So I just worked my way up, and worked at a talent agency, representing writers and directors for 5-6 years, and then hung up my shingle and said: “I am a producer, who wants to work with me?”. After that I spent 2 years struggling without having anything going, and finally people that I was a round a few years before started to come to me saying let’s try to do this. It was young people; we started with a lot of innocence, thinking we were going to set the world on fire…

Why did you choose to become a producer instead of an actor?
Because I am a shitty actor. I had my 1st acting job recently. My friend Wes Anderson, I produced 3 of his films, he did the American Express commercial, and I played Barry, the movie producer. I even could not do that very well.

What is the movie that was the most difficult for you to produce?
Definitely “Munich” was difficult to produce. It was a film based on a real tragedy. There were families of assassination victims on both sides, Palestinians, and families of the athletes in Munich. So it was very difficult to give tributes to those people and give them the dignity they deserved to follow the needs of the movie to entertain the audience

Which movie that you have made gives you the most satisfaction?Probably “The sixth Sense”.

When you make a film you have a lot of goals, you have a kind of dream about what the film can be and it always end up different from what is originally on paper, because when you add actors, cinematographers, music, and all the different elements that go into it, it ends up being different.

It is like a child and the expectation about what it is going to be like, you get to know it when it is young but still keep surprising you and coming out differently. The Sixth Sense just was the most fully realized version of what we intended and there was a magic that happened between the film and the audience that just made the experience very special.

You are an avid tennis player, when did you start to play tennis?
I started playing tennis when I was around 12 but really I loved playing baseball and I was good. I am a true right and batted lefty, and parents where playing tennis a bit, and because batting lefty is similar to a 2 handed backhand, all of a sudden my 1st time on the court I hit huge backhands. So I thought maybe I am a natural. Well it turned out that I could not really hit the forehand. They always say, ‘If you win the 1st time in Vegas then you will be hooked for life”. I played then for a couple years and I was too into my music. I picked it up again as an adult just to keep me in shape, and I got into it big time around 2000 where I wanted to play all the time.

Are you a baseliner or a serve and volley player?
I can’t say I am a baseliner or a serve and volley player as you have to build everything but I ended up being on the baseline and playing too defensive, and my best play is when I am aggressive, but I do not do it enough

Do you still participate in marathons?
No, I had to stop due to an injury, I have not done 1 in 7 years, but if I have time and train again, I would for sure do it again, it is a lot of fun.

Who is your favorite Player?
Male & Female ? I always loved Sebastian Grosjean. He got style, I am 5-8 5-9, he is a short guy too and he can make people pay, I love the way he plays. He has the kind of touch I will never have, and I just envy. I don’t have one right one. I like the underdogs, so I will say Martina Hingis because she is making a comeback and she is overmatched, she does not have the power, but try to use her brain. I like also Safin, I think he is an unbelievably cool guy.

How do you see the evolution of the game and do you think Roger Federer is the greatest player ever?
I think Federer is the greatest player ever because training techniques and the game evolves and gets better and better. I do not know if you would turn back time and put him against Pete Sampras, or Rod Laver. Whether he would be better, but players are better now than they used to be and so he is incredible to watch and makes the game looks so easy. I feel that the net game could comeback in the Men’s game followed by the women’s game.

What about adding a coach on the court , do you think it will make a difference?
I have mixed feelings about adding a coach on the court. I enjoyed watching it in college tennis but the element of the player out there alone trying to figure it out on the professional tour is one of the psychologically compelling things about the game. So if on court coaching comes in, I would miss that element of it

When you travel to different countries for shooting, do you keep yourself in shape through tennis?
Always, one of the best things about my work is I have friends now in Sydney, Malta, Hungary, England, Italy, Rome, all over the world, New York, Florida, Philadelphia, those people I played with became my friends. I played in a bubble Italy one time from 10:00 PM at night until 11:30 PM and I could not have more fun than that

