Playboy Interview: Larry Hagman

The most hotly debated issue this past summer was not the fate of the American hostages in Iran, how long the recession would endure, which Presidential candidate would do us the least harm or what teams would be in the world series.

It was far more weighty and complex: Ask any one of the 300,000,000 people in 57 countries who were glued to their TV sets that fateful night in March when an unknown assailant pumped two hot lead slugs into the gut of prime-time's premier putz, "Dallas"' magnificently despicable oil robber baron, John Ross Ewing, Jr.

Since "Dallas"' 1978 launch, the latter-day "Peyton Place" intrigues of the Texan Ewing clan have become de riguéur TV fare. After the attack, the question "Who shot J.R.?" reverberated from rural living rooms to network board rooms and surfaced in the betting pools of London and Las Vegas. And with good reason. Nearly every member of the "Dallas" ensemble had ample motive to want J.R. dead.

What began as a master stroke of programing also became a merchandising bonanza. The original I Hate J.R. and I Love J.R. T-shirts were, soon joined by a slew of buttons and bumper stickers touting the elder Ewing brother for President. An English rock group, the Wurzels, scored with its doublesided hit--that's right--"I Love J.R." backed with "I Hate J.R." Apparently one could have it both ways, as actor Larry Hagman, the man behind J.R.'s smile, had long since discovered. "Everyone knows it's fun to be bad," said, Hagman, thrilling to his never-neverland notoriety.

Once best known for his portrayal of Major Anthony Nelson, the harried flyboy love object of an affection-starved Barbara Eden in "I Dream of jeannie," Hagman seemed almost destined for his current role as an overstuffed Iago in a Stetson. He was born September 21, 1931, in Fort Worth, Texas, to lawyer Ben Hagman and actress Mary Martin. Among other things, the elder Hagman was a legal counsel for large oil concerns.

Hagman's parents divorced in 1936. Martin took her son to California. For seven years, he lived with his maternal grandmother and attended a series of private and military schools. Martin went in search of stardom. She eventually found it in "South Pacific" and "Peter Pan." She enrolled her son in a progressive-education school in Vermont, when he was 14. There, Hagman learned about sex, cigarettes and burning down the boys' dormitory. He was asked to leave.

Lured by the "cowboy stories of Zane Grey," Hagman went to live with his father in Weatherford, Texas. He hunted, fished, endured the rigors of manual labor and graduated two years later from Weatherford High. Ben Hagman wanted his son to be a lawyer, but Larry chose his mother's graduation present of a trip to Europe instead.

After two months in Sweden, Hagman enrolled in Bard College in New York State. But it was a scholastically unsuccessful effort. "I majored in drinking, wenching, dance and theater--in that order," remembered Hagman, who soon returned to Texas to become an actor.

His first job was with the Margo Jones Theater in the Round, in Dallas. Soon he moved to New York for some regional theater. His next stop was two years with the London production of "South Pacific."

In 1952, Hagman joined the Air Force with the promise of being stationed in England for the duration of his enlistment. There he directed and acted in Service shows. He also met and married Swedish-born designer Maj (pronounced my) Axelsson.

After his discharge, the Hagmans tried to run Mary Martin's 1000-acre Brazilian ranch but ended up in California in 1965 looking for acting jobs again, when he was offered the male leud in "I Dream of Jeannie." The show is still syndicated world wide.

Hagman followed "Jeannie" with two unsuccessful TV series, "The Good Life" and "Here We Go Again." He also acted in numerous motion pictures, including "Fail Safe," "Stardust," "Mother, Jugs & Speed," "The Eagle Has Landed," "Harry and Tonto" and "Superman." He will next appear in Blake Edwards' "S.O.B." (And not as the s.o.b.)

In 1978, Hagman took the role of J. R. Ewing in Lorimar Production's miniseries "Dallas." Largely due to Hagman's against-the-grain rendering of the duplicitous J.R. as a grinning heavy, the show proved a rousing success. He has been smiling ever since.

But this past summer, Hagman used the shooting episode to press for a contract renegotiation. What followed was a widely publicized battle over wages and other perks that was almost on a par with "Dallas"' own internecine intrigue.

As exterior filming for the new season began in June, in Dallas, Hagman was gallivanting around in England with May, attending the Ascot races and joyously suffering the mob adoration of British fans. His high-profile posing was more than a vacation: It was a calculated move of Ewingesque proportions. Hagman was trying to make it both impossible and foolish to kill him off. But Lorimar was not without leverage. It made it clear that it was not unlikely that, in an ambulance crash on the way to the hospital, J.R.'s face could be burned off. And that a month later, emerging from the bandages would be . . . Robert Culp. Three weeks into the shooting schedule, an "amicable, fair" agreement was reached.

Once back in Dallas, Hagman arrived at Southfork to a crush of international reporters to whom he gushed automatic answers like so much Texas crude. (And no answer to "the question.") When the horde finally dispersed and he had retreated to the privacy of his rented Dallas home for a long holiday weekend, Playboy asked frequent contributorDavid Rensinto brave the unseasonable heat and interview the man America loves to hate. Rensin's report:

"If life is one big party, then Larry Hagman is wearing the lamp shade. In fact, our first meeting was at a party for 200 out-of-town TV editors at the actor's Malibu home. Our introduction was necessarily brief. Although Hagman circulated constantly, and thoroughly enjoyed the attention, the barrage of questions was endless. It was my first of many exposures to the frenzy Hagman regularly encounters.

"Three days later, in Dallas, it was the same, only this time fans waited outside the Southfork-set gates and police guard, in 107-degree-plus heat. When Hagman drove up, sweaty hands clutching pens and papers smeared against the car windows. He distributed handfuls of special Larry Hagman $100 bills he'd had printed to appease his autograph-hunting fans.

"Except for a persistent crank caller, life was calmer at Hagman's secluded home. Our first sessions took place while standing chest-deep in the swimming pool to escape the murderous temperatures. We drank--no, consumed--bottles of Hagman's staple: ice-cold champagne. Hagman was casual, talkative, often boisterous. His favorite expression of 'Shitfire!' was appended to most sentences. My first sure sign that he was warming to our conversations was when, around sunset, he suggested we lake the Golden Fish Tour.

"The tour began with a leisurely cruise in Hagman's steel-gray Mercedes turbo diesel, past various Dallas non-landmarks. The main attraction was spinning reckless circles in a parking lot surrounding twin reflector sunglass buildings the color of Duracell batteries. Vivaldi screamed on the tape deck; the windows, sun roof and mouths of amazed bystanders were wide open

"It's almost too easy to say that Hagman's a devoted husband and father; a wonderful guy; just like you and me--only richer. It's true that he's perched on the highest peak of his life, but he views his precarious position philosophically. He's aware of the debt he owes his fans, his family and himself; that he's worked damn hard.

"But what best sums up the essence of Larry Hagman happened as we were leaving a Dallas rancher's annual Fourth of July party. Cushioned by a few drinks and a wonderful evening of home-cooked food and Texas hospitality, Hagman, Maj, Maj's sister, her husband and I settled into the Mercedes and headed down the long driveway of the E-bar-S ranch. Hagman opened the windows and sun roof to the cool, 95-degree evening and turned on the radio. To our surprise, the D.J. introduced the 'Theme from Dallas.' Hagman cranked up the volume over our laughter. He took a deep breath, like a hit on a primo bomber. He punched the gas and, as we sped away, yelled. 'Whooo-eeee' long and hard into the night.

"When, we began our conversation, Hagman unexpectedly turned on a tape recorder of his own. Remembering his apparent facility and rapport with the press, it seemed an uncharacteristic move. I asked him about it immediately."

Playboy: Why do you have your own tape recorder on?

Hagman: Because often reporters' stories don't say what their tapes say. They prefer to say whatever they want and if that happens, I like to have some recourse; maybe contact their editors and let them know I have a transcript of what was said.

Playboy: Don't you trust people?

Hagman: Yeah, pretty much, until they prove otherwise.

Playboy: Have you ever called an editor?

Hagman: Yes. There was a reporter from San Francisco who said I'd called Dallas "a piece of shit," though he used "S. dot, dot, T." I never said that. I would never say it about a production even if I thought it. That's shitting in your own rice bowl. CBS was upset about it. Lorimar, too. But how do you refute it? Act like old J.R. the next time you see the guy? Time wounds all heels, as far as I'm concerned. So I called his editor. He stood by the reporter. I mailed a transcript, then called again. The editor said he'd read the transcript but would "still stand by what was printed in the paper." I hadn't doctored my tapes and obviously things didn't jibe, so I asked for a retraction. The editor said it wasn't the policy of his paper to do that.

Playboy: What was your reaction?

Hagman: I told him I hoped he knew I wouldn't grant his reporters any more interviews. He said, "Frankly. Mr. Hagman, I don't give a damn." Now, I like press people. I have some really good friends in the press. Fine, responsible people. But you've got to take the good with the bad. There are those who will take advantage of your candor, or your lack of it. In the end, there's nothing you can do about it unless you're someone nonpress like De Niro or Redford, who make a film every three years. It's part of the action. The press is part of my living. I have some friends who just fucking hate any press and will go out of their way to make their lives [screams] Miserable! But, hell, the press is just people looking for copy. And if you don't give it to them, they're going to make it up. And once it's in print and picked up all around the world, there's nothing you can do about it.

Playboy: Why don't you just refuse interviews?

Hagman: Well, Jesus Christ! I suppose I could, but then I'd be living in a jail-house. The press is always there, anyway. It's their job to find out something. So what's the difference? At least it they have a chance to know you, they might be a little kinder. They might print part of the truth.

Playboy: What other erroneous stories have been published about you?

Hagman: A lot of reporters ask, "Would you say you resented your mother, Mary Martin, for being a big star when you were not?" I'd say, "No. I don't resent her." And they'd print, "Larry Hagman resents his mother for being a big star when he wasn't." When I confront them and play the tape back, they say, "Well, Larry, it was such a dull interview. We wanted to make some good copy." And recently, there was a report that I'd won $63,000 betting at Ascot when I was in England. Where does that come from? It's bullshit. I couldn't believe it. I mean, holy shit, if I won that money, you'd hear about it. It would be a fucking windfall. And who the hell wants the IRS coming to your door, saying, "Where's the money you owe us?" What really happened was that I lost $16--and that's not including the rental of the suit and car. It cost me $2000 just to get there.

Playboy: Well, this is your opportunity to set the record straight.

Hagman: It's always been relatively straight. I'm not going to say reporters are full of shit or sue them for putting words into my mouth. It's a business, like anything else.

Playboy: That's a rather philosophical attitude.

Hagman: Not entirely. There are people who have printed lies about me. Absolute fucking lies that could hurt my career. That's the difference. Them, I go after. But never legally, and never in an obvious way.

Playboy: Sounds like J.R. talking. Do you have the National Enquirer in mind?

