Video: Michael Crichton on 'Jurassic Park' – Today show 1990

Here's an interview with Michael Crichton from the Today show on November 16, 1990:



Many Thanks to Alec Riker for bringing this to my attention!

1983 Michael Crichton Interview - The Coming Computer Revolution

Michael Crichton discussing his book Electronic Life on the Merv Griffin Show in 1983:



Many thanks to the reader who brought this to my attention!

Michael Crichton News - 8/9/11

Spielberg Confirms Jurassic Park IV Film

It’s been reported that on July 22 at the 2011 San Diego Comic-Con, Steven Spielberg confirmed that a fourth Jurassic Park film will be made. Spielberg said, "We have a story, we have a writer who is writing the treatment and hopefully we are going to make 'Jurassic Park 4' in all of our foreseeable futures.”

Spielberg was responding to a question during a panel discussion. His remarks can be seen on this video – the question and Spielberg’s answer begin at [5:45].


New Book - Conversations with Michael Crichton



Conversations with Michael Crichton, a collection of 19 interviews with the author, was published in June by the University Press of Mississippi as part of their Literary Conversations Series. The interviews, which are from various sources, range in date from 1969 to 2005. An in-depth review of the book will be posted soon.

What Michael Crichton Said About Micro

Michael Crichton was reticent about whatever project he was currently writing. In a 1997 online discussion he said, “I never discuss what I am working on until it is done. It's a superstition of mine. Many writers share it.”

Prior to a Crichton book release, the only information readers usually had was the description provided by the publisher. (Speculation abounded, but that was part of the fun.)

After a book’s release, Crichton would give many interviews, and that is something I missed very much when Pirate Latitudes was published.

Now we’re awaiting the November 22 release of Micro, the technothriller Crichton was working on when he died, completed by science writer Richard Preston. Publisher HarperCollins has described the novel as "a high concept thriller in the vein of Jurassic Park."

HarperCollins isn’t just trying to market Micro by associating it with Crichton’s most popular work. Crichton himself made the connection in two interviews.

From a December 2006 interview with the Sunday Times:

As far as his next books are concerned, it's time to lighten up. "I've decided to do something that's just fun to do. I think I'm always concerned about becoming a scold. I'll just do something closer to Jurassic Park."

And in the March 2007 interview “Seven Answers From Michael Crichton” when asked what he was working on now, Crichton replied:

“An adventure story like Jurassic Park. I'm enjoying myself.”

In addition, we have valuable information from a Harper Collins press release:

In an unfinished introduction to MICRO, [Crichton] wrote, "Perhaps the single most important lesson to be learned by direct experience is that the natural world, with all its elements and interconnections, represents a complex system and therefore we cannot understand it and we cannot predict its behavior...Interacting with the natural world, we are denied certainty. And always will be."

To better understand the meaning of Crichton’s words, it is useful to examine what he said in his June 2008 radio interview with Dennis Miller. (This was the last interview Michael Crichton gave, so far as I have been able to discover.)

Miller asked about the topic of his forthcoming book, and Crichton said:

“The last few books have shown me how many people really don’t have good information about the environment. So I thought I’d try and write a book that wouldn’t rile everybody up but would be informative in a way that would be fun, and would give them some information about how our environment really is structured.” (Part 1 at 9:07)

Now let’s take a closer look at what Crichton wrote in his unfinished intro to Micro.

“…the single most important lesson to be learned by direct experience…”

Crichton’s autobiography Travels contains a chapter titled “Direct Experience” where he writes:

“One of the most difficult features of direct experience is that it is unfiltered by any theories and expectations. It’s hard to observe without imposing a theory to explain what we’re seeing, but the trouble with theories, as Einstein said, is that they explain not only what is observed, but what can be observed. We start to build expectations based on our theories. And often those expectations get in the way.” (p. 351)

“…the natural world, with all its elements and interconnections, represents a complex system, therefore we cannot understand it and we cannot predict its behavior.”

Crichton addressed this topic in a November 2005 speech:

We live in a world of complex systems. The environment is a complex system. The government is a complex system. Financial markets are complex systems. The human mind is a complex system. Most minds anyway.

