SPEAKER_00 0:14

Welcome to the Pan Am Podcast, brought to you by the Pan Am Museum in Garden City, New York. This podcast and our museum are dedicated to celebrating the legacy of the world's most iconic airlock, Pan American World Airways. My name is Tom Betty, and I'm the host of this program. Thank you for joining us. The Pan Am Museum Foundation is a nonprofit organization. Please visit our website for more information at the Pan Ammuseum.org. Again, our website is the Panamuseum.org. You can find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok. If you are using Apple Podcasts, please consider leaving a review. It will help others discover this program. This podcast is sponsored by the generous personal support of Mr. Adam Aaron, the CEO and chairman of AMC Theaters. He is also president of our sister organization, the Pan Am Historical Foundation. If you're not familiar with Pan Am, welcome. We are honored to have you here, and for you to learn about what we're all about. If you already know of Pan Am, worked for, or flown on the airline, or just love our history, it's good to be with you again. So with that, let's get this episode in the air, so to speak. Welcome aboard your Pan American jet clipper. She later made history as the first African American to serve as president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and is now the founding director of the Sidney Poitiers New American Film School at Arizona State University. But before our interview, I'd like to take a moment to share an important update with you about this program. The Pan Am Podcast is now in its fifth season and has been downloaded almost 200,000 times in over 180 countries worldwide. And this is the 60th episode of this award-winning history and humanities program. Since our first episode nearly five years ago, we have had the privilege of welcoming an incredible range of guests. We have spoken with former Pan Am pilots, flight attendants, mechanics, executives, reporters, historians, authors, filmmakers, and passengers whose lives were shaped by the airline. Together, we have explored Panam's role in aviation innovation, civil rights, global travel, Cold War diplomacy, the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s, hijackings and aviation disasters, presidential press flights, pop culture, and the very human stories that unfolded at 35,000 feet. What began as an oral history project grew into something much larger: a global conversation about memory, history, and legacy. Over the past four and a half years, the podcast has received numerous awards and countless positive comments from listeners all around the world. The Pan Am Podcast has also maintained a consistent five-star rating on Apple Podcasts. It is also important for me to share that this podcast has always been a passion project for me and is 100% volunteer work. On average, each episode requires between 15 and 20 hours of research, preparation, interviewing, editing, and production. It has truly been a labor of love, driven by a passion for history and a desire to preserve the stories of Pan Am for future generations. I am immensely proud of what I have accomplished with this program. Despite all of this success, I have made the difficult decision that the time has come for me to hang up my microphone after season five as host and producer of the Pan Am podcast. This was not a decision I made lightly, and I know that some of our listeners will be disappointed. But it is the right decision for me at this time today. And I am not finished quite yet. I am currently working on several additional episodes, which will be released over the next months. My time with the podcast will conclude at the end of May 2026, and I sincerely wish the very best to whatever comes next for this program. And if you are disappointed by this announcement, I would ask you to keep in mind that much like your favorite television series that is no longer on the air, all good things must come to an end. For me personally, I want to see my work on this program conclude on a high note. With the awards we have received, the reach we have achieved, and the continued enthusiasm of our listeners, I'm proud to say that that high note is today, as evidenced by the ongoing popularity of this program. It has truly been an honor to create and host this podcast for you, our listeners. And I can't tell you how much it means for me to know that you appreciate the work I have done. Finally, I would love to stay connected with you. Please feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn, where I look forward to continuing the conversation and sharing what comes next. Thank you again for your support over the years, this program, and the community around it has meant a great deal to me. Now on to our 60th episode. Cheryl Boone Isaac's journey is a remarkable one that spans aviation, Hollywood, and film education. She began her professional career as a Pan Am stewardess from 1972 to 1974, an experience that gave her a global perspective and a deep appreciation for storytelling and human connection. After leaving Pan Am, Cheryl moved to San Francisco, where she held various jobs. However, she always thought about either going back into aviation or pursuing her dream of being in the film business, inspired in part by her brother Ashley Boone, a pioneering film executive. Through him, she attended an advanced screening of Star Wars before it was released in May 1977. That moment proved transformational and solidified her belief that the motion picture industry was where she belonged. So she packed her bags and moved to Hollywood. Over the decades that followed, Cheryl worked on the marketing, publicity, and release of some of the most iconic films in cinema history. Her credits include Forrest Gump, Titanic, The King's Speech, Braveheart, The Artist, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Right Stuff, Once Upon a Time in America, The Wedding Singer, Austin Powers, The Spy Who Shagged Me, and Spider-Man 2. She also worked on two Indiana Jones films and five Star Trek films. Behind the scenes, Cheryl broke significant barriers. She became the first African-American woman to lead a major studio marketing department at New Line Cinema, and later the first African-American to serve as president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, where she guided the organization through a pivotal period of reflection and change. Today she continues shaping the future of storytelling as the founding director and professor of practice at the Sidney Pontier New American Film School at Arizona State University. In that role, she mentors students and builds a program grounded in Sidney Pontier's legacy, emphasizing inclusion, leadership, and real-world industry experience. From the skies of Pan Am to Hollywood Studios and now the classroom, Cheryl Boone Isaac's career reflects a lifelong commitment to storytelling, leadership, and opening doors for future generations. Cheryl, I'd like to introduce you to the Pan Am podcast. It's a great honor to have you. This is our 60th episode. So it's a landmark episode, and I am so pleased to have you on the program because I very much enjoy talking to you.

SPEAKER_02 9:33

And it is my pleasure, Tom. Thank you very, very much. I am really honored to be able to speak about my time with Pan Am and to also uh congratulate you and your podcast for being on the air for 60 episodes.

SPEAKER_00 9:52

60 episodes, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:54

Really, really impressive. I know how much you love Pan Am. And um we all and we all, all of your listeners are very appreciative of how you keep us informed.

SPEAKER_00 10:08

Well, thank you very much. So why don't we begin? We're gonna have a lot of stuff to talk about. Hollywood, the academy, your film school in Arizona, but let's start at the beginning. Tell us a little bit about where you grew up, your parents, and how you eventually became a Pan Am stewardess.

SPEAKER_02 10:27

All right. Well, I was born quite a bit ago, um uh in Springfield, Massachusetts. I was the youngest of four, but we're pretty spread out. My sister is the oldest, is 13 years older. Uh brother, 11 years older, one five. I figured my mother was when she had two at home at the same time, she thought I'm not doing this again and waited until a child was in school before she had one more. Because then they were five years apart. Uh, I I questioned her about that once and she said she didn't realize it, but I I think deep down inside her heart did. You know, just one at a time. Two was a little bit too much. Um, my mom's a stay-at-home mom. My dad is a postal worker. However, when the two older ones went off to college, that's a lot. That's a lot for a lower middle class African-American family back in the 50s. So dad took a number of jobs in order to keep the family stable. And we were never for want. Ever. I don't remember any of that. We were very close, very tight-knit, um, great community, uh, very mixed. Um, and it was a great childhood. I actually have nothing to complain about. That's great. And still friends with many from those years. Um however, my oldest sister um had moved to California, and uh, we went to visit her um and and attend her wedding. And arriving in California, I went, oh, wait a minute. This is in the summer, there's no humidity, there's no mosquitoes, hardly any thunderstorms. I wanted to be there. So I applied to colleges there, much to the horror of my parents. But since my sister lived there, it was approved. Um, I attended a small univ a small college, not a university, Whittier College in Whittier, California. Primarily because I looked them all up. Uh UCLA I applied to, but it's too big. It was just too big. You know, uh, I didn't understand 30,000 students when our elementary school was eight rooms, right? And so I went to Whittier because it was known for its political science department. And in those days, that was an interest, still is, actually, of mine. And they had this semester in uh Copenhagen that one could apply to. And uh so I did. And it was even bigger than the move to California for me. And we're talking in uh 1969 to be in another country. Now my parents are really like, oh my god, what are you kidding, right? 1969, you're in Europe and uh you know, so far away, and something that African American families were not really ever thinking about, right? And at least in our in our community. But I was itching, itching, etching, and it was such an experience that it it really did change my life in many ways to be able to be around a different, totally different environment, different views, little things, architecture, city structures, of course, studied government, international relations while I was there, and and art. Those are my my two favorite subjects there. Living with a family. It was a great experience. Traveled around, um, you know, the old style from college with uh with hostels and Paris and and um London and you know, different places, um, Amsterdam. And uh over the Christmas uh excuse me, uh Thanksgiving holiday, our art class went to Berlin. And in those days, Berlin was split in half, as was all of Germany. That was even bigger. I did also these experiences about what the world was like really penetrating into my head to be in East Germany, West Germany and East Germany, and Berlin, which is both East and West at that time in 69 was truly mind-blowing. Uh speaking of the time and period. But it it really got me. I have to travel. I have to. I have to see things. So of course I finished and got my degree. However, I thought gotta gotta gotta travel. Uh, I had a job when I graduated, but wasn't moving anywhere, right? Wasn't going anywhere. The job was uh the buyer's program in a department store that no longer exists called JW Robinson's in California. Um, and it was horrible. I just I felt, you know, just a prisoner in a way, right? Not their fault, my need to move. So I applied to two airlines because I only wanted I wanted to fly international, TWA and Pan Am. I do want to say that when I was in Copenhagen and we would go to the movies, the the commercial, you know, commercials played in Europe, they didn't play in the United States, but they played in Europe, and there were always the Pan Am commercials, and we as a group, we American kids, would cheer and cheer. And I can still remember because they were animated, um, those commercials. And if anybody had ever told me that time that I would actually fly and be an employee of Pan Am, I would not have believed you. But that that burning desire to see the world and how to see it, uh, TWA sent me a rejection letter. And I thought, you're kidding. However, I mean it's like, why not? Why, why, why? However, Pan Am did not. They accepted me. And someone was looking out for me because I had not done enough of my homework on TWA. I would not have been happy because it was the senior stewardesses who got to travel internationally. So I would have known, I would have probably quit within six months max. But Pan Am no no no got to travel the world instantly. And it was uh it like I said, I I it was this escalation of going to Copenhagen and and then traveling through Europe and then joining Pan Am. And those days when you walked through the air air uh terminals, how people would stop and stare and sometimes clap. It was amazing. It was just um it was amazing. It was and I wasn't afraid of flying, but it took me a minute or so uh to get used to uh the turbulence for a length of time, right? Sometimes it would be for quite a bit of time. Those days uh the 747s had just come on board, so to speak. Um so most of the flights were 737-707s. Um and I got to travel the world. I got to meet interesting people, um, learned so much about humankind, really.

