James Caan is Back in the Game

Published by Interrobang Staff at October 12, 2013

James Caan’s list of great performances is longer than most actors lifelong resumes. He is a legend. “Brian’s Song”, “Rollerball”, “The Godfather”, and “Elf” are just a few examples of his legendary roles that have crossed multiple genres and generations. And now he’s co-starring in a new prime time comedy series on ABC, “Back in the Game.” Caan stopped by the SiriusXM studios and sat down with Ron Bennington to talk about the new series. Excerpts from the interview appear below. You can hear the entire interview exclusively on SiriusXM satellite radio.

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James Caan Talks About Creating His Character For “Back In The Game”

Ron Bennington: This character that you’re playing, I think the interesting thing about it is the first time we’ve seen street smarts on television in a long time. (James laughs) It’s almost a forgotten art form.

James Caan: Yeah. Well, thank God I’ll bring it back. The purpose – when I first came in – and the idea of having fun, and these Cullen brothers, who belong in a home – they’re hysterically funny – and the writing staff – is – I said, “If I can create the most horrifying character that’s ever…” Just a racist, and this and that, but not out of hatred. It’s not a guy who’s angry, but a guy who’s impatient and hasn’t got time for bull-stuff.

Ron Bennington: It just shows it’s a different era, where kids today are coddled a little more than they were during his day.

James Caan: Well yeah, because he’s not going to contribute to the sissification. He tells his kid – this kid’s picking on him, “You gotta do something. When he’s not looking, take a brick or a bat, when he comes around the corner smack him with this thing, right?” And of course, the mother is going crazy.

Ron Bennington: But everybody always had that grandfather or uncle or somebody in their family who would give them that kind of advice, where you’ve got to be respected when you leave the house.

James Caan: Well, there’s that. It’s just everything. The guy, he doesn’t call him the right name, the daughter comes to live with him after not seeing him, hated him because he brought her up like a boy. The wife died, she played baseball, he was like the second coming of Sandy Koufax for 11 minutes, and he drank himself out of the thing, busted his arm. Brought her up like a guy, all she knew was baseball. Trying to run over the guy that was taking her to the prom. Just normal things. So now she’s forced to come out and live with me. I don’t even call my grandson the right name.

Ron Bennington: He’s Donny or Danny, or whatever.

James Caan: Danny, whatever. I say, “bring the guy in here.” It goes to the point with these life lessons, and hopefully, if we’re there long enough, she’s going to have to deal with two of us. He’s becoming more and more like me. He’s a great kid, Griffin. A great kid. There’s stories where he wants to know about sex, I said, “no, go talk to your mother.” And finally, the first thing I tell him is, “You got to put your hand around her, learn how to open a bra with one hand. That’s the first thing.” He goes, “Why would I do that?”

Ron Bennington: There’s something about bad advice delivered with confidence, though.

James Caan: Well, if you think it’s bad advice to start with.

Ron Bennington: Yeah, if you think so.

James Caan: I don’t think it’s bad advice.

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James Caan Talks About Growing Up In Queens

Ron Bennington: What was it like when you were a kid? You grew up in Queens, right?

James Caan: Sunnyside, yeah.

Ron Bennington: Yeah. So there, like I said, you had to be alert when you were a kid. The parents weren’t going to be there all the time.

James Caan: Well, look. The truth of the matter is, the beauty of growing up in the neighborhood that we all grew up in in New York, as opposed to California, there is no neighborhood. And there are great life lessons to be learned. In other words, my dad kicked my ass out into the schoolyard, so there’s a hundred kids there. So, by the time you’re seven, eight, nine years old, you learn how to win, you learn how to lose, you learn respect, you learn loyalty. And you get a sixth sense. You meet so many people, that after just shaking someone’s hand or the first moment, you know whether he’s going to be a friend or not. It’s just instinctive, it’s like a sixth sense. And play your best, and don’t get pushed around… There’s a lot of lessons out there. The closest thing to it is organized sport. That’s how I got involved with quitting and coaching Scott for six years. You’ve got to show up. You don’t have to play again, but if you sign on this year you’re doing 13 games. All of them. If you don’t like it, you don’t have to play next year. There’s a lot of those lessons.

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James Caan Talks About Walking Away From Acting

Ron Bennington: Even when you brought up losing, there’s a lot of great lessons in losing to somebody who’s better than you that day. The fact that you could go out there and get beat puts in the back of your head, “Okay, what happens next time?” If it becomes this horrific thing where the parents are worried about the children because they lost, and what about their self-worth, it’s almost like we put too much emphasis on losing.

James Caan: Well, there’s another side of that. No. My least favorite phrase, especially competitive – but, in all of life. Whether you’re making love, whether you want to have dinner, “I don’t care” is the worst three words that exist. If you don’t have passion – and I went a little crazy when I lost my sister, I quit for six years. She was my best friend, and I just quit. I did some stupid things, I got involved with drugs – some, not crazy stuff, but just not me. I never did it. But the point is, I coached for six years, and… where the heck were we going?

Ron Bennington: We were going back to whether you lose or not – “I don’t care.”

James Caan: Yeah, “I don’t care.” So, if I say, “Hey, you want to play tennis?” and you go, “I don’t care,” well, fuck you, I don’t want to play with you. On that day, I want to know that I beat you when you were trying. That doesn’t mean I beat you every day. You want to make love, “I don’t care.” Well, go get a vibrator. “I don’t care.” You want to eat? Where you gonna eat? “I don’t care.” I just don’t like “I don’t care.” And I think when my sister died, I realized I wanted to be passionate about whatever I did. And I got so nuts about that, I quit for six years, and I coached for six years. I was really riding high, I took care of that, I just disappeared for six years.

Ron Bennington: But do you feel like that six years was helpful?

