1) Kaz had made many trips to Cannes, albeit always working as a chauffeur (assistant) to his boss, who is a famous movie star. Kaz has seen it all through his work and he has frequented the finest and tasted the best. When our picture begins, Kaz has reached the point of wondering, Why not me? Why is it that all these other people have it... but not me? Kaz has come to Cannes again because his employer (old friend) has a few important meetings. This opportunity gives him more time than usual. Kaz feels it's now or never!

2) A great percentage of people who are really good liars, actually believe their own lies. They become convincing not only to themselves but also to those who are around them. Kaz truly believes that he will be and should be an integral part of the motion picture business. If I couldn't relate to Kaz's dreams, his needs, his hopes, I could not have so absolutely enjoyed being him. I have known many people like Kaz, the film business is full of them. Kaz for me is a composite of a number of very specific, needful, decent people who have been unable or unwilling to take a hard, realistic, analytic look at their own life. They just keep dreaming... like I do.

3) Kaz is a decent human being whose needs are maniacal. A lot of us remember being desperate, but not this desperate. We've gotten over it, but Kaz hasn't, and makes us feel good. It's funny. Henry Jaglom and I have discussed this character in a myriad of forms over the years since we began shooting (1974) our first picture together, (Tracks), which I produced and acted in. Tracks became one of the official USA entries at the Cannes Film Festival of 1976. This was our first trip to Cannes together. It was the beginning of Henry's observation of me, my observations of the various players, which was followed by twenty-five years of conversations revolving around the desperation of people in show business. This includes, of course, myself.

4) The fact that Kaz is so needful and vulnerable, to watch him openly showing his real feelings and deep needs makes us understand him so much more. He's like many of us, only more so. It's easier for us to care about and laugh at someone who has so much less self-control than the rest of us. At the end, Kaz finds someone like himself, who has been living a lie. When we watch two people find each other, two people who haven1t been able to tell the truth to themselves, it rings a bell for everybody.

5) I don't think that Kaz is ever caught up in a dilemma between artistic filmmaking or going after blatant commercial success. To be part of an artistic or a commercial failure, or an artistic or commercial success, really is not what it's about for Kaz. He just wants to make a deal and become part of the business. Personally, I would much prefer to make a successful artistic film on the one hand; however, if I can't do that (and I've tried many times), I'd much prefer to make an artistic or even a commercial failure. It's a hell of a lot better than having done some of the many jobs I have done in the course of pursuing a life in show business. I have worked as a hat check boy at the 21 Club, a maitre-d at Paddy's Clamhouse, a pogo-stick demonstrator at Macy's, in addition to being on the Board of Directors of a Boston bank, a builder of apartment houses, and many other disparate jobs. I always had one goal in mind: just to find another good part in a play or a movie.

6) I've appeared in seven of Henry Jaglom's films; he only admits to five. He refuses to count Always, which I physically appear at the beginning (therefore for me that's No. 6), and I had a wonderful part in Deja-Vu that was left on the cutting room floor. I would have never considered this my seventh Jaglom film, except that Henry gave me screen credit. More important, since he's just completed the movie Shopping without me, at the least I want my epitaph to read that Zack Norman was in half the pictures that Henry Jaglom ever made. I worked with Robert Zemekis (once), I worked with Milos Forman (once). As a matter of fact, I can't think of any director I've ever worked for twice. So why wouldn't I like Henry? Henry is singularly the most exciting and understanding director an actor could possibly work for. I love many of the things I do on the screen in Festival in Cannes, but really only Henry and I know all the things that didn't work, and fortunately through no fault of mine they were left on the cutting room floor. I trust his taste, I love his truth, I admire his intellect, and we constantly argue. What more can one ask for? Of all the films I've worked on with Henry, this was the most unusual. We have discussed this specific world and these specific characters over a period of more than twenty-five years. It was a long time gestating and well worth the wait.

7) Shooting in the middle of the Festival was the best job I1ve ever had in the movies. It was exactly thirty years from the first time I arrived in Cannes, looking about wide-eyed and dreaming, and having it all come full circle was spectacular. My favorite hotel in the world is the Hotel Du Cap. To be able to actually be on location and shoot at the hotel was absolutely a dream come true. A scene at the Cabana and my own lunch break at Eden Rock. It may not be my real life as an actor, but it was for those days... and I felt as good as Kaz.

8) First of all, it1s important that everybody knows that the film is Festival in CANNES. I was in Venice/Venice, but Henry only allowed me to play in Venice, California, so I never discuss Venice/Venice any more; however, Festival in Cannes is most special for me as it relates to four different couples, four different ages, that are all joyfully complex relationships. These are needful, innocent, loving, intelligent and pretty damn funny people. I think the single biggest joy for me in playing in and watching Festival in Cannes is that Henry has truly captured the deepest of human needs in a gentle, loving and sardonic manner. It's about all of us, in one form or another. Anecdotally, Henry and I lived at the Hotel Du Cap for the entire Festival of 1976 (the genesis of Festival in Cannes). I had breakfast next to Cary Grant daily, drinks with Burt Lancaster, and my driver constantly got drunk and shouted cryptic messages with Johnny WeissmŸller. I met my dear friend Michael Douglas at that Festival, and a hell of a lot more great anecdotes evolved. I can't begin to tell you the thrill, or better I could begin to tell you the thrill of returning to the scene at Cannes thirty years later. When I arrived at my first Cannes Film Festival as a fledgling producer (having since produced, presented or financed more than thirty pictures) I was told by my press agent who brought me there not to talk to anybody, because if I spoke to anyone they would immediately know that I knew absolutely nothing about show business. It took me thirty years to finally figure out... he was right!