Jack Nicholson

HOLLYWOOD LEGEND AND BEST FRIEND ROBERT EVANS DESCRIBES HIM AS HAVING "A MILLION-DOLLAR SMILE AND A BILLION-DOLLAR BRIAN." HERE, HE SHOWS US THE MONEY. PLUS THE WORD FROM KATHY BATES, CHER, SEAN PENN, SUSAN SARANDON, AND, OF COURSE, EVANS

Jack Nicholson could have retired long ago. He could have hung up his hat on his many awards, basked in the glow of movie history (even before his 12th nomination for About Schmidt, he was already the most-nominated actor in Oscar history), and holed up in his Beverly Hills bungalow above all the hustle and bustle of Hollywood. But luckily for everyone, he hasn't gone anywhere and, at 65, is at the top of his game. In the past year alone, he's worked with one of the movies' edgiest young directors (Schmidt's Alexander Payne) and sharpest comedians (Adam Sandier, in this month's antic Anger Management), demonstrating a penchant for artistic evolution and experimentation. But as Nicholson tells Julian Schnabel, and as five of the legend's colleagues tell us, as much as his role choices and costars have changed, some things about the man remain the same: He loves to learn, makes a hell of a friend, and can't get enough of life's little pleasures.

JULIAN SCHNABEL: Hey, Jack.

JACK NICHOLSON: Hey, Julian. How are you?

JS: I'm okay, how are you doing?

JN: I'm doing fine.

JS: Okeydoke. I made a list of some things to talk to you about.

JN: Okay.

JS: What battles are worth fighting?

JN: Is this the first question?

JS: [laughs] Yeah.

JN: Well, a girlfriend once told me never to fight with anybody you don't love.

JS: [laughs] Okay. Now, I remember calling you after I saw About Schmidt, and I was so enthusiastic about what you did with the performance that I forgot how depressing it was. [Nicholson laughs] So Jack, tell me: What makes you decide to take a role?

JN: It's always an accumulation. You know, I had read the book [About Schmidt, by Louis Begley] quite a while before. Then, when [producer] Harry Gittes got Alexander Payne and [cowriter] Jim Taylor involved, I read the script, which was very good. Different from the book, of course. I was an admirer of Alex's, and Harry is one of my oldest friends-so as I say, it's an accumulated thing. When it's good.

JS: What's one of the best pieces of advice anyone ever gave you?

JN: My sister Lorraine told me--I was undecided as to whether to stay East and go to school or come to California--"If you stay around here, you'll always be Jack Nicholson, and you could be a big fish in a little pond, but it's better if you go to a big pond." [both laugh] That was her way of nudging me out of the nest, I think. I don't know if it's the best piece of advice, but it has worked out the best, anyway. I'll tell you one thing: Don't ever give anybody your best advice, because they're not going to follow it.

JS: [laughs] You've

"I see Jack every morning. I have a picture of him and his little girl in a frame set in the top of a box that sits on my bathroom counter. So every morning, when I wash my face, I look at it.

One day we were doing this scene in [The] Witches [of Eastwick, 1987] where he invites me for lunch. Before we were ready to do it, I had this huge panic attack. I went and knocked on his door, and I said, 'Johnny, I need to talk to you. I am having an awful anxiety attack. What happens if I can't do this scene?' He said, 'Well, we'll just close up for the day and we'll come back and do it another day. It's not a problem. But why don't we just sit here and talk for a while?' The moment he said it wasn't a problem, I felt perfectly fine. I've worked with a lot of really good actors, but I think his personality allows him--maybe it's his personality and his experience and his confidence--to be so sweet. Witches was a rough time--the director and the producers really didn't care about us, so we would go to Jack, and he helped us work on the script. And sometimes he would bring us lunch and come in and sit while we were all getting our makeup done, listening to us gossip. He said it reminded him of when he was li ttle and would sit around listening to women in his grandmother's beauty salon.

He's an incredible, dedicated actor. I mean, from the very first thing I saw him in, which was Easy Rider [1969], he's been the focus of whatever scene he's in: It's like Jack and small kids and little dogs. [laughs] He's really cool, but his edges are round. There's a softness about him. He's not cool by affectation. That's why actors love him, fans love him, and the academy loves him."

"When I was at my low, Jack insisted that I be his date at the Academy Awards when he was up for Ironweed [1987]. I didn't want to go. The last time I was there, I was nominated for an award, and this time everything was going wrong. He said, 'I want you to be my date. I want to walk in with you tonight.' So I said, 'Can I call you back in half an hour?' So I call Sue Mengers, and I say, 'Sue, Jack wants me to be his date at the Academy Awards; I don't want to go.' And she says, 'Listen to me, Evans: If you don't go with Jack tonight, move to Palm Springs.' So I called Jack back and I said, 'I'll go on three conditions. One, you've got to pick me up in a limousine and you have to have caviar and champagne in it.' And he says, 'What else?' 'You've got to take pictures with my help and my kid.' He says, 'Okay, what's the third?' And I say, 'You've got to promise one more thing. You can't try to fuck me on our first date.' He wanted me to go down there on his arm because he wanted to show everybody in the indust ry that I was his guy and he was my guy. We went to the Governors Ball, and table by table, he walked me over to everyone, his arm around me, saying, 'Evans, he's the best,' just to give me my confidence back. It was one of the best nights of my life.