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(somber music)
(film reel whirring)
- You know, what's interesting is that,
I bet all four of us have slightly different mothers
and Kathy and I probably have the closest to the same.
And Tara and I probably have the most different.
And Cindy a bit different,
because she definitely changed over time.
You know, the woman of her 20s and early 30s,
that was tough.
- Hi folks, this is Johnny Cash.
- Johnny Cash. - Johnny Cash.
- Johnny Cash and the Tennessee Two!
♪ I keep a close watch on this heart of mine ♪
(camera flashing)
Yeah, there was a girl.
She had black eyes and the blackest hair.
When I left, she cried.
- Johnny Cash was an 18 year old Air Force trainee
stationed down in San Antonio, Texas
when he first met Miss Vivian Liberto.
(somber music)
- [Johnny] Hello Vivian, how is my sweetheart?
Yours is alright but he's lonesome for you as usual.
But then I'm always lonesome for you, Viv.
I'll be thinking of you til we're together again, honey,
and I'll never stop loving you.
As long as I live, I'll never stop loving you.
I love you, Vivian.
(somber music)
- My experience, just what I've seen
out there has been
that people really don't know her.
- You know who VL is, don't you?
- Vivian Leigh?
- Nope.
- It's someone prettier than Vivian Leigh.
- I don't know, I think ever since "Walk the Line"
came out too, that really did some damage
and made her look very bad and just was not shown
in a very nice light.
- My band is here in Memphis.
- Your band?
John, your band?
Your band is two mechanics who can't hardly play.
- I haven't seen the movie
and I don't want to see the movie.
- Stay clear of my children.
- [June] Vivian, I-I was just saying hello.
- You heard me. - Viv.
- I understand the movie depicted her differently
than she was and honestly, I don't think anyone
had an impression of her before that.
- She stayed so private and so out of the public.
I mean she would have friends for 10 years
that never knew she was married to my dad.
- She had been offered interviews, a lot of money,
a lot of books and she refused to ever say anything.
- When she was writing her book, late in life,
she said, "There are things you kids don't even know,
"that's why I wanna write the book."
- She was a very private person.
And was not prepared for all of the attention
and public life and my dad's notoriety and fame.
There was nothing in her past
that would have prepared her for that
and it's nothing she ever wanted.
And then of course, when there was something
that was negative, like when he got arrested
for bringing pills across the border from Mexico,
something like that just devastated her.
- You know, appearances were incredibly important to her.
And she was so elegant.
A really nice figure, she dressed beautifully.
Her hair was always done.
She's very exotic looking.
- Mom's hair was jet black and it was past her waist
and it was really thick.
It was just beautiful.
And then in the 60s it went up into a big pile on her head
and she, you know, it was just a work of art.
- I would run my hand over her dresses in her closet.
She had beautiful dresses.
I thought that was the epitome of womanhood.
I couldn't wait for the day when I could wear
something like that.
After their divorce, they saw her as,
I don't know, as nothing.
So my mother faded into a kind of negative obscurity.
- That's what's so sad about the end
of their marriage after 13 years.
13 years is a long time.
- To experience such a loss like that
and have the whole world see it,
I think that was really hard for her.
Really, really hard.
(camera flashing)
- My mom had terrible anxiety.
She had a really tough childhood
and you know, through years of therapy
I began to understand that she was damaged
from the get-go and was working out a lot.
Well, she didn't really work it out so much.
(film reel whirring) (light music)
- My mom was born April 23rd, 1934
in San Antonio, Texas.
Her ancestors had come over from Sicily
and that's where my grandpa, Tom and Irene were from.
Irene Robinson was my grandmother's maiden name.
Her father was incredibly strict
and Catholic, devout Catholic.
They believed in mortal sin and had
to go to Mass every Sunday
and all of the rituals and restrictions
in the Catholic Church, that was center.
She went to Saint Mary's in San Antonio.
All girls, Catholic School. (school bell ringing)
She took some domestic classes,
you know, had to take Homemaking
and the girls would have to dance together
because there were no boys.
So my grandfather, Tom, was an amateur magician,
but he would be called to perform at parties
and he was also a champion rose gardener.
And he was asked to create a breed of rose
for Ladybird Johnson's visit to San Antonio
and he had beautiful rose bushes.
Of course that's where my mom got that,
her love of rose bushes and gardening.
As strict as my grandpa was, my grandma, Irene,
was kind of loose and didn't really have a sense
of the parameters of how you lived your life
that my grandpa did.
And that my mom eventually adopted.
My grandma was an alcoholic
and I didn't hear very many stories about that
but I understood that at some times
my mom would come home from school
and grandma would be passed out on the sofa
and she would clean the house
so that Grandpa, when he came from work,
wouldn't know that Grandma had been passed out.
So my mom did take on an adult role and
I think that my grandpa was violent
that he hit Uncle Ray.
- I know that my grandfather didn't believe
in spanking girls.
So if the girls did something, he spanked Uncle Ray.
Uncle Ray told me that years ago
that he would say, "This one's for Vivian
"and this one's for you."
I know, I don't get it either.
- You know, I heard that he never hit the girls
but I don't know how much to believe of that.
So the summer of 1951, my mom was 17 years old
and she was a big roller skater.
And she went roller skating one night
and she met this young man who was in the Air Force
who was stationed in San Antonio for a short time.
I think before he went up to skate with her,
he bet his buddy that he could walk
that girl home that night.
And he won the bet.
- He told me that he fell in love with her
the minute he saw her.
So he knocked her down so he could meet her.
- I've never heard that Dad ran into Mom
on the skating rink.
I never heard that.
Did she say that?
- Well, I always heard that they physically bumped
into each other, my dad and my mom.
- She found out later he bumped into her on purpose
'cause he thought she was cute.
- No, I don't think so.
He definitely made a bet that he could walk her home
and then I think he went up to her
and said something to her and then started skating with her
and then started flirting with her
and then walked her home.
And then they saw each other for three weeks
before he was shipped off to Germany.
And then they wrote each other
when he was in Germany nearly every day.
Sometimes twice a day.
My sisters and I have over 1000 letters
they wrote to each other.
They were besotted.
"My sweetheart, my angel, my darling.
"I can't wait to see you.
"I think about you day and night."
It was endless.
- Mom kept a diary of every time she got a letter
and every time she mailed one.
There's a photo of my dad in his uniform
in the barracks in his bedroom
with a picture of her on the wall
and him acting like a monkey while he looks at her.
- You know, a handsome young guy in a uniform.
Dad was probably the most exciting thing
that had ever happened for her.
- It was like they just knew they were meant
to be together and there was no doubt about it.
He proposed through the mail.
- And he actually sent her engagement ring through the mail.
- You know, they were very, they were incredibly young.
Incredibly young and that all comes out.
