The interviews collected here took place over a span of more than 20 years and the interviewers include David Frost, Richard Schickel, Dick Lochte, Charles Champlin and Jerry Roberts, the editor of this book. They elicited from Mitchum reminiscences and observations that cover his early life, the Depression era (part of which he spent behind bars), his arrival in Hollywood and the movie and television career that then lasted almost 50 years.