‘Barbara Walters Special’: An Oscar-Night Tradition

Warren Beatty, with the demeanor of an innocent man being led to the gallows, approached Arnold Schwarzenegger at a wedding not long ago. As Barbara Walters tells the story, Beatty, a media recluse who had not done a one-on-one TV interview in more than a dozen years, was beginning to feel a sense of doom about his impending session with Walters.

“Have you done it yet?” Beatty asked Schwarzenegger earnestly. “What did she ask you?”

With his interview scheduled for the next week, Schwarzenegger decided to have some fun. He said to Beatty, “The first thing that she asked me was, ‘Of all your women, which one was the best?’ ”

Beatty grew nervous and concerned. “She did? “ he said.

Schwarzenegger said, “Yeah. And the second question was, ‘How much money do you have?’ They must have some great researchers, Warren. Because she knew how much money I had, right down to the penny.”

Walters laughed nervously, recounting the incident that was told to her by Schwarzenegger. The TV interviewer, like an experienced big-game hunter, has built her larger-than-life reputation on bagging the most elusive celebrities and political figures, and Schwarzenegger’s practical joke could have cost her one of her greatest trophies to date--an interview with the tight-lipped Beatty.

“The Barbara Walters Special,” an Academy Awards night tradition that airs Monday on ABC (Channels 7, 3, 10, 42) immediately following the Oscar ceremony, features three of Hollywood’s blockbuster movie stars--Beatty, Schwarzenegger and Chevy Chase.

Chase headlined the surprise $70-million holiday hit, “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.” Schwarzenegger and Beatty, meanwhile, are sitting on two of this summer’s potentially biggest films. Schwarzenegger stars in “Total Recall,” a reported $60-million science-fiction epic, and Beatty produces, directs and stars in a film version of the comic strip “Dick Tracy,” co-starring Madonna.

This wasn’t the first time around for Walters and Beatty. About 20 years earlier, she interviewed him on NBC’s morning show “Today.” She abruptly cut to a commercial in the middle of the segment because Beatty’s responses were so nervous and halting. She calls it her worst interview ever.

“We both talked about that and laughed,” said Walters, sitting in her Century City office overlooking Los Angeles, where she recently took a breather from her cross-country schedule--she maintains homes in New York City and Bel-Air.

“Warren remembers the interview even better than I do,” she continued. “He reminds me of an artist who paints a picture and wants to stay silent and let people make their own interpretations of the work. He always felt interviews got in the way of the film, which is totally different from Schwarzenegger, who markets and packages himself like a product to sell his films. Now Beatty wants to step out.”

And what better place to step out than on a Barbara Walters special. If all the world’s a stage, then Walters has the best seat in the house. A parade of top celebrities, world leaders, royalty, business tycoons and professional athletes have all faced her. Over the years, she has fostered a safe and familiar haven where superstars emerge as ordinary people.

“This is a place where they can tell it like it is,” Walters said. “Their words are not going to be distorted. They’re not sitting there thinking, ‘Is this going to be a hostile interview?’ So much of today’s journalism is tearing down. You know, ‘If we can’t make a mean piece, than we’re not going to make it.’ So I think, in that sense, they feel safe.

Chase apparently felt safe enough in his interview with Walters to admit publicly for the first time that he left “Saturday Night” too soon, that he always regretted leaving when he did and that he’s been in a professional slump until now.

“There are a lot of people who turn us down because it feels too safe,” Walters added, “as if I have some Svengali power to make them say something they don’t want to say.”

Ever since she became the nation’s first female evening news anchor, when she accepted ABC’s now-famous $1-million offer to join ABC News in 1976, Walters has been churning out at least three celebrity specials a year. Their popularity is generally reflected in their strong ratings. Walters is a hands-on reporter, personally involved in every phase of her interviews--sometimes even in the interview itself. For Monday’s special, she joined Schwarzenegger for a light workout at the World Gym in Venice.

“Doing the specials, I think, have made me far better known to the country,” Walters said slowly. “They may have made me more human. But they also made me more open to ridicule, because they’re easy to make fun of.”

Walter’s hard-edged interviews are reserved for the ABC news program “20/20,” where this season the veteran reporter has faced former President Ronald Reagan and his wife, Nancy; Pete Rose, Lech Walesa, Ted Turner, Vaclav Havel and NBC competitor Bryant Gumbel.

“The specials have taken away from the hard news interviews that I do,” Walters said. “If I just did ‘20/20,’ I would be regarded in a different way. News is kind of a rarefied world. There are certain rules and regulations you’re supposed to follow. Doing ‘20/20’ has allowed me to keep up my news credentials.”

Walters says that, unlike many of the celebrities she interviews, her public life is much more exciting than her private life. Still, Walters’ ABC contract lapses next year, and she already is looking to a day when she can slow down and spend more time with her husband, studio executive Merv Adelson.

“I don’t know how much longer I’ll be doing these specials, truthfully,” Walters said. “I don’t know how many more new stars there are. Each year I think, ‘Now, this is it. I mean, we’ve done everybody. There’s really nobody else to do.’ And then along comes a Roseanne Barr or a Tom Cruise. And you say, ‘Well, OK, one more year.”’