By a complex system, I mean one in which the elements of the system interact among themselves such that any modification we make to the system will produce results that we can’t predict in advance.

In addition, a complex system is sensitive to initial conditions. You can get one result from it on one day, but the identical interaction the next day will yield a different result. We cannot know with certainty how the system will respond.

Third, when we do something to a complex system, we may get downstream consequences that emerge weeks or even years later. We have to be watchful for delayed and untoward consequences.

“Interacting with the natural world, we are denied certainty. And always will be."

Crichton wrote of this issue in his Author's Message from State of Fear:

“We know astonishingly little about every aspect of the environment, from its past history, to its present state, to how to conserve and protect it. In every debate, all sides overstate the extent of existing knowledge and its degree of certainty….I am certain there is too much certainty in the world.”

So will Micro create the controversy that State of Fear did? Will Crichton’s views on the environment come through clearly in the novel? With great anticipation, we wait and watch.

Michael Crichton Speech Videos

Just found some of Michael Crichton’s speeches and public appearances online.

National Press Club - November 28, 2006
Crichton discusses some of the issues raised in his novel Next.

Students and Leaders - March 16, 2005
Crichton takes questions from students at Cleveland High School in Reseda, California.

Science Policy in the 21st Century - January 25, 2005

National Press Club - April 6, 1993
This was Crichton’s famous Mediasaurus speech. In May 2008, Slate declared Michael Crichton Vindicated in his predictions for the media. The article by Jack Shafer was based on an email interview.

Michael Crichton on Futuristic Sci-Fi

I made a marvelous discover recently. The 1984 book Omni’s Screen Flights/Screen Fantasies: The Future According to Science Fiction Cinema contains a nine-page section titled “When Men and Machines Go Wrong: An Interview with Michael Crichton by Danny Peary”. (pp.250-259)

Peary asked Crichton why his science fiction works are set in contemporary times, rather than far in the future. Peary said:

“Your films and novels are fairly cautionary. Perhaps if you set them in the future they’d have to be more pessimistic…”

Crichton replied:

“…Futuristic science fiction tends to be pessimistic. If you imagine a future that’s wonderful, you don’t have a story. There has to be some kind of conflict. Someone once said something I believe is true: If you live in the past, you’re depressed and if you live in the future, you’re anxious, so the only way to feel okay is to live in the present.” (p. 250)

I don’t think Crichton was as interested in predicting the future (though he certainly did numerous times), as he was in examining the present. The farther in the future a story is set, the less real it feels to us, and the less we connect it to our own times, beliefs, and actions. Crichton’s work does not allow us to escape far into the future; it keeps our feet on the present ground so we can question, analyze, and hopefully understand where we are now. And, more importantly, where we might be heading.

Michael Crichton Appearance on Larry King Live

This week Larry King retired after hosting his CNN show Larry King Live for 25 years.

Michael Crichton appeared on the program on September 22, 1995. Here’s one of the many highlights from the transcript (sorry, no link, obtained from Lexis Nexis):

LARRY KING: Do you have a personal favorite?

MICHAEL CRICHTON: Of?

LARRY KING: All your works, everything you've done.

MICHAEL CRICHTON: No.

LARRY KING: Let's say a culture came and said 'Show us something of yours.'

MICHAEL CRICHTON: I think I would show them a book called Travels that was sort of autobiographical.

LARRY KING: The least known of your books, maybe?

MICHAEL CRICHTON: Probably. Yeah.

Crichton was asked a similar question by Charlie Rose:

ROSE: Of all the things you have done, what has brought you the most psychic income, satisfaction?

CRICHTON: Whatever is really difficult.

ROSE: The more difficult, the more pleasure?

CRICHTON: Yes, more -- it was very difficult for me to do a book 20 years ago called "Travels" that was -- because it was about myself and I don’t like to talk about myself.

ROSE: I liked it actually.

CRICHTON: Thank you. And I am trying to do another one.

