Re: Me & Stevie Spielberg 1972, the real beginning...

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Posted by Ross C. Bubba Nicholson from 207.95.255.190 on August 28, 2000 at 04:07:28:

In Reply to: Me & Stevie Spielberg 1972, the real beginning... posted by Ross C. Bubba Nicholson on August 28, 2000 at 03:44:52:

: Hello, boy am I going to have a hard time.

: There's a lot of skeptical people out there and whenever I talk about the old days, some of you get hot under the collar and call me names. Try not to do that, OK?

: Shesh. Anyway, here's the story:

: In 1972, Little Stevie Spielberg was 24 but looked maybe 17. Well, I was 18 and we two were the last two McGovern campaign volunteers in Texas, or we felt like it. Lemmon Avenue, late July and August of 1972. Steve was only there to chase a girl (his first actually), and his pet name for her was, you guessed it, "INDIANA." That's because she hailed from Muncie Indiana. He'd met her in college somehow, I thought she was somehow related to somebody else in the Dallas office. The building, with no parking, still stands, next to the corner pawn shop. The building now belongs to Ann's family somehow. Ms. Roger's was a neighbor and former sister-in-law once removed who lived on the street behind Ann's. Ann drove a nice little Toyota hatchback, an odd car at the time. Steve didn't have a car, but sometimes drove his girlfriend's old stationwagon. Here's a list of us:

: The Honorable William Jefferson Clinton, President of the United States. (then the future president)
: Mr. Vince Foster (future presidential counsel, deceased)
: Ms. Ann Richards (future governor of Texas)
: Ms. Marybeth Rogers (future chief of staff to governor Richards)
: Ms. Hillary Rodham (future First Lady of the United States, and soon-to-be senator from New York).
: Mr. Stephen Spielberg (actually how you spell Steven's name)
: Mr. Ross C. "Bubba" Nicholson
: and some older guys, some cool African American guy, and some younger kids.
: Occasional area appearances: our ladies: Steve's first: Indiana or "Indy" or Deedee(?) and on the side, Hillary Rodham (just lunch and she paid), and Ellen or "Ele" or Peggy Blanton (talked a lot on the phone, about me and my girlfriend (briefly), Ms. Cheryl "Cherri" "It was not to be, Cherri" Williamson (future pubah of the World Bank)

: OK, so you know everybody but me and the beautiful women, well, Indie wasn't beautiful, but she was attractive enough. Trust me on this point, she was no Amy Irving and dang sure no blond nightclub singer.

: Have you ever noticed that President Clinton often wears an "Indy" Jacket? Well, he used to wear the hat, bigtime. The original, American hat his granddaddie bought in Arkansas for his Uncle with his same initials which are in the back of the original hat used as the model for the English prop-guys to copy. There have to be pictures of it somewhere, Clinton wore it in Russia when he was a free-lance anti-communist terrorist/artifact smuggler during the Viet Nam war. He wore it into the office one day, and wow it looked cool.

: At my confident urging, Clinton, our President Clinton, gave Spielberg a story and descriptions which formed the basis of the Indiana Jones Character. Lucas had absolutely nothing to do with it, but when Raiders came out, Steve needed somebody and hadn't seen Clinton for 8-10 years and had lost all track of him, forgetting his name, and mine, too. Thanks a lot, Steve, you weinie. Clinton was a student at Yale University back then and had met some archeologist on the campus. Plus Clinton had written a story as a youth about his uncle called, "Arkansas Bob and the Aligators". We gave Indiana Jones (almost Smith, but I just loved Jones!) a University of Chicago education because it was a good school and because they'd accepted the young Stephen Spielberg but he hadn't been able to afford to go there. The reason we were helping Steve with stories and such is because he'd been so proud of this awful movie on TV, Duel, about some mad dog road-rage trucker and he'd won a nice cash prize ($25,000), and we were hoping he would make movies the whole family could watch.

: So who am I, right? Look at your copy of the VHS movie, E.T. the extraterrestrial. I'm the "Ross Nicholson" whose name appears on the original concept drawings for the E.T. which you can see in the movie itself. In the scene just before Elliot frees the frogs, his biology teacher picks up a piece of paper from Elliot's school desk. Those are my original concept drawings for the character of E.T. The famous E.T. logo is just my handwriting! Is that weird or what? So find my name before you decide to trash me, ok? Thanks.

: Anyway, Clinton put in the hat, the whip, and I dunno, probably the gun, Clinton was a huge gun nut, everybody brought guns into the office because we had a republican breakin and next time we were gonna bag one, not kill 'em just wing 'em. The original hat had been too big for Spielberg.

Alright, continuing:

Steve asked me for help to define the character of Indiana Jones. "The bag" which I added was a military bag (which is the small bag with web shoulderstrap that Captain John Mueller/Miller wears in Saving Private Ryan) but I was too lazy to bring it in to Steve before. I told him just to find any old bag, Spielberg added the leather strap. I gave him my web belt and plain belt buckle, my dads/older brother's leather jacket (from which they made something else) which looks like the one in the second and third movies. Clinton oblidged Spielberg by wearing my jacket and his own hat all day long one day, which was weird. Clinton had "inherited" all these funny hat moves from his family somehow, and Clinton's wearing the whole outfit was to help Steven Spielberg "get the look right." All this was back in 1972. Spielberg took copious notes in a little notebook with a rubberband around it, which he'd snap, just like he had Indy do in Raiders in the Well of Souls (from a National Geographic Article of the previous decade). Clinton also suggested the "headpieced to the staff of ra" and probably the old guy who could read hieroglyphics. There actually were people in the Nile delta who could speak ancient Egyptian and who were helpful when the Rosetta stone was discovered. I also know for sure that Clinton suggested the warehouse scene at the end of the show, too. Clinton is a gifted guy, anyone would have to admit. I suggested the arc of the covenent and the side trip to NEPAL, where I figured my girlfriend at the time would wind up, with the guy who took her there, dead and her running a bar. The former Miss Cheryl Williamson of Farmers Branch Texas did model for Marian Ravenwood, and her present husband not only took her there, but survived himself. They even hiked into red China through the mountains. So that's how we got Nepal. Her being instrumental and an equal partner was the influcence of Ann Richards talkin'. Ms. Williamson now is a director of the world bank, Harvard law, the whole schpeal. Oh brother.

If you like I'll be glad to post a picture of me in the 1972 jacket, you just gotta tell me how.

Thanks


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