And there's some really fascinating things, too,
of him talking about albums he was listening to
and playing guitar with some of his buddies
and seeing a film about Folsom Prison.
The most heartbreaking thing is that they had planned
that she would come over and visit him at Christmastime
and then her father said no.
They were heartbroken.
She didn't speak to her father for weeks.
That's what I heard.
(film static) - Viv, I had to fill up
the other side with something.
If you don't like it, you can just scratch this side off
but it has a meaning, honey.
- He would send her letters on tape
and I think he sent her a song or two
that he was working on or had written.
♪ Am I the one who'll always hold you ♪
♪ Til the end of time ♪
♪ Or will there be another lover ♪
♪ To steal a love that's mine ♪
- But the one that sticks out for me
is that letter that he sent her on tape.
- [Johnny] Hello, Vivian, how's my sweetheart?
Yours is all right but he's lonesome for you as usual.
But then I'm always lonesome for you, Viv.
This isn't quite the same as being with you, honey,
but maybe I can tell you some things I want to.
The most important thing, I guess, is that I love you.
I do, Vivian, I love you very much.
It won't be long now, honey, and we'll be together for life.
We won't be counting the days much longer, angel.
Just keep those precious letters coming
until we are, sweetheart.
They mean so much to me over here
I'll be thinking of you til we're together again, honey,
and I'll never stop loving you.
As long as I live, I'll never stop loving you.
I love you, Vivian.
(romantic music)
(pen scratching)
- He got home on July 4th, 1954.
I cannot imagine how intense that was for them
after thousands of letters
and being separated for so long.
And like, there's a desperation to be together
and get married and talking very seductively
about that day in their letters to each other.
They got married August 7th, 1954 in San Antonio.
(light music)
And I remember my mother saying how hot that day was.
I mean, you know, San Antonio can be unbearably hot
in the summer.
He wore his uniform
and she wore a very elaborate wedding dress
with veil and sleeves in that heat.
And then they drove to Memphis for their honeymoon.
I don't know where they spent their first night
but I remember my mother telling me
that when they went to breakfast the next morning
after their wedding night,
she was so embarrassed and hoped that the people
in the restaurant didn't know what they had been doing.
And they'd been doing something
'cause I was born nine months later. (chuckling)
I think they moved to Memphis
because my dad had an offer of a job
with his brother, Roy.
I wrote a song about that trip.
It goes, "Headlights on a Texas road.
"Hank Williams on the radio.
"The church wedding, we spent all we had.
"Now the deal is done to become Mom and Dad."
So I imagine that they were making that decision,
you know, for all of us in the future.
Memphis was not an hour from where my dad grew up
but I know when they moved to Memphis,
they didn't have a nickel.
They were so poor.
My mom's sister told me once
that she came after high school graduation
and that they didn't even have money for groceries.
That she had to spend her graduation money
to help buy groceries for them.
My mom told me she had two dresses
when she was pregnant with me.
That that's the only thing she could wear
and that she would sit on the front porch
and eat a dishpan full of cherry tomatoes every day.
That that's what she craved, that's what she wanted.
- You know, she said those were the hardest times
and they were also the best times.
- She told me that was the happiest time in her life.
She said that many times over the years.
She would've traded it all to go back
to that little apartment in Memphis.
(somber music)
- My dad went to see his brother, Roy,
at the car dealership and he walked
into the mechanic's garage
and Marshall Grant was working there.
And Marshall always said that he saw my dad walk in
and the hair on the back of his neck stood up.
Like, he just knew that they were going to be together
and create history together.
And my dad said to them,
"Roy says you boys play a little bit of guitar."
And Marshall said, "A very little bit."
And then they started getting together and playing.
Well, my mom became very close to Marshall's wife, Etta.
They were like sisters.
I always felt good that she had such a close friend
moving to Memphis not knowing anyone, no money.
My dad had a job as a door-to-door salesman.
He was terrible at it.
A classic story is that one day he knocked on a door
and the woman opened the door and he said,
"You don't wanna buy a refrigerator, do you?"
(laughing)
Or he would talk a customer out of a product
because it was too expensive.
So he didn't do well at that.
- Dad wasn't a salesman except when it came to himself.
He showed up at Sam Phillips' door at Sun Records
every day until Sam listened to him, so.
- You know, my dad's first record came out
a month after I was born so then the whole thing started
with him going on the road and doing shows
and I remember Mom saying that the first time Dad went
on the road, she was terrified to be left home alone
with me and that Dad went around to every window
and every door and make sure the locks were working,
make sure everything was locked, you know,
to try to calm my mom's fear
and that he was very worried too.
Like, this was just unheard of, somebody to go on tour.
Just completely out of their knowledge
of the world or upbringing.
I think she would meet Etta in town in Memphis
to go to the Woolworth's and have a soda.
Etta always said they just had so much fun together.
When she went back for her post-partum check-up
at six weeks after giving birth to me,
the doctor told her she was pregnant with Kathy.
And Kathy was born ten months and 23 days after I was born.
I don't know if my mom was thrilled.
She probably was because she always said
she wanted six children.
Or feeling a little overwhelmed, like,
"How am I gonna deal with two babies?"
Not like a little kid and a baby, but two babies.
There's a legendary story in our family
about her weaning me off the bottle
before Kathy was born because she couldn't deal
with having two babies on the bottle.
And me, when Kathy was born, toddling into her room,
sticking my hand through the crib and stealing the bottle
out of Kathy's crib.
I was not ready to be weaned at 10 months.
- It's time for Country Style U.S.A,
and here's our star, Johnny Cash!
(audience cheering)
- And then all of a sudden,
here comes this huge, huge career.
- This feller's good looking, isn't he?
- Oh, he's handsome.
- And I imagine he sings pretty good too.
- [Host] So good that he's one of the biggest new stars
in country music today.
- He got big enough where he didn't have
to open for Elvis Presley.
(camera flashing)
- Everything started snowballing.
It all came pretty fast.
"I Walk the Line" went up the charts.
It was his first number one.
♪ I keep you on my mind both day and night ♪
- [Kathy] And that was his love song to mom.
♪ Because you're mine ♪
♪ I walk the line ♪
(audience applauding)
- We went everywhere as a family
unless Dad was on the road or rehearsing.
Everything was real tight, you know.
I remember being really, really happy in Memphis.
And family was around too.
We had uncles and aunts, my grandparents.
Grandma and Grandpa Cash had moved to Memphis by then.
We had a lot of family picnics
and Dad would end up chasing Mom with ice
to put down her shirt or shorts or whatever
and it always ended up with him picking her up like a baby.
A lot of great memories in Memphis.
I thought her name was Honey (chuckling)
because that's the only thing Dad called her.
That and Baby.
I thought Baby was a nickname and Honey was her name.
And when somebody called her Vivian,
I just sounded so weird to me.