Travels is by far my favorite of Michael Crichton’s works. As I wrote in an earlier post, Crichton himself, during an online discussion, told me he was working on a sequel. Let’s hope we’ll see that published someday.

Michael Crichton on the Future – Video

Here’s an interesting find on YouTube - a March 1999 interview:

Michael Crichton on the Future [10:47]

Crichton answers the following questions:

“In terms of your medium, what will the future be like?”

“Well, how do you feel about that? Just a sign of the times, or…”

“What about the shift in power from the Media elite to a wider power base?”

“As a parent, what are your hopes for your child and for children generally in the coming years?”

“Have a bit of fun, and make some prediction about the next 100 years…”

There's also a short outtake clip.

Michael Crichton Artwork – Quoted by Joseph Kosuth

Out of the 98 works of art owned by Michael Crichton that were auctioned off at Christie’s this year, there is one that intrigues me.

Quoted by Joseph Kosuth

First of all, the realized price for the work--$813--was something I could have afforded in theory (if not justified in actuality). It would be wonderful to own a work of art that had belonged to Michael Crichton. Perhaps the opportunity will arise again.

The artist, Joseph Kosuth, wrote an essay titled “Artist as Anthropologist”. Michael Crichton received his bachelor’s degree at Harvard in anthropology. He was a visiting lecturer in Anthropology at Cambridge University in1965, before going on to Harvard Medical School.

The art work, a screenprint on transparent wove paper, contains no images, only the following text:

‘Is that a quotation?’ I asked.
‘Of course. Quotations are all we have now. Language is a system of quotations.’
Jorge Luis Borges
The Book of Sand

The recent auction of Crichton’s art collection inspired me to reread both the 1977 and 1994 editions of Crichton’s book on Jasper Johns. In one passage, Crichton quoted Borges:

These questions stand alongside another debate among artists themselves about what is important in a created work. Borges wrote: “The composition of vast books is a laborious and impoverishing extravagance. To go on for five hundred pages developing an idea whose perfect oral expression is possible in a few minutes! A better course of procedure is to pretend that these books already exist, and then to offer a resume, a commentary.” (p. 47, 1977 edition)

The phrase “an idea whose perfect oral expression is possible in a few minutes” reminded me of Crichton’s habit of using quotations at the beginning of his books (and sometimes the sections of books). The proper term for these opening quotations is epigraphs.

Crichton used epigraphs in 27 out of the 31 books he published, starting with Odds On (1966), which he published under the name of John Lange. Two other John Lange novels-- Scratch One (1967) and The Venom Business (1969) lack epigraphs, as does the nonfiction book Electronic Life (1983). The posthumously published novel Pirate Latitudes (2009) does not have an epigraph, or a bibliography, both of which Crichton might have added if he had been able to finish the book himself. From the interview “Michael Crichton: a Career in Three Acts” by David Kipen, Firsts magazine, July/August 1997:

Firsts: Where do you get your epigraphs?

Michael Crichton: I think it originally comes out of an interest in doing nonfiction. There’s more of that tendency to put epigraphs in front of chapters in nonfiction. I was trying to make it, especially in something like The Andromeda Strain, like nonfiction. (p. 52)

Here is a complete list of the epigraphs in Crichton’s books. It’s interesting to note that several of the epigraphs for Crichton’s novels are quotes from fictional characters.

The Andromeda Strain (1969)
“The survival value of human intelligence has never been satisfactorily demonstrated.”
–Jeremy Stone

“Increasing vision is increasingly expensive.”
–R. A. Janek

Five Patients (1970)
“Doctors and nurses are the only people who possibly can alter the conditions of patient care.”
–Paul B. Beeson, M.D.

“Health, as a vast societal enterprise, is too important to be solely the concern of the providers of services.”
–William L. Kissick, M.D.