SPEAKER_00 17:48

When did you start with Pan Am?

SPEAKER_02 17:50

Uh in March of 72. And it was almost two years later that I left Pan Am. And a lot of that had to do with um the the uh uh the the energy crisis, the gasoline crisis of 73. That uh there was a scale back for all, right, in many different ways because of fuel and and financial. And I had the opportunity of either transferring to Houston or Hawaii, but that was not of interest to me. I had spent my first six months in New York and then the rest of the time in San Francisco.

SPEAKER_00 18:30

So you preferred the West Coast?

SPEAKER_02 18:32

Well, I preferred being able to travel further than Hawaii turnarounds primary uh, you know, primarily, and uh and and the Houston was primarily Central America, the way I remember it. Um and while that's it's not gonna be as interesting, is is a wider reach. Um so in New York, it was uh the Caribbean, Middle East, and of course Europe. So I got to see quite uh quite a bit, even more than when I was in Copenhagen. And it also allowed me the opportunity of having um two of my siblings, my sister, she'd never been to Europe. And so I brought her to Europe and we spent like two weeks there. Oh, that's great. And it's still the highlight of her life. And my brother, who uh my old my younger brother, 25 years older, loves race cars, loves Formula One, loves you know, all that. So I brought him uh to Barcelona then to attend a um a Grand Prix. And oh cool. And so they both have never been out of the States other than those that those times. And uh so that though those things make me very, very happy. My mom hated to fly, so she she never and my dad wouldn't go without her. But um, but Pan Am just opened my eyes to just so much, just so much. Um, and I was very, very proud to wear the uniform. And there were some touchy times on the plane. If you remember, during that that period, there were still uh casualties, crashes. Um and we we used to, I don't know if it was true, but we would say that they come in threes. So uh your nerves would be a little tight each time. Um so I wasn't really scared, but a little tight. And and a couple of uh uh highlights of my travels. One was we would fly in and out of Manila into Saigon Um and Um Tunsnut and uh in a 747, my favorite plane for ever, ever, ever, ever, ever. I don't know why they try to make any other planes, it's the greatest plane that ever ever existed in my mind. And you know, uh the planes were not full, but that was a route. And there was this one time that we had to fly through a uh a typhoon, and that was pretty intimidating.

SPEAKER_00 21:21

I'm sure it was.

SPEAKER_02 21:23

It really was um I must say there weren't many people on, mostly military, going in, and and that lasted uh going through uh like I don't know 45 minutes an hour. It was it was amazing, I'll never forget it. Uh but when we would land, we would land, we couldn't get off the plane. And so we would get asked to stand at the front door and wave to soldiers in particular who would go to the airport uh and look at that beautiful white plane with the American flag on. The back of it. And that was, you know, I still get choked up about it. But many different experiences being in Manila, just as Marcos declared um martial law, and the fright at the airport, which I'll never forget as well, because it was, you know, you know, that frenzy, that energy in inside um the terminal with the fans, you know, it's a it's a when I saw the movie Killing Fields, I thought, oh my gosh, it was it was pretty much like that. Just the energy was so tense and tight. And we all get on the plane, nobody's talking really. We all get on the plane, it's absolutely packed, babies in laps because every seat needed to be taken. And as we were running down the runway, and then we started slowing down. And we all just, I mean, hearts stopped, like, what? And we had to go back to the gate because there was some luggage they couldn't account for on the plane without and that's what they said.

SPEAKER_00 23:02

And so So everybody was extremely tense at that point. Like, what's going on?

SPEAKER_02 23:06

Oh no, it's even more. And we all had to get off the plane, and but and that was tight. That was pretty tight. Um, got back on the plane and running down the runway. And when we took off, I mean the hollering, clapping, crying, it was very I still get that way. It was very emotional.

SPEAKER_00 23:28

Amazing, amazing.

SPEAKER_02 23:30

Yeah, yeah. The very, very, very, really great days. I'm sorry I wasn't able to keep my uniform. Of course, I couldn't get past my knees now, probably, but um, so when I saw women in their uniforms, I was really jealous. But those days we could not keep them.

SPEAKER_00 23:50

Do you have any uh fame famous uh passengers or memorable stories, flights that you were on that you like to share with our audience?

SPEAKER_02 23:58

Um no, there were some crude people, but you know, we kind of expect that. Um uh one time I remember because I liked working first class. Um, and I liked working the galley. Um, because if the galley didn't work, it wasn't gonna be a good play.

SPEAKER_03 24:16

Yeah. We all knew it.

SPEAKER_02 24:18

We all knew in the room we'd look around and we'd go, okay, who do we know in this room is really great in the galley, right? And if they're great, I'm good. If there's no one great, I'm gonna be in the galley because if that doesn't work in those days, then it's not gonna work. You know, we had to run trays, which I wish they would bring back. I don't understand this stuff now. Um, but um, and it's running trays in a 747. Come on, it can be done, people. It can be all good. I uh I one time I I uh there was a wonderful passenger, and he invited me to a concert. And um that was the only time I ever did it. It's a very nice guy, and he was very lovely and very polite, and no weirdness, no funniness, no whatever. And we went to hear um um uh Count Basie's band in Japan. Wow. And that was an incredible experience. Yeah, you know, I met him there. I mean, I you know, I have no understanding of anything. He was just very nice, very polite, wonderful time, said goodbye after. Uh, that was the only time I ever did that, you know, because all my friends would say, Whoa, who did you see who you date? No, no, no, no, I don't do that. But for some reason, that one I did, and um, and it was a count basic um orchestra that day, and the auditorium was packed, and I got to experience that in Japan, where everybody's just dead silent and quiet until it's over. And then it's just it was a different experience, and it was just great. There were many things about being a stewardess, and one of them in San Francisco is I felt when I was in San Francisco I was a tourist, right? Because I didn't work in San Francisco, I worked in the air, you know, and um and that was always fascinating to me because it was like I was on vacation when I was at home. So that I would love to repeat somehow some way, right? Because I thought that was really right, but um, and I I pondered there for a minute of should I stay in aviation because I do like the world travel and all, but there was something else tugging at me about that time.

SPEAKER_00 26:31

And your brother at this time uh moved to Hollywood, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:38

If if we want to move over to Ashley, he he's a he's the one who was 11 years, 11 and a half years older. And so growing up, he always wanted to be in the film business. I don't know this when I'm a little girl, but you know, I find this out later. And when he graduated um from Brandeis um in 1960, um, he tried very hard to get a position in the industry and was finally hired after working for American Airlines scheduling aircraft for two years. Oh, absolutely. I know we have these, and I at the time did not even associate it until I was much older with these these these um similarities here. Yeah. I would go to visit him at United Artist and spend a week. And he would put me in the back of the theater and go, be quiet, do not speak, you know, bring your comic books or whatever you're bringing, just sit in the back, don't talk. People are gonna come in and out and see movies. And boy, did they. So I so they would come in and there would be the James Bond, because those are the days of with a number of international films. It was Pink Panther, there was a man and a woman, my favorite, even as a high school kid, and um, and of course the James Bond films. And uh the one thing that later on in life would have uh knocked me over if I had known then, and that is that I would see the big two two big names. One was The Mirish Corporation, so many great movies of those years, right? Another was casting by Lynn Stallmaster. I of course thought Lynn Stallmaster was a female. No, those are the days before women stole that name as well as okay, and many others. Um and didn't think that years later I would know those gentlemen and they would actually know me. Again, it's just life you just don't know. That's why I tell students, you don't know, so live it, because you have no idea.

SPEAKER_00 28:48

That's very good advice.

SPEAKER_02 28:49

You have no idea. So um so that was something, but it didn't occur to me to be in the business because he was so smart. And you know, he's my big brother, he's smart, there's no way, didn't think about it. But when the opportunity appeared because of the shift at at Pan Am, um I said, Well, what do you really want to do? And I thought about it for a couple of years actually, staying there, um, and little odd jobs, but they were going nowhere. I was going nowhere. I said, This is this this is not you. And so I finally confessed I really would like to be in the film business. And he was not for it at all. Um, even though we were very close. And he was a loving brother, he knew the challenges it was going to be for me.

SPEAKER_00 29:41

So he was more protective, much more. That's why he didn't want you to get in the business.

SPEAKER_02 29:46

Exactly. He was very concerned. He knew um just be especially behind the scenes for minorities, minimal, minimal. If you could perform and great, and I said I understood, but it was his fault that he got me. He love movies so much. It was pretty much his fault, even though it wasn't, because we would, you know, go to the movies on the weekends all the time.