They were always very affectionate.
- My mom said that people were making fun of them
five years after they were married
because they were still holding hands everywhere they went.
I just know they were very in love
in the beginning and for quite a long time.
- When Marshall and my dad would come off the road,
they would come to pick my mom and me and Kathy up
at Etta's house.
And my dad would pick me up and throw me over his shoulder
and Etta said that I would pat him on the back
like, already, I knew it was a hard life.
(film reel whirring) (light music)
So in 1958 we left Memphis,
moved to Encino, California in the valley of Los Angeles
and Cindy would have just been a month or two old maybe.
- I was six weeks old.
And Dad said he didn't wanna buy a crib
until we got to California 'cause he didn't want
to have to move it.
So I slept in a dresser drawer
and he called me his rockabilly baby.
(laughing)
- [Announcer] Who do you trust?
Here's the star of our show,
Johnny Carson. (audience applauding)
- And we bought Johnny Carson's house
on Hayvenhurst Avenue in Encino.
(camera shutter clicking) - There was this story
that Johnny's wife had left a pie in the oven for my mom.
I don't know if that's true,
but I heard that my whole childhood.
We had moved to California because my dad
had an offer to be in a film
and his manager, agent thought
that this was the next career move for my dad
to go into films.
Like Elvis, I guess.
And so the film he made was one called
"Five Minutes to Live"
which was later retitled "Door-to-Door Maniac".
You know, I don't think I've ever seen that film.
They certainly wouldn't have let us see it as children.
But that didn't really pan out.
My dad wasn't getting good films.
I don't think he was necessarily a good actor
but we stayed in Los Angeles.
(water splashing)
(light music)
(water splashing)
- Dad had this affection for animals
which was great, we all love animals
but he liked unusual animals
so we had a monkey named Homer,
a parrot named Jethro,
and an Irish Setter named Penny Cash.
(chuckling)
It was a lot of fun.
If you're a kid, it was a lot of fun.
I don't know how that was for Mom,
taking care of a monkey, a dog, a parrot and three kids
at the time, while he's on the road
but I'm sure it was overwhelming at times.
- He brought home animals all the time.
And Mom would say, "What did you do now?"
- I remember him bringing home a crate
of baby chicks one time and letting them out
in the living room
with my mother being furious about that.
(parrot squawking) - I think it was the parrot
that cried just like Cindy when she was a baby.
And so my mother would go running in there
and it would be the parrot crying. (chuckling)
I think she thought, "Well if we move to California,
"he'll be working and home every night
"if he's doing TV shows or a movie or whatever,"
but that wasn't the case.
He was doing luncheons with the executives
and then the TV shows and then the road
and he was promoting himself.
- It's so nice to be back on Town Hall.
It's been about seven months since we've been here.
And we've been doing a lot of work since then.
We've been to Australia, Tasmania,
New Zealand, Alaska, Piticollac Cove
Where's Piticollac Cove?
♪ You ask me if I'll miss her kisses ♪
♪ I guess I will every day ♪
♪ I don't like it but I guess things happen that way ♪
- She had a husband who was at this point very famous.
Traveling all the time,
no friends there.
In the beginning, no help.
I don't know that she made any close friends
the entire time that we lived in Hayvenhurst either.
I remember, I think, Aunt Sylvia visiting.
- On the corner from our house,
there was a bus stop there,
and she noticed a woman there every morning
in a uniform, like a housekeeping uniform.
And she said, "I was so desperate for help
"that I remember running to that bus stop
"crying, asking her if she had any extra time."
(somber music)
- I mean, it had to have been incredibly difficult.
It had to be hard.
But one of the most powerful memories I have
of living in that house is the day these television cameras
came to our house to film
this show called "Here's Hollywood".
And they interviewed my mom and dad
and then took pictures of them in the kitchen
and took pictures here and filmed the house.
And then I remember we children
had to go out in the backyard with a keeper
to keep us away while they talked to my mom and dad alone.
I remember resenting this so much.
That kind of celebrity intrusiveness.
I don't know.
Just the beginning of the Kardashian concept.
I could tell my mother hated it too.
I remember thinking that she became very false.
She disappeared behind this facade
and I remember thinking, "Where's Mom?
"What is that?"
(somber music)
(camera flashing)
She was not prepared for the level of notoriety
and public attention she got.
She somehow metabolized that as humiliation.
- You see how easy it is to keep a man happy?
- [Fred] They sure work hard, don't they, Barney?
- How's the missus?
- Just fine.
I think she's here tonight. - Is she here tonight?
We'll have some dinner after while.
(audience laughing)
- So my dad and mom became friends
with Curly and Carol Lewis.
And Curly was a contractor.
So he got it in his head
to build this house Curly was going to design
in Casitas Springs.
Now, Casitas Springs was halfway
between Ojai and Ventura.
And it was in this little,
it was this village, practically,
this tiny little stop in the road that you...
The road to Ojai went here.
If you just curved off and then back on the main road,
this was Casitas Springs.
It was just one road through it
with some poor houses.
You know, it was some lower-middle-class houses down here.
Well he was gonna build this house on this mountain
above this town.
Like this big house overlooking these very basic dwellings.
I mean, that in itself is so weird.
It didn't make sense.
The house was completely out of place.
So isolated, no amenities.
Crazy.
- I think they were both really excited about it.
They were gonna build their own house.
I mean, they were in their 20s?
Building their own house?
- Long, long, long, long driveway
leading up to the house.
A ravine on one side.
Dangerous.
Rattlesnakes everywhere.
- I remember my first memory is standing
in front of that house while it was being built
and I was standing next to my mother
and she was holding my hand
and her belly was out to here with Tara.
- Right before we were getting ready to move to Casitas,
Mom went into labor with Tara.
- My mom had epic stories about childbirth.
So much so that I was absolutely terrified
at the idea of giving birth.
Awful stories about my dad not being able to be in with her
and them giving her a washcloth to chew on.
Then them knocking her out right at the moment of birth
which is the most awful thing they used to do to women.
It's like, you go through labor
and work, and work, and work, and work
and right at the moment you're about to give birth
they knock you out.
And then you wake up in your room with some baby
and they go, "This is your baby." (laughing)
I just can't even imagine.
With Tara, you know, this story,
this awful childbirth story took on epic proportions.
- You know, my mom always used to say,
"They strapped me down and left the room,"
and it was horrid for her.
It was really bad.
- It was 16 hours and she always said,
"And it was a dry birth."
Never knew what that meant.
Like, the amniotic fluid that had broken earlier?
But that happens to almost everyone, you know?
I still don't know what that means
but she said it was so difficult
that immediately after giving birth,
she was crying and she turned to my dad and said,
"I don't want any more babies."
Poor Tara.
- Mom was in the hospital for three or four days.
We moved two weeks later to Casitas.
