At the third annual TIFF gala, screen legend Al Pacino joined George onstage for a wide-ranging conversation. Over the course of nearly an hour, they talked about Pacino's beginnings as a comic, his iconic film performances (The Godfather, Dog Day Afternoon, Scent of a Woman, Glengarry Glen Ross, Scarface), his relationship with his father, the loss of Robin Williams and his upcoming film Imagine.

Pacino, it turns out, "always knew" he was going to be a star.

"When your eighth grade teacher comes up to your grandmother, six storeys high in a tenement building, and says to your grandmother, 'watch this kid and keep him acting,' you get a little confidence."

He also spoke about his encounters on the streets of New York with John Lennon and Orson Welles.

"I had a Lennon moment and I had an Orson Welles moment. I remember those! I don't know if it was the seventies though. I was walking, because I used to walk out on the street at Central Park and he was probably walking to the Dakota and we saw each other and it was this great kind of smile he gave me, it was an acknowledgement and it was a thrill because I loved him so much. Orson Welles was in a wheelchair when I saw him, about fifty feet away, and I saw him and looked at him and this beaming light came out of this guy, just smiled. Those are thrilling moments I had. Never said anything. He might have gone the other way if we talked."