Hagman: I'm not going to mention any names. That would put them in a position to retaliate against a retaliation that hasn't even happened yet. I'll only say that there is a paper in the U.S. that goes out of its way to make lives miserable, to revile people. I'm not going to fool with their reporters. I'm going straight to the people who own it.

Playboy: How will you retaliate?

Hagman: Harassment, embarrassment, humiliation, lying, cheating, stealing, vandalism.

Playboy: What tactics do you exclude?

Hagman: Just physical violence. Totally. There are ways of making people pay who fuck you up. I'd be more specific, but that will take all the fun out of it when I do it.

Playboy: Let's try to be specific, anyway. One quote from the Enquirer reads, "He [Hagman] swims in his pool with rope tied around his waist--and the other end tied to his house." Is that true?

Hagman: I've got a little pool that's not long enough to do laps in. Esther Williams told me how she works out. She attaches a shock cord to the side of her house and swims in place in the middle of the pool She can do laps in one place. But the Enquirer didn't want to get into that.

Playboy: It also claimed, "He dug a hole on Malibu beach, because, he said, 'Every beach should have one."'

Hagman: It was a fire pit. We were tearing down part of my house and burning the stuff up. I even had a fire permit--I don't do things halfway. What I said was, "Every beach ought to have a hole in it for a fire."

Playboy: So you've been misquoted. But the accurate quotes would still suggest you're quite an eccentric.

Hagman: Well, I am eccentric to the extent that I collect funny hats and costumes and flags and have marches on the beach. But what the fuck? I mean, eccentric more than what? Outrageous is more like it. I just like to live out my life a little more than most people.

Playboy: Why?

Hagman: I just like to attract attention, I suppose. It seems to be a fun way of doing things. I suppose I could come up with a lot of bullshit for you, but it would just be bullshit. I could give you four to five hundred different reasons, but they wouldn't be valid. I just do. The real point is that what's been printed is all lies specifically designed to sell copy. But in that Enquirer article, they also said I'd had tantrums on the set-----

Playboy: We were going to get to that-----

Hagman: That I had boozed, held up production and cost the series hundreds of thousands of dollars. And it was absolute fucking lies. I mean, I've had a few drinks on the set at the end of the day, but, Jesus Christ, do you think Lorimar would let me direct the show--which I've done and will continue to do--much less act in it, if things were that way? No fucking way. Another thing: The Enquirer said they got their information from members of the crew and from an actor who worked on the show. I asked who those people were so I could confront them, but the Enquirer said that under the First Amendment, they didn't have to tell me. I asked them how I was going to defend myself and they said, "Get a lawyer and prove that we're wrong."

Playboy: But you're avoiding legal recourse.

Hagman: Right. I investigated it and found it would cost, anywhere from $50,000 to $1,000,000. And if you win your case in court, they will print a retraction on the 17th page under the hemorrhoids ad. Two small lines saying. "We're sorry. We made a mistake." The problem is that not only is this story in the Enquirer but it's also picked up in five London newspapers and 30 more around the world. Five years from now, a producer will see my name on a list of actors he wants for a film and say, "Jesus, I don't know where I heard it, but I understand Larry Hagman is difficult to work with, a pain in the ass, throws tantrums, drinks on the set. Let's pass him over." That's where this can hurt you. My agents have already called me about it a couple times, saying it was getting in the way. People don't pick up that I've been happily married for 25 years, have a stable family and that my mother's a wonderful actress. So that's where I'm going to get back. In fact, I know several people who are part of a world-wide group banding together to make a fund to combat this sort of thing.

Playboy: Are you contributing?

Hagman: No. All it does is make lawyers rich. I like direct action. I'm a firm believer in revenge. [Long pause] It's all going to be part of a film I'm doing. It's my film. I'm writing it, and in it I will retaliate. It's called Vendetta Inc., and it will make their life as miserable as they've made others'. I won't have to be rich to get satisfaction. Just imaginative.

Playboy: Do you play the poor guy screwed by the paper?

Hagman: No. The owner--a guy who gets the shit kicked out of him with every justification in the world.

Playboy: A J.R. character who gets it in the end?

Hagman: Why not? That's what everybody wants.

Playboy: There's been lots of armchair analyzing of J.R. How much do you mind talking about him at this point?

Hagman: It's almost impossible to avoid, so I go with the flow.

Playboy: What kind of guy is J.R. to you?

Hagman: He's not someone who does evil things for the thrill of it. Oh, he's led astray now and then; likes a little strange pussy now and then; but, generally speaking, the guy's just taking care of business, the family. It's the American ethic. And if people get in the way, they've got to take their lumps. If J.R. feels Bobby can't take care of things as well as he does, he's got to be aced out. And that's just the way it is. He doesn't do despicable things.

Playboy: What about wrestling with Pamela and causing her miscarriage?

Hagman: He didn't do that purposely; no way. He was drunk and asking her forgiveness and she fell off the goddamn roof. It was written as it he caused it, but he didn't. I didn't play it that way. Pamela was just having hysterics when she fell.

Playboy: Isn't that a rare moment--for J.R. to be asking forgiveness?

Hagman: [Laughs] Yeah. It was early in the season.

Playboy: J.R. has been the man America loves to hate for more than three years. How do you account for his having so fascinated the American public?

Hagman: [Nefarious chuckle and J.R. smile] Well, obviously, it's the way I act him, don't you think?

Playboy: There have been other villains. Why J.R.?

Hagman: He's so cute. Lovable. Charming. He's a real nice guy lots of the time. When he wants to shaft you, he's even nicer. I think it's because everybody's got an asshole like J.R. somewhere in the family or at work. I've had people come up to me and say, "You son of a bitch. You've got it down absolutely fucking right! That's my boss." Then their wives come up and say, "Larry, he's lying. That's not his boss, that's him." The guy's everywhere.

Playboy: Anthropologist Ashley Montagu, interviewed for a Los Angeles Herald Examiner article, said that J.R. "represents the covert character of America; that he makes a mockery of the adage Crime doesn't pay."' A clinical psychologist suggested in the same article that he provides us with a means of "seeing our own evil." Is J.R. the under-belly of the traditional American ethic?

Hagman: Right. Right. Well, print that. They said it better than I could. Shit-fire! I don't even understand what they said, but sure, use that.

Playboy: What makes J.R. appealing to you?

Hagman: He does anything he wants, has lots of fun and gets away with it. J.R. has a strange sense of humor. People don't usually have that much glee. Aren't you going to ask me who shot him?

Playboy: Later. You've recently had occasion to meet some real J.R.s. What were they like?

Hagman: Well, a lot of them are really good businessmen. They're a lot smarter than you think. They come on as Texas hicks, but they're brilliant as crackers. Basically, I think they would just like to have my business. Self-interest is at the core of just about all our conversations. They don't treat me like J.R. To them, I'm Larry Hagman the actor, who they think is making $20,000,000 a fucking minute.

Playboy: How much do you make?

Hagman: Ten million a minute.

Playboy: That's another topic we'll have to pursue. First, do you think any of J.R.'s fans really hate him?

Hagman: No. Not at all. I think love is the predominant four-letter word here. I've never had anyone come up and say, "I really don't like you." It's always, "I hate you. Give me a kiss." Just the women on that one. Last night, a woman followed me around the Playboy Club all evening. Finally, as I'm getting into the car with my wife, stepmother and friends, she screams, "So long, asshole. I love you!" It's one of those moments that are so indicative of the character. There are a million others.

Playboy: You seem to be handling it all pretty well.

Hagman: Sure. It'll all be gone in another 30, 40 seconds.

Playboy: What's your fan mail like?

Hagman: I sure get a lot of it. Sacks of it. Fortunately, the post office is just across the street. They bring it over and just ask that I return the bags.

Playboy: Do you get any suggestive pictures from women?

Hagman: [Casually] Oh, I get a few of those, but not really many.

Playboy: We have a quote here-----

Hagman: Yeah, yeah. I know. I just said that at one time I'd gotten letters from ladies who made certain sexual propositions and sent pictures, and so forth.

Playboy: Do you keep them?

Hagman: Hell, no! I looked at them when I opened the things, but it doesn't interest me. I don't answer that kind of letter.

Playboy: Take us back to the beginning. How did you develop the J. R. Ewing character?

Hagman: Well, Lorimar and the writers came up with J.R., but I'd been working on a character like him for years. In the Seventies, I did an English rock 'n'-roll film called Stardust. In it, I played Porter Lee Austin, a feisty, fast-talking American businessman who ended up managing a Beatleslike rock group called the Stray Cats. Marty Balsam was supposed to do the part, but couldn't, so my agent sent me the script. Originally, it called for a guy with a Boston accent--some mafioso who had gone to Harvard. So I got both my Boston and Italian accents down, went over to England and studied for three weeks. Sat in a hotel room getting the whole fucking character ready. Then I went to meet the writer and the director for lunch at an Italian restaurant in Soho. I wore a pinstriped suit. Gave 'em my whole thing. Finally, they asked me where I was from. I told them Weather-ford, Texas, and they asked if it would be possible for me to play the part with a Texas accent. I ended up doing an early J. R. Ewing in Porter Lee. You know: "Don't worry about a goddamn thing, boy. Everything's gonna be all right. Meanwhile, we're gonna fleece the shit out of you. But you're gonna enjoy every minute!"

Playboy: In Stardust, Porter Lee seemed to enjoy life a little more than J.R.

Hagman: Bigger budget. I also based J.R. on a guy who lived in Weatherford. But I can't tell you too much about him, because it might hurt his family, whom I've known fairly well for the last 30 years.

Playboy: Was he an oilman?

Hagman: Yeah. He was into oil. I guess I can say that. There were a lot of oilmen in Weatherford.

Playboy: What was it about him that impressed you?

Hagman: Good-natured ruthlessness. He really enjoyed what he was doing and had no qualms about hurting anyone. If they couldn't defend themselves then that was their tough luck. He did things with such abandon it was a joy to see.

Playboy: Did he have any redeeming qualities?

Hagman: He was a survivor. Also a deacon in the church--heavy, heavy into religion. A well-respected man. His ruthless abandon was just what was expected in that era, the late Forties.

Playboy: Were you ever his victim?

Hagman: Not at all. He used to come and visit my dad. I only remember him as sort of crazy fun. He was someone who would drive his jeep straight up your stairs, through the front door into your living room, and park it there at two in the morning. When you were home. And leave it for two or three weeks. I found that kinda interesting.

Playboy: Did the townspeople love to hate him, too?

Hagman: Well, he didn't have the exposure I have. There weren't 50,000,000 people watching him every Friday night.

Playboy: It's been written that you regularly slip back and forth between Larry Hagman and J. R. Ewing. Yet there are some actors, Henry Winkler is one example, who go to great pains to insist they are not their character. How closely do you identify with J.R.?