So here Mom's got four children
all under the age of six.
A brand new house to take care of
and they've just moved in.
And I believe Dad went on the road.
- Welcome back to Nashville too.
- Well, nice to be back with all our friends again.
Got a tour of the South.
- A tour of the whole South.
- Yes. - Wonderful.
- It didn't dawn on me then but much later, you know,
in my 30s, I started thinking,
"Why would he put us in such an isolated place
"when he was already on the road all the time?"
You know, he had this idea of his rustic hideaway castle
but he wasn't there that much.
- I remember when we moved in, the entire yard was dirt.
I remember her planting rose bushes.
She had a cactus garden eventually
but I don't know how she unpacked
and set up house all by herself.
It just seems like an impossible task for one person.
- It was scary for her.
Up on a mountain top in the middle of nowhere
with a bunch of rattlesnakes, scorpions and tarantulas.
- My mom was a really good shot.
Dad had taught her how to shoot
so she took care of more than one rattlesnake.
- I remember all of us standing behind my mother's skirt
while she shot a seven foot rattlesnake 15 times.
That was really scary
'cause that thing would not quit crawling
and it was spread out in front of our whole garage door
from one end to the other.
I know that's why she had live-in maids.
She didn't have live-in maids
'cause she wanted live-in maids.
She had 'em because she wanted another adult there.
- We had bobcats.
We had fans wanting to party on our front yard
hoping Dad would come out and listen to their songs.
- People would drive up there to find Johnny Cash.
Sometimes one o'clock in the morning.
And my mother was terrified.
I remember once, she went to the door.
Somebody was knocking on the door
and she looked out through the glass on the side
and said, "It's some old drunk," you know,
and she wouldn't open the door.
That happened all the time.
But he did stay away for long periods
and it was heartbreaking and it was really hard for my mom.
And then one day he came back and he wasn't him.
When he got on drugs.
Like, that is seared in my memory.
And he, before that, had always been so affectionate
and so present with me and I felt his love.
And he came in the house and he was gone.
(shutter clicks)
It's like, "Where's Dad?"
It was traumatic.
- I don't remember anything bad.
My mom just kept us protected from all that.
I didn't even know my dad was famous.
I saw him on a show called "The Rebel"
and he gets killed, a guy hits him over the head
with a whiskey bottle and kills him.
I thought it was real and he was dead
and I was hysterical.
I was four.
My mom said she had to call all over the place
to get my dad on the phone
to make me realize he wasn't dead.
- I think after I was born, things got really difficult
between my mom and dad.
He was on drugs a lot and so when he would come home,
it would be a week or two later
than he said he was gonna be.
- I remember her letting me stay up and wait for my dad
to come home one night.
There was a window, you could look down the long driveway
and you could see the bottom where the road
came up to our house.
So if you saw a car come onto the Casitas road,
that could be Dad.
If you saw a car come onto the Casitas road
and turn into our driveway, that was Dad.
So a few came onto the Casitas road
and we got excited every time
but it never turned.
Never turned.
I think she sent me to bed at one or two in the morning
and he hadn't come.
But then the next day he came
and of course then they fought
because she used that against him.
"I let Rosanne stay up, you never came."
(sighs)
- When they built the house, they loved to have barbecues
so they built this barbecue pit.
- [Rosanne] Yeah, my mom was a wonderful hostess.
Generous, laughing,
very social.
- Dad was good at bringing home animals.
Just random animals.
So he brought home a little black goat one time.
And we thought that was our pet so it was Billy, the goat
and it stayed in the backyard.
We played with it for about a month
and all of a sudden, all we got to hearing about
was this barbecue and who was invited.
And come to find out, this was Billy's barbecue.
I was furious.
This was a pet I played with.
Well, Dad was from the country
and you know, you didn't get attached to barbecue.
So Tex Ritter came, I remember him.
I remember Patsy Cline being there.
I remember June Carter being there.
I remember my mom and my grandmother being kind of upset
after it was over and the next day or something,
I remember my grandmother warning Mom
about her a little bit.
(light music)
- [Johnny] Thank you very much.
Nice to be back in Hollywood.
- So my dad was playing the Hollywood Bowl.
1963 so I would have been eight years old.
June was on the show.
- We had not seen Dad in a while
and so we got all dressed up.
- My mom was wearing a white coat.
We went backstage after the show
and I felt very awkward.
Even though it was my dad,
he felt very separate at this point.
And June was rude to my mother.
She said something like, you know,
"Is that dirt on your coat, Vivian?"
I don't know, there was this friction between them.
- I was standing there with my mom and grandma Cash
and sisters and I remember June sliding in the back seat
of the limo with Dad and waving at us and saying,
"Bye girls, bye Vivian."
And I remember thinking, "That was odd."
- It seemed kind of clear to me
in this unconscious way, but I felt it very clearly
that my dad had moved off.
That we were separate.
(dramatic music)
- Dad had left a long time ago in his head
and I think he just...
He was trying to figure out how to manage leaving for good
because he just kept going longer and longer
without coming home.
And I remember a whole year that he didn't come home.
- I don't remember my dad being gone for a year.
I mean, I'm sure it seemed like a year
but he would not have stayed away for a year
and sometimes he would disappear at the end of a tour
and nobody knew where he was
but eventually he always checked in and came home.
But then he and my mom would fight
the whole time he was home
so he wouldn't wanna come home and fight.
- I know they were so different, you know.
My mother was, she wasn't a real quiet little thing.
If she was mad you knew it.
And Dad could not stand conflict.
Arguing.
- I remember our birthdays came and went.
And Mom and Dad's anniversary came and went.
And I remember Christmas came and went.
And he showed up sometime after Christmas.
I remember being furious with him
and wondering, you know, just kept saying,
"Where have you been?"
- Seems like I remember Dad sleeping in the guest house.
One time I remember he came home
and he had a suitcase full of money.
He had been paid in cash for an entire tour
and he and my mom laid the money out on their bed
and I remember my parents being very serious
and getting along.
It was very odd.
They were getting along
because they were counting their money together.
(laughing)
Oh my god.
- I don't get to see you very often.
Every time I see you, I enjoy your work very much.
- Thank you.
Proud to be with you.
- You're looking well.
- I'm feeling fine.
- It was dire.
He was on drugs, he was 130, 40 pounds, six feet two.
There was just something horribly wrong
but nobody told us what it was.
(light music) (bowling ball rolling)
(bowling pins clattering)
My mom disappeared into her rage about my dad being gone.
And then about him being with June and her knowing it.
And into her fear that she was gonna lose him
and anxiety and her resentment.
- Well, Mom weighed 95, 97 pounds the whole time I was a kid
so when she got upset, she lost even more weight.
She just didn't eat.
She cried a lot and she didn't sleep much
and you know, she was smoking herself to death.