The Royal Tenenbaums, I really liked this movie. Tell me who came up with the idea of having a tennis player (Borg) in the movie?
Ritchie Tenenbaums was the 1st character that Wes Anderson came up with. When he 1st talked to me about the movie, he has not figured it out that it was a family or anything else. He only had 1 scene, this character, Ritchie Tenenbaums is in the looker room before the finals of the US nationals (he likes to make up names), and is having a nervous breakdown in the locker room. That was the 1st building block. The meltdown scene was always very close to Wes Anderson’s heart, and because I know something about tennis I had Wes watch matches Jimmy Connors begins to fight afterwards and his bodyguard had to restrain him, or I had him watch Martina Hingis meltdown at the French Open. We totally enjoyed it and we loved getting the permission of West Side Forest Hills where the US Open used to be and then when he saw the court he was like, we got to do this grass. I had to do a lot of research to see if we could get the grass but we ended up using Astroturf. We got the crew out there to paint the yellow on the grass so it looked warm. What were awesome were me and my friend Amy, going out there on the weekends when we were not shooting, we just played Stadium court all the time. We were paying a lot of money to the club and the club was nice enough to let us use the courts to play.

Did you help train the tennis character Luke Wilson in the Movie?
I trained Luke, we went out most days for about a month before shooting, you know, he did not have a backhand and serve, had a good backhand but was bored with my instruction. So we just played sets, and my goal was to not give him a game. At some point he told me “At some point I am going to win a game, not today but at some point !”

Why tennis movies are not really making a hit in Hollywood compared to other sports featured movies?
I hate every moment of tennis in every movie I have every seen. They never had a good tennis movie. I am friends with the people that produced and acted in “Wimbledon”, but there were not good tennis players. You watch match point and you just cringe. Everything seems so fake. I have seen some good documentaries, like our mutual friend… Mark Keil. ‘The Man Who beat Pete Sampras” is an awesome film about tennis. I saw another one on the women’s tour, with an American girl of East Asian decent that was also good. There have been good films, one of the Van Patten's I heard had a movie called “Tie Break”. I have not seen it, I will check it out. Subject matter is very interesting to me but I love drama and the story itself, and I love sport movies, especially when I watch Rudy, and all the others, The Longest Yard, Invincible…but I would love to make a big sports movie and if it were about tennis, then it would be even greater.

There have been a lot of controversy for the movie " Munich", a movie you produced in 2005, directed by Steven Spielberg. The movie got 5 nominations, for best picture, best director, best writing/screenplay, best achievement in editing, and best achievement in original score. In the end no Oscars, what do you think went wrong?
I am a member of the Academy and we vote for all sorts of reasons. Most of the People who are voting for the Oscars are still acting in the film industry and sometimes they can think: “If I vote for him, then he will be much more expensive”, or “I really like this person and I want more people to see his movie”, or this year Martin Scorsese will probably tell you that this is not his best film, but this is the film he won an Oscar for, so there is a lot of uncertainty whether the film I am working for will get an Oscar or not.

But Munich got 5 nominations and has not gotten one Oscar, do you think Politics is involved?
It is not politics, it is just the strange reasons that people place their vote for things. I started to make a list of all the great movies that did not get an Oscar nomination. Ingrid Bergman in “Casablanca”. I remember Bill Murray, who was the star of my 1st film, got every critics award possible, and when came the Oscars, he was not even nominated. He was not upset about it and I asked him why? He answered me by saying “ I do not live in L.A, I just sit home and watch it on TV, I look at all those people with that look in their eyes, and tell myself God help me if I ever won it, it would be the end of myself as I want to be. And that was very cool to hear and very inspiring and something I try to live up too.

How was it to work with Spielberg?
He is a very inspiring person, he is very positive, has 100 ideas a day and is like a fountain, and also the job of his team around him to help keep him inspired and coming up with ideas. He is very good at what he does, a very serious filmmaker. For a director it is very important to meet the schedule. You have a list of things you got to shoot everyday and if you feel you are going to make the day, you know you have got the main parts of the scene you are supposed to shoot, you know the last scenes you slow down a little bit because you pushed the crew really hard, but Spielberg tries to work as fast at the end of the day than at the beginning of the day, the last day of the shoot he is trying to work as hard than at the 1st day of the shoot. He is like this basketball or football team that just drives the stake through the hard of it and just kills it and never never lets up. It was kind of cool to see that. I learn with Spielberg a lot of film lessons but also life lessons

Do you like to speak out about your politics beliefs?
True story telling I do not think I am a bit too shy to do public speaking about politics. I have been involved in politics a few times in my life and I found it that film is in a mass medium and I felt Munich is the best Political statement that I ever made and I have other stories that politically oriented that I am interested in telling as well.