Hagman: Well, I'm enough of J.R. to know what he is and what I am. It's too much fun to take seriously. And nobody calls me Mr. Hagman. It's either Larry or J.R. Swear to God. I kind of slip in and out and I don't particularly know when I'm doing it--especially when I'm in Texas. It's an unconscious thing. I'm J.R. when people expect it and ol' Lar when I feel that ol' Lar should be out there. But, like I said, it's pretty close to my personality, anyway. The line is very fine.

Playboy: There must be lots of pressure from fans to be J.R.

Hagman: I tell people more or less what they want to hear.

Playboy: What goes through your head when you switch back and forth that way?

Hagman: I fake it. If I don't know what I'm doing, I can fake it. I really don't have time to dwell on these thoughts, to tell you the truth. I'm just too fucking busy. It's an esoteric question and it requires an esoteric answer. So: Half the time I don't know what I'm doing and half the time I don't care to know what I'm doing. I just go with it.

Playboy: Do you feel capable at this point of reflecting on your incredible success?

Hagman: It's awful hard to be reflective when it's going on. You have to be looking either backward or forward. I'm in the eye of the storm, so to speak. I'm just having fun. I've learned to deal with the attention and it's not that bad, you know. About the time it starts to get on my nerves, it will be dying down, anyway.

Playboy: When you can reflect on it, given all the craziness of your life now, is it difficult to keep track of who you are--your core?

Hagman: Well, whenever that happens, it happens below the belly button and above the pubic bone. Whenever I get any kind of white light, it's there. That's my core. I know where the center is and how to center. If I ever get upset. I know how to find that warm, comfortable place. And that's all I need. I guess you could say I was self-ish. With a hyphen. When I find peace in myself, I have no problems dealing with other people and they have no problems dealing with me. I'm a firm believer in self-ishness.

Playboy: Where did that come from?

Hagman: I think maybe Alan Watts. He's one of my heroes. I kind of like his philosophy--whatever the fuck it was. It kept wandering around.

Playboy: Did you meet Watts before his death?

Hagman: Yeah. I was on a jaunt with my son, Preston, and we just happened to walk into the Esalen Institute, and there was Alan Watts giving a seminar. I'd read his book, The Joyous Cosmology, the week before, but didn't understand it. After listening to him for half an hour, I understood it.

Playboy: Did you continue your relationship?

Hagman: I met him only once again, at the house of a friend of mine, a successful businessman who asked Watts to come down and drop acid with him. My friend asked me over, since he knew I liked Alan so much. Well, Alan comes down two hours late for this thing. When he opens the front door, somebody says, "What would you like?" I figured this supersophisticated, aesthetic, charming man would ask for herb tea. Instead, he says, "I would like a very, very dry martini. Make it a double; straight up." Well, I nearly shit. He asks for a jolt. And after that, I loved him even more, because I thought, Here is an interesting dude.

Playboy: Anything else stand out about that meeting?

Hagman: I asked him if he would describe his ideal room for me and where he would like to be in it. He said, "I would like to be in a room full of hundreds of thousands of drawers, in each of which is an experience. Perhaps a Japanese tea ceremony in one, a dry martini in another, the study of the Tao in a third."

Playboy: What kind of room would you like?

Hagman: The same. Only mine would also have to have a Jacuzzi.

Playboy: So the real Larry Hagman emerges.

Hagman: I've got Jacuzzis all over my house. My wife, Maj, builds them. The family that bathes together stays together. [Pause] See, the thing is, perhaps what you see here is what you get. Maybe this is it for me. I know how unexciting and boring I might seem, but maybe this is the real me. Most people have never heard of Alan Watts and don't know what the fuck his philosophy is. I'm not sure I do, either. I just think he was an absolute hedonist who liked to enjoy life. So do I. Although I doubt I will ever attain his intellectualism, I'm living my philosophy.

Playboy: Watts was something of a hero to the Sixties hippies. Was that part of your life? Did you drop acid for instance?

Hagman: Four times, about ten years ago. Just before I met Watts.

Playboy: Ten years ago, you were playing Major Anthony Nelson, the clean-cut astronaut in I Dream of Jeannie. What would the public have said if it had known you were taking LSD trips instead of space trips?

Hagman: I honestly don't know. I was more private then, for sure. I've since learned the usefulness of being public. As long as you're dressed properly and playing the game as everyone expects it, you can walk in anywhere in the world and blend in with the situation. Etiquette is the big trip. I'm a chameleon. Most actors are.

Playboy: What do you remember best about your LSD experience?

Hagman: I guess it was just about the best thing that ever happened to me. It changed my way of looking at life and, more important than anything else, it changed my way of looking at death.

Playboy: What do you mean?

Hagman: Life is terminal. Death is not. I think death is just another stage of our development. I honestly believe that we don't just disappear. We don't go into a void. I think we're part of a big energy curtain, an energy wave in which we are like molecules. The wave has always been here. For example, look at our prayers. They say, "As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be." When we say that, we are speaking of God, right? We are all God. We are God. Acid took the fear of death out of me, the fear of heaven and hell.

Playboy: In what religion were you raised?

Hagman: I was confirmed in the Episcopal Church. I did it all--catechism, confirmation, but I lost interest at the age of 12 because I'd taken Communion--which was the goal that had been set for me. The idea of something representing the body and blood of another person is fine, and I'm not knocking it, but frankly, it seemed a little ghoulish to me. Did you read Stranger in a Strange Land? You know how they cooked the guy up in the end and had a little soup? That's my kind of philosophy. It seems like a great waste to throw all our bodies away. Putting them in the earth in bronze caskets is a waste.

Playboy: So you advocate eating people?

Hagman: No. I don't even eat meat. My lawyer asked me how I want to be buried so it could be put into my will. I said I wanted to be minced. Have you ever seen those machines they put cut tree limbs and stuff into? It all comes out in little cubes? Well, I'd like to be minced and spread over a field so that worms could get at it. There ought to be a service that would mince you up and plow you under. Then, wouldn't it be nice to give a party and serve a cake baked from grain raised on the quarter acre of property you were spread over? A Larry Hagman cake? Best damn tasting cake you ever had! And in another year, I could come back again. [An evil smile]

Playboy: Don't you think people would find that a little ghoulish?

Hagman: I don't know. It's just recycling, I'd donate any healthy organs left, and the mincer would take a few minutes, tops. Cremating uses a lot of energy, fuel, that we can't spare. I have a friend, though, who makes ashtrays out of peoples' ashes. Calls them "ashtrays."

Playboy: When asked what he'd like for an epitaph, Johnny Carson said, "I'll be right back." What about yours?

Hagman: "How would you like a piece of Larry Hagman cake?"

Playboy: So, to finish with the topic, have you taken acid recently?

Hagman: Nope. Ten years ago. It was just one of those little drawers. I had my experience and was ready to go on to something else.

Playboy: Let's move on to something else, too. How about politics? J. R. Ewing is being touted as a Presidential candidate, isn't he?

Hagman: If elected, I'll serve.

Playboy: What would J.R. do as President?

Hagman: The first thing I would do would be to raise the salaries of the President and Vice-President. They shouldn't get less than any of this country's major industrialists. They ought to have a salary that allows them some sort of lifestyle after they get out of office--$5,000,000 a year. You could say what you wanted about public officials, but at least they couldn't be bought off. Shitfire, man, the President gets--what--$200,000? I already make more than that.

Playboy: What would President Ewing do about the Iranian crisis?

Hagman: He would say, "Fuck the hostages!" When they sign up for that kind of thing, they are like Marines. It's combat and they take their chances. Of course, they ought to get hazardous-duty pay, but they also ought to know full well what might be in store.

Playboy: What would Larry Hagman do?

Hagman: Larry says get them out as soon as possible and in the easiest manner. I mean, really do something. Set up some kind of dialog with those people. Shitfire, if I were President, I would have gone over there and said, "Let my people go or I'm moving in with them."

Playboy: Do you think the oil companies are ripping us off?

Hagman: As J.R., I would say, "Our great petrochemical firms are being terribly held back by the restraints put upon them by Government. After all, automobile companies are getting support from Washington!"

Playboy: And Larry's opinion?

Hagman: Personally, and seriously, the only alternatives I can see are letting prices float to natural market levels or nationalization. And I have observed during my short life--especially through living in England and having a Swedish wife--that every time you nationalize something, you fuck it up.

Playboy: Would you say J.R.'s opinions are more in tune with the times than Larry's?

Hagman: I just tell people what they want to hear. And they want to hear J.R., that's for sure. It's easier for them, believe me. Easier for me, too. J.R. is what we're selling these days. Fifteen years ago, it was Major Anthony Nelson. And I'll tell you, I'm a lot easier to handle now than as Major Nelson.

Playboy: Why?

Hagman: At the time of I Dream of Jeannie, from 1965 to 1970, the Vietnam war was going full tilt, and I was very much against it. Since I was playing a major in the United States Air Force, the press was not fond of my belief that the war was a criminal act and that those responsible should be put in jail. A lot of them thought I was crazy and, in fact, many journalists I knew personally would not print what I said because they liked me. I knew I might be damaging a product I was trying to sell, but, frankly, I thought it was less important than killing our own children, Servicemen and a lot of others for no reason I could comprehend.

Playboy: How did Jeannie's producers react?

Hagman: They told me to shut up. They asked me to go to Vietnam and entertain the troops. I couldn't. And didn't.

Playboy: Would you have served in Vietnam if required?

Hagman: No. I would have gotten out somehow.

Playboy: Would prison have been acceptable?

Hagman: No. I do not like to be with butt-fuckers. Nope, I would not have done that.

Playboy: You're talking about prison. What about homosexuality outside prison walls?

Hagman: Different strokes for different folks. If somebody wants to stick his cock up somebody's ass, and the other person agrees to it, it's OK with me. It has no influence on my life.

Playboy: Have you ever been propositioned?

Hagman: Plenty of times. I say thanks, but no. Once, when I was in England, I got invited to a party only to find out that I was the party. I was 19 and taking ballet over there and it was basically a misunderstanding. Some very prominent actors and directors assumed I was in the homosexual world. I had to, if you'll excuse the expression, bow out. Walking backward, quickly, toward the door.

Playboy: Before we get off the track here, how do you explain your feelings about Vietnam in light of the fact that you were a gung-ho Air Force Serviceman in the early Fifties?

Hagman: At the time, I thought yellowskinned people should be exterminated from the face of the earth. That's what I'd been taught during the Japanese and German wars. I was brainwashed into thinking the yellow peril was upon us and that we ought to exterminate them like cock-a-roaches. However, I joined the Air Force to stay away from Korea. I was assured I would remain in England for four years. I was a coward. But a smart one.

Playboy: Is there any issue you feel as strongly about today as Vietnam?