I mean, she didn't even know how to find him
to talk to him about it. (audience applauding)
- There were many times, if I would like have a nightmare
or wake up in the middle of the night for some reason,
and go into my mom's room, she wouldn't be in there
and I would go into the den and all the lights would be off
except for one little reading lamp over her chair
and she would be on the phone with my Aunt Sylvia,
her sister, crying.
That's the only thing I remember.
I think she was just doing the best that she could
but probably crumbling inside at the same time.
But I think she was super, super strong.
- I know she was a very strong woman, always,
and so she just, she just did the best she could.
- My sisters would tend to protect her
and to hold a very particular picture of my mom.
And also, I experienced the brunt of a lot of it.
I mean, honestly, I would come home from school
with the most intense knot in my stomach
wondering if my mom was gonna be alive.
And I remember if the dry cleaning was there
or the carpets had been cleaned
and like, she had, there was the paper on the carpets
to walk on while it was still drying,
I remember feeling this sense of relief, like,
"Well, if she got the carpets cleaned,
"she's not gonna kill herself right now."
I had this knot in my stomach every day of my childhood.
Every single day.
She was enraged, she was frightened, she was anxious.
She was grief stricken.
Had violent outbursts.
Never knew when that was gonna happen.
There was a sense of a lack of safety in my house
and chaos.
So no parenting and this constant fear
that one of 'em was gonna die.
I'm not saying this out of self pity, you know,
I'm saying it looking back from decades on and going,
"That was fucked up."
Like, that's not how children should be raised.
(film reel whirring)
So I did take on a more adult role with the kids,
my sisters, and acted like little mother.
They called me Little Mother.
I was always mothering them.
Particularly Tara.
And Kathy.
I was always very protective of Kathy.
When we were in Casitas,
we went to Academy of Saint Catherine,
we took the bus there
and I was so worried about Kathy
the whole time I was in class for the first few months.
And Kathy didn't do well.
She did not wanna be away from my mom.
You know, and then there came this point
where Kathy almost died.
And she got a bacterial disease
and it was impossible to diagnose
and they sent her blood around the country
trying to diagnose her.
She had this fever of like 106 or something.
She was in the isolation ward of the hospital.
And my dad came home.
That got him home.
- It took her two or three days
to even get a message to him.
The only way she knew to get a hold of him
was to call someone in the band
or someone that, you know, she thought he was working with.
- There was still an element
of resentment of my dad in that.
Like, "This is what it takes to get you home?"
And they packed Kathy in ice to bring her fever down
and it was just horrific.
They sent me to my grandma and grandpa Cash's
who lived not far down the road.
I remember sitting in the bathtub
at my grandparent's house praying with all my might
that Kathy wouldn't die.
And I always felt guilty about it too.
I was constitutionally stronger than Kathy
and I thought maybe I,
it was because she was born so soon after I was.
Maybe I took everything good from my mom
and Kathy didn't get it.
I don't know.
I had guilt about that.
(piano riffing) - I found out
about three years ago
that during that year, he was living in Soho
or The Village or something with Bob Dylan,
hanging out with Bob Dylan.
Thanks!
(laughing)
(suspenseful music)
(cameras flashing)
Dad got arrested in El Paso.
He had gone to Mexico to buy amphetamines
and I guess barbiturates, I don't know.
He got arrested with pills in his guitar case.
(plane engine humming) So Mom went to El Paso
to the courthouse with him.
(cameras flashing)
Coming out of the courthouse,
somebody that works for the newspaper took a photo
and Mom had on all black, her hair is all black,
and she turned out darker than Dad.
- [Rosanne] There was this rumor that my mother was black
and then that my father had married a black woman.
And in the south in the 60s,
that was just, it was beyond, you know,
that just didn't happen.
(camera flashing) It was kind of a big deal
at the time.
(suspenseful music)
- She didn't talk about that very much to me.
And I think it was a very painful experience for her.
There was a lot of negativity around it.
And it was portrayed as a very negative thing
and the KKK was out to get my father
and prove that he was married to a black woman.
- I remember Mom getting something in the mail
at the post office in Casitas that really shook her up.
I remember it was a really dark time.
Just everything was dark.
(somber music)
- And it actually scared her a lot
and she projected a lot of that fear on the kids as well.
You know, it's like she didn't want us
to play too far away from the house, or.
- She was scared to death the KKK was coming for her
and that Dad would be on the road
and she had no idea what to do.
Everyone knew where we lived.
I mean, people showed up from all over the United States
in our front yard.
- We, I mean, what, they were gonna kill us?
She said, "Yes."
She said, "I was afraid to let you girls outta my sight."
We also found all the letters that people had
to write, proving she was Caucasian
so that he could be booked in the South again.
Yes.
(typewriter keys clacking)
(typewriter bell dinging) (suspenseful music)
(pen scratching)
(typewriter keys clacking)
(typewriter bell dinging)
They had to go to court to prove it
'cause they had canceled every concert.
- I remember being in the back seat of the car,
driving to court and my mom was in the front seat
and she just had this running commentary
just, at my dad.
"Look at all those people looking at us.
"How does that make you feel with kids in the car?"
She almost couldn't process it.
It played into her very deepest wounds
that were already there from childhood.
So it made it doubly difficult.
(ominous music)
- Mom didn't sleep.
She stood in this big picture window we had
in our living room that overlooked the front yard
and the driveway and she would stand in the dark
in that window where she could look out
but they couldn't see in.
And she always had a cup of coffee and her cigarettes
and the gun was real close by.
And she was standing guard while we were in bed asleep.
She didn't sleep much for many years.
It was really, it really took a toll on her.
- You know, it was inappropriate for her to tell me this
but she said, "Doctor Hall," who was our family physician,
"Told me that if I didn't get myself together,
"somebody else was gonna be raising my kids."
And she said, "And that's when I tried
"to start turning things around
"and not being suicidal and so distracted."
- So she filed for divorce thinking it might shock him
into coming home.
She actually did that thinking he would come
to his senses and come home.
And it backfired on her.
She filed for divorce and he let it go through.
- I remember going in, I remember the room we went into
and everything, and I remember her saying,
"I have something I need to tell you."
And I said, "What?"
- She set Rosanne and I down and told us
that she had filed for a divorce and I said,
"Well, what does that mean?"
And she said, "Well, the only thing
"that's gonna be different is your daddy's clothes
"won't be in the closet."
- I said, "Oh, okay, well that's okay.
"I don't care about his clothes."
You know?
- I think my older sisters have more clear memories
of how it actually was happening
but I was probably outside playing
and making up songs and not really aware
of the tragedy that was unfolding
between my parents' marriage and my dad's drug addiction.
Dad was always gone on the road anyway,
so it didn't really change things for us.
- I don't have a clear memory of my mom telling us
about getting the divorce.
I have a vague memory of it.
