke parchment with holy words and then they would burn it and I would smell the holy words.

My parents would put me on all sorts of weird diets... a raw egg every morning. And you know I kind of liked that.

You did? I did. Especially the yolk, mercury I had to have a little thing of mercury every morning.

This is terribly toxic.

That might explain the way I behave.

What, what are you doing?

A good technique is not how many fast notes do you play, A good technique is how do you manipulate a phrase in such a way with giving it colors and stuff that you can actually make it sound amazing.

Once you have that technique, then you have to have I suppose a vision, of what to do with the technique, and I suppose that'''s in acting the same thing... if you have the... Yeah, I think so, I think there are different layers of preparation different layers of performance, for me personally I find out how I'm going to do it by doing it, Ok, yes! You too? Oh yes... Oh yeah... oh no no no, I don't have a plan when the music speaks to me I react, yeah but you know when something is planned it'll sound planned.

Boy, I think that's so true, I don't want to hear a report on what they decided to do, I want to hear something lived for the first time.

Ah now we're talking.

You know as I'm getting older I don't know do you find as you're getting older you don't like anybody.

No I've got the opposite as I get older I think oh my God look what they can do You said it... Was either of your parents musical? No. No? So where did you get it?

Tuchus.

*laughs*

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