Hagman: Not really. I thought Vietnam was solvable, and I don't think any of the issues now are. I don't see how we can make energy cost less, because we've been shitting on the Arabs and now they've finally discovered that oil is very important. I think we fucked up by constantly taking advantage. I think what we all ought to do is go down to a nice island someplace and talk about it. Maybe Hefner would build a Hugh Hefner Disneyland somewhere so we could all have fun and be happy. All the countries in the world would be run by caretaker governments composed of conglomerates and businessmen and artists. The political leaders would go to the island and work something out. And if they couldn't within a year, we'd blow the fucker up and start over again.

Playboy: Sounds like you're saying our future in this country looks pretty bleak.

Hagman: No. It looks great. For as long as it lasts. Which is maybe five years--that is, before we no longer have much impact, before world-wide anarchy gets out of hand.

Playboy: What do you think of the choice between Reagan and Carter?

Hagman: Listen. Everyone I've ever voted for has promised to do one thing and then turned around and done the opposite. Carter is a nice man. I don't want to hurt his feelings. Reagan may be damned good for this country.

Playboy: So you'll vote for him.

Hagman: Shit, no! [His best J.R. smile] Back somebody else besides myself for President? Surely you jest! Christ, I'm probably the best bet everybody's got right now in this country. Me and Walter Cronkite.

Playboy: Will Cronkite be J.R.'s running mate?

Hagman: Yeah. We met at a CBS affiliates' meeting. We were talking in line while about 300 stars were being introduced. He said, "I hear you're up for President." And I said, "Yes, sir, and I hear you're up for Vice-President." He said, "That's true." So I said, "Well, Mr. Cronkite, if you want to be President, I'll step down. Besides, I think Vice-President is a much more appropriate office for J. R. Ewing." And he said, "You know, kid, we just might win." Goddamn! Such a nice man. And it occurs to me that even if we couldn't win, we could certainly divide the vote.

Playboy: Seriously, whom will you vote for?

Hagman: I don't know if there's any real choice, but in the last three elections, I voted for Dr. Spock. I figure anyone who will admit to fucking up two generations of children gets my vote. I think in the end we'll get whatever we deserve.

Playboy: Let's talk about Dallas. Do you watch it?

Hagman: I tape it. It's on too late for me. I watch it Sunday morning, and since I don't talk on Sundays, I can't comment on it. That makes it even better.

Playboy: Fortunately, this isn't Sunday. What do you think of the show?

Hagman: I'm pretty pleased with it. I've gotten out of the business of trying to influence the writers or the cutting like I did on Jeannie. It's exactly what it's designed to be: entertainment. It's a real good comment on a mythical country.

Playboy: Mythical?

Hagman: Absolutely. A lady I know here in Dallas, who's right in there socially, told me that the first time she saw Dallas, she thought it was "the cutest little science-fiction story she'd ever seen." And she's right. If you ever put what Dallas was really all about on television, they wouldn't run it.

Playboy: For example?

Hagman: Ever hear about H. L. Hunt and how he had three families at one time? Or T. Cullen Davis? It's bizarre. People would not believe the level of intrigue and family feuding that goes on down here. It's endemic, pandemic.

Playboy: That kind of intrigue doesn't sound above the Dallas writers.

Hagman: Well, they're learning just from being here. They're finding out that all those things they thought about Dallas are just Milquetoast compared with what the reality is. Texas is air-conditioned street theater. It's all Greek stories. Texans are the Greeks of America.

Playboy: What would you change about the show?

Hagman: I'd probably get into more social problems. We have no blacks and only two Hispanics. I don't know if they're Mexicans or not, because they're never allowed to say anything. Plus, there are no Jews, Indians, Chinese. Dallas has a surprisingly big Vietnamese population, you know.

Playboy: Wouldn't that detract from what makes Dallas work?

Hagman: You could work it in. Lucy falls in love with the Mexican waiter. Or Ray could have a Vietnamese girlfriend. Nah--he's got enough problems already.

Playboy: What do you mean?

Hagman: He's going to be revealed as Jock Ewing's son. But not Miss Ellie's.

Playboy: What else can we expect this season?

Hagman: Ray's the big one, but I think maybe Lucy gets married, too.

Playboy: How do you account for Dallas' appeal?

Hagman: It's got lots of glitter and it's about rich people getting fucked up. Mistakes they make. That seems to cut across all social barriers. It's got a certain kind of panache and drive and sex and greed that people find interesting. It's huge in England, and I hope one day it goes to Germany, because the Germans are a lot like Texans: hard-workin', hard-eatin', hard-drinkin', like pretty women and flashy cars.

Playboy: Aren't you afraid for your career--that you'll be type-cast forever?

Hagman: God, I hope not. Don't say that. Bite your tongue. [Pause] You mean this would be the end of my career, that I'd be stuck with this character?

Playboy: Yes.

Hagman: I don't think so. I'm a versatile actor. I've got other roles in me. Just haven't discovered them yet. See, I figure you never know in a television series. Either it catches on or it doesn't. It goes through a cycle. I never really thought this show would go, but now it's gotten hysterical. And I'm sure there are thousands of people in other segments of the industry trying to figure out why, especially at NBC and ABC. CBS just wants to perpetuate it. Lorimar wants to duplicate it.

Playboy: You've been quoted as saying, "TV is crowd control." What did you mean by that?

Hagman: It's the perfect element for this era. Think of what people would be doing if they weren't watching television. If they weren't sitting in a little room watching a little box, they'd be out in the streets kicking ass.

Playboy: On what do you base that conclusion?

Hagman: It's just a theory. But people sit at home from six at night till God knows when, in a controlled environment. There're not enough moviehouses in America to consume all their energy, so TV is the opiate of the people. It's where religion was 100 years ago.

Playboy: With Fred Silverman and Bill Paley as high priests?

Hagman: The stars like me would be the high priests. I'd be a bishop or something. Cronkite would be the Pope. Look, suppose the Government, as it often does, comes out and says that TV causes cancer of the eyeballs, and to protect the American populace, TV is being canceled. We're no longer allowed to watch. The networks would go under and millions of people would be out of work. What do you think they're going to do with their time? Read? Bullshit! They haven't been taught to read for the last 30 years. They're going to be in the streets yelling, "Let's get television back" or "Let's change social conditions." If you were the Government, wouldn't you think it was better to keep people in their homes than to cope with their social demands?

Playboy: What does it feel like to be a pacifier?

Hagman: I'm very grateful. If people started getting into what it's all about, how they're controlled, they'd be out doing something about it. I don't want that. Everything is working just fine.

Playboy: What happens when people read this interview and learn the truth?

Hagman: They won't believe it. I've been saying it for ten, 20 years, and no one believes it. No one's taken me seriously. But I think TV is better than the alternatives: crowds in the street, getting shot down, chaos.

Playboy: Wait a minute; you get shot in Dallas.

Hagman: I didn't particularly like that. I thought it could have been something more imaginative.

Playboy: It seemed to us a very imaginative stroke, at least in terms of publicity.

Hagman: Well, it was smart, and it was the best thing to suck people in for the next season. But I think I could have gotten into an elevator and fallen 13 stories.

Playboy: So, instead, we'd have heard all year long: "Who cut the cable?"

Hagman: It's just that guns are so immediate and available. If you really wanted to do someone in, you could think of something more elaborate. But it seemed to work out OK. Do you want to know who shot me yet?

Playboy: Soon. What do you think of all the Dallas rip-offs? Oil, Texas. . . .

Hagman: It's a big airwave out there.

Playboy: Has there been any talk about Dallas: The Movie?

Hagman: Not to me. We'd probably never get cast in it, anyway. They'd get the latest hit stars.

Playboy: What would Dallas be without the original cast? Who else could play J.R.?

Hagman: What was South Pacific without Mary Martin? Believe me, if I hadn't come back this year, they would have found someone else.

Playboy: You almost didn't make it back because of your contract negotiations. Was what you wanted just more money?

Hagman: I wanted something fair.

Playboy: What's fair?

Hagman: That's right. What's fair? That was the crux. We came to an amicable agreement.

Playboy: Most reports have it that you're making $75,000 an episode. True?

Hagman: I wouldn't be interested in confirming or denying anything. I don't think it's anyone's business. Let 'em speculate. It's better that way. Anyway, if you're really interested. I'm sure there're 25 C.P.A.s who worked on the deal. You could find out.

Playboy: What else did you want?

Hagman: Future things like Movies of the Week, opportunities to do them through my own company. I'm on a roll now and people will watch something I'm in. I also want it to be interesting and good, so I want to have some control over it instead of working a regular job like an actor. Plus, there're tax incentives. You can keep a lot of money if you do it yourself.

Playboy: How involved are you in merchandising yourself?

Hagman: It's part of the game. Why deny yourself an opportunity that is going to be there only periodically, spasmodically? I may never get another chance like this in my lifetime. See, everybody takes advantage of the character, and the character is what I've developed. So if somebody is going to make $10,000,000 off bumper stickers, T-shirts, posters, pins, coffee mugs, I'd be a damn fool if I didn't say, "Hey, wait a minute, boys. I want a piece of that. It's my face on there." And I don't even have a very big piece of it. I also wanted to be able to use my name and J.R.'s in context with public appearances. They didn't want to give that--and I don't blame them--but eventually they came around. I mean, if I advertise J.R., they get proceeds from it, too.

Playboy: We heard you made a $230,000 deal to advertise some British jeans.

Hagman: It's not firm yet.

Playboy: But you'll do it?

Hagman: Hell, yes! Wouldn't you? For a day's work making a commercial? Jesus!

Playboy: And you're going to make a record?

Hagman: A single. I'm not really a singer. I was thinking of something like Some of My Favorite Things. J.R.'s favorite things. I'm not sure if I can use J.R.'s name on it; otherwise, everybody gets a piece of it. I certainly want the lion's share.

Playboy: Weren't you offered quite a bit of money to make some personal appearances at the London Palladium?

Hagman: Yeah, $200,000. For a Larry Hagman retrospective or something like that. The idea seems to intrigue a lot of people. There's also a book offer, but I don't want to think about that until I've done this personal-appearance tour. I get offers from colleges, supermarkets, clothing stores.

Playboy: You certainly have your fingers in a lot of pies.

Hagman: No one else's pies. Just Larry Hagman pies.

Playboy: Just how important is money to you?

Hagman: If you've got a chance to make it, make it. Frankly, I don't think anyone is worth this kind of money, but they say they can make $10,000,000--maybe lots more--off my face and personality. And that's just this year! I think it's ridiculous, except that's also the way it is. It may be out of proportion, but I'd be a fool not to take advantage of it. Five years ago, I would have thought the whole idea obscene.

Playboy: Why not now?

Hagman: Because they didn't offer it to me then. Now they do. When I was doing Jeannie, I was working steadily but making only about $150,000. I like working. I like doing the things I'm doing. So why not go with it? Go with the roll. It's like a crap shoot--good for eight or ten passes, maybe.