The Terminal Man (1972)
“I have come to the conclusion that my subjective account of my own motivation is largely mythical on almost all occasions.”
–J.B.S. Haldane

“The wilderness masters the colonist.”
–Frederick Jackson Turner

The Great Train Robbery (1975)
“Satan is glad—when I am bad,
And hopes that I—with him shall lie
In fire and chains—and dreadful pains”
–Victorian child’s poem

“I wanted the money.”
–Edward Pierce, 1856

Eaters of the Dead (1976)
“Praise not the day until evening has come; a woman until she is burnt; a sword until it is tried; a maiden until she is married; ice until it has been crossed; beer until it has been drunk.”
–Viking proverb

“Evil is of old date.”
–Arab proverb

Jasper Johns (1977 and 1994 editions)
“We see, not a change of aspect, but a change of interpretation.”
–Ludwig Wittgenstein

“I am just trying to find a way to make pictures.”
–Jasper Johns

Congo (1980)
“The more experience and insight I obtain into human nature, the more convinced do I become that the greater portion of a man is purely animal.”
–Henry Morton Stanley, 1887

“The large male [gorilla] held my attention….He gave an impression of dignity and restrained power, of absolute certainty in his majestic appearance. I felt a desire to communicate with him….Never before had I had this feeling on meeting an animal. As we watched each other across the valley, I wondered if he recognized the kinship that bound us.”
–George B. Schaller, 1964

Electronic Life (1983)
No epigraphs

Sphere (1987)
“When a scientist views things, he’s not considering the incredible at all.”
–Louis I. Kahn

“You can’t fool nature.”
–Richard Feynman

Travels (1988)
“In self-analysis the danger of incompleteness is particularly great. One is too soon satisfied with a part explanation.”
–Sigmund Freud

“Existence is beyond the power of words to define.”
–Lao-Tzu

“What you see is what you see.”
–Frank Stella

Jurassic Park (1990)
“Reptiles are abhorrent because of their cold body, pale color, cartilaginous skeleton, filthy skin, fierce aspect, calculating eye, offensive smell, harsh voice, squalid habitation, and terrible venom; wherefore their Creator has not exerted his powers to make many of them.”
–Linnaeus, 1797

“You cannot recall a new form of life.”
–Erwin Chargaff, 1972

Rising Sun (1992)
“We are entering a world where the old rules no longer apply.”
–Phillip Sanders

“Business is war.”
–Japanese motto

Disclosure (1994)
“It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer: (1) to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin or (2) to limit, segregate, or classify his employees or applicants for employment in any way which would deprive or tend to deprive any individual of employment opportunities or otherwise adversely affect his status as an employee, because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.”
–Title VII, Civil Rights Act of 1964

“Power is neither male nor female.”
–Katherine Graham

The Lost World (1995)
“What really interests me is whether God had any choice in the creation of the world.”
–Albert Einstein

“Deep in the chaotic regime, slight changes in structure almost always cause vast changes in behavior. Complex controllable behavior seems precluded.”
–Stuart Kauffman

“Sequelae are inherently unpredictable.”
–Ian Malcolm

Airframe (1996)
“The damn things weigh half a million pounds, fly a third of the way around the world, and they carry passengers in greater comfort and safety than any vehicle in the history of mankind. Now, are you fellas really going to stand there and tell us you know how to do the job better? Are you going to pretend you know anything about it at all? ‘Cause it looks to me like you boys are just stirring folks up for your own reasons.”
–Aviation legend Charley Norton, 78, speaking to reporters in 1970 after an airplane crash*

“The irony of the Information Age is that it has given new respectability to uninformed opinion.”
–Veteran reporter John Lawton, 68, speaking to the American Association of Broadcast Journalists in 1995

Timeline (1999)
“All the great empires of the future will be empires of the mind.”
—Winston Churchill, 1953

“If you don’t know history, you don’t know anything.”
–Edward Johnston, 1990

“I’m not interested in the future. I’m interested in the future of the future.”
–Robert Doniger, 1996

Prey (2002)
“Within fifty to a hundred years, a new class of organisms is likely to emerge. These organisms will be artificial in the sense that they will originally be designed by humans. However, they will reproduce, and will ‘evolve’ into something other than their original form; they will be ‘alive’ under any reasonable definition of the word. These organisms will evolve in a fundamentally different manner….The pace…will be extremely rapid….The impact on humanity and the biosphere could be enormous, larger than the industrial revolution, nuclear weapons, or environmental pollution. We must take steps now to shape the emergence of artificial organisms….”
–Doyne Farmer and Alletta Belin, 1992