SPEAKER_00 30:10

Let's go back to May of 1977. Your brother Ashley was working at Fox and just saw Star Wars, a rough cut of Star Wars. This was May 2nd, I believe, 1977. And it was him that came up with the idea. Uh, before that, all of the blockbuster summer movies was around July 4th. And he said, Why don't we do this in a limited run to get young people talking, kids talking on the playground, which was brilliant at the time. This was a new thing that that your brother originated, um, and release it in uh at the end of May. And then get this buzz going, and then more theaters will sign up for it. And they thought it was a good idea. So your brother organizes this special test audience screening in early May of 1977 in San Francisco. You're living in San Francisco at the time, and he invites you to come to this screening to see Star Wars before anyone else saw it. Tell us a little bit about what happened.

SPEAKER_02 31:33

Well, I'll start with the evening before Alan Ladd Jr., who was head of 20th Century Fox at the time, and his wife, um Ashley, me, and two other executives, um had dinner. Um and Laddie asked me, he said, Are you looking forward to seeing Star Wars tomorrow? And I said, uh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um I there was I knew nothing about it, of course. And I just sounded like another, you know, uh out in space battle kind of thing, Star Wars. And I think Ashley was gonna go under the table, but he does know me. And if you ask me a question, I'll give you an answer. Wasn't trying to be cute or anything, and um and he's and so lad said, Oh, and I went, I tell you what, I'm really interested in seeing some of your other movies, like Julia and an unmarried woman.

SPEAKER_00 32:38

Um and your brother's like, oh gosh, I invited her.

SPEAKER_02 32:43

No, no, he just, you know, it was fine, everything was fine. So the next morning I went to a North Point uh theater uh in San Francisco, and I think the screening was like at 10 o'clock in the morning. Uh I think it was early. And as the car pulled up, there are all these people down the block, hordes of folk. And I'm like, what? Where I'd never heard of this movie, where all these people come from, and it wasn't advanced screening. And uh, and as happens in Hollywood, you invite certain organizations or groups or you know, general public. It's it it depends how you're gonna do that. Um, and I didn't know any of that at the time, but it was a packed theater and a lot of buzz. And that the whole thing I kept thinking, where where how did they know about this? How did they know about this? Um, because I was with Ashley and Laddie and other executives, we were in the back of the theater, which I never said, okay, and there's all this buzz. Okay, the movie starts. Oh my goodness. By the time the Millennium Falcon got across the screen, everybody was standing up and shrieking. It and clapping. It was one of the best experiences ever in a film screening. And then it was, you know, you're glued, absolutely glued, and everybody was with it from beginning to end. It was just the most fascinating. And then it was over, and then I went with them to lunch, and I'm sitting there looking at um these folks who made this movie with stars. Nobody they they weren't stars, right? And it was a fascinating day. They were so happy uh because, as you are aware, um the higher higher-ups at Fox were not that keen, right? They were not that keen, they didn't get it. So, and every time I would read uh stories later that said Fox never knew what they had, I went, oh now you're crazy, because I I know that at least the production end of it and marketing, they absolutely knew what they had. Did they know it was gonna be what it became? Nobody ever does. I don't care what movie it is, you you get to a certain point, and that's your goal. After that, it's like on its own. And that's the point, is to get it to that point, any movie, to have it then do whatever it's gonna do, right? Um and that really energized me one heck of a lot to such a degree that I was sitting there after no longer working at Pan Am and thinking what's happening with my life? Um, I'm I'm you know, I'm I'm too old. I need to get going, I need a real career. And that's when I had a good serious time, and I did have a really good serious talk with myself. I said, stop fooling around. You have had these odd jobs. What is it that you really enjoy? And I had a thought, a bit of a thought of um going back to actually um aviation and maybe working in the office and working with stewardesses, and you know, there was a part of then the other part was, you know, I really love films. I really do. And so I decided I'm gonna try my hand. Try my hand, and that's when got in the car with the boyfriend, the two the plants in the house, the two cats and drove to LA, where had a discussion with Ashley because I was staying at his house, and um I said, I really want to try to get in this business. And he said I'm not gonna help you. Not, I mean, that's the bottom line. He wasn't angry, he wasn't um mad and mad in any way, he was concerned, and I did understand that. Um, I understood it more after I got in. But uh here I'm his little sister and African Americans behind the camera. You know, if we can't perform, what can we do? Right. And he was uh one of uh a handful in film. There were other uh African Americans of greatness, and the ones that he was friendly with, certainly one was Sidney Poitiers, another was um uh Barry Gordy and Quincy Jones. And um, you know, to me, I'm like a a little whatever, right? But that I I didn't think about becoming rich or famous or anything like that. But my goal was let's see if I can get a job. And as I uh went around knocking on doors, this was before HR became the behemoth that it's become, thank goodness. I think opportunities were much better before, but I understand. And um what was curious is I was asked a few times on the phone, are you one of Pat's daughters? And I would say, no, I'm not. And then I'd go to the interview, and as soon as the door opened, there was a couple of moments of oh, I didn't expect this. I you know, I could pretty much read people's minds. Um, and um but that's okay. That's not new, right? I was born in 49, that is not new. So um after going on a number of interviews, I planned it out, try to get at least two a week and just kept on on it until I went to Columbia and someone had said Columbia was going to put on the biggest press trunk ever. And maybe they need some extra help. So I called over there and um I had no idea what a press trunk it was. I don't care to me. Anyone who says yes, I'm taking the job right, and uh met with Barry Laurie, who I will forever, ever, ever have praise for. And after his shock, when the door opened, um he said, Um, are you related to Ashley Booth? And I said, Yeah, I'm his little sister. And he said, You're hired. So at the end of the day, that is how I started. And he did help because the buzz, of course, of the success of Star Wars now people knew him in Hollywood even more than they had before. So that was the beginning, and um admitted I called him and I said I did get a job at Columbia, and then it was schooling. Your life's not your own. You're never to say you can't do something. You figure it out, you figure it out. So Barry Lurie, who I will forever, ever be grateful for, uh gave me the opportunity, and they were putting on what was considered the biggest press drunk in Hollywood history. You know, Hollywood. No, no, no. Um, and it was for a movie by this young successful director by the name of Steven Spielberg. Oh, who's that guy? I never heard of that guy. Close encounters of the third kind. And um, you know, I'm a little nothing in the corner. But to actually, I would pinch myself to drive on a lot, a studio lot as my first job. Unbelievable. Just unbelievable.

SPEAKER_00 41:17

What job were you hired for?

SPEAKER_02 41:19

I was hired to work on the press junket because I wasn't hired as an employee. It was, you know, an added job because it was such a big deal, which happens a lot all the time. And then I stayed for about a year working on press junkets and got to know them very well. And the important thing about it is that I got to meet journalists because our job really was to coordinate one woman. Her whole job was issuing uh airline tickets.

SPEAKER_00 41:48

Which you have some familiar.

SPEAKER_02 41:50

Yeah, exactly. But uh my job was to talk to the press folks. We would divvy them up as they would agree to come from around the country because it was the biggest press junket ever in the history of Hollywood. And I got to meet, you know, on the phone, but got to meet these journalists. Um, and then at uh there were a number of junkets, and one of them I got to actually see some of them. And what's interesting is about that is that I became friendly and we knew each other my entire career in the film business. Again, you never ever know. You don't know the future. So you make the most of the present that you can. So that was my beginning. And um, I think by the time because I was at at Columbia for um about a year, and um, and then Milton Goldstein, who was president of Mel Simon Productions. And there's one movie people that that that people might know. You'd you'd know a few more, like Love It First Bite with George Hamilton, um and The Stunt Man, which was the first academy campaign I ever worked on. And then the most famous of all, and the most successful for us was Porkies. Have you ever seen Porky's?

SPEAKER_00 43:19

I have when when I was a teenager.

SPEAKER_02 43:23

The best time is you laughed your head off.

SPEAKER_00 43:26

Yes, it was very funny, and and also uh I probably was a little too young to be watching it, but um I I I vividly remembered the the uh inappropriate scenes.

SPEAKER_02 43:39

It was very, very funny. It did very well, and I learned a whole lot about the film business because it was a small company and we made movies, and then Milton, who was great at distribution, and Ashley had been one of his His staff years before. And Milton liked young folks that he thought had potential, including Terry Simmel, who became co-head of Warner Brothers. Never mind others that are not as well known. And for some reason, maybe he felt the same way as Barry Laurie. You know, maybe the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. And he called me up and said, I want you to come over here. I thought because he was one of those guys that you kind of read about. Although he did not smoke and he did not hardly ever drink, but he was larger than life, which taught me a lot about how to work with people in Hollywood, as well as the process, because it's a small company. So I know the process of how they go about selecting a script, you know, how it goes through the the revisions, how to strike deals for domestic as well as international territories. So I started there as a coordinator and five years later left as VP of Worldwide Advertising Republic Publicity.

SPEAKER_00 45:16

Wow. And for our listeners, this is a time where old Hollywood and New Hollywood were at odds with each other. Right. And and your brother and George Lucas and Alan Ladd Jr. represented New Hollywood.

unknown 45:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 45:37

And old Hollywood, even though they were making a ton of money on Star Wars, were not happy. And for our listeners, I'm going to include a link in the episode description of a great article that Cheryl is is quoted in, and so so is George Lucas, all about Ashley Boone Jr. And it's titled Uh He Was Star Wars Secret Weapon. So why was he forgotten by the Hollywood Reporter? And we are certainly not forgetting him in this interview.