Playboy: Have you considered merchandising overkill?

Hagman: What am I supposed to do about it? Sooner or later, some merchant is going to be eating J.R. T-shirts. If they end up hating me for it, there's nothing I can do about it.

Playboy: You're lucky you have a character they hate already.

Hagman: [J.R. chuckling] You're right. They hate the son of a bitch from the get-go. Never thought of it that way.

Playboy: Did you experience any resentment from the Dallas cast for holding out? There were reports that the other actors were saying that you ought to have cut it out and gone back to work.

Hagman: I think they did that more out of love and respect. We really have a good time together and there is no bullshitting. We've all worked hard--and everybody got raises--and that's the most important thing. Fuck the acting. That comes automatically. Anything about my having to get my ass back there was probably misinterpreted by the press. I haven't felt anything of the sort. They probably just didn't want me to blow it.

Playboy: What was the hardest point to squeeze out of CBS and Lorimar?

Hagman: That I was absolutely serious about what I was doing; that I was not going to work unless I got what I wanted.

Playboy: You mean they didn't take you seriously?

Hagman: Yeah. You know, people have ideas of actors as flighty-brained butterflies. But at some point, you have to convince them you'll go for broke. I just turned 49, and I figured this was my chance to make an inroad for my future--however short that may be. If I hadn't gotten it, my life would have still gone on. I'm still going to make money. I'm an established actor. I've got a good character right now. If I don't work for a couple of years, I've got enough money to sit on it. As it worked out, I'm very satisfied with the results and I think they are, too. I like Lorimar. They've been nothing but honest with me and I want to be honest with them. They pay me what I think I'm worth and, God knows, they're not hurting for it.

Playboy: How did you ascertain what you're worth?

Hagman: Took a theoretical number, doubled it. They halved it and I was back to the status quo.

Playboy: How involved were you in the negotiations?

Hagman: Not at all. My agents handled the whole thing. I took my wife's advice and got out of the country. I didn't want to be on the scene to get the pressure from all my friends. One's friends and family panic first. They keep saying, "Goddamn, Larry, don't blow it! Christ you've got a great opportunity and there's no reason to blow it because of your being greedy this year." They don't know it's a game everyone plays. So we went to England. I talked to my agents twice a week. If I didn't like an offer. I said so. Besides, I needed the vacation. It turned out to be a beautifully well-orchestrated trip. I got international publicity, which filtered back to the U. S. in the best form. When things got down to the wire, I went to the Bahamas, so I could be back in Dallas in a day.

Playboy: What were your instructions to your agents?

Hagman: I told them I wanted it carried on in a very professional way. No yelling or screaming. If it got to that point, write it off. Before I left Los Angeles, I went to Nudie's, a Western tailor who's also a national institution, and got my team white Stetsons for their meetings. I told them they were the white-hat guys.

Playboy: Have you wondered if the shooting of J.R. on the show had any relation to your coming renegotiation?

Hagman: That's pretty Machiavellian. I don't remember any early conversations, but it might have been an idea on their part. I only know that it made me so happy I could hardly wait. I mean, what a perfect opportunity for an actor to say, "OK. I'm dead. Perfect. You guys got the out. You can write me off any time. I'm dead." I think negotiating from a dead man's position was the perfect plot. All I knew was that I was prepared to die. God knows, I could make a couple of million bucks in England and South Africa just based on the character--even if I had died.

Playboy: But did you think they might have let J.R. die? Even for a moment?

Hagman: I honestly don't think so. Our relationship is great. I sensed this. The writer-producer-director, Leonard Katzman, is probably the smartest man in the business. There's no goddamn way in the fucking world he would be crazy enough to write J.R. out of the script. So I guess you could say I was confident.

Playboy: Would the show work without you?

Hagman: Absolutely. It's hot. It's got the roll.

Playboy: So you were bargaining from an odd position.

Hagman: No. I was bargaining from the best. I didn't give a shit. I've already got it made. I've got everything I want: a house, a woman, wonderful children, enough money for about five years. It made no difference except that I would be richer and more famous. And I don't care about that.

Playboy: Of course, once we know who shot you, the onus will no longer be on J.R. Do you look forward to the attention slacking off?

Hagman: If somebody else gets it, I'm all for it. The show's going great. I'm on it. I think it would be fine for somebody else to carry the ball. Maybe six months from now, it will be "Save Sue Ellen" T-shirts.

Playboy: OK, OK. Everyone's waiting for us to ask: Who shot J.R.?

Hagman:There you go! [Devious grin] I don't know.

Playboy: By now, you must have figured it out.

Hagman: I still couldn't tell you. What about the transcribers, your editor, the printers--everyone who would see this early? If I told one person, pretty soon 20,000,000 would know.

Playboy: The magazine has kept tight security on a lot of political news breaks. Surely, this can't be that important. Is there any way to convince you?

Hagman: Can I do the centerfold? I've been working out on Nautilus equipment. [Big laugh; thoughtful smile] I couldn't possibly say . . . unless . . . I could talk you into coughing up some bucks. Say half a million? I'd split it with you.

Playboy: Two hundred and fifty thousand doesn't sound bad.

Hagman: Wait. A split doesn't necessarily mean 50--50. It could be 30--70. Or 20--80. Tell ya what: I'll give you ten percent.

Playboy: And we'd get the low-down?

Hagman: At least who I think shot J.R.

Playboy: We can talk money only if you actually know who did it.

Hagman: Aren't you willing to take a chance?

Playboy: We think you ought to give us your guess for free.

Hagman: No way. I've already been offered $100,000 by a British newspaper syndicate to tell.

Playboy: Seriously?

Hagman: I'm being absolutely serious. Playboy's got the money. Are you listening Hugh? Everybody's got his price.

Playboy: But your guess may not be right.

Hagman: Life's a gamble. [Terrible grin]

Playboy: Wish we could get that smile on tape.

Hagman: They see it out there every Friday night.

Playboy: This has gone far enough. Do you know?

Hagman: You can bet that if you paid me, I'd find out. Might have to give up little chunks along the way, but I'd find out.

Playboy: We're obviously wasting our time.

Hagman: Thing is, I really think I know who did it. The producers throw in a lot of red herrings, but I think I know.

Playboy: Linda Gray, the actress who plays your wife, Sue Ellen, also thinks she knows. Have you compared notes?

Hagman: Well, I've never discussed it in anything other than a one-to-one situation. We're all being really careful about this, because we've all made good deals this year. I wouldn't want to jeopardize my relationship with Lorimar or CBS on a simple speculative deal like this that could screw up their promotional number. They want a really big ratings share for the show and it's more important for me to be ethical and honest in the long run.

Playboy: Noble words. How about a cool million?

Hagman: Now you're talking.

Playboy: You say you know. Are you making any bets?

Hagman: It's not really part of my personality. I might have someone lay off about $100,000 in Vegas for me--if I was a bettor. It's tempting, but not ethical. I guess I'm just a schmuck in that area.

Playboy: Well, while we wait to see if any Hefner-Hagman negotiations develop, perhaps you wouldn't mind telling us what reasons each suspect might have for shooting you.

Hagman: I'm in a real bind here. It's like having the secret to the nuclear bomb. The Rosenbergs were executed for less important stuff than this. Well, maybe not.

Playboy: How about it?

Hagman: I'll tell you what. I don't think my mother, Miss Ellie, did it. Anything else would be too easy to cross-reference with my other comments. That's all I'm going to say.

Playboy: How about your dad?

Hagman: OK. That's two. I don't think it's in their personalities. But I don't think we ought to pursue this any further. I'm ambivalent about it. I jokingly say I'd sell you the information, but I wouldn't.

Playboy: We also think it would be safe to assume that Dusty, Sue Ellen's cowboy lover who supposedly died in a plane crash, but whose body was never found, can be eliminated on the basis of wishful thinking.

Hagman: Yes. But with all his notoriety, and so forth, I think it would be wise to bring that dude back.

Playboy: Sue Ellen is too obvious.

Hagman: Sue Ellen could have done it, since she had the gun in her purse. But I think it's just a red herring.

Playboy: That leaves Kristin, Sue Ellen's sister and your mistress; Alan Beam, the lawyer; and Cliff Barnes, Pamela's brother.

Hagman: I don't think Cliff would ever do it, because, again, it's too obvious. I mean, I know I knocked a half million dollars off his income, and he was filmed getting caught . . . but I think it's another red herring. But you never know.

Playboy: Vaughn Leland, the banker, is too unimportant. It looks like Kristin or Beam.

Hagman: Kristin? My little mistress? Christ, I don't know. The writers are so devious. I suppose it could be her. Remember, I tried to get Beam on a rape charge. It could be three, four, five other people. Look, I can't go any further, except to say that the person I think could have done it is not a major character, but a good character. But then, fuck, I don't know.

Playboy: We're partial to the two-gun theory: ABC and NBC.

Hagman: Wait a minute. How about this: I was shot twice, right? Maybe the person missed with one bullet. Someone else could have come in, seen me on the ground and plugged me again.

Playboy: It's certainly a complex question. How do you think the crucial moments are going to be filmed and put on the air?

Hagman: I think they're going to film the fucking thing ten hours beforehand and feed it straight out. Maybe even live television. I don't put anything past the Dallas people. They're so circumspect.

Playboy: How would you do it?

Hagman: I'd tape it, hold everybody on the set, lock it up and have a big fucking party. No phone calls going in or out until it was aired.

Playboy: Have you sat around and giggled about how great this all is for you?

Hagman: Every day. Two full minutes of giggling at yourself in the mirror each morning is as good as two miles of jogging.

Playboy: We meant all the way to the bank.

Hagman: That's relative. It sure as shit is more than what I made off Jeannie--which is still playing all over the world and I don't get one penny for.

Playboy: Why?

Hagman: It wasn't in the Screen Actors Guild rules that actors got any piece of the action after a limited period of time. I think six or ten runs. I've since decided that it wasn't going to happen to me anymore. See, I figure I'm competing with the Larry Hagman of 15 years ago. When producers say, "Let's get Larry Hagman," they want a young one. The next stage is "Who is Larry Hagman?" I don't want to be competing at 60 with someone ten years my junior, who is also me, for which I'm not getting paid.

Playboy: You're not getting paid for creating a boom in cowboy fashion, either. Do you take any credit for that?

Hagman: Well, I don't know, but about eight months ago, I was down here for a men's clothing thing and a guy came up to me and shook my hand and said, "J.R., I wanna thank you. I sold out ever' damn piece of clothin', hats, boots, that I had contracted for for the first three months of the year. Now I've got special orders and I just don't know how to fill 'em." And he pegged me as partially responsible, along with the show. Now, Jim Davis, who plays my daddy, wears strictly Western-cut clothing, but I wear Brooks Brothers and Carroll's with Western boots and a Stetson. I hate Western boots, though. You got to get that pointy toe. The human foot wasn't made for it.

