So many people mistakenly think that the rest of his [John Cassavetes] pictures and the ones we did were improvised, which isn't true. He wrote all the rest of them.

Because John Cassavetes was so terrific in live TV, a lot of his friends had not been able to participate in that yet and so they asked if he would gather with them at night when I was at the play and tell them what live TV was like, what you had to adjust to because it was its own medium - it had many things you had to be aware of.

Bette Davis had very strong opinions and was not afraid to express them. She wasn't afraid of anything that I ever saw. And she was so funny. She's just funny and she was laughing all the time.

It was a period when live TV was just starting and getting popular and they took it seriously too. Not so much like TV now. They did Hemingway and Faulkner - and they’re all wonderful artists and it just was very creative at that time.

Of course, much easier to do a film when you're doing an extremely emotional part than it is doing it onstage over and over especially.

So I went home and I told my mom that I wanted to quit and be an actress and she said, “Huh, that sounds fascinating. It’s wonderful!” And I told my father and he literally said, “I don’t care if you want to be an elephant trainer if it makes you happy.”

[John Cassavetes] came backstage afterwards and introduced himself and we talked a bit, and then went for a little coffee at the Russian Tea Room next door. It just...started.