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Cranky: What b/w TV shows did you grow up on? Who would you have picked to be your ideal mom and dad?
William H. Macy: I liked Ward and June 'cuz I wanted to be the Beav, though I think I was more Eddie Haskell. One of the great characters of all time is Eddie Haskell. I was a TV junkie. It was a joke in my family that my concentration on television was so great that you could walk up right here and be talking to me and tell me that there was a tub of ice cream with my name on it and I wouldn't hear you. You had to literally touch me to break my concentration from the TV. I watched Lucille Ball, Gail Storm, I watched 'em all every single one of 'em. I loved 'em all.

Cranky: Do you agree with the argument that's been made that these 50s sitcoms have screwed up a whole generation's way of expecting things to be when they inevitably turned out not to be that way?
William H. Macy: I don't think you can blame television. Television certainly reflected what had going on. I mean we'd just kicked ass. We'd won the war. We were the ones we could do anything and that wasn't our feeling, that was true. We'd invented the bomb. We defeated Germany. We have the land the resources and the know how to do anything and television reflected how strong we felt. And so we had to grow up sooner or later. And now we don't rule the world. Things are a lot more complicated than we thought.

Cranky: Was there some discussion when you were playing the coloreds vs the non-coloreds about black people at all?
William H. Macy: Well, I thought it was pretty clear. I thought (writer/director Gary Ross) handled it so deliciously that the only discussion was "how clever you are." When I read the script, when the first "no coloreds" signs appear in the storefronts it was such a skewed way to get that sign in the store that it threw a light on how absurd racism is. It's just absurd on some levels. What machinations must you go through to get to a racist point of view. What I thought was great about Gary's script was that he suckered us so beautifully that I was genuinely surprised when I first saw that sign. "No coloreds". It was brilliant.

Cranky: As a TV junkie it must have been a treat to have worked with Don Knotts.
William H. Macy: [wide-eyed]Oh my God can you believe it?

Cranky: Had you not met him before?
William H. Macy: Never. I was a-quiver. I'm not kidding you. I met Captain Kangaroo one time. That also tore me up. Don showed up on set and he had a huge scene to do, 3 pages back and forth and he had great blocks of dialog. I don't know how old Don is but I'll tell you this, he did it letter perfect the first time and all day. He was so prepared. And I can't tell you the actors who come in who barely have read the script. They don't know the lines. They spend the whole day fumbling through the thing as if it's their right. The more the movie stars get paid, the less they learn the lines. I long for the day that some producer has the chutzpah to walk up to (him) and say "Hey, you're fired. I'll see you in court. I hired you to do this role. You didn't learn the lines. Get out of here."

Cranky: Did you walk up to Don and go 'Barney Fife, cool,' whatever...
William H. Macy: No. It's sort of an unwritten actors rule that that is verboten. I did a movie once with Elizabeth Montgomery and woe to the actor who twitched his nose. [laughs]

Cranky: Well, as long as we're on the subject of remakes. Psycho. One word question...
William H. Macy: Why?

Cranky: I'm sure you've heard it before.
William H. Macy: And the answer is three words. I don't know. Here's my take on it. Gus Van Sant wants to do the phone book, count me in 'cuz that guy can direct! I love every move he's done. He is quite clever and he's got a great take on things. And here's what else I think. If I go got see Hamlet four times, a lot of times the set looks very similar. It's the same set and it's in a theater; The only thing that's changed is the cast and the director. And it's a different play every time. I predict you're going to see a different movie, even though we did a sort of homage, I mean, it's shot for shot sometimes. The timing is the same. The blocking is the same. The shots are exactly the same. I think it's going to be very different simply because you've changed the director and you've changed the cast. I think it's going to sell a zillion tickets. I think it's going to terrify a whole new generation of bathers. It's a great story. I think it's going to work.

Cranky: Most people haven't seen Psycho on a big screen.
William H. Macy: Yeah. There are a lot of people who just aren't interested in a black and white movie. There's a whole bunch of kids who haven't seen that movie. And you know what? I'm a Hitchcock fan but, boy, go back and look at the original closely. There's a lot of it that's pretty sloppy. Bad acting. There's some idiotic moments and I think we address those. I play Arbogast, the Martin Balsam role, and when Norman Bates goes out with the knife at the top of the stairs you look at the film; I mean he misses him by about four miles! It ain't even close! But Hitchcock shot the thing in 35 days and he cut 2 days off the schedule even at that. So they were going a mile a minute. So I think we've cleaned up some stuff.

Cranky: Did you make it better?
William H. Macy: It's better in some ways, let me say that. It's consistently different, just because. I don't know why. Just because. I only saw 2 days of rushes so it's an unknown to me but I think it's going to be really successful. I hope so.

Cranky: What can you tell us about A Civil Action that's coming at year's end.
William H. Macy: it was based on the book of the same title, great book. Steve Zaillian wrote and directed it and did an excellent job of taking this sprawling book and getting it down to 110 page screenplay. It's about, very much like Pleasantville, the script operates on several levels, which is my favorite kind of script. Overall its the story of a little boutique law firm which takes on two great big companies which had deep pockets and unlimited resources, and they win. But they lose in the long run because the real victims never got any money. So they won the court case but the families that had suffered from the poisoning of these wells up in Woburn, Massachusetts really didn't get that much money. I think it was a couple of hundred grand per family which is not a lot of money for a daughter or a son or a husband. On the other hand it's got another story which is about hubris, which is about pride going before a fall. Jan Schlictman, the guy who was the lead prosecuting attorney in this law firm, just couldn't step away from the battle and even though settlement offers came in he had to beat them and he finally did but he destroyed the law firm in the process. I play the accountant for the firm so it was my job through the thing to find the money to keep the doors open. I think I might be funny in this.

Cranky: Did the actual families get to benefit in any way from the making of the film.
William H. Macy: Yes they did. I think they got; all their stories were bought. Disney made the film and they were compensated. There was some legal action I think, it was settled out of court. They wanted their fair share and thank God finally they did get some money out of the whole story.

Cranky: Given the preponderance of special effects shots in Pleasantville where you worried that the story would get overshadowed by the technical aspects?
William H. Macy: No, not at all. I know that Gary Ross did worry about that. He was worried that the special effects would steal focus from everything that is going on. That they would not be able to see the scene because of the red rose over in the corner. But it works, doesn't it? It works like gangbusters. It didn't take my focus away.

More StarTalk with the cast of Pleasantville:

Jeff Daniels   Reese Witherspoon   Tobey Maguire