SPEAKER_02 46:13

Yes, he was, he kept me on my toes, and I learned a lot. He and I were very close. There were four of us. But now we have something even more in common. Then even when I was little and he was at United Artists and would bring home, even though we lived in New York, he'd come to Massachusetts and with a um projector and would bring uh 16 millimeter films. And we would set it up in the dining room and invite neighbors and see some of the movies from UA, right? So, you know. That was the never mind.

SPEAKER_00 46:51

Um what were some of those movies in in your memory?

SPEAKER_02 46:54

Oh, the um, what was the one? Um, Top Cappy is the one for some reason stuck in my head to this day. I don't know if you ever saw it.

SPEAKER_00 47:03

I have not.

SPEAKER_02 47:04

Um, but uh that one I remember the most. Uh and it didn't happen all that often, but it was maybe four or five times over a like two-year period, you know, that not that much. But that was very exciting. And I I knew his world was exciting. He didn't talk about actors so much. He was very much a business guy, and he's like an architect, and I remember he wanted to be one. And uh, and uh, which is many businesses in some ways, the training of the mind on how to build upon, right? Um, and that's what he loved the most. He loved the puzzle, and um that's where he found real love, more than marketing, but in distribution, and where are the gaps and how to look at the big picture and how to take that journey based off of when a movie is seen and where is it seen, you know. Um so of course Star Wars was a success, even though in the beginning there were grumblings in Hollywood. This is gonna be a failure, this is gonna be, you know, again, as you pointed out, old Hollywood. And, you know, it also that period, there was Lucas and there was Spielberg, and there was Coppola, that were also all breaking away with something different. Um, and uh and that was very exciting. And so for me to have my first film, my the first film I worked on was a Spielberg film. At the time I didn't get that um greatness, you know, to me it was a job. I had seen Jaws, of course. And um as I have said to Stephen, uh Jaws was brilliant, but it didn't scare me. You know why? Because I'm not going in the ocean. Therefore we have to worry about the shark, right?

SPEAKER_00 49:17

You know, speaking of Jaws, which it's uh the 50th anniversary this year, which is crazy. Um, I still do not, I will not go on the ocean because everything in the ocean will kill you. And I and I think at an early age that was ingrained in me with Jaws, like don't go on the ocean.

SPEAKER_02 49:37

Exactly. I mean, I the oceans are so amazing, they are so amazing. I know the first time on Pan Am that I flew from the mainland to Hawaii. I'm sorry, I'm in the air for six hours and I see only water. That was I I think that was one of the reasons why I did not make the decision to move to Hawaii. It just seemed so remote. You might as well tell me I'm going to Mars, right? Because you, you know, I grew up on the East Coast. Of course, I I saw the Atlantic Ocean. We would go there and I'd go in, but never hire the manies. Because you don't know what's in there. Um, but uh it's it's it it was um it was an interesting time. My goal was Cheryl, keep your head down, listen to Ashley. And he said, Your life's not your own. That was my motto. My life belongs to the business, and I wanted to be that way. And my goal was to hopefully stay employed for 10 years, and in 10 years I will look up and just evaluate at that point.

SPEAKER_00 51:06

So tell us about those 10 years.

SPEAKER_02 51:08

Well, I went to Lad Company after Mal Simon for about a year and worked on uh the right stuff once upon a time in America, um, a few other movies, but the one I thought was gonna make the most money, and I said that to the producer, and he just laughed at me and said, Oh, Cheryl, as a second half. I go, Yeah, it is, yeah, it is. This is gonna be the most successful film because I worked on Porkies and the movie was Police Academy.

SPEAKER_03 51:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 51:43

Because I know people want to laugh, people want to see something that's silly but fun. And and and you know, it it's it's it's always magic to understand if you're gonna hit that button, you know, when you're writing a movie or making or producing a movie, you don't know, but you try for it, and that's that's what you do, but it doesn't always work, as we know. And when it does, if it tickles the tickle bone at some place, it's gonna do well, right? And uh I had a great time because um Laddie was a major supporter of mine, and it what was interesting is when I got the call um from the Ladd Company, from a gentleman who was head of publicity there, whose boss happened to be Ashley Boone Jr. Okay. And um and he said, you know, I want you to come over here. And I thought it was another one because I always had these little gatherings. Laddie loved having folks around. And I thought it was just one of those. I didn't think much of it, but I also knew that the financial situation globally was tense and the independent uh companies like Melson um were fading away because trying to make the deals internationally, which was usually the base by which you better get a certain number. Um otherwise you're just not gonna get the return. And there goes the investors, and you you know the whole story. And um and I thought okay, again, thinking, and he goes, No, I mean come over here to work. And I went, Oh, no, no, no, no. Ashley's there. Does he know that you're calling me? And he said, No. And I said, Bob, and he said, Don't worry about it. Laddie and I had a meeting with him, and we asked him if he was an equal opportunity employer. And it was, if you knew these guys, you would understand because this is how they were. They were really all close. There was Jay Cantor, who was Laddie's best until, and um Gareth Wigan, who went on to be a very successful producer. They were all agents at one point, right? And um, and Ashley, of course, that's my this is the story I was told, was a little like, what, what, you know, uh uh yes, of course I am. And they went, Great, because we want to hire Cheryl. And I was scared because I, you know, just I'm stepping in his territory, even though we're again very close, but never asked him for anything, you know, other than advice, but nothing else. And always happy that I did because I discovered that many uh folks in Hollywood, and I would hear Milton in particular, shriek in the air. I got his wife a job or his son a job, or I would hear these things from top executives. And that's when I called Ashley one day and I said, I get it completely now. And I told him the story. And he just went, Yeah. And I said, and I wanted to do it on my own anyway, so I wouldn't be questioning myself. Um, and and some people I know think, gosh, Arl, that's so crazy. No, that was a different day, folks. It was a totally different day. So I had a wonderful time a lad, but it also, as an independent, they had a deal with Warner Brothers. However, they handled international separately. And um, just all that was going across the country and the world anyway. I thought, oh my goodness, this is gonna shut down, which it did. Ashley, we we were at the Ladd Company together, I think, for like two and a half, three months, when he went to Columbia Pictures as head of marketing distribution, with the biggest success, I would say, was Ghostbusters um for him as well as um karate kid and quite a few others. Um and I thought I want to get back into a studio because the companies are all fading right now. It's not a great time. So the only two places I want to work were Warner Brothers were Paramount because they made the cool movies. You know, for Paramount, there was staying alive, there was Footloose, there was Flash Dance, there were, you know, there was um uh John Travolta, Greece. So they're making these hip things. And um so I read in the trades that their uh West Coast publicity manager was leaving to get married. So I called the head of publicity and but she's uh Susan Pyle, who to this day, I just adore her forever, taught me so much about PR because I really didn't know it much, even though it had been in my title. Uh we always had outside agencies who actually did the work. So I learned how people were doing the work, but I had never really done the work myself. I was more creative advertising. Um also working with outside, but understanding the needs, what you need from a trailer, a TV spot, the poster, whatever. Right. And again, these things shaped me forever because start working with the same people over and over and over and over again. And uh and then go to Paramount as West Coast publicity manager. And I took a pay cut and certainly a title cut, but now I'm in I'm in the Pacific Ocean, not in Lake Michigan, right? So um that was fine with me. I was happy as a lark to get that job and was there for 13 years.

SPEAKER_00 58:07

What were some of your the favorite movies that you've worked on at Paramount?

SPEAKER_02 58:12

And favorite for so many different reasons. Um there's so many. Um when I got there, Paramount was and had put in release um Indiana Jones, right? Not Raiders, uh, because I came after Raiders, but Indiana Jones. So I worked on um Last Crusade. Last Crusade and Um Temple of Doom. All of those movies where yay! When I first saw screenings, and there would be the clipper, you know, the pan. It was like um, and I do remember Har Bennett, who was a producer um of Star Trek, and telling him my love of aviation, which he had a love for.

SPEAKER_00 59:02

Oh, interesting. I didn't know that.

SPEAKER_02 59:04

Yeah, and so we talked planes, and I told him that I had been a stewardess at Pan Ham. And he was he thought that was cool. You know, you never know what people are gonna think, you know, in other areas. But I, of course, was always yay! I mean, I still remember, like I've said before, back in theaters in Europe where they showed commercials, and they were the Pan Am commercials on and still see them, they're great.

SPEAKER_00 59:37

And for our listeners, Harv Bennett was the producer of Star Trek II, The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek III, The Search for Spock, Star Trek Four, The Voyage Home, and Star Trek V, The Final Frontier.

SPEAKER_02 59:51

And I worked on all of those.

SPEAKER_00 59:53

Oh, wow. My favorite movie is Star Trek II, The Wrath of Khan.

