[cont'd]
DALAI LAMA: Yeah, but they fucked me on the residuals. I mean, Scorsese...I respect his work but if I ever meet him again I'll rip his fucking throat out, that's all. And that shlub they got to play me...I ask you, do I look like that?
ROLLING STONE: Who did you want to play you?
DALAI LAMA: Jackie Chan, man. He kicks ass. And Chan was supposed to be doing it, but he wouldn't shave his head, and his agent was like, I have to protect my client and blah blah and they were suing us at one point, it was a mishegas. Just...Hollywood shit, you know, it's fucking fairyland.
ROLLING STONE: You have a lot of prominent supporters in Hollywood.
DALAI LAMA: Yeah, you know, there's some good people, but it's...one minute they love you, the next you're Mr. Yesterday, you know, it's like bam bam bam, when's the next act coming into town, I mean what is it now, it's the Kaballah, right? They're all with this Kaballah shit now. What is that, fucking numbers? Jesus, numbers, is that any basis for a religion...what do they, work out God's telephone number...You know, you get some fucking, uh, autistic number-cruncher like Russell played in that film
ROLLING STONE: A Beautiful Mind ?
DALAI LAMA: Precisely, and he, you know...'Oh God, right, that's fucking 435,876,542, that's God'
ROLLING STONE: That was the theme of the film Pi
DALAI LAMA: Oh? I never saw that. But see, there you go, that's where it's at, it's Kabbalah films now, you know, you'll see a whole raft of them coming through, you know, you're gonna see Kabbalah detectives or whatever, or, or martial arts guys killing people with with, with, numbers, Kabbalah moves, and at one point it was the Amish who were hot, and you had Witness, because Harrison Ford, he was deeply into that whole trip, the carpentry, the whole Hollywood hierarchy at that time in fact were living like Amish...I remember about that time my TV blew up and I went round to Spielberg's to watch his set, and he was like, No, we don't do that any more, and what he had in place of a television was a little wooden box, like a toy theatre, with some schmuck standing at the back working marionettes, and that was it, the TV, that was the evening's entertainment, and I'm like, Jesus, this is fucked up...there were sturdy blond fuckers raising barns all over town, and they chased all the hookers out, it was a bad time... And then Buddhism was it for a while, and now the Kabbalah, these people are fickle. And next it'll be, I dunno, Hinduism maybe, or the fucking Orange Lodge or something, or Mormonism...all it takes, how it works, you convert two guys at the top of the tree, two or three of the top-feeders, and it filters down...and the next thing you know, we could be seeing, you know, Julia Roberts with a fucking dot on her head, or Schwarzenegger as an Orangeman whacking the crap out of Catholics, or Leonardo Di Caprio starring in a Mormon romantic comedy. [Laughs] Seven Brides For One Brother. But that's just...I'm just a jealous has-been, you know, don't take my word for it.
ROLLING STONE: You spoke of Russell, presumably Crowe. Are you really on first-name terms?
DALAI LAMA: Sure, we hang out, go bowling, hunt yaks together, he's, you know, he's a regular guy. He's a guy, that, you know, if I got in a fight with my old lady, or my bike got impounded or something, I can call him up and he's there for me. He's probably the guy that I have the most time for in that whole scene, because he's a man's man, you know, and he has a certain...he's there for me but he won't take any shit from me. Most people I can con or bully, and that's bad for me, but with Russell he won't take it. You know I'll say something whiny or self-pitying or I'll try and pull some ego-trip, and he'll just punch me in the face and knock me on my ass and say, 'Snap out of it.' And I need that, that's what buddies do for each other. I need people to stand up to me.
He's a good guy. In fact we...I don't want to jinx this, but we're trying to get something together, the two of us, where we would really put our relationship on screen and the public would see a whole different side to us, and if we can get it together it would be a blast. It would be a comedy thriller, okay, and me and Russell play cops, partners, and it would be a whole Lethal Weapon thing, except Russell would be the mild cop and I'm the one that's out there. You know he's this meek, buttoned-down, by-the-book rookie in glasses, and I'm out there pounding faces and kicking ass. And, you know, he's yah-yah-yah I'm gonna tell the captain, and I get him to loosen up, and I get him laid, and I really fuck with him. We think it could be funny. And there's this great scene where we're on a runaway tram and it crashes through the wall of the dormitory of a girls' college, and all the girls are running around in their underwear screaming, and Russell's like 'What do we do?' and I say, 'Don't just stand there, wade in and grab a piece.' I really hope we can get the financing.
ROLLING STONE: If we could talk about Madonna briefly.
DALAI LAMA: Just good friends, man. [Grins] I banged her a couple of times, natch.
ROLLING STONE: If you could sum up your philosophy in one sentence?
DALAI LAMA: Live fast, die young, come back as a cougar.