My titillating encounter with the great Debbie Reynolds

In November 1996, while I was free-lancing for NBC affiliate KRRC-TV, I drove to Austin to cover the junket for Albert Brooks’ Mother – and had a brief one-on-one sit-down with Debbie Reynolds. 

Funnily enough, I had asked her a question during a press conference for the very same movie a few weeks earlier at the Toronto Film Festival: “How would you compare working for Albert Brooks to working for Oliver Stone?” (Afterwards, I had to remind more than a few of my quizzical colleagues that she had played a supporting role in Stone’s Heaven & Earth.) And she was very gracious while saying nice things about both gentlemen. 

But in Austin, she displayed — well, a delightfully bawdier side of her character.

As I walked into the hotel suite where the videotaping would take place, Reynolds was talking with the production crew about her… her… well, OK, her breasts. Specifically: She was discussing how she had maintained her figure despite the passing of years — she was 64 at the time, the same age I am now — and the laws of gravity. And she wanted everyone within earshot to know: “I’m very proud of my tits.” When she realized a newcomer had entered the interview zone, she turned her gaze to me, and bluntly asked: “Don’t you think I still have great tits?”

For a second, I thought: “Just how does one respond to a question like that?”

And then I figured, what the hell, say what you think.

So I answered: “They look terrific, ma’am. And your ass looks pretty good, too.”

She laughed, but demurred. “Oh, no, that’s gone to hell. But my tits…”

I have dined out on that anecdote many times over the past two decades. And I thought about it again yesterday, when I learned of Carrie Fisher’s passing, and recalled how she was a fabulously and fearlessly funny woman who never shied away from making herself the butt of her own jokes. (Pardon the pun.) Tonight, I grieve for Debbie Reynolds, and find myself painfully reminded of the classic explanation of the difference between plot and story. (Plot: “The queen died. And then five days later, the king died.” Story: “The queen died. And then five days later, the king died — of a broken heart.”) At the same time, however, I take some solace and amusement in my happy memory: Like mother, like daughter.