SPEAKER_02 59:57

Everybody's favorite movie. It's like the Star Wars series. It is the second film, right? Yep. Episode five, absolutely. Yeah, it's interesting. And so that was something because I loved Star Trek as a TV show, and now I'm with these guys, and Bones was my favorite. Yep, really fun to work with, and we did get all of them their um their hands and footprints in the front of the Chinese, and wow, what a day that was. Quite a lot of people.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:34

Yeah, that's so cool. And so, did you know at the time that Gene Roddenberry was a Panam pilot before he came to Hollywood?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:42

No, I did not know that.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:44

Interesting.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:45

Yeah, I didn't know that. Yeah, that would have been fun. That would have been fun.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:50

Yeah, and and Harv Bennett um probably didn't know because so for our listeners, uh, after Star Trek the Motion Picture, Paramount Pictures basically demoted Gene Roddenberry to a consultant and then brought in Harv Bennett, which he did not know Star Trek at the time because Paramount wanted a fresh start. So yeah, it's just it it's interesting how everything is somehow there's a little pan-am morsel of a connection to everything.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:21

Absolutely, absolutely. Um, so other movies at Paramount, um uh Beverly Hills Cop. Um one and two. Oh my goodness, so many. Um, first Wives Club later on. Um, when I was uh I think a uh vice president, Paramount acquired this little movie from Australia called Crocodile Dundee.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:52

And um the head of distribution who had acquired the movie, and we had the screening. And after the screening, my boss and and the head of marketing, they said, Cheryl, we want you to be project manager, you know, the you know, be the the paramount person to work on this movie. And I thought, really? We don't really do that much. You know, that we we saw a particular person inside. Um and I said, of course, because I was taught. Yeah, I said yes, right, and I said, of course, and that was a wonderful, fulfilling time with Paul Hogan, who was more than lovely, and his producing partner, we made it a success. You know, we traveled, Paul, to a number of top cities around the country where he'd never been. And at that time, people didn't think much of Australia because it wasn't in our world. Not that they didn't like the country, but it just wasn't in our world. Foster's beer was not here, other than on the West Coast, right? And so while he was famous with throwing other shrimp on the Barbie, Americans didn't know that. They didn't know what a star he was in Australia. So I asked them, would you tour? And he's they said, Yes, sure. And I think it was a 10 or 12 city tour. And I knew because his personality was so darling, that you put him on the talk shows, you put him on radio, and he did, and he did. And um I was involved with the academy, you know, um, at that point, and had a conversation with um Samuel Golwan Jr., who was producing the Oscar show. And I I said, you know, we should have Paul Hogan on the show. And um also in those days there was a magazine inside of Sunday newspapers called Parade. Do you remember that?

SPEAKER_00 1:04:08

I do remember that, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:10

And had um and had uh a photographer shoot I well, they wanted him, you know. I pitched it, they went, oh yeah, we can have him. And so he was on the cover of Parade, you know, during that time and and did get an Oscar nomination for screenplay. And um and was on the show. Guess what? Flu to Australia again, you know, as I had earlier on Pan Am. And um so that just keeps it's Pan Am weaves itself through my life and other movies. Um, the biggest one, which was uh at the end of my career at Paramount because I got offered a job as president of marketing at New Line, but during the production of um Titanic, which was very interesting. It's great, but very interesting. Um and thought that's that's that's gonna be toughie because as we say, everyone knew the story. You knew the ending, you knew the story, you knew the ending. Oh my goodness, how is that gonna happen, right? And of course it did, but other films that were challenging, which I like them, they're my favorite, because they were challenging and we got through it. One was Forrest Gump and the other one was Braveheart. Oh, yeah. Um, that at the very you know, before you know anything about these movies, you don't know. I mean, Mel Gibson's in this period piece, and yes, he was in uh Gallipoli, but still, right? Um, and nobody really knows this story, right? Um, but When I went to the set with my boss, president of marketing, Arthur Cohen, we went to Arlen and went to the set and watched him work. And then he showed us footage afterwards. And I got on the phone with my colleague back in LA and said, okay, this is what we're gonna do. We're gonna go for best picture. He goes, they're still shooting. I go, we're gonna go for best picture. But we're telling no one. No one. And guess who the producer of Braveheart was?

SPEAKER_00 1:06:33

Who was that?

SPEAKER_02 1:06:34

Alan Ladd Jr.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:36

Oh, so everything comes full circle.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:38

Everything comes around. And Laddie had made a deal with Paramount earlier. Um and um and he produced Brady Bunch, which was another interesting movie because like Untouchables, like Mission Impossible, were changing it in a way. They were very successful on TV. Um Brady Bunch was the closest, absolute closest, uh, that could be, um, just kind of moved into this new space. But Untouchables was uh just a little different um to make it cinematic, do you know that movement, you know, either from TV to feature or from a book to uh a feature? It takes maneuvering, you know, in in it in its development and to stay on course.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:34

So you're working at Paramount Pictures, yes, and you were invited to join the academy. Now there was someone else already part of the academy, your brother. Yes. How was it now joining the academy? And you have that 10-year period, you built your own career on your own in parallel with his career, and now you're serving together on the academy. Tell us a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:59

Well, you know, the membership was in those days probably about 6,000. Um, and he wasn't very active. Um, but he was a member, of course. Um, but we he wasn't very he was actually surprised. Maybe as much as I was that I was accepted into it. I don't remember saying to him or anybody else um about my my boss and girlfriend having me fill out the application because I thought it would be just too embarrassing. Um, to then go, oh, but I didn't get in. Right. Would it have been embarrassing? Of course not. But in those days, you know, I'm still in my mind fairly junior, knowing the the people I have been around. You know, I don't pretend I'm not that. So um I went to Paramount in 1983. And in uh 1987, 10 years later, from my start in 1977, I was invited to join the academy. Um he he he was more than delighted, so much so that a few years later he said, you know what? People keep asking me to run for governor for the executive branch. So he did and then won. So for about a year, a year and a half, we were on the board together. Nice. So that was a uniqueness, and then unfortunately in uh 95, um, and he would tell me about how he wasn't feeling well, and I thought, yeah, never thought anything serious about it. However, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died at 55. Yeah, and my life would have been different if he hadn't died. How so? Um, because we had talked about because now I've had length of time in the business. I've worked at Columbia, Mel Simon, Land, Paramount, knew a lot, a lot, nowhere near as much as he, but knew a lot. And we talked about starting a company, and that's why it would have been different. That um, and and we and I do believe to my toes, we would have been very successful. Very successful. Um, and it would have been ours, you know. Um, so that was an you know an extra little thing. It's a little thing compared to the person, but um, that's why I know my life would have been different. Would it have been better? I who knows? And and what would make something better, you know? I don't know, but I know it would have been different because we talked quite a bit about that, you know. I think especially I always felt that he was also hurt terribly by not being recognized in Hollywood. And and we both knew why, but you know, um we feel we knew why, right? Um, as other any other guy um that had pulled that off with with uh with Star Wars would have been offered of you know, competing companies going after him and all that. That didn't happen.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:39

So how how do you feel we're now 50 years almost 50 years uh to the release of Star Wars, that your brother is now getting the recognition he deserves from a lot of the Star Wars people? They are I think so, yeah. Okay, yeah. Um how does that make you feel that uh I mean, George Lucas is very open about his contributions and the success of Star Wars would not have been what it was if it wasn't for your brother and Alan Ladd Jr. How does that make you feel now, all of these years later, that a new generation of people and Star Wars fans uh know who your brother is or was?

SPEAKER_02 1:12:27

It feels great. It it really does. And I'll say that with his passing, I learned something very big. And that is the term life after death. I came to the conclusion, my conclusion, that life after death is how people remember you. It's not about where you go, it's about uh who you were while you were alive and how you affected people. And for years and even up to now, you were talking about but for years I started all of a sudden it started coming into my head that it wouldn't be a month that at least one person would say something to me about Ashley. For years. One time I was in Dubai at a film festival and a gentleman came up to me who I discovered worked at Film Nation, a distribution company, uh, production too, as well. I see their names quite often. And he said, I just wanted to meet you, Cheryl, because I worked with your brother and he was such a great guy. It's like are you kidding me? This is like 40 years later, you know? Well, not 40, 30 years later, that and to me that's great. Yeah. And you remember once in a while now someone will say, I knew your brother. He was great. So I passed heary again. Obviously, I cry easily.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:09

So you built a very successful career at Paramount, and then you decided to go to New Line. Let's talk about that. And what year was that?

SPEAKER_02 1:14:20

That was 97.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:22

97. So Titanic was just being released. Yes, and uh now you're at New Line.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:31

And why? Because I was itching, itching, itching, itching, itching. I had done publicity for years, Cobra Communications. Um, but I want wanted the bigger picture. I really, and I knew I wasn't going to get in at Paramount. Not for any reason other than they loved the team. I loved the team. We were a great team. Um, we worked really, really, really well together. And it showed. Um, but I wanted to be overall marketing because I missed creative. I missed areas that I had already had knowledge in, but now I'm deep, deep, deep into communications. Um, and I wanted more. I just wanted the bigger picture, the bigger puzzle, so to speak. Now it's a thousand pieces instead of 400 pieces. Um I had heard that new line was looking for a head of marketing. And um, and so some folks that I had worked with, I told them because I knew no one at Newline, no one, which was also very odd because I knew people between, you know, my years in almost every studio I knew no one there. Um and uh I thought, okay, uh one thing they were making again different movies than others were making. And I really liked the smaller company, you know. Looking back on Ladd and Mel Simon. Um let me so where I went to a bigger space, now I wanted to get a little smaller, right? Um and if I could, because I'm not in control, and that you have to really understand you're not in control. And when you have contracts and others have contracts, it's like the wheel goes around, and there needs to be the space where both are free in order to make a leap. And I heard that new line. So I had some friends reach out, and then I had an interview and another one and another one, and was hired. And um I remember the first screening I sat in was called Boogie Nights with the young P. T. Anderson. And um Larry Gordon, who is a very well-respected producer, who was producing the movie, and I knew him from Paramount. I just said to him, watching that movie, which I loved, and I thought now I loved Paramount, but they never would have made this movie, you know, um, as a corporate, more corporate y place, they never would have made that movie. And that was exciting to me. The diversity of talent. Ice Cube had a had a um a production deal there, and uh they had put out house party, you know, with the young um Will Smith. And so there was a more of a diversity than I had been around, and that was very exciting. And so I was there for about the I found out the average of like two years. I looked at other people who had had the position, it was about an average of two years, so that was about it. Um, and there we had very, very successful time uh with uh movies, uh movie called Pleasantville.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:07