Playboy: Talking about people coming up to you, what about women? Do a lot of them come on to you?

Hagman: Sometimes it gets pretty wild. The other night, for instance, I was out with the family--went to get a beer at a local C&W club, and these two pretty little girls came up and said [high voice]. "Mr. Hagman? Would you like a Texas sandwich?" I said, "I didn't know they served food in here. What's that?" And she said, "It's not food. It's my sister and me." Oh, my God. Why now? Why not when I was younger and unmarried? Forty-nine years old and--a Texas sandwich! Holy mackerel!

Playboy: What did your wife do?

Hagman: She just turned her back. She's learned to deal with it.

Playboy: How do you handle the come-ons?

Hagman: Well, you're just real nice, you know? I don't like rejecting people, especially for that. But I'm a happily married man, for Chrissakes. What am I going to do? I don't think it would be worth the trouble or the effort to fool around. I don't lead a very duplicitous life and to start now would be a waste of time. I wouldn't feel good about it. I'd feel guilty. God knows, it's out there, more than any one man could deal with, but it's just not the time. I wouldn't feel right.

Playboy: But there must have been some real temptations.

Hagman: Sure. I'm only human. There've been plenty. I was in Oklahoma City recently. And there was this gorgeous blonde lady, about 35, whom I'd met. She was luscious. In real good shape. And she'd somehow gotten into my bed. When I walked into my hotel room about two A.M., there she was, waiting for me. With champagne, music on and the lights turned low. I guess she'd told the desk she was my wife or something. She'd put on a diaphanous, beautiful peignoir. She was a fan, a lovely lady, and I had to say, "I really appreciate this, it's very nice. I hope you don't think I'm rejecting you, but I'm sorry, darling, I have to get up at six in the morning and go to church." I had a glass of champagne with her.

Playboy: How did she take it?

Hagman: She was real nice about it. She understood. She got out of bed, I took her to the door, kissed her good night and sent her on down the hall.

Playboy: Did you tell your wife about that one?

Hagman: No, I didn't. I don't think she has to know all that kind of nonsense. And, frankly, so many things happened that weekend, it just sorta slipped my mind.

Playboy: Do these women want Larry Hagman or J. R. Ewing?

Hagman: I don't know. They might be the same person for them. So they never get any of it except a handshake or a peck on the cheek. I just show 'em a picture of my family.

Playboy: You've said that J.R. is the kind of man most women want to tame. Wouldn't most of them be unsuccessful and end up like Sue Ellen?

Hagman: A lot of ladies like to change men and vice versa. There're plenty of motivations. There's something in the character of J.R. that definitely appeals to women. I guess power is sexy, and I think the fact that lots of women like to be abused is another factor. But a guy like J.R. can be a thoroughly despicable prick, so why any woman in her right mind would want him is beyond me.

Playboy: Basically, you're a faithful family man.

Hagman: Maj and I are partners on this trip. She's my best friend. There's plenty of room for experimentation in a marriage--not necessarily sexual. That's just one area I prefer to keep sacrosanct. Maybe it's morally derived from the things I learned in catechism; maybe it's because I'm just a lazy person and being faithful is easier. The point is that Maj is a part of me as much as I'm a part of her. I've been married longer than I've done anything else; longer than I was single.

Playboy: Tell us about that short span of being single. What was your first sexual experience?

Hagman: Oddly enough, it's got something to do with smoking, which I hate. When I was 14 and going to the Woodstock Country School in Vermont, everybody was smoking. It was the real big thrill. I mean, that was it, man. Everyone's parents were against it, but we just thought they were old fuddy-duddies. But I had never smoked a cigarette. So we were out on the school's back porch one day and a girl asked me if I wanted to smoke. And I said, "Oh, no. No way, smoking a cigarette." She said, "If you smoke this cigarette, I'll let you put, your hand on my tit." Well . . . I started smoking right that minute and I never quit until I was 32 years old. It was the nicest experience I'd ever had.

Playboy: The cigarette?

Hagman: No. Her tit was the nicest, softest thing. . . . I don't know if I've ever felt a tit quite so nice as that. Boy, I tell you, she really turned me on. Beautiful girl. Felt my first nipple.

Playboy: If you'd smoked a cigar, what would she have let you do?

Hagman: Well, in those days, you could only get up to sticking your hand in a girl's crotch--and with panties on. There was always fear of pregnancy. Boy, they were tough times--and they're coming back now, with the pill kind of falling out and I.U.D.s being dangerous and all that. It's coining back to the same old dilemma. Anyway, I smoked a lot of cigarettes for the next 15 or 20 years.

Playboy: So you began sleeping with girls at what age?

Hagman: When I was 14, 15 . . . there was no real overnight thing. That was in Vermont. But when I moved to Texas a couple of years later, it was a whole different kind of promiscuity. A lot of petting but not a lot of fucking. When a girl said no, you didn't pursue it any further--well, a little further. When I joined the Air Force and went to England, you'd go out on a date with a girl and then say, "Do you want to come back for a cup of tea?" because you couldn't afford any liquor. And she'd say, "Thank you." You'd make the tea and be sitting on the couch, and you'd give her a little kiss and then pretty soon you'd say, "Do you want to go to bed?" And she'd say, "I thought you'd never ask!" Maybe not on the first date, though, but on the second or third. My theory was that after two wars, English manhood had been absolutely decimated. They didn't have enough to go around.

Playboy: Was that before you met Maj?

Hagman: Yeah. I was also a working actor on Drury Lane, making $12 per week, which was a lot of money in those days. And there were a lot of ladies around--beautiful, intelligent, smart, fun.

Playboy: Did they want relationships?

Hagman: Not necessarily. They liked to fuck. Liked it. Enjoyed it.

Playboy: Needed it?

Hagman: Needed it. Whatever. If you enjoy it, do it. In Texas, there was more of a religious background, for some reason; they got sex and religion mixed up somewhere along the line. But then again, I may just have been with the wrong crowd. England turned me around. I found the women wonderfully aggressive over there. I like women who know what they want.

Playboy: How did you meet Maj?

Hagman: I was in the Air Force, in England. She was an acquaintance of my roommate--he may have been dating her--and he brought her home one night for tea. She didn't like me very much right away. In fact, many people in England at the time didn't like Americans in uniform. Well, I asked for a date, anyway. About a year later, we got married.

Playboy: What have you learned about women from your wife?

Hagman: She's taught me lots of things: how to be kinder to women; that they are real people. A lot of men don't think that. I used to think of them as servants. Now we all serve one another.

Playboy: Thinking of women as servants is sort of a J.R. attitude.

Hagman: Absolutely. Of course, J.R. thinks everybody is a servant: his momma, daddy, brothers, women, whatever.

Playboy: Would you say treating women like servants stems from distrusting them?

Hagman: No. I think the women in my life have probably been the people I've trusted most. I trust women more than men. By the time I married Maj, we'd already spent a year together, and I knew women were real people.

Playboy: What are your feelings about women's lib?

Hagman: The more liberated they are, the more liberated we are. You can't have a slave society. Now I just tell my wife, "Darling, you can go out and build your Jacuzzis and do your work all day, just as long as I can come home to dinner on the table."

Playboy: Don't you think most women would resent that?

Hagman: Maybe. But I do a lot of the cooking myself--at least as much as Maj does. Actually, I was being J.R. about dinner on the table--which is what John Wayne said when he was given the Brass Balls Award by the Harvard Lampoon. I was actually brought up in a liberated atmosphere. My mother was certainly equal to most male stars, if not more than their equal. She had the deference, she made the money, she had the creativity. So liberated women aren't anything new to me. The John Wayne attitude comes from living in Texas.

Playboy: Do you think women's lib has brought on the so-called indecisive male? Men who lack backbone?

Hagman: Tough shit. [Chortles] Listen, why do you have to be a male-chauvinist pig to have backbone? What is backbone? Just a spine. Women have one, too.

Playboy: A recent Esquire spread referred to you--or to J.R.--as an example of the new "hard-line hero" of the Eighties: "mean, effective, revels in his freedom." Do you agree?

Hagman: That's interesting. That's ol' Lar. Yeah, I'm strong. Nobody fucks around with me. I've had situations where my back's been put against the wall and I always come out for what is right and let everybody know about it. And if they don't like it, fuck 'em. That's my stand, and I don't make stands just because I have money or position. I do it if I think someone is fucking up.

Playboy: You mentioned your mother's influence. As the son of a major Broadway star, you couldn't have avoided some of the problems associated with that upbringing, could you?

Hagman: I never really had any problems. I lived with her for only about a year after she got divorced. I never resented her. I didn't know any different. She was never around. I had her mother in California to take care of me. In fact, as far as I was concerned, I enjoyed my youth very much. I got to travel to lots of places, meet different people, go to different schools. Maybe you can resent something like that later in life, but at the time, it was my life. It was fun. There were plenty of people who loved me. Another thing, I was living in a society where there usually weren't mothers or fathers around. Everybody was divorced. And parents always came to visit.

Playboy: All right, but how do you view things in retrospect?

Hagman: In retrospect, it just doesn't seem to have been that difficult for me. Look, as I grew older, there were times it was difficult for me, and I'd just cut the relationship off for two or three years. I couldn't go any further at that particular level. But the point is that I just wasn't very mature at the time. Nor was she. Hell, she's only 17 years older than I am, for Chrissakes. She's just a kid herself. Sometimes we didn't communicate, but on inspection, I find that a lot of people don't communicate with their mothers and fathers for long periods of time, until everybody matures.

Playboy: You seem particularly resistant to this discussion.

Hagman: Not really. What happened was just part of the action. Mother and I have a real good relationship now. We've been able to look back on things as kind of a folly. And, to tell you the truth, my stepmother and I also had our stormy periods. No one asks about that. I love her equally. She's a wonderful woman who's also had a lot of influence on my life. Over the long run, the animosity I've had with them, generally speaking, is a lot less than many people I know have had. Gosh, I start asking people how they really feel about their mothers and fathers and, holy mackerel, there's a lot of animosity out there, and mostly for no good reason.

Playboy: Why did you cut things off with your mom for two or three years?

Hagman: It's really not valid for this interview. There were a lot of reasons that are really none of your business. I don't care about setting the record straight. Most people don't know what the fuck they're talking about, anyway.

Playboy: Do you resent being asked the question?

Hagman: No. Do you resent being given a straight answer?

Playboy: No. Let's talk about your father. Did you have much contact with him after your parents were divorced?

Hagman: Very little. I got interested in my dad when I was about 14. And, of course, he was living out in Texas. He was hunting and fishing and doing all those things that are fun while I was in Vermont reading Zane Grey and Hemingway. Those were my literary gods and he was living that life.

