This interview is actually a transcript of an appearance Don did during the second season of The Young Riders on Into The Night with Rick Dees. I tried to be as accurate as possible, but you can only rewind a tape so much before you get sick of it…anyway… The show opens with a clip from the episode ‘Born To Hang’…and then: Rick Dees: He’s a man’s man, let’s bring him out, Don Franklin! Don comes out dressed in a pair of jeans, a black top and a black blazer, and some cowboy boots. He takes a whip from Rick and starts playing around with it (and he looks like he’s having waaaaaaaay to much fun). He starts walking back towards Rick. RD: Stay away from me Don! Don Franklin: This isn’t the whip I use on the show. The whip I actually use on the show (starts laughing at all the wild screaming girls…and no I wasn’t among them. Shoot, I wasn’t even allowed to stay up that late to watch the show) is twice as heavy as this. RD: Did you know this is the closest we’re ever going to come to having Madonna on the show? (Don laughs) Have a seat Don. (picks up the whip). Hey Madonna, there’s still time for you to get down to ABC. I’ll have Don stay here…And this is it baby. DF: I was in the dressing room, in the green room just now and I’m holding this whip, because it’s not my whip and I’m not real familiar with it, and this girl walks in and she looks at the whip and she goes “Hmmmmmm” (again people, this was not me! I swear it!) And I said, is this yours…look familiar? RD: Do you have to have special training to use a whip? DF: Oh yeah! They sent me to like…well, what they call cowboy camp, which is up by like Magic Mountain for like 4 or 5 days…something like that. And the guys were teaching me how to use it. And I asked if I could have like, a motorcycle helmet, or a football helmet because I caught myself in the ear a couple of times. RD: Oooooh. DF: You know, you’re hitting, trying to get the swing of this thing and you catch yourself on the ear and you’ll be surprised at how quick you learn once you get hit. RD: You could’ve been the Van Gogh of cowboys. DF: Big time. RD: Just like that! So, what do they show you first? They just say, “hey…” DF: Well (grabs whip). RD: What is the main trick? DF: Well, it’s kinda difficult because there are different sections. This is the handle, obviously, and this is the body of the whip. And then you have what’s called the fall. And this whip doesn’t have a popper, which is why it doesn’t pop, you know, as powerfully as it could. And what happens is, it moves through space and as it unfolds, you reverse the direction of it, and it breaks the sound barrier. And that’s what gives you the pop. And that blew me away because I thought “Oh, you just swing it, and whoop, swing it back and that’s it.” RD: You’re the only character who uses a whip on The Young Riders. DF: Yeah, my character Noah actually prefers to use a whip because he says “Ain’t nothing that scares white folks more than a Negro with a gun.” He’s like “I’ll carry a whip, I’m cool with a whip. Use a gun in the shadow”. (Rick Dees is laughing way to hard at this!) RD: I love the way The Young Riders is shot though. It just feels like you’re going to a movie every week, instead… DF: Yeah, it’s got a really nice look to it. One of the things that really helps with that is obviously we shoot down in Arizona. So we’re down on location, in the desert. We have everything around us. We don’t have to fake it like here in Hollywood. RD: Did you fake the horseback riding? That’s gotta be new to you Don. You’re a city guy. DF: Yeah, all of us. The only thing I rode was subway trains. OK, let’s just get that straight right now. RD: Which is worse than horseback riding. DF: EXACTLY! More dangerous. RD: Yeah, much more dangerous. DF: Yeah, all of us have doubles that do most of our rough and dangerous riding, you know, for us. RD: Well speaking of riding…it must be tough to find women sometimes, I understand while talking to other young riders, out there in the desert. And, and… DF: It’s not that tough. ((Oh, he’s big pimping!)) RD: Women to go horseback riding with… DF: Um, I don’t know. I’ve got my wife out there with me…and it really makes me… (Audience is not happy with that bit o’ news) RD: Wait a minute. DF: Hey! This is the 90’s. RD: Hey this is the 90’s…this is a happily married man. We’ve got Valerie Harper on the show (ok, um, what does this have to do with the price of squash?), don’t give him any heat! The man is happily married. DF: Everybody get’s married for the 90’s. (Again, I don’t understand this comment!) RD: Now, did she get you before you made it big? DF: Yeah. RD: So, she really loves you for who you are? DF: Yeah, which is reaaly nice, it’s really great. I met Shelia in Chicago…we were doing theater together in Chicago. (people start applauding) Right on! What about Chicago over the Lakers! Yeah! RD: There you go! DF: Yeah, we met in Chicago. RD: Chicago right now, I talked to ‘em today. The Bulls got the edge ((Whatever! The Knicks is the team to root for!)). They told me they had something. DF: Well, you know, Chicago is a big theater town, and I think it was very, very smart, you know, of the Bulls to allow the Lakers to win the first game. You know, let them get their confidence up, so we can come from behind and “Hmmmm”… (Audience starts booing and hissing) RD: Well listen, you come back and we’ll have a victory party for you. DF: Great! RD: Don Franklin! He’s a young rider and he’s on the way up!