James Caan: I had the best time. I had kids walking around going, “Hey, coach.” They called me, and a couple of kids went on to college playing. My son’s a great ballplayer.

Ron Bennington: But maybe that’s exactly what you needed , that six years to step away.

James Caan: I don’t know what I needed. I can’t – I don’t have one of them fortune telling things.

Ron Bennington: Yeah. When you look over your career, because you’ve done so many great roles, does it feel like there was a plan to it, or does it feel like just one thing happened into the next?

James Caan: No, the only plan was, you have to whisper the word – I keep my integrity, that’s all. And I didn’t want to do the same thing. That’s why doing the series at a point where I basically had to, because I got into financial trouble, but you try to make that as good as possible. If my son’s upset with something, I says, “Just take care of yourself,” which he’ll do anyway. His ego, the healthy part of the ego will not allow him to be bad. Yeah, so I never set out when I was going to do a bad movie. I never did a movie for money.

Ron Bennington: It was always out of passion, it was always because you believed it.

James Caan: Yeah, it got to the point where I really was very successful and the money came, and that all comes. Like, if you’re the best at something – I’m not suggesting I was the best, but in any business, don’t worry about the money. It’ll come. If you’re the best, they’ll pay for it. So, strive to be the best.

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James Caan Talks About People Thinking He’s Italian

Ron Bennington: Everybody always thinks you’re Italian because of “The Godfather.”

James Caan: Oh yeah, I won Italian of The Year twice. Well, my best friend is Italian. I grew up with Italians, so I’m artificially inseminated to start with. My mother – [off-mic] Ed, did I ever tell you this story? My mother’s playing golf – my mother’s 98 now, but this was – she’s playing golf right opposite of 20^th Century (FOX). And there’s a big billboard – I was doing some picture, there was a picture of me. She’s playing golf, she shows up, they put her with two strangers, or if she has a partner – they put four at a time. She’s playing, and all of a sudden, this guy sees this picture of me. Has no idea, and he goes, “Ah, that’s a good Italian kid, that guy.” “What guy?” Points to me, James Caan. He says, “He’s a good Italian.” My mother goes, “He’s not Italian.” “Listen, lady.” Okay? Now this argument starts, it’s hysterical. He goes, “What are you talking about?” She says, “No, he’s not Italian.” “I happen to know the guy,” he says, “The guy’s Italian. I got friends here and I have friends there, and this guy’s Italian.” He says, “What do you know, lady?” She says, “I’m his mother!” True story.

Ron Bennington: But, that’s got to be the thing, that people feel like they know you before they meet you.

James Caan: Yeah, all of these things, you make it sounds horrible, but the truth of the matter is, it’s all part of – there’s a certain pride in that you were impressive enough in doing something, and it’s a sign of respect to me. And people, “Oh, these guys – I don’t want to sign autographs.” They’re full of crap. They live to the day that somebody would recognize them, and then they don’t want to be bothered with it. They’re full of shit. If they didn’t recognize them, they’d have a heart attack.

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James Caan Talks About His Approach To Comedy

Ron Bennington: You did Wes Anderson’s first film. What I always liked, when you play comedy – and you’re doing it now too in your new series – you play it pretty straight. You play it the same way, I think.

James Caan: Well, it depends on the type of comedy. Listen, it all depends on the script and the way it’s written. If it’s slapstick, I do that. But the idea of true comedy, it’s the elephant in the room kind of thing. If you walk in and there’s an elephant in the room, and you just walk through like there’s not an elephant in the room. See, the words. If you have clever writers, I can make it funnier by not pounding them. I can make it funny with my behavior, not with the words, because you can’t say “fuck you” nicely. There’s no way to say that nicely. So, the words take care of themselves. So, there’s a lot of body language and there’s a lot of stuff that makes comedy comedy. I love doing comedy and I like doing it like I was talking about cancer. I mean, the silliest things.

Ron Bennington: But let’s say Wes Anderson, he was so young then. Nobody knew him.

James Caan: Well, Wes – that was a whole different thing. Jim Bridges called me, he said, “Hey, do me a favor. There’s this kid – “ nobody knew these kids in Texas. And he says, “Do me a favor, can you go down there for three or four days?” I go, “Come on.” So I went down there. The poor guy, he was a mess. They had some producer, I don’t know who the heck she was. Didn’t know her ass from a hole in the ground, and I don’t know. But we did that and somehow –

Ron Bennington: – and somehow, that’s one of the ones that sticks. That’s one of the ones that people remember.

James Caan: Yeah, it certainly made way for Wes, and Owen, and Luke, and all them.

Ron Bennington: Yeah, it’s amazing when you look back and see that.

James Caan: It’s all because of me, you know that?

Ron Bennington: Yeah, well, you actually did bring so much heat to that film. Suddenly you have this danger thing in the middle of a comedy.

James Caan: Three days.

Ron Bennington: Three days.

James Caan: Yeah. One day I waited like four hours because they couldn’t shoot, because they couldn’t get the ice cream truck to be where it’s supposed to be. I don’t know, they had a hard time. Wes was crazy. It was fun, and I’m happy for them.

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Ron Bennington: Well, I’m happy for you too, man. It’s great to meet you. And I’m happy that you’re doing this TV show.

James Caan: Yeah, it’s a lot of, lot of fun. I’m proud of it, which is something I don’t often say. And I think that people are going to really laugh.

Ron Bennington: “Back in the Game” premieres Wednesday, September 25^th, 8:30. James Caan plays kind of a baseball coach. I don’t think we ever forget those little league baseball coaches. I think they’re in the back of our head for the rest of our lives.

James Caan: Well, this one will certainly stay in the back of their heads.

Ron Bennington: Yeah. Thank you so much for coming in, my friend.

James Caan: Thank you.

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