John Lithgow just wants a good ending

Wild Card with Rachel Martin

NPR

Society & Culture

4.6 • 991 Ratings

🗓️ 5 December 2024

⏱️ 34 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Everyone has their own role that made them fall in love with John Lithgow. It could be "Footloose" or "Shrek" or "3rd Rock from the Sun." And as he approaches 80, Lithgow keeps giving us more memorable roles. This year alone, he was in "The Old Man," "Conclave" and "Spellbound." He tells Rachel what makes him so easy to work with and how he's become more comfortable with death.To listen sponsor-free, access bonus episodes and support the show, sign up for Wild Card+ at plus.npr.org/wildcard

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for NPR and the following message come from the Walton Family Foundation,
0:05.1	working to create access to opportunity for people and communities by tackling tough social and environmental problems.
0:12.0	More information is at waltonfamilyfoundation.org.
0:15.3	Do you think there's more to reality than we can see or touch?
0:22.0	More to reality than we can see or touch. More to reality than we can see or touch.
0:26.9	I am very simplistic about that.
0:30.4	I think of death as death.
0:32.8	I don't think there's life after death or a soul after death.
0:37.5	I'm Rachel Martin, and this is Wildcard, the game where cards control the conversation.
0:46.6	Each week, my guest chooses questions at random from a deck of cards, questions about the
0:52.2	memories, insights, and beliefs that have shaped them.
0:55.5	It's coming, and I think the best thing is to have a gracious ending.
0:59.9	My guest this week is John Lithgow. I calculate my exit from any film or television or stage
1:05.8	play, and I always want to have a good ending. Well, I want to have a good ending to my life, too.
1:12.0	We're starting off with a question today.
1:13.8	Who is your John Lithgow?
1:15.9	We had a staff meeting recently where we all went around and named the character who made
1:20.3	us love John Lithgow, and the choices were as varied as his career.
1:24.9	Mine is Reverend Shaw Moore, the pastor from the movie Footloose, who banned dancing in his
1:30.8	small Texas town, and in doing so gave Kevin Bacon one of the best, I'm so mad, I need to do
1:37.5	gymnastics scenes of all time.
1:39.9	Our producer said her John Lithgow is from the 1983 Twilight Zone movie.
	...

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