The main memory I have is relief
that they were gonna get divorced.
I remember thinking, even at 12, you know,
(sighs) "Maybe both of them will be happy now."
Divorce isn't always bad.
- Well, when he first moved out,
he moved in with Waylon in an apartment
in Madison, Tennessee
and Waylon had a $1000 a day cocaine habit
and Dad was popping pills and there was no way
in hell my mother was gonna let us come and stay
with him in that apartment.
So Dad got in his car, started driving around
and he came upon the house on the lake
and just the frame was up.
And he parked the car and got out and said,
"Who's in charge here?"
And they said, "Braxton Dixon" and Dad walked over to him
and he said, "I want this house."
And Braxton said, "I'm building it for my family,"
and he said, "I'll give you double."
So Dad bought it and called my mom
and she said, "When the house is finished being built,
"they can come."
(light music)
- My grandparents, my aunt, my uncle,
everybody in Mom's family found out
about the divorce by reading it in the paper.
- I know she left town when it came out in the paper.
She took us girls and we went somewhere
because my mother was very private and had, I think,
some shame around the experience of having to go
through the divorce.
And I also think it was really a very sad, sad time for her.
So that's how she dealt with it.
- By then, the Lewises had moved to Oregon.
She took us to Oregon to visit them.
Just the four of us girls and we would do things like that
but you could tell she was just really sad.
Her heart was broken.
- Her father was still alive.
It just was not acceptable.
It was a mortal sin.
You would go to hell.
I remember her fearing her father's judgment a lot.
And she got it.
And yet she stayed Catholic.
She went to Mass every Sunday.
She sat in the front row.
She worked at the church with the Ladies' Guild.
She did bake sales, she did all kinds of stuff.
Involved herself in the church.
She made friends with the priests and nuns.
But she couldn't take communion
because she was divorced and she was excommunicated.
Divorce was cause for excommunication then.
And that's when I wanted to leave the Catholic Church.
I thought, "You have this woman who is devout,
"who buys into everything you're selling.
"You know, she's buying everything
"and showing up in every possible way
"and you won't let her receive communion?
"That's just wrong."
- So my dad, knowing how much her Catholicism meant to her,
wrote a letter to the archdiocese and said,
"This divorce happened all because of me
"and it's not her fault."
And they pardoned her
and she was able to receive communion again.
- You know, you got a choice,
you can either keep going or lay down and die
and she just kept going.
And, uh...
I don't know.
I don't know how she did it.
She just did.
- Well again, from a six or seven year old standpoint,
you know, we're looking for new houses
and we're looking at really awesome houses
and I remember some of them very well
but then when we found our house
with the indoor swimming pool and the view.
That was pretty exciting.
(electric camera whirring)
This house was a new, fresh start in a better location,
more people around and it just felt really good.
You know, sad that we're moving because there's a divorce
but my mother remarried really quickly after.
- My dad was doing a benefit
for the Boys' Club in Ventura
and Dick was one of the police officers signed
for security and she met him then.
And then as my parents' split became real,
she gravitated to Dick.
There was safety there.
Dick was married.
He left his wife and they got married very shortly
after my parents' divorce was final.
- I wasn't real thrilled about the remarrying part
because I wasn't crazy about him, to be honest.
And my mother said, all she kept thinking about
is that she knew Dad was gonna marry June
and she needed to get remarried before he married June.
I don't know why she felt that way.
I never understood that.
And I never understood why she chose who she chose.
It's still a mystery to me.
- But it was an unspoken bargain
because my mom could not be alone.
She had to be married.
Dick knew what he was buying into.
That there were gonna be a lot of perks.
He got sports cars and toys
and could do what he want.
He became a private detective for a short time,
then a travel agent, then you know,
and then eventually retired from everything.
And my mom really ran the show.
She ran everything.
And he just bought into it.
It was a bargain.
- I think she was happy as she could be.
She joined the garden club, she joined a bowling league.
- She would go to line dancing
and she would go to some country-western bar
with my stepfather and they would dance.
I remember her always saying,
"You girls should learn how to dance.
"You really should learn how to dance."
And I remember thinking, "Why is that so important?"
(laughing)
But she loved it.
She really did.
- She created a life that made sense for herself.
And that was very beautiful.
It really served her.
Her friends, her domestic skills, her paintings,
her making of her own stationary.
All of those things were beautiful
and kind of spread out from, I think, who she really was.
- Every time there was an event.
"Oh, I'll have it."
You know, she always had the parties
and the get-togethers and the baby showers
and the, you know.
Mom's whole key to everything was staying very busy.
She told me a few times, "If I stay busy, I don't think."
And I thought, "But sometimes you need to think."
You know, think things through and she said,
"No, I don't, I don't.
"I just do better if I don't think about certain things."
(upbeat music) (audience applauding)
- [Johnny] I thank you very much.
- After their divorce, they saw her as nothing.
As the woman he had to leave in order to be saved.
In order to be rehabilitated, you know,
and move into this great mythic love story with June.
- My wife, June Carter.
(audience applauding) Hi, honey.
How are you doing?
- And the myth was huge.
June was the one who saved him from drugs.
The Johnny and June show was very big, you know,
it was, like I said, it was mythic.
So my mother faded into a kind of negative obscurity.
(typewriter keys clacking) (light music)
(typewriter bell dinging)
(typewriter keys clacking)
(typewriter bell dinging)
(typewriter keys clacking)
(camera flashing)
- I wanna introduce to you, the man in my life,
as husband, lover and the father of the children,
seven of them, by the way.
When June would be on an interview with Dad,
she would say we have seven kids and I'm tired
and things like that.
We were only spending the summers and a week at Christmas
with Dad and June, so that would really hurt Mom
because she was raising all four of us by herself.
- When I was like 21, I was a tour guide in Dad's museum.
Do you know what was the biggest question I got asked
about my mother?
"How long has your real mother been dead?"
- I had a, I had...
I'm covered up with daughters,
I have six daughters, you see.
He had four daughters and that gave me six daughters
and then we had a little boy, and that gave us seven
and I'm tired.
(laughing)
- [Tara] I think, you know, it was just really difficult
for her to have my father's new wife
claiming her kids.
- She had no voice.
She had no way to communicate to the public.
And she'd always say, "I'm gonna write a book one day,
"you just wait." (chuckling)
- Tara, where are you, baby? - You know, June
had the platform of the public eye and being able
to say, you know, "These are our kids."
And my mother didn't have that platform.
And she was doing so much work raising us
that she didn't feel that people were seeing her
and that was important to her to feel seen.
And for people to recognize her role.
- I also found a letter she wrote to him
after she died that she never mailed
and it was like, "Dear Johnny, I have never, ever
"asked you for one thing since we've been divorced.
