Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, May 28, 1994 TAG: 9405280077
SECTION: SPECTATOR PAGE: S-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: NEW YORK LENGTH: Long
That's because 50 years ago he was there.
Infantryman Durning was among the first soldiers ashore on D-Day, June 6, 1944, during the cross-channel Allied invasion of Europe in World War II.
Durning landed on Omaha Beach and nine days later he was wounded in action, the first of three times, and evacuated to a hospital.
The two-hour "Normandy: the Great Crusade" will be shown twice on Monday evening, May 30. It will be repeated twice the evening of June 1, once the afternoon of June 4, twice the evening of June 5 and once the evening of June 12.
Doing the narration "stirred up memories," Durning says. "It was a very emotional experience for me. I had to stop a couple of times; I couldn't go on."
When he read about the project, Durning called Discovery to say he was interested. He auditioned. He's still willing to audition after eight Emmy and two Oscar nominations.
His nearly 70 movie parts include the governor in "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas," the comic Nazi officer in "To Be or Not To Be" and a lovesick suitor of Dustin Hoffman in "Tootsie." His TV credits include co-starring and dancing with Maureen Stapleton in "Queen of the Stardust Ballroom" and playing Honey Fitz, Rose Kennedy's father, in the miniseries "The Kennedys of Massachusetts."
Since 1990, Durning has appeared in Burt Reynolds' TV series "Evening Shade." After he won a Tony for his role as Big Daddy in Broadway's revival of Tennessee Williams' "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" that year, Durning says, "I waited for the phone to ring. Burt Reynolds was the only one who called. He said, `I'd like you in this sitcom with me.' "
When Durning read Christopher Koch's script for "Normandy: the Great Crusade," he says, "He nailed what the whole time was for me. I was very impressed with what he had written and moved by some of it. I don't think you can describe it adequately. No one can.
"By the end of the first day Utah Beach had 250 casualties on land and Omaha 9,000. The Germans had 10,000.
"There's not a day goes by I don't think about it. I can't talk about it. I don't even talk to my children about it. Certain things in our lives we can't share.
"Early on, I tried talking a little bit. People are bored and don't believe you. It sounds like whining."
He still has nightmares, Durning says. "I have a nightmare that I can't remember when I wake up. My wife wakes me because I'm carrying on so. I don't want to remember. I don't know what else it would be but the war."
Durning and his first wife were divorced when their three children were small. He has been married to his second wife, Mary Ann, for 20 years. "I'm Irish. She's Italian," He says, "We both scream a lot. She doesn't let me be temperamental. I give her the, `Do you know who I am?' routine. She says, `Yes and I don't care. Take out the garbage. Now."'
Durning's father, born in Ireland, joined the Army to gain U.S. citizenship. During World War I, he lost a leg. He bore a bayonet scar from left wrist to elbow and died of effects of mustard gas poisoning when Durning was 12. Durning and his three brothers were in the Marines, Navy, Army and Air Corps in World War II.
After the war, Durning went to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, where Jason Robards, Colleen Dewhurst and Grace Kelly were students.
"I was kicked out," he says. "The school said I had no talent, take a hike. I resented that a long, long time. I made a living dancing. I worked with Harriett Ann Gray, who was with Jose Limon many years and formed her own modern dance troupe. I did work with Louis Horst and Doris Humphrey."
Then Durning began getting jobs off-Broadway and in live TV plays. "I worked with gems and didn't know it," he says. "I had a high school education and no knowledge of great playwrights. They were just plays to me. If I had known, I probably wouldn't have tried to do it.
"I took up reading to learn more. Everything is related to acting for me. There is nothing I experience in life or reading that I don't apply to acting in some way."
In 1964, a week before his scheduled Broadway debut - as a priest in "Fiddler on the Roof" - his part was written out. "Zero (Mostel) and I became friends. He tried to get me another role, selling sewing machines. That didn't work.
"I was devastated. My wife was pregnant. I was out of a job. Joe Papp said, `No you're not. Come down Monday.' By the time `Fiddler' finished I had done 35 plays for Joe."
Durning worked 11 years for producer Joe Papp at the Public Theater off-Broadway. He calls it "my joyous time," where he learned to act by acting. Twenty-two of the plays he was in, usually playing clowns, were by Shakespeare.
"I said, `I want to play other than clowns.' He said, `You're here to serve our needs. We're not here to serve yours.' When `That Championship Season' came along, Joe said, `I've got the part that's going to make you a star.' "
While Durning was in that play he was offered the role of a corrupt cop in the 1973 movie, "The Sting," with Robert Redford and Paul Newman.
"I go to Joe. He said, `Go make some money and come back.' I said, `If you give me 50 grand a year I'll stay here the rest of my life.' He said, `I can't afford it.'
"I never came back. They kept offering me movies."
by CNB