“There are many people, including myself, who are quite queasy about the consequences of this technology for the future.”
–K. Eric Drexler, 1992

State of Fear (2004)
“There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.”
–Mark Twain

“Within any important issue, there are always aspects no one wishes to discuss.”
–George Orwell

Next (2006)
“The more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless.”
--Steven Weinberg

“The word ‘cause’ is an altar to an unknown god.”
--William James

“What is not possible is not to choose.”
--Jean-Paul Sartre

Pirate Latitudes (2009)
No epigraphs

The Pseudonym Novels:

As Jeffery Hudson:

A Case of Need (1968)
“I will prescribe regimen for the good of my patients, according to my judgment and ability, and never do harm to anyone. To please no one will I prescribe a deadly drug, nor give advice which may cause his death. Nor will I give a woman a pessary to procure abortion. But I will preserve the purity of my life and my art…”
--from the Hippocratic Oath demanded of the young physician about to enter upon the practice of his profession

“There is no moral obligation to conserve DNA.”
--Garrett Hardin

As Michael Douglas (Michael Crichton and Douglas Crichton):

Dealing, or the Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues (1970)
“Most of what my neighbors call good, I am profoundly convinced is evil, and if I repent anything, it is my good conduct that I repent.”
--Thoreau

“When somebody like Timothy Leary comes out and justifies [using drugs], we’ve just got to jump on him with hobnailed boots.”
--Linkletter

“I knew I was going off [hard] drugs when I didn’t like to watch TV.”
--Billie Holliday

As John Lange:

Odds On (1966)
”There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”
--Benjamin Disraeli

Scratch One (1967)
No epigraphs

Easy Go (also published as The Last Tomb ) (1968)
Title page
“What secret was ever kept in Egypt?”
--Howard Carter, discoverer of the tomb of Tutankhamen

Part 1: The Plan
“Everything forbidden is sweet.”
--Arab proverb

Part 2: The Search
“Evil is of old date.”
--Arab proverb

Part 3: The Last Tomb
“…and the idols of Egypt shall be moved…”
--Isaiah 19:1

Zero Cool (1969)
Part I
“Radiologists see things in black and white.”
--D. D. McGowan M.D.

Part II
“The diagnostic skills of the radiologist are significant, but limited.”
--Harold Ellison M.D.

Part III
“Radiologists have the shortest lifespan of all medical specialists.”
--U.S. Bureau of Statistics

The Venom Business (1969)
No epigraphs

Drug of Choice (1970)
Title page
“The beginning of modern science is also the beginning of calamity.”
--Karl Jaspers

“Give me librium or give me meth!”
--Anon.

Part I: Coma
“Shall I tell you what knowledge is? It is to know both what one knows and what one does not know.”
--Confucius

Part II: Eden
“If an urn lacks the characteristics of an urn, how can we call it an urn?”
--Confucius

Part III: Madness
“It is indeed harmful to come under the sway of utterly new and strange doctrines.”
--Confucius

Grave Descend (1970)
Title page
“He is no wise man that will quit a certainty for an uncertainty.”
--Samuel Johnson

Part I: Swift Ship
“Much may be made of a Scotchman, if he be caught young.”
--Samuel Johnson

Part II: Dark Swamp
“Being in a ship is being in jail, with the chance of being drowned.”
--Samuel Johnson

Part III: White Money
“It is better to live rich than to die rich.”
--Samuel Johnson

Binary (1972)
“Binary: any system composed of two interacting elements. As in binary stars, binary numbers, binary gases, etc.”

“Chemical agents lend themselves to covert use in sabotage against which it is exceedingly difficult to visualize any really effective defense…I will not dwell upon this use of CBW because as one pursues the possibilities of such covert uses, one discovers that the scenarios resemble that in which the components of a nuclear weapon are smuggled into New York City and assembled in the basement of the Empire State Building.