"We've been divorced now,"
I think they'd been divorced 15 years,
"But I have one thing that I feel very strongly about
"and I have a favor to ask you.
"Will you please ask your wife
"to stop calling my daughters her children?"
(sighs)
(sniffles)
"You know how much they mean to me.
"I would think you could at least give me this much."
It's really sad.
It really broke her heart that he allowed that.
It was just, it was really,
when I found that letter, I thought,
"Why didn't she mail this?"
I wish she woulda mailed it.
'Cause he probably woulda done it.
He probably woulda asked her not to do it.
(film projector whirring)
- It may have been what happened in Casitas
that led to her wanting to have alarms on everything.
Her house eventually became
like living in an emergency room.
She had bells attached to everything.
To drawers that opened, to the front door,
to the door to the laundry room,
to the garage door, to her washer-dryer,
to her dishwasher.
There were bells going off in her house all the time.
I remember being so exhausted every time I came
to my mother's house, I'd have to go in the other room
and just close my eyes
and she would gasp at everything, you know.
If the bell went off, that someone had come up the driveway,
"(gasps) Who's that?"
It was constant.
And she had the TV, the radio going all the time,
sometimes at the same time.
- Ladies and gentlemen, my daughter, Rosanne Cash.
(audience applauding)
- She was proud of me but she was also suspicious.
She had seen what a life of fame and traveling
and you know, what the music industry was like
and what happened to my dad.
And so she thought that you become a musician
and you get divorced and you get on drugs
and you leave your kids.
- Aren't you out running around on the road all the time?
- Well, I mean, I go out and I come back a little bit
or I take them with me.
I'm a full time mother.
No, I wasn't gonna abandon my children.
I wasn't gonna become a drug addict.
I wasn't, well, I did get divorced, but it was,
you know, it wasn't out of that kind of acrimony.
And she would say, "You're just like your dad.
"You're just like your dad."
And it wasn't with any affection, believe me.
She was tough, you know.
It was hard to get her unmitigated approval about things.
"Why did you wear white shoes with a black suit?"
And, "What are you gonna do about your hair?"
And, "Why don't you start wearing makeup properly?"
You know?
All of those things were so important to her.
- That's right.
Now, let's talk about your hair.
(audience laughing)
This is a beautiful photograph.
You're a lovely woman, I don't need to tell you that.
- I remember the first time I was
on the David Letterman show, it was on my 30th birthday
and I thought I did really well.
And I was proud of myself and I thought to myself,
"I'm gonna call and get my mother's approval for once."
Like, just straight on, not held back approval.
And I called up, I said, "Did you see me?"
And she said, "Who was that person?
"I didn't even recognize that person."
(dial tone humming) I was shocked.
You know, my mom could be really funny too.
Like unintentionally funny.
I remember we went to see "Broadcast News" together
and there was this scene when Holly Hunter goes
into the room with Albert Brooks
and he reveals that he's actually in love with her
and it's this very intense scene
and like at the height of the intensity,
my mom turned to me and said,
"Where's her purse?"
(light music)
Hey, I noticed since I brought the camera out,
mom disappeared.
Oh, here she comes.
- And introducing,
Vivian Distin.
She didn't laugh as easy as she used to, you know.
She took herself too seriously sometimes
but you had to lighten her up
and she'd get to giggling.
- She was a very, very vibrant woman
but I could see the pain.
But then I brought it up to her,
and she just kinda got closed-mouthed about it
and just wouldn't wanna talk about it, you know.
Which is her way of saying, "That's too painful.
"I'm not going there."
- I'm not here to pry into your personal life.
- My personal life is an open book.
- [Columbo] Yes, sir.
- I remember it was no problem for her
to turn the TV on and watch his shows.
Which always was a little odd to me.
It was a little strange to me.
Like, she's okay with still embracing him in our lives
and as the years went on, I realized
that she still carried a very big torch for him
and always loved him.
- It was very obvious.
She died still loving him with all her heart.
- She just said she had never loved anybody
like she loved him and she had never gotten over him.
- No, my mom never fell out of love with my dad.
I remember as a teenager, walking into the bathroom one day
and said, "You're still in love with Dad, aren't you?"
And she would not look at me and would not answer me.
- She loved him til the day she died.
And Dick always knew that too which was interesting.
He was always the specter,
my dad was the specter in their marriage.
We weren't a family where you disappeared.
You stayed connected even though some of it
was destructive or hard, we stayed connected.
(camera flashing) (light music)
- You know, I have to say,
my mother was a better grandmother than she was mother.
And she became a good mother later on,
particularly to Tara.
And she loved us fiercely and would defend us against anyone
but she really came to life with her grandchildren.
(light music)
- She had an 800 number so they would call her all the time.
And it was 1-800-O-VIVIAN.
'Cause back then, you had to pay
for long distance phone calls.
And none of her grandchildren ever had any money, so.
(chuckling)
- When my husband and I moved back to Ojai, California,
my mom was living in Ventura,
which is only like 20 minutes away
so we got to see her a lot
and so she watched my kids when we went
out on a date or something.
And she spoiled them.
She loved them to death.
And I think she would have loved to have all
of her grandkids around all the time
because she just really enjoyed being a grandmother.
- [Man] Who are you talking to?
- Grandma.
- I went to her 50th class reunion
and I knew it was a big deal
and so I met her in San Antonio.
There was this lunch for all the ladies
who were, at this time, 68 years old.
And so all of the women went around the table
and told about their lives and every woman said
how long she'd been married and how many kids she had.
So it came to my mom, and she said,
"I've been married,"
and then she gave the total, whatever it was,
of both husbands, but then she admitted,
"Well then, that's two husbands."
(chuckling)
Because it was a Catholic school, you know.
They didn't believe in divorce.
I felt bad for her.
(light music)
(pen scratching)
When she was writing her book late in life,
she said, "There are things you kids don't even know.
"That's why I wanna write the book."
And I said, "Why would you tell us that way?
"Why don't you tell us instead of writing a book
"about the things you want us to know?"
She had no answer for that.
- Going through all the memories as she was writing it,
it was very cathartic for her.
She said it was her therapy.
That she had never shared any of these things
with anyone because she felt like that
would have been betraying Dad or betraying their marriage.
So she actually went to Tennessee to get Dad's permission
to even publish the book.
(light music)
June passed on May 15th,
so Dad had been alone a couple of months
and Dad was in a wheelchair at that point.
And I pushed him out into the bedroom to see Mom.
It was cute.
She blushed and hugged him
and he kinda grinned and blushed a little bit
and they made small talk and then it ended up
being a really good conversation.
They had about an hour and a half talk
and Mom asked him how he felt about her publishing a book.
That she had worked on one and had told her story
and he said, "Well, of all the people on the planet
"that should tell their story, Vivian,
"I think it should be you."
That thrilled her
and made her feel really good to know
that he was okay with that.