Yeah, I remember Pleasantville. Yeah, it was it was an interesting uh black and white uh parts of it, and then color the color came through that that was a very artistic movie.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:19

It really was, it was a major challenge because the two young stars, uh Toby McGuire and Reese Witherspoon, were in color and Joan Allen and Cass were in the black and black and white, and that was a very hard puzzle between going, but watching the movie was wonderful. But from a marketing standpoint, that was one of the most challenging. Um it was kind of like force gump in a way, that if you showed certain scenes, then your impression would be that would be the movie. And that isn't. So how do you, and no really major star, right? Good actors, but not a major star. Toby and of course Reese, they were coming up, no question. So if you showed them a lie, how do you weave this in? And you know, we did all the best we can, um, but it was a challenge. But um Gary Ross, who produced and wrote, directed everything, the movie. And I remember him, uh, we were uh that first weekend, and he said, Cher, can you believe it? We're number one, and we were the box office weekend with a black and white Joan Allen movie. And I'll never forget that. That was it's true. We got it open, and and and while the numbers were very small, but they were small in those days, we still were the number one for the weekend. So um that was that was a toughie. That was a bit of a toughie. Also, their believe it or not, Blade.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:59

Wesley Snipes, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:20:00

Yeah, it was a vampire movie, and um the vampire movies were not doing so well. They were doing okay, but you know, you want a bigger hit. So the team we put together a great marketing campaign. It opened incredibly well to the point that they're, I understand, Paramount now, was looking at making the fourth. Oh wow, I'm sure Chris Tucker would be happy. And when I did at some point meet, well, not at some point, when Jack A Chan, that's one word, Jack A Chan, um, we awarded him an honorary, and I got to call him to tell him. And then um, you know, that of course he came and saw and we saw each other, and that was great. And I every once in a while still run into Chris Tucker. Um, and uh that was that was a bit of a challenge. I didn't want to show uh Jackie doing, you know, the every ad I looked at, I looked at all the ads, and it was always like jumping in the air and the legs were going away. I said, No, no, no, no, because it's gonna remind people of other films. I don't want that. We need to go for the comedy, and he and Chris were quite funny. And Chris had wonderful lines that really helped us um put the campaign together, and it was very successful. Um, another one, so it was Blade that was successful, Rush Hour was successful, um, and then the big one was the the spy who shacked me.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:30

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:31

Um which was their biggest. And I had said to the team, I want to make more money the first weekend than the first run ever made. And we did. So the time I was there, I still have a t-shirt where we opened four movies to number one in the two years that was. Awesome. Yeah. Um, and then they this is the first time I was involved in politics, not because I was in it, but because I was there with other executives badly. So I left and uh now I'm a little tired. My husband and I had adopted a baby, and um I wanted more freedom, so I became a consultant and and worked on a number of movies while I could be a mom. And so at the same time, I'm teaching.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:28

Where were you teaching?

SPEAKER_02 1:22:29

Well, I started at USC in the Peter Stark producing and grad program in marketing and distribution, which who had taught it years before? Ashley Aboone.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:42

Oh, wow. So it everything comes full circle.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:46

Oh, keeps coming around. All keeps coming around. He had already passed and asked me, you know, if I would come. And so I uh you taught there.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:57

So with your company, uh CBI Enterprises, uh, you worked on some really big movies. One of them is one of my all-time favorites, The King Speech. Another one is The Artist, Spider-Man 2. Uh, tell us a little bit about working on these major motion pictures that uh won Academy Awards.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:22

Um all great. Not dissimilar uh than my my previous work, especially Paramount, um, and and new line, but especially Paramount because I was there so much longer. The King speech, I can remember um we said Harvey one scene would have a bunch of folks, believe me, um, working um marketing strategies. And a wonderful woman who's still brilliant and is at Netflix, Lisa Taback. She and I got on very well and she goes, You want to work on this movie or this movie? And I go, Yeah, sure. I don't want to be in any meetings. I don't want to, I just, you know, I'll talk to you. I'm out there in Hollywood in the world, and I'll just take the temperature as we all, which is so much fun, talk about what movies have you seen, what movies have, especially during the award season. And did you see that? It's wonderful. That part I miss not being there. You go to all these screenings, you meet each other, what have you seen? It's wonderfully collegiate and and really, really, really, really great stuff. And so I said, I'll just wander through and hear what people have to say. You know, is the message getting through? Because that's a key point. And I came away with for King's Speech, this line what doesn't matter is that there will never be anything more powerful than the human voice. And the main competition that year was social network, which was hip and young, and had these young, wonderful characters and and Zuckerberg, nobody knew anything about, you know, it was really fresh and and happening. It was that stiff competition. That was very stiff competition, right? Aaron Sorkin. But I believed to my toes that that should be the base. Now, of course, I'm working with other people. I know what I said because I believed it. And I thought, what but the press was missing? How come New York Times, any of the the the high-end press did not write that you have these two movies that are so terribly different, really, really different, right? But they both had to do with communication. And one of them, the king stutters, has millions of followers, has to try to suppress that stutter and speak into this microphone that would eventually uh reach out to the empire, right? Coupled with this new form of communication that was starting to bloom a hundred years later. Oh my god. And nobody wrote that story. I couldn't understand it. And I knew if I pitched it and Harvey found out, he'd kill me. Um, because you know, but I it was such a big thing to me. And I thought, oh, there's no, there's never going to be anything more important than the human voice. And that was how I felt about the movie. And of course, again, filmmakers gave us a great movie. So you have that, and then you try to figure out how to weave with this competition that was now and hip and young, and right? And and the membership is older of the academy. Actors that the actors branch love. So you just walk off of that and it won.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:00

So you started at Pan Am, yeah, and now you're in the stratosphere of Hollywood in the movie industry, and something happened in 2013 with your academy work. Uh, why don't you take it from there?

SPEAKER_02 1:27:16

Well, I do want to start by saying, um, yes, I've been a member of the Academy since 87, joined the board in 89. I was on the board 21 years, and I'm only the second president in its history that held every office. Huh. And I never, honestly, I never pushed to be uh an officer, never mind president. It was members of the board. And I remember um one of my mentors who was also a marketing executive and had been president of the academy, Richard Kahn, the f at what this one meeting, he stood up as he did. I used to call it the Dale Carnegie thing. Just stand up as we were going through nominations for officers. This one year and he's going on and on. All of a sudden I realized he was talking about me because I it just didn't occur to me, never said a word to me, and nominated me for I think it was treasurer. And I thought I was going to die. I I I just thought, Oh my god. Oh my God. And with these people on the are you kidding? Right. And then I won. Um, but I think it's because I'd been so involved in the academy in so many different ways, you know, it was my third avenue. I had my career in marketing, teaching, and academy. I just realized that about three years ago. I never really put it all together. I went, oh, I think it was when I was being asked outside of Hollywood about the position at ASU that as I started talking, I started realizing, oh, I had these three tracks going, and they all came together to help me, unbeknownst to me. I didn't plan it at all. So uh there were members of the board. I remember Bob Raimi, who had been president a couple of years before, said, you know, you should run for president. I looked at him and I, yeah, that's gonna happen. You know, there's been um, I don't, I like three or four African Americans on its entire history on the board. Um, and two of them were boons. So, you know, um, and um I it took me a while to come around. They all got behind me without me even knowing it, which was interesting and and just heartfelt. Um and when they announced my name, I really had an out-of-body experience. Uh uh I know it sounds kind of cliche-ish, but because you always hear about that, I experienced it. I really felt myself going up and looking down at the room, going, Are you kidding me? Right? Are you kidding me? Okay, all right. Now, now you're on stage, girl. And it's very interesting the way uh you get nominated um by the board. It isn't through membership. Thank goodness. I hope they never change that. Because then it gets it's gonna get it would be ugly, very competitive, and you don't even know who's gonna nominate the people, right? Except that a few people said, I want to nominate you. And they did. And yes, I I I won. And there are members of the board who wanted someone else, and they were not happy. Um, but that's also kind of normal. And I just thought, okay, and the words of Ashley B comes in again about your life is not your own, right? Those words. And I I really loved it. That that second year with Oscar so white, um, that was that was a lot. I've just got to say it. Because now I've spent my whole career behind the camera, right? And now I'm thrust, you know, into a spotlight, and it's and I just thought, okay, keep your wits about you. And remember, you cannot let down your family and your branch. And those were my words of you, it's not about you, it's about that. And uh, I was very annoyed um with the press, who I've been working with forever, but they just can't help themselves, you know, as the bottom line, their their outlets are about selling soap, and so they need you to pay attention. So trying to create even more of a controversy um at the same time as amazing celebration. I um during that time, I uh gave commencement speeches and um was on shows and some things I turned out. Cheryl Pupil Magazine. Now, again, because it's now going to become all about me, and I didn't want it to be about me. I wanted it to be about the academy and what I had learned all these years in Hollywood, that many folks, women and minorities, felt that the door was not open for them. I know that from experience, and where I would see different ways of expressing that throughout my career. And so that was a big point for me of uh changing that dynamic of people who didn't believe they were wanted. And to me, every member was an ambassador. Every member had to succeed to a level that they could be accepted into the academy. Therefore, they were leaders. Therefore, folks, uh my phrase was you need to widen the lens. It's very easy to stay in your own space all the time, but we're in a business that our audience is diverse and worldwide. So we need to come to terms with that and our importance when I would travel during that period around the world. It was it was amazing that I in in China that they used to, I don't know if they still do, refer to the Oscar as the little gold man. So I used to think that they think I'm the little gold man. It was that the the feeling of love and respect for the Oscars was huge, huge. Um, I knew it was, but you don't until you go, you know, you actually travel and represent it. Um and there again, you know, my global love was nurtured. You know, my global love that started way back in the 70s with Pan Am. It's the same, it's it's just a continuous theme for me. Um, and but it was it was a challenging time. But then again, what happened the next year? A repeat. And what is also very frustrating is people don't know the process, so they build conclusions that are not necessarily correct. And it was interesting that other guilds, nobody wrote about them, right? Um, and other shows they didn't write about them, but the Oscars was so big, it was an easy target. Now I'm angry. By the second one, now I'm really kind of this is this is um for a lot of things, including members who would use this phrase of, well, it's not an academy movie. Huh. And every time somebody would say that to me throughout my career, actually, about certainly then, I would because it would be listened to now, I would say, explain to me what an academy movie is, because we don't have a definition other than excellence and achievement in our in a particular art form. But what is an academy movie? Right? And it was um quite a bit of relating to previous winners, which is kind of normal in a way, but they weren't that's not no no no no no no no. This is about excellence, it can come in all sorts of forms, it can come into the form as a documentary, as an animated film, as an international language, okay. I they're not fringe, and I really felt that um that it's a it's a global it's a global love uh around the world. It's a language filmmakers speak regardless of what their language is. It doesn't really matter, and that was very that would that that to me was very, very important.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:42

