MM Remembers: Sydney Pollack (1934 - 2008)

By Joe Leydon
URL: http://www.moviemaker.com/blog/item/mm_remembers_sydney_pollack_1934_2008_20080527/
This is my favorite Sydney Pollack memory: It’s December 1982 in New York, during a press junket for Tootsie. Pollack approaches the roundtable of critics and feature writers with a spring to his step and a grin on his face. He knows, based on what he’s been told about the audience reaction at last night’s press screening, that all the hard work during the troubled production was worth it, that he has a hit—a really, really big hit—on his hands.

But the smile fades from his face when one of his interviewers (no, not yours truly) casually refers to a minor glitch that occurred during the screening: For a good two or three minutes midway through the movie, the soundtrack was silenced, and the only voices that could be heard in the screening room were those of grumbling audience members. Pollack listens to an account of the technical mishap with silent but obvious displeasure. He politely excuses himself, walks to the door and motions for two or three studio reps to join him in the hallway outside. Back at the table, we can’t quite make out the precise words that are being screamed. But there’s no mistaking who is doing the screaming.