Where do you think America is today and the rest of the world?
When I leave America and work overseas, I learn more about America than I do living over here. I am embarrassed by our policies since 911. I think 911 was a huge opportunity. The world was united in condemning this form of negotiation. It is rare for the world to agree about anything ever and we had that moment. A great leader, Martin Luther King, Gandhi, even Churchill could have seized that moment to bring the world together. And unfortunately we chose to kill more people in Afghanistan by far than died in the World Trade Center more innocent people. It just made the world a more fear driven divided place. America is the aggressor and has failed to live up to his ideas. It is very discouraging and it is very difficult inside America. When you see an election you see Blue States and Red States and since I have been around and thinking about politics, people have become less changeable. It is very rare for someone who thinks that Bush is a great President to change his or her mind and think about it is very rare for a Democrat who thinks Bush is anything but an idiot. There is no middle ground any more people are totally separated. Elections seems to be decided now by “Is there going to be a Ralf Nader or Ross Perot who are going to steal votes from the Democrats and give it back to the Republicans, or is there something particularly bad and scandalous that happened that is not really relevant, and that is going to tip very few undecided voters one way or the other. It is very discouraging and you feel powerless in terms of your vote to change very much because everything seems to be set on stone. It is quite scary to see us so aggressive and fomenting so much hate in the world, and so much anti-American feeling. Post World War II and before Vietman, America was the place of freedom, the Kennedy era to bring the world together. We had the Cold War, but obviously now things have gotten much worse.

What are your current and future projects?
I am going to do this movie with Mr Night Shyamalan. We are going to shoot in Philadelphia this summer. We did the Sixth Sense and Unbreakable ( “Incassable” in French, a much cooler title). Yap it is going to come out the same day around the world, June 2008. It is my first time opening worldwide and it is going to be super super exciting. But I have other stories I am interested in telling, such as a movie about the last week of Dr Martin Luther King’s life, a movie about Hiroshima, these are my political movies. I have also a love story about the application of the Duke of Windsor, King Edward the Eight who stepped down from the Throne to marry a divorced American woman. It just takes a long time to get all those stories together

You are a New Yorker, any chances to see you at the US Open this year?
It is possible that I come this year as we will be shooting in Philadelphia, right during the open. So I might pop up for a weekend. I used to go as a Kid. I used to watch Vilas, and the great things at the open you get so close to the players.

A quick look back at the Oscars this year, any comments?
I thought Medley with the sound effects was awesome. I voted for that little girl Abigail for best supporting actress in Little Miss Sunshine, and I am finally happy that Martin Scorsese won finally an Oscar. I don’t know I am not into the Oscars. I definitely want to be nominated again to get recognition so the movie can be remembered in the history in a good way but I feel there is an obsession in Hollywood about it that you got to have an Oscar to be recognized by the Academy but I feel it is a terrible and dangerous approach. You have to make the film because you love the film and whatever happens happens. But I have to say I am not so into the Oscars but I respect tough.

Forest Whitaker got best Actor, have you seen the movie the King of Scotland?
I think Forest was great. I thought also Mc Avoy the Scottish guy was absolutely great too. It is a really great movie, directed by a friend of mine Kevin Mc Donell. Jillian Anderson is also a friend of mine in the movie and did great also and is not just the one of the X Files girls anymore. Forest gave a great performance and it is surprising, because he is such a quiet man, when you see his performances in Ghost Stars and other movies, he looks like a gentle soul, and when you see this performance coming out of him, that’s what he is all about, he was awesome. I was happy he won. It is nice to see people getting their moment. I hope I never get an Oscar because I don’t think I can come out on stage and make the speech.

Barry, I hope one of your future movies will get one or more Oscars, and also hope that ITM will get another interview with you, this time on film! The Team at ITM wants to thank you for doing this interview. Good luck for your next movie and all your other projects.
Thanks Ronald, I will be faithful to International Tennis Magazine and will check it out as much as I can!