Playboy: What was your first meeting like?

Hagman: Pretty good. Met me at the train station. I had my hair in a pompadour. He wore a crewcut, like everyone in those days. He said, "The first thing we're going to do is get that hair cut." And I said, "No, sir. Unh-unh." Soon as I got off the goddamn train. Well, he let me keep it until I decided to cut it.

Playboy: Did he try to be a father, after so long?

Hagman: He was real nice. He was always real nice. Juanita, his wife, and I had some problems. They'd just gotten married, she was his secretary, and she worked all the time--with him. Poor woman, it was a full-time job. But there wasn't any big deal about his exerting his authority. He was kind and strong and he knew I was coming from a different world. He always bent over backward to be kind and understanding. He was a real smart dude. A lot of wisdom.

Playboy: Did you two ever sit down and actually talk about those things?

Hagman: Fathers and sons don't often sit down and talk about it. We never had a real heart-to-heart, but it was sort of all included in our hunting and fishing together. That's where we really enjoyed each other. Shit, we'd hunt and fish, drink beer, smoke cigarettes and bullshit all night long. Goddamn, we must have smoked 8,000,000 cigarettes. We had a nice relationship the last 17, 18 years of his life.

Playboy: When did he die?

Hagman: When I was 32 or 33.

Playboy: Since you never had a verbal heart-to-heart, what would you say to your father now, if you had the chance?

Hagman: I appreciate what you did. Thank you. You let me do what I wanted to do and you backed me in my mistakes and supported me in my decisions.

Playboy: Is that the attitude you take with your own children?

Hagman: Yeah, Also, we've been together a lot longer. And, as an actor, I'm able to be with my children a lot more than some fathers. I used to not work for two, three months at a time, so I could pick 'em up at school, talk to them, really be with them. It's much nicer to be closer to your children, because they are the only things that you are really going to do of any value in your whole life. I believe that the family that stays together stays together. I suppose that attitude might come from being the child of a split marriage, though, like I said, there are lots of advantages to that, too. Frankly, that stuff about my mother supposedly rejecting me for all those years--I consider myself lucky. What if she had terrible guilt feelings and smothered me with love all that time when she didn't really have the time? I might have turned out like Joan Crawford's kids, I'm fortunate that my mother followed her heart, her psychic energy or whatever.

Playboy: Why did you turn to acting? Was it your mother's example?

Hagman: Well, she was and is a huge star, and she did offer me a chance to go out on the road with her in Annie Get Your Gun when I was 14--which I turned down because I thought I'd be hanging out with a bunch of sissies; besides, I wanted to go to Texas and be a cowboy for a while--but that's not the reason. I just never knew anything different. When I was in the Air Force, I acted in and directed road shows. I had tried ranching and farming in Texas and found that to be just grueling, backbreaking work: I dug latrines; I worked for Weatherford Oil Tool, making springs for oil pipes by hand while a machine right behind me did it a million times faster; I baled hay; worked a pneumatic hammer; dug a swimming pool . . . I told my dad that no one in his right mind would do that stuff for a living. It was slave labor. He asked me if I wanted to be a lawyer like him, but I said no.

Playboy: Why?

Hagman: Lawyers are just guys who find a way to get around justice. And law and justice are two totally different things. Lawyers are just bona fide crooks. It's like having a license to steal. But, of course, you've got to have lawyers. My dad, my grandfather, my half brother--all lawyers.

Playboy: Isn't acting also a license to steal?

Hagman: Sure.

Playboy: So?

Hagman: It was laziness. Being a lawyer takes a lot of preparation and bullshit. So does acting, only I thought it would be easier. The professions are very similar. Both teach you how to lie. Only in acting you say someone else's lies, not your own.

Playboy: Why do we keep getting the impression that lies make up a large part of life for you?

Hagman: I certainly think they're part of it. I mean, if we could read each other's mind, if we knew what the other one was thinking, how could we have a conversation? I talk to people who are lying, and I know it, and sometimes they do, too. Or they don't because they haven't gotten around to looking at that particular part of their personality yet. I have friends who know when I'm lying. I can read body actions, I can read eyes. I know exactly when someone's lying.

Playboy: Do you tell them you know?

Hagman: Of course not. I wouldn't want to hurt them or destroy their illusions of themselves at the time. God, if you were to confront me about lying, it would put me into a panic. I might roll up into a fetal ball or something.

Playboy: Really?

Hagman: No, not really.

Playboy: Larry, you're lying right now.

Hagman: [Huge laugh] Of course!

Playboy: When you finally decided to take up acting, did your mom open doors for you?

Hagman: Sure. People saw me and actually gave me jobs based on that. I believe in nepotism. But ultimately, I had to prove myself, had to deliver the goods. And I was never aware of any problems along those lines. I just went ahead and did my business and didn't worry about what people might or might not be saying.

Playboy: Your daughter, Heidi, is an actress. Are you concerned that people will say she rode on your coattails?

Hagman: I don't give a fuck what people say. I rode on my mom's. That's what it's all about. If you have a shoe factory, where do you think the kids work? Why should it be any different in show business? I have no doubt that my daughter can ultimately prove herself in my field, and if I can help my daughter become a successful actress, super.

Playboy: How did you get the role in I Dream of Jeannie?

Hagman: Well, I was acting in New York and I could see the handwriting on the wall that things were falling apart there as far as jobs for television actors. So I went out to L.A. to look for work, but it wasn't during pilot-casting season. I got very discouraged, went back to New York, went to bed for three days. Well, a couple of days after that, I got sent a script from some people I'd met in L.A. It was for the Alfred Hitchcock series and the offer was $2500 and a round-trip ticket. I went back to L.A. knowing full well, inside, that they would never actually get to do the script.

It was about a young couple who had just gotten married and moved from Illinois to Los Angeles. But because of an injury in the Korean War, he could not consummate his marriage sexually. So the guy hooks up with a bunch of people who are looking for a virgin to sacrifice. Then they supposedly drugged him and made him watch while they carved his wife's heart out and then burned the house down over the both of them. Like I said, I figured no way were they going to be allowed to do this. And sure enough, we rehearsed the first act, broke for lunch and were told, "Ladies and gentlemen, we're sorry, but the network has read the script and refused to allow it on the air. All of you will be paid anyway. Thank you." I sent my $2500 home right away and took some time to look around again. In the next week, I was offered five pilots. Jeannie was the one I selected.

Playboy: Do you still get star-struck around great actors?

Hagman: I suppose if I ever met Alec Guinness, I'd be tongue-tied, but I understand he's tongue-tied, too. Most of the time. I guess he's my favorite actor, along with Olivier. But then, De Niro, Jesus Christ.

Playboy: Do you aspire to act on the same level?

Hagman: No fucking way. I don't take myself that seriously. I mean, they really work at it. I just kind of float along. Acting is like a game to me. I mean, it's fun. I enjoy it. I've learned how to be fairly proficient at it. It's a rush--I get a shot of adrenaline when things are going really well. But those guys are superduper actors.

Playboy: Maybe they don't take themselves seriously, either.

Hagman: I can't believe that. I think they really work on their art as a 24-hour-a-day job. I have too much fun for that.

Playboy: Would you reject a meaty part like they play if it were offered?

Hagman: That commitment is beyond me. I just don't think I could ever get as involved as they do. I tell you, I like the immediacy of television. I really like having to do eight or ten pages a day. Then it's over.

Playboy: Some producer will read this and pass you over.

Hagman: Something else will come along. I mean, look at Dog Day Afternoon or The Deer Hunter. I couldn't do those kinds of roles. It's the commitment; the subject matter.

Playboy: Could you do comedy--as opposed to Dallas melodrama?

Hagman: Sure. I'd love to work with Burt Reynolds, for instance. He's a marvelous actor. I just don't go in for all the blood and killing and maiming.

Playboy: What about something like Kramer vs. Kramer? Serious role, no gore.

Hagman: I've played that role before in a TV series called Here We Go Again. That was after The Good Life, which was after Jeannie. It bored the shit out of me. Besides, Hoffman did it so well, I don't figure anyone's going to do it again for a while.

Playboy: Do you consider yourself a leading man?

Hagman: In Jeannie, yeah. But that was 15 years ago. Then I got into character acting, which to me is the most fun. And now, all of a sudden, I'm back to leading-man roles. I'm being approached for that sort of thing more and more.

Playboy: More J.R. characters?

Hagman: Not one of them so far. I'm absolutely amazed. In fact, they're all pretty dull. That's why I haven't taken any. Like I said earlier, I'm writing my own.

Playboy: Would you describe for us a typical day's routine when you're working on Dallas?

Hagman: Sure. I get up at 5:30 A.M., go outside and take a pee over the bulkhead onto the beach at Malibu. I always like peeing outside. I like to mark off the corners of my property. Then I take a three- or four-minute Jacuzzi. Then I have a little fruit juice before Maj and I run two miles. When I come back, I have some tea and then I drive to work. On the way, I tape-record all my lines and all the scenes I have to do that day. I refresh my memory with what I studied the night before. When I get to work, I go into my dressing room--which, by the way, is a real crummy dressing room, so I draped it in flags--and I review my lines for another ten minutes. Then it's into make-up. By now, it's a quarter to eight. I see the cast. We bullshit, then go into rehearsal for however long it takes. We start shooting around 8:30, usually, and shoot and shoot and shoot. At lunchtime, I have a salad or something I've brought from home. After that, there's usually an interview two or three times a week--though I'm going to cut down on that, because I think I've been a little overexposed.

Playboy: You won't have to do any more after this.

Hagman: Right. I can just hand this one out. Then, let's see, I work till about 7:30 P.M. at the latest, then drive home and review the next day's lines on the way. When I get home, I take another pee over the bulkhead to mark off my territorial domain.

Playboy: You mean the way a dog stakes out his turf?

Hagman: Exactly. A lot of dogs on the beach come and sniff around. And they will piss all over your bulkhead, your stairways, and if they can piss all over your plants, they'll do that. So I like to mark my area so when they come around, they'll say, "Oh, shit. This dude's serious."

Playboy: It actually works?

Hagman: Sure. When I'm pissing, I'm saying, "Dogs, don't piss on my place." They can be a real pain in the ass. Especially the males. Anyway, after that, I hang out with Maj and the kids--if they're around--and ask what their day's been like. During this period, I take a Jacuzzi. I have this big wooden bucket and I soak down and take off my make-up and pour these buckets over my head. Kind of Japanese fashion. Then it's back into the Jacuzzi for more talk and a bottle of champagne before a light dinner and bed. I'm asleep by a quarter to ten.

Playboy: You recently lost about 40 pounds. How?