Okay, so you were part of the film industry in the late 1970s when old Hollywood and New Hollywood were butting heads. Do you feel like in the 2015 era that it was kind of the same thing where the new Hollywood is now kind of the old Hollywood, and they were kind of we don't want to lose our grip in these new, this new way, this new wave, this new generation's coming in, and they were butting heads. Do you do you do you think that that's accurate kind of looking back?

SPEAKER_02 1:37:18

I would yes, I I I would say um yes. And not in a major way, it's just part of that evolution, and now we're seeing it now with technology, right? It it changes the verbiage, it changes discussion, it changes processes. Um in some ways, I think nothing ever stops. It's not one then then the other. That's how we can um generalize it and speak about it, but it's actually an evolution of right, of society, of uh human nature, of technology, because technology has been a major, major part of the success of film, which created television, which is creative um um uh ancillary markets that now is all gonna kind of combine, I believe, into streaming. You know, we got rid of the um the law of studios not owning distribution, you know, which so now that's gone um with streaming. I always thought that was kind of strange because who is out there on the limb? The production entity. They're the ones who have to put up all this money, find all these people, try to put these things together. And yes, on the gravy train, every step of the way, there are ways to make money. Not the problem. But you gotta understand that very beginning, right? And I thought that there were so many films that were really terrific. That I remember the year when up, the animated film from the Pixar.

SPEAKER_00 1:38:57

Oh, yes, I love that movie. Up.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:00

I thought it should have been the best picture of the year. I voted for it.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:03

You know, um, but I knew members were not gonna think that way. I don't know why. Because if we actually talk about what is an academy movie, it's great execution of a great story. You know, that's what it is. It doesn't matter if it's moonlight, it doesn't matter if it's paradise. Oh my god, I cried. And certainly cried with moonlight. So that was my third year of excitement out of my four years as president, you know, just to keep coming.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:35

Well, yeah, with uh land and moonlight. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:40

Oh my gosh. I I sat there in total shock as I saw the stage manager come up on the stage. Oh my god, followed by the PWC executive. And I'm sitting there going, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I felt like Al Pacino.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:56

You've pulled me back in. I mean, that's how I felt.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:59

I just and for our listeners, Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway uh read the wrong, the wrong best picture uh winner, and they said La La Land won when it was actually moonlight.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:15

Yeah, that and you know what was a human error, nothing malicious or horrible, but of course, and I knew you know we would be the butt of the joke on the late night, and you know, it's whatever. Okay, you know, but to me that night, I thought we solved it before the show was over. To me, I thought that was a very big deal.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:37

And it was uh I forgot the gentleman's name, but the La La Land people um, you know, came up and they said, you know, we want to congratulate Moonlight. And and it it was it was classy the way that it was handled.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:50

I think the whole thing was those two gentlemen, you know, during the whole um campaign era, you know, you you go to all these events and you see them. And and like I've said before, it's the camaraderie is so wonderful. Um, and you see these two young filmmakers, these two young filmmakers, because they're writers, directors, you know, young filmmakers, they're the next group. And I felt so proud for them, right? So when it was, and I knew the tight again, it always comes down to two movies to me, and maybe not to others, but to me, it always comes down where it looks like two, and I didn't know, but I didn't think necessarily was going to be Moonlight, because there were still folks who would not have looked at Moonlight as a um Oscar film, right? Even though it was getting better with 12 years a slave, but that was that made me sad, you know, for Damien Chazelle a bit, but on the same time they handled it, like you said, brilliantly. They were grown up. I thought by the that very end before we closed the show that there was a lot of good here, people. There was a human error, human error, and everything how they acted. Young directors congratulating each other. And I really thought it was a very interesting moment, but of course, it's not what is gonna sell soap. So it became, you know, a whole other thing. Um, and who made the mistake and who, oh my goodness gracious me. Right. But I also felt the academy could not go out and issue a statement and needed to be PWC because that's gonna put us in a space, all my years in communications. No, trying to defend yourself out of. Um, and while we stood with them, because they're our partners there, and there were a few people who called me and said, you need to fire them. And I'm like, we've worked with this company for decades. No. I mean, I could get overruled, but that's no, this is human error. This isn't malicious or any sort of intent to an action at all. Um, and I knew the PWC executive, and he's probably crushed more than anybody. Right. So, okay, we'll just get through this. Um, we just get through this, which of course we eventually did, but it'll be, you know, one of the bloopers that'll, you know, along with so many others from the academy.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:33

And you know, mistakes happen, and they do in my experience, you know, a mistake happens, and the real character is how you deal with that mistake.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:44

Exactly right.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:45

Uh some people, you know, but they blame everybody. Other people, they they accept the mistake, accept responsibility, and okay, let's make it right and move on.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:54

Yeah, it's just yeah, gonna, it's always gonna be there, but but I miss teaching. So, and then an academy uh governor um convinced me and to go on a tour of Chapman and in Southern California, Chapman University. So I taught there um as well uh for about four years, five years. Um COVID hit, and um I was consulting, um, which would give me time to also like take the kid to school. Has husband would pick him up, but you know, could be spend more time, right? And that was so that all worked out. That really worked out. Um and um and then COVID. Um, and then I got the the email asking if I would be interested in talking about Arizona State's film school. And at first I thought, well, I'm not moving to Arizona, I've been in California forever. All my friends, family, everybody's here now. However, then they told me the school was called the Sydney Poitiers New American Film School. They did not know I knew Sydney Poitiers, and that made me go, all right, I'll I'll talk. And I did and had a number of um interviews, about three, four. Um, and I understood from the recruiter. Cheryl, they really would like it. They really think it'd be great. And I said, Well, I I I've done enough in schools to know that I could broaden this the program that I felt really needed to be, and that's also the mission of the president of ASU. So I joined for um in uh October 2021 as a consultant and then took the full-time gig uh starting um January 22. And we have over over 800, almost 900 students. We're in three cities, Tempe, Arizona, Mesa, Arizona, as well as Los Angeles. So it's been a wonderful challenge putting everything I've learned in my life up to that point to help build um a program, a school that bears the name of Sydney Poitiers, who is my north star about it all. Um, because Sydney, who is an incredible actor, but in the 60s, again, people go through rough patches, and his rough patch all of a sudden he was, you know, an Uncle Tom. You know, this was a whole new movement. And what did he do? He took up directing and became a successful director. And to me, is another I'm very much about determination, passion, and determination. And to me, he is that, and those principles as long as well as learning the day-to-day machinations of this ecosystem that has to be part of it. It he's not in the background in my head at all. It is about what would Sydney do? What would Ashley do? Right?

SPEAKER_00 1:47:34

And you're passing that along to your students.

SPEAKER_02 1:47:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:37

And how's that make you feel that you're like passing along this knowledge, these relationships, this legacy to young people?

SPEAKER_02 1:47:47

I believe if everybody paid it forward, I know it sounds kind of cliche, but again, I'll go back to how you how are you remembered? How do you want to be remembered? And not to and not to make it I I want to be considered great because I I hear young people all the time. They want to be rich and famous. And I usually say, you want to rethink that, believe me. Um, or I want to be, you know, I want to leave a legacy. Well, what none of these people really thought that I've known through my life. They never thought that. They I never heard words like I want to be remembered. I never heard those. These this is new, these kinds of things. And it's well then be the best you you can be, and you will be. I mean, um, you know, running after fame, running after awards, that's not it. That's just not it, people, you know, and I tell that to students. No, it's more about who you are and how you want to be and whatever your passions are, whatever your passions are, that you stay with it, you stick to it, and you please yourself most of all. That you feel you were able to get your inside thoughts, emotions, um, attitudes forward, which will always help others. It just will. Doesn't have to be manufactured, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:49:21

So very well put. So here we are. And to our listeners, there is a link in the episode description to Arizona State University, the Sydney Poitiers New American Film School to learn more. What what do you think your brother would have thought of your trajectory and being president of the academy?