- She was always elated if she had some time
to spend with my dad.
She just really enjoyed being with him
and seeing him.
He meant a lot to her.
- Rosanne was the only one not there.
And we have a picture of Mom, Dad, Kathy, Tara and me
and I hate Rosanne wasn't there
'cause it would have been our family again.
(light music)
- These were Mom's skates that she was wearing
when she met Dad.
She kept anything and everything
that had a memory attached that had to do with Dad.
- There was this giant, red suitcase in our house
and I remember her opening it a couple of times
and just being overwhelmed
by how many letters there were in there.
She saved every one of 'em.
And so she had 'em in chronological order.
She could read, you know, their responses to one another
and it was really quite something that
she saved all of those.
(light music)
- Johnny Cash is dead at the age of 71.
- [Reporter] While fans mourn, the son and daughter
of Johnny Cash prepare to send their father into the ages.
- While you probably may not be able to see it,
the flag is at half staff here
at the Country Music - We'll talk about the
- Hall of Fame. - Greatness of Johnny Cash.
- Some generations of country listeners
are indeed mourning his death today.
- [Reporter] It's a sad night overall in Music City.
- Mom called me every morning after Dad died.
The first time she called, she said,
"Even though I didn't see him or talk to him very often,
"just knowing he was on the planet was enough.
"But now that he's not, I don't know if I wanna be here."
- [Tara] To experience such a loss like that
and have the whole world see it,
i think that was really hard for her.
Really, really hard.
- A couple of months after Dad died,
and enormous memorial tribute was planned for the Ryman.
Everybody was there, from Tim Robbins, Sheryl Crow,
Willie Nelson, just an enormous line up.
(audience applauding) Mom wrote in her book
that people of the Nashville mind-set
preferred that she be written out of Dad's history
and that was pretty clear that day.
- [Announcer] He was a husband to his beloved June,
he was a father to a flock of children.
- Your mom also, Miss June Carter Cash
made me proud to be an American.
- They married with six beautiful daughters between 'em.
John's battles with his demons
would have ended a lesser love story.
- Mom sat through all of that.
I don't really know how she did it.
(audience applauding)
- Please welcome Rodney Crowell.
(audience applauding) - Thank you.
I wanna send this song to Vivian Distin.
Blessed Vivian, the grandmother of my daughters
and a woman I admire very much.
(suspenseful music)
- [Ann] It's not okay if they move forward
with the movie and just, if what they produce
is anything like that script, you know,
it's gonna be devastating.
You know, devastating to Vivian.
I mean, that's just not fair.
She's been through too much.
(ominous music)
- She hadn't been feeling good for three or four months.
She was having trouble breathing
and she said, "I keep dreaming about your dad.
"He's sitting in a chair in my bedroom
"and he just keeps going like this."
- (sighs) Well, my mom was diagnosed
with lung cancer the day before her birthday.
Her 71st birthday.
But it was treatable.
So I flew out and I went to her first consultation
after the diagnosis with the surgeon.
He was showing her the slides
and showing her what it was and where it was
and the kind it was.
- Then the doctor said, "I've done 3,500 of these surgeries.
"Never lost a patient.
"It's the easiest lung cancer to have.
"It's contained, it's just one little spot.
"We'll take it out, no big deal."
- So we all felt pretty calm that it was treatable.
- We decided as a family to take turns
to go one at a time to be with her
and I volunteered to be the first person to go.
So she went in the hospital, I don't know,
around May 19th.
- All of a sudden we get a call.
"Everything went great.
"Your mom's doing great.
"It was very small, we got it.
"She'll be going home tomorrow."
- Then I went in to see her and she didn't look good.
I thought, "Something's not right."
She was very, very bloated.
- Two hours later the phone rings.
"You need to get on a plane."
- She had edema that kept getting worse.
She had swelling, her lungs were filling with fluid
and they were going to have to put her
in an induced coma in order to treat her and bring it down.
- When I left, she was in ICU and I kissed her
and she said, "One more," as I was walking away
and I said, "One more what?"
And she said, "Kiss."
And so I went back and I kissed her on the forehead.
- Then they put her in a coma.
So I'm staying in touch with the nurse.
Calling, you know, a couple times a day
to find out how it's going.
On about the 21st, he said,
"She's just not doing well."
And I said, like I didn't know how serious it was,
I said, "Should I come out there?"
He said, "If it was my mom, I'd come out."
And so I went out there on the 21st.
22nd we really knew she was gonna die.
And my birthday is May 24th
and I thought, "She can't die on my birthday.
"She just can't do it."
And then she died on my birthday.
(somber music)
I was in the room when she died.
And I was standing at the foot of the bed.
And I saw her
leave her body.
And I saw her
become a child.
She was only about four or five years old
and she started laughing.
She was so happy.
And it was a comfort, you know.
Like, wow.
She's really free.
Like all of that torment she suffered
from losing my dad, from the various humiliations she had
and grief, just grief,
and the resentment, all of it, you know.
It's like, phew, man, taking off a suit of armor
and becoming a child again.
You know, and then we found out later
it was a medical error.
She shouldn't have died.
They had given her too much fluid in the operating room.
Too much intravenous fluid.
- I was in shock.
I really was.
I think I really went into shock.
I remember getting really upset about something
and Rosanne took me outside and said,
"Cindy, you need to calm down."
And I said, "It's my mother!
"I can't lose my mother."
- [Photographer] Joaquin, up top please.
- And then the movie about my dad came out
later that year in the fall and I thought,
"Damn, she wanted to get out before that movie came out.
"She couldn't have taken it."
It just would have killed her,
that kind of notoriety and...
Well, it did kill her.
She wanted to leave before it came out.
I knew that.
And, you know, kindly, they showed us the film
before it came out and then I left for Paris.
It's like, I don't wanna be around for this.
- Unfortunately the book didn't get any press.
Most anyone I've talked to never even knew she wrote it.
And that's really sad to me.
I wish that we could do something and make her come to life.
And you guys doing this is just,
it makes me so happy.
- I have a lot of cherished memories with my mom.
- You know, she was a great friend.
She loved fiercely.
She was very disciplined.
I got a ton of my discipline from her.
She was tenacious and she was creative.
- She did a little bit of everything.
Anything that was creative, she tried it or did it.
You know, as long as she was doing something
where she felt useful, that was important to her.
- She was an amazing woman
with so many talents and such a thirst for life.
And you know,
I think that's what pulled her through
all of the hard things that she had to go through.
- I don't think the music had anything
to do with it, really.
I think the fast life and pace in California,
when we moved to California,
all the problems really started, and...
I think everybody's aware of what problems.
The pills and from there
it was downhill.
But the first few years, we had a very good relationship.
And I'm happy about that because all the children
hopefully have some good memories.
(chuckling)
(light music)
(suspenseful music)