Hagman: A sort of protein-vanilla-milk-shake diet. No food. Now we don't eat meat anymore, either. I've found my blood pressure significantly lower. I'm not too wild about killing things, but I figure if you're going to eat 'em, kill 'em yourself. Otherwise, it's like hiring executioners. Of course, you do kill vegetables, and I'm sure they scream, but they're not on my frequency, so I don't really give a shit. I'd been a vegetarian on and off for years and I knew that somehow it made me feel better. My shit didn't smell. My body odor went down. You know, I went to China last year and Maj and I suddenly realized, while standing in the midst of all these Chinese, that they didn't smell. And, of course, it was because they eat very little meat. Also, in the past six months, I've gotten into running--I do two miles every day, work out on Nautilus, play racquetball, throw the Frisbee, do t'ai chi.

Playboy: How had you gained all the weight?

Hagman: Living the good life. Not exercising. Eating and drinking and doing all the things that people do when they're successful. When I was in England recently, Maj and I were visiting with this rich guy. He makes 8,000,000 pounds a week; lives on the Isle of Man, where there are no taxes. Anyway, at dinner one night, we were at his table. We consumed maybe 100 bottles of Louis Roederer Cristal, which goes for $65 a bottle. And over ten pounds of Beluga caviar served in crystal bowls. I never thought I'd get sated with caviar and the best champagne, but after that, I just didn't want any more. By the second day there, I just wanted a beer. We've quit that. It's leafy green vegetables, yogurt, fish and fowl, now.

Playboy: Earlier, you made a reference to your practice of not speaking on Sundays.

Hagman: I can only say that you've got to try it to appreciate how nice it is.

Playboy: Is it a form of meditation or discipline?

Hagman: No. Neither of those. I just find it kinda makes my day easier. It has no religious connotation, as far as I know. But it has a subconscious benefit for me psychically. It's just nice to lay out for a day.

Playboy: How do those around you react?

Hagman: Well, my family is no problem. I've been doing it for ten years and they know all about it. I realize it's a totally selfish thing to do, but it seems to work for me in the end. Once people realize what I'm into, they understand it. Most of them can deal with it. In fact, more and more people I meet who observe it end up saying it's a pretty good idea. They say they wish they could do it. And I intimate to them that all they have to do is do it. It's sorta hard for me to describe, because I'm looking at it from a totally different perspective.

Playboy: What made you decide to do that?

Hagman: Oh, I came home one day and I'd been doing a scene in some film or something where I had to scream and holler and yell. I woke up the next morning and couldn't talk. So I just stopped talking for the rest of the day, and the next day, too. It was nice. Now I have one day a week when I can at least not do something that is normally expected of me. I don't have to answer phones, which is wonderful. If my wife doesn't want to answer them, either, we don't for the whole day. If there's an emergency, we have a special line. If I'm home alone, I'll answer it and whistle. If there's some sort of problem, I'll talk. Of course.

Playboy: What about the people who just won't understand? Ever had anyone hassle you about your silence?

Hagman: Yeah, Usually, I can handle it. I use sign language to make myself understood. There was a lady last Sunday who wanted me to speak and was real aggressive about it. Fortunately, I managed to keep from saying "Fuck off."

Playboy: But you must occasionally be tempted to break your vows of silence.

Hagman: I did on one occasion. I was in Oklahoma City. It was my day to shut up. It got to be midnight and I'd signed about 2000 autographs already at a country-and-western clothes store--something I'd been paid to do. And I shut off at midnight. I was in a disco at the time and I had my stand-in and bodyguard, Tim O'Connor, with me. Everybody at my table understood and Tim was there to explain it to anyone else. Anyway, this girl came up actually several girls. They wanted my autograph. They understood about my not talking. But one girl also asked me to say something like hello. I shook my head and smiled. So she says, "I'm going to make you talk." And for 20 minutes, she bugged the shit out of me. I mean, she bugged me and bugged me. I was trying to visit with other people and she was tugging at me and making faces and doing all kinds of obnoxious things. Finally, she says, "What's the matter with you? Are you too good to talk to me?" She took it as a personal affront, as if I weren't doing it for anyone else, only her. And I said, "No." And she says, "I got you to talk!" And I said, "OK, what would you like me to say?" And she says, "Anything." And I said, "You want to fuck?" And she went, "Oh, my God, you're disgusting!" And she went away.

Playboy: How did you feel about breaking your silence?

Hagman: I felt really bad about what I said to her. It was an aggressive thing, something that I didn't actually mean, said to hurt her. It ruined the next day for me. I felt shitty. It was like I had hit her. It was not me--well, it must have been me or I wouldn't have done it, but I mean, she just bugged me and bugged me until I was helpless.

Playboy: Silence sounds like one of the centering techniques you've talked about. What are some of the others?

Hagman: Lots of things help. A good "Ommmm," hyperventilation. It can be a bathroom or a closet that helps you get away from the madding crowd, so you can just sit down, close your eyes and think of nothing.

Playboy: Do you actually retreat to closets?

Hagman: Yeah. Sometimes when everybody wants your attention, you just have to take ten minutes to be alone. I get in a dark room and think of a huge clover field with a red rose right in the middle and I go and try to be that rose.

Playboy: Do you find yourself resorting to those techniques more often these days?

Hagman: Yeah. In crowds, I always have to remember to just slow down. I want to be very kind to people. See, there comes a time that I call shark-feeding frenzy. Have you ever seen sharks fighting over the carcass of a whale? It's terrifying. They go absolutely mad over the whale and end up striking at themselves. Well, a crowd can get like that when they're denied something. You saw them out at the gate on the Southfork set, the hands reaching into the car in a kind of hysteria, afraid they're going to miss something unless they get to you. So I just have to go very slow, because if I panic, they'll panic. It's easier to be gracious, but I don't like to get kicked around, either.

Playboy: You've said you're quite a collector.

Hagman: Yes. I collect hats, flags, pieces of cut glass, necklaces, lots of things.

Playboy: Anything else you'd like to collect?

Hagman: Jet planes. Helicopters. Not submarines.

Playboy: Where do you keep all that stuff?

Hagman: At home. But I'm running out of room, and Maj says she wants to simplify our lives. Maybe I'll build an underground house--we've been thinking of that. Anyway, it's real easy to collect stuff and when people find that out, they're always giving you stuff, mailing it to you. I guess I've gotten almost 200 hats just in the last year. And there's no place to put them. So I may just give them away. Or establish a Larry Hagman museum.

Playboy: How do you feel about autograph hounds?

Hagman: Signing autographs takes a lot of time. So I've printed up some Larry Hagman $100 bills and pass them out instead. I'm going to up it to $1000 on the next run. Inflation.

Playboy: You must get tired of, it if you've gone to such lengths.

Hagman: You know, I once had a guy come up to me right in the middle of dinner and say, "My wife wants your autograph." Now, I figure if somebody wants something, he ought to put himself on the line. So I say, "Thank you very much, but I'm in the middle of dinner." He said, "She wants your autograph now and she wants you to come to the table." I said, "I'm right in the middle of dinner. I hope she'll understand. But if she wants to come and get my autograph ... if she wouldn't mind waiting." And he started fuming. He said, "You want my wife to come over to you?" I said, "Yes, I do." He said, "You arrogant prick." Well, I thanked him and told him that was just the way it was, and he split. On the way out, I passed his table and went over to him and said, "I don't give a fuck what you think of me, you little prick. You wanna step outside, I'm going to kick the shit out of you?" So he stands up and I see that his wife . . . is in a wheelchair! Christ! She was a paraplegic. It was the first time I'd noticed. He just assumed I knew. So I never say anything nasty anymore--until I know all the facts.

Playboy: You have to figure the guy was just expecting a certain attitude from J. R. Ewing.

Hagman: That's what's funny about it. It was during my I Dream of Jeannie period. Hah!

Playboy: Are you wary of making mistakes these days?

Hagman: Well, yeah. You can't take advantage of every deal that comes along just because there's money involved. It might be too much exposure in the wrong direction. I'm new to the game, so I want to be a little cautious.

Playboy: In the beginning of this interview, you claimed the press had to make up copy because your real life was so dull. In retrospect, we can't agree.

Hagman: I live a nice, easy life. I don't have a lot of difficulties. I don't get into fights. I don't blow ether up in my face--Richard Pryor, that poor son of a bitch, he's so talented, but he must be horribly hurt somewhere inside. People think, How exciting to be Larry Hagman. But we're sitting here in Dallas in the middle of a heat wave, trying to keep cool. I'm not a guy who's out in a whirlwind of champagne or caviar, though that's there when want it. When I'm home in Malibu, I never go out anyplace other than to about three restaurants. I'm just a normal guy, maybe more normal than most. Excitement is in the eye of the beholder. This whole J.R. thing will be gone before you know it.

Playboy: You sound as though you don't take the whole thing too seriously.

Hagman: I don't. If I do, it will lose its magic. I take my wife, my marriage, my children's lives seriously. But, generally, I don't have to take anything else seriously.

Playboy: Isn't there something you feel you have to say in life?

Hagman: You want me to say something to the world? Love each other. It's a lot better than hating each other. Easier, too.

Playboy: Would you say that sums up your approach to life?

Hagman: My approach to life is the same as my approach to acting: Be as outrageous as you possibly can.

Playboy: What's the most outrageous thing you've gotten away with?

Hagman: J.R. Because I got away with it and because it's become what it's become.

Playboy: What's the toughest thing about being Larry Hagman?

Hagman: Finding the time to be Larry Hagman.

Playboy: And, finally, how, in the midst of all that's happened to you, do you remember who you are?

Hagman: There was a film I saw, or something I read once, in which there was a story about a Roman general entering the forum after conquering Gaul and slaughtering 2,000,000 men, women and children. The crowd was going apeshit. The general was a great hero. He had his 100,000 troops marching behind him. But riding in his chariot was someone they call the Public Conscience. And all the time, this guy is whispering in the general's ear: "Only Caesar is godlike. Only Augustus is the Emperor. You are only human. Do not forget. You are only human."

"How do you refute a reporter's lie? Act like old J.R.? Time wounds all heels, as far as I'm concerned."

"There are ways of making people pay who fuck you up, I'd be more specific, but that will take the fun out of it when I do it."

"J.R. likes a little strange pussy now and then; but, generally speaking, the guy's just taking care of business, the family. It's the American ethic."

"Since I was playing a major in the United States Air Force, the press was not fond of my belief that the Vietnam war was a criminal act."

"Texas is air-conditioned street theater. It's all Greek stories. Texans are the Greeks of America."

"I'd tape the crucial moments, hold everybody on the set, lock it up and have a big fucking party."

"When I moved to Texas, it was a whole different kind of promiscuity. When a girl said no, you didn't pursue it any further--well, a little further."

"Being a lawyer takes a lot of preparation and bullshit. So does acting. The professions are very similar. Both teach you how to lie."

"I always like peeing outside. I like to mark off the corners of my property."

"Have you ever seen sharks fighting over the carcass of a whale? It's terrifying. Well, a crowd can get like that."