SPEAKER_02 1:49:43

I don't know he would have thought that was going to happen, but I do know he got honored when he was very sick. And it was probably the last public thing I did. He was he was honored with an award from an organization I didn't know anything about. I tried. To get tickets and then he gave me any. So I'll make that. Yeah. But um, but I heard that in his speech he said something like, watch out for my sister, because she's gonna go much further, something like that.

SPEAKER_00 1:50:18

How did that make you feel then? And how does it make you feel now?

SPEAKER_02 1:50:21

Well, then it was like hey, why would he say that? And what in the world would that be? Right? What would that be? Right. Um back at the Ladd Company, there was uh quite a in my own head. And I did this to myself, because production will always be head, as it should be. It absolutely should be, because that's what we're all at the end result. That's the experience is what happens in production. Right. I and I think if I had said to Alan Ladd Jr., you know, I want to move over to production, he would have said sure. Because he was always a big supporter of mine. Oh, and also on Braveheart, when Braveheart won Best Picture, I couldn't stop crying for both Ashley, even though he had nothing to do with it. And and for um Alan and for Laddie. And when I went to the ball, that was the first person I wanted to go see. And as I was walking through the crowd, we caught eyes and we both were crying. And that was another really tender moment. So he would have been proud. Um, but I don't know if it would have happened because if he hadn't passed away and we started a company, who knows what life would have been like. But if he but if I just kept on my tri trajectory, he would have been very proud. Who would have thought that I would work on a number of Steven Spielberg films and be on the board together and to see each other and to give hugs? I mean, who would have thought I amazing. Just absolutely amazing.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:12

I have heard that he is a Pan Am fan. Indiana Jones always flew on Pan Am. Catch Me If You Can uh heavily features Pan Am almost as a co-star.

SPEAKER_03 1:52:24

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:24

Did you and he ever talk about your experience with Pan Am?

SPEAKER_02 1:52:28

No, because I it was a while uh before I I realized that, even though when I saw Catch Me If You Can, I cried. I cried. I I did, and and a colleague sent me um a bag um and said, I I heard you used to fly for them. And I do I you know what I have never done that and I really should. And I just saw him the other night, and I I should remind him of I should let him know. But certainly working on Indiana Jones films, uh, which I did, and of course again seeing the Pan Am was like anyway, and tell people that I of course go into all my stories, you know, with everybody and everybody.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:14

But I then the newest film that came out, uh Dial for Destiny, Indiana Jones upgraded and now he's flying on a 707 Pan Am jet. And the World Port was recreated for that movie digitally, but yeah, yeah, the World Port makes an appearance in it.

SPEAKER_02 1:53:29

So there it's a it's just interesting in some ways how small the world really is.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:34

And all the Pan Am connections everywhere, either below the surface or you know, connections that you can see. It's it's rather remarkable.

SPEAKER_02 1:53:43

And to know that Jack Epps, um, who wrote Top Gun, um, that I also worked on, you've told me of his relationship with Pan Am. Uh, so that's something he and I have in common, even though we both don't know each other really.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:58

His student at USC loves this podcast, Kate. You know, Kate introduced me to Jack, and we're like, oh, well, the Pan Am connection is Kate. And uh he's uh he said, I'd love to be a guest on your program. So that's how he got on our program. Uh we talked about screenwriting and I mean Top Gun that you worked on, one of the greatest aviation movies of all time. Uh so why wouldn't we talk about it on this program?

SPEAKER_02 1:54:25

Yeah, I should say, and I will. Um next time I see Tom, which I I have, I saw him this last weekend too.

SPEAKER_00 1:54:33

And um and when you say Tom, it's not Tom Betty that you're referring to, it's Tom Cruise.

SPEAKER_02 1:54:39

Tom Cruise. No, I'm sorry, Tom Cruise. And as well as Jerry, Jerry Breckhammer. I will see them again in a few months for sure. And um if not sooner, when I go to LA and I will say, and by the way, we have another connection that you're not aware of.

SPEAKER_00 1:54:57

Cheryl, as we're nearing the end of our episode, I always ask this question to guests why is Pan Am history important and why should it be preserved? And what does Pan Am history mean to you?

SPEAKER_02 1:55:14

Well, I would say Pan Am certainly early in my life represented something big, grand, elegant, worldly, that I never at those those earlier years when you knew about Pan Am. It was classy that I would ever fly Pan Am, actually. Never mind work for Pan Am. In college, especially my senior year, when I realized that I had a love for travel because I had spent time in Europe in college. And that's why I applied to Pan Am because they could give me that and was didn't have any idea if I would be uh selected or not. I I had no idea. I knew it was hard to become a Pan Am stewardess, so they were they had a lot of you know discretion and it was prestigious. And but I thought, okay, I'll try. And then when I was accepted, um it was it was major, uh a little scary, you know, in some ways, but um the kind of scary that you long for. Um because you know it's gonna be fresh, you know it's gonna be different, but you don't know really what it's gonna be. And so those two years I met so many people around the world. I got to experience life in a much bigger uh view and and understanding, meeting so many interesting people that also gave me a lot of personal confidence to know that I could travel in all sorts of diff different spaces when I would tell people, other than in San Francisco, you know, my friends were actually quite jealous, um, try to make it seem like it wasn't important, but I knew they were just truly jealous. Um, never thought of traveling that way, and they were still, you know, with a backpack, which I said I can't do anymore. And it certainly periodically through my life as Pan Am has been a weaving through in and how I view international, global, um different folks, it's all really based off of those years. And so anytime there'd be a reference or in a movie and or somebody talking or whatever, that um I would just have a beam of pride about it. And certainly folks of a certain age when I would say, and I always say that I was a stewardess for Pan American, and they're usually impressed because they know of the era and the time, you know, which is very interesting, would not have thought of that in any way, shape, or form, but doesn't matter. It's true, it is absolutely true. And and certainly when the show, the Pan Am show with Margot in it, oh my god. I mean, I called everybody in the world, right? You gotta watch this show. You can't believe this. This is unbelievable, right? Um, I'm sorry it didn't last longer, but that was just whoa, right? Really cool. Um and certainly catch me if you can, which I think I I had said to you earlier, cried when I saw that. Because again, it represented an era that is gone in so many ways, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:58:52

And and that movie introduced Pan Am to a whole new generation.

SPEAKER_02 1:58:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:58:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:58:58

So you keep at it.

SPEAKER_00 1:59:00

Well, thank you.

SPEAKER_02 1:59:01

Honest to goodness, because it should not go away. It shouldn't be a footnote. You know, um, there's just too many people around the world. Um, I don't know if you've had much um exchange with other people from around the world, um, but uh it was the gold standard. Really, gold standard.

SPEAKER_00 1:59:27

One last question for you, Cheryl. So we have a lot of young people that listen to this program all over the world. What message does the great Cheryl Boone Isaacs have for a young person that might be listening, that's interested in film, uh getting into the film business, or just general advice?

SPEAKER_02 1:59:52

Well, you know, when you're young, not everybody has the advantage of knowing what they want to do with their lives. I always envied my best friend from high school, Pam. I jokingly used to say to her, You came out of the womb wanting to be a nurse, to up till today, even though she's retired, she was always nurse, always, and I envied her, actually, because she knew what she wanted to be. Um, and I didn't. And I kind of bounced a little here and there. And it was odd to her, and for me, it was odd to see her, um, knowing exactly what she wanted, going for it, having a family, and and worked as a nurse until she retired. Um, and I'm kind of bouncing a bit around. Um, I after a while I could see a path, but I didn't start out that way. So I would say the biggest thing is follow your passion. And sometimes it takes a while before you know what it is. But that should not stop you because it will surface and be as positive as you can. Um, I have a very close friend whose son loved airplanes. And it was the one thing in his life that he just stuck to it, stuck to it, stuck to it, stuck to it, and now he's a pilot. Oh, great. And um, so someone close that I know and now is applying commercially, um, but years of different steps, right? Because that's something. So I say for young filmmakers don't give up easy and whether you become end up becoming a filmmaker or not, don't try to take easy road. Try to pay attention to your heart more than your brain, even sometimes, of where you get your satisfaction, what excites you, and um that will move you along, and you will discover if you don't know already, how you will succeed in pleasing yourself more than anyone else.

SPEAKER_00 2:02:17

Well, thank you very much for that, and thank you very much for your time. Uh, it's been an honor having a chat with you. Um, I always enjoy speaking with you, and uh, I am so proud to have you on this program to share your story with our audience.

SPEAKER_02 2:02:35

Well, I want to thank you, Tom. And this is the 60th episode.

SPEAKER_00 2:02:41

It's the 60th episode. That is correct.

SPEAKER_02 2:02:44

So that's one hell of a lot of knowledge that's in your head. And I appreciate, and I know thousands of others appreciate you sharing that with us.

SPEAKER_00 2:02:57

So thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Uh, Cheryl Boone Isaacs, it's always a pleasure.

SPEAKER_02 2:03:03

Back at you.

SPEAKER_00 2:03:09

Pan Am was a pioneer in air travel and still stands as one of the most iconic and innovative airlines in aviation history. That legacy lives on at the Pan Am Museum in Garden City, New York, where you can explore the rich history of the aircraft and individuals at the heart of the company known as the world's most experienced airline. For more information about the Pan Am Museum, check out our website at www.thepanammuseum.org. You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok. As was once a tagline in one of our commercials, we would greatly appreciate your support to help the Pan Am Museum continue making the going great. You can also support the museum by shopping on our online store for all things Pan Am accessories, apparel, jewelry, books, models, and posters. We want to hear from you. If you have a question for us or want to share your story, our email address is podcast at the Pan Ammuseum.org. As flight crews once said to passengers departing for their destinations around the world, thank you for flying, Pan Am.