Actor Griffin Dunne on writing new memoir

We are here at the Aspen Ideas Festival. Our next guest is actor, producer, director Griffin Dunn. He recently published his first book. It is a family memoir. It is titled The Friday Afternoon Club, details his upbringing from New York City to Beverly Hills, his time on screen and behind the scenes, and his family's personal story growing up with larger than life characters. He is one. I called him a character actor before. So I wanted to actually even to start there. Do you like when people call you a character actor? I got to face it. I am a character actor. You know, the life of a a young actor who's not terribly bad looking. You know, you, you enter it as in your, your 20s and you're getting the girl. And then next thing you know, you're the girl's father and then you're the grandfather. You know, I used to play the lawyer. Now I play the judge. So it's life. So tell us about this book, The Friday Afternoon Club. How long did it take to write? What were you trying to do? You, you come from a colorful family. I do, you know, people who have done this before. So how intimidating was that? Well, you know, I'm, I'm from a long line of storytellers and my, my my aunt and uncle are John Gregory Dunn and John Didion and my father was Dominic Dunn, who was a great crime reporter for Vanity Fair. And but are the history of my family always interests me. I grew up on these stories about my outrageous grandparents and great grandparents who did just scandalous, kind of crazy things in their lives. And but in the distance of, of time since, since my most of my immediate family had passed away, I started to recognize how extraordinary they were. You know, how, yeah, we've been through a great deal of of, you know, death and, you know, mental illness and alcoholism. But it's the book is actually very, very funny. It's, it's funny, sad, funny, sad, you know, and one side of my family is Mexican and the other side is Irish. To bring the two over together. The story is about your relationship with Carrie Fisher and all sorts of people from the very beginning. I mean, did you appreciate what when you were growing up, do you think you appreciated the family and the life you were living? Not in the least. I, you know, I grew up in, in, in Beverly Hills. My parents were so social. They gave these extraordinary parties and went to parties that had, you know, Alfred Hitchcock and Jimmy Stewart and Billy Wilder and all these film makers and movie stars that I would appreciate much later on when they were practically dead. And I go, oh, I never got to speak to Billy Wilder about something like that. Hot. So it was just normal to me. But, you know, Carrie Fisher, you know, was my best friend. I met her when she was 15 and I was 16, and we moved to New York together. We were roommates and she was just a struggling actress. She was in the chorus of her mother's show on Broadway. And then she comes home and and says, oh, I got this part in this really stupid movie. It's shooting in England. And I didn't even understand it. And I go, what's it called? And she goes, Star Wars, What's that you 2 words? What's that? And then she called from London and go, Oh, my God, I have two bagels on the side of my head and we have ray guns without triggers and a monkey chases us around. And and then I had, you know, I grew up around famous people, which, you know, as that was just the diet of life. But I'd never seen a best friend overnight explode while I was still a popcorn concessionaire at Radio City Music Hall and a waiter counting my tips. And all of a sudden, she's just this huge movie star. So what was that like for you? It was really it was tough on the ego. You know, we had a we lived in the doorman building and Jimmy the doorman is. Hey, Jimmy. Hey, Griff. Hey, this. And overnight he go. Hello, Mr. Fisher and I went, what are you Jimmy? It's Griffin. You know, everyone, you know, flowers are arriving from rock stars and you know, and I'm still counting my tips and I've got James Taylor and Glenn Frey in my living room. You know, I had to get out. It wasn't my time to five decades later, you have been in how many films total? Oh gosh, have to look, but in summer 60 something. Is there one to you that is like the the one that you hold on to? Well, I mean, the one that that really where all my dreams came true was a movie I produced and that was directed by Martin Scorsese called After Hours. All all, everything I've been working on and toured came together for that movie for sure.