In other words, once the possibility is recognized to exist, about all that one can do is worry about it.”
--Dr. Ivan L. Bennett, Jr., testifying before the Subcommittee on National Security Policy and Scientific Developments, November 20, 1969


Links and more info on Michael Crichton at:
Kahlessa's Corner

Interview – “Travels of Michael Crichton”

I just discovered these amazing articles on Michael Crichton. Janet Berliner interviewed Michael Crichton for a week in December 1993. She has recently posted these articles about the interviews. There are many great quotes from Michael Crichton that I’ve never read before. This is such a treat! A huge “Thank You” to Janet Berliner!

Crichton Author’s Note
By Janet Berliner, February 26th, 2009

On Writing and Influences: A Snippet from Crichton on Crichton
By Janet Berliner, February 26th, 2010

The Travels of Michael Crichton
By Janet Berliner, March 26th, 2010

Links and more info on Michael Crichton at:
Kahlessa's Corner

Michael Crichton on Civility in Discussions

In November 2005 I was fortunate enough to participate in a Barnes & Noble online discussion with Michael Crichton on his novel State of Fear. Most of those participating were civil, though one man, “Adam”, seemed to have joined up just to get in Crichton’s face. The moderator dealt with him as best he could and finally Michael Crichton posted this:

Adam, debate---including spirited debate--- is enjoyable, interesting and informative. It sometimes even changes peoples' minds.

But you have to be open to it, you have to be courteous, and you have to be careful about sarcasm and snottiness.

And especially you have to be mindful, as Mill observed, to state your opponents' views correctly and with care.

You don't.

So there's no discussion possible with you.

Crichton’s advice should be heeded by those on both sides of the political aisle.

Links and more info on Michael Crichton at:
http://kahlessa.proboards80.com/index.cgi

Michael Crichton and 9/11

In an August 7, 2003 interview “Michael Crichton: You Ask The Questions” in the British newspaper The Independent, Crichton was asked:

Your novel Airframe is about an investigation of an air disaster. What effect did the September 11 attacks have on you?

Michael Crichton replied:

I was on an American Airlines flight that left New York for Los Angeles at 8am on September 11. Our plane was ordered down in Indianapolis - we weren't told why, and we knew nothing of what had happened. While we were taxiing to the gate, I called my office in California to tell them I would be arriving late. Everybody was in tears. They thought I was dead. The news hadn't by then identified which 8am flights had been hijacked.

Michael Crichton Playboy Interview Now Online

In January 1999 Playboy magazine published a lengthy interview with Michael Crichton. I had obtained a photocopy from a university library, but the interview has become available online only recently.

Playboy Interview - Michael Crichton - January 1999

Links and more info on Michael Crichton at:
http://kahlessa.proboards80.com/index.cgi

Michael Crichton on His Epitaph

Here’s something that brought a lump to my throat. On Amazon, there’s a short interview with Michael Crichton:

Michael Crichton – Significant Seven
(scroll down)

Here are two of Michael’s answers:

Amazon: If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?
Michael Crichton: I don't want an epitaph. If forced, I would say "Why Are You Here? Go Live Your Life."

Amazon: Who is the one person living or dead that you would like to have dinner with?
Michael Crichton: Benjamin Franklin

I like to think that Michael Crichton and Benjamin Franklin are having a high old time right now.


Links and more info on Michael Crichton at:
http://kahlessa.proboards80.com/index.cgi

Michael Crichton's Last Interview - Dennis Miller

Michael Crichton was on Dennis Miller's radio show on June 18, 2008. It's available on Crichton's website:
http://www.crichton-official.com/video-dennismiller.html

It's a brief interview but Crichton talked about State of Fear and Al Gore. Who knew Dennis Miller was a Crichton fan? Miller had some hilarious and intelligent things to say about Crichton's work. I'm so grateful to him for providing the interview. For most of us, it's the last opportunity we had to hear Michael Crichton's voice.


Visit Dennis Miller's Website!


Links and more info on Michael Crichton at:
http://kahlessa.proboards80.com/index.cgi