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Playing the Game
By BOB THOMPSON
The Toronto Sun
Sunday, August 31, 1997


Maybe Michael Douglas is accustomed to having some of his movies mirror life. After all, he did co-star in The China Syndrome, which focused on a nuclear plant incident the same year Three Mile Island made headlines.

The Game is a different story, because the movie, opening Sept. 12, reflects Michael Douglas' private life. Although the David Fincher film is a stylish melodrama about a wealthy banker (Douglas) who becomes involved in an elaborate prank, there are some striking parallels between Douglas and his character's profile -- like a recent divorce, a troubled younger brother and a famous father haunting his every move.

Missing from the script is a troubled teenage son trying to kick drugs. Even Douglas doesn't bother denying the similarities.

To heighten the point, the wildly successful actor and producer admits that he was dealing with his chaotic personal life while filming in San Francisco last year.

"If you call getting a divorce a game, I guess there are comparisons," says Douglas, smiling slightly. "I certainly was re-evaluating a whole bunch of things -- just like my character."

Unlike his Game man, the 53-year-old obviously has put his recent unsettled year of living infamously in perspective.

Besides talking about his divorce from wife Diandre -- "We were married for 20 years and we had a lot of lovely times" -- Douglas, during his session last week, talks about his son Cameron's substance abuse problem, his half-brother Eric's troubled times, and his famous father Kirk Douglas' amazing legacy, especially in light of his dad's life-threatening stroke, which gave the son a dramatic reason to review where he was and where he wants to be.

"I certainly thought about mortality," Douglas says. "I thought about what I wanted to do the rest of my life."

Apparently, his father, like his son, is getting stronger every day.

"I've just been so amazed at his continued growth, and his spiritual growth. I think at some point that I believed you reach an age and the father becomes the son and the son becomes the father.

"But it never happened that way, necessarily. He just finished his fifth novel, Climbing The Mountain, a book about his rediscovery of his spiritual side."

And the Michael Douglas lesson learned?

"You don't have to wither just because you reach retirement age. You can pursue goals, and one of them should be completing your life and making it whole."

Like worrying less about who you are and more about what you are becoming?

"There was always an element, when I was growing up, that no matter how much you succeeded, some credit would be taken away because you had a famous father in the business."

So?

"So, for my son, I always try to think how to encourage him to do what he wants to do, especially when he has had a father and a grandfather with that kind of fame."

Did that kind of awareness lead to your focusing attention on your son this year?

"Yeah, I've been able to spend more time. You do what you can -- be supportive and loving. But ultimately, everybody has to take care of themselves. But he's doing great -- he's in wonderful shape."

Brother Eric is another unstable story. Why the difference?

"Maybe that alpha son thing has a little bit to do with it. First sons tend to be dominant. I was also a hippie. So monetary gain was not part of my vernacular at all. We weren't even thinking about that. In fact, we weren't thinking about much.

"But my mother was great. She divorced my father when I was five. So I grew up back east in Connecticut. My father was the first one to acknowledge that he didn't bring me up."

"I was really brought up outside all of this Hollywood business. You know like I worked at a Connecticut gas station -- that probably solidified a lot of stuff."

Michael Douglas worked at a gas station?

"I was Mobil Man Of The Month. That's not in my resume? But yeah, I worked at a gas station -- when I flunked out of college my first year."

Those were the days. But what about these days?

"I'm looking at the finite amount of time. I'm moving to New York. I'm doing a picture with Gwyneth Paltrow roughly based on Dial M For Murder."

You're filming John Grisham's The Rainmaker with Francis Ford Coppola. "And I go to Europe for a holiday, a little golf."

As an anti-marriage bachelor on the prowl? "I'd get married in a nanosecond. I'd like some more kids too." In the meantime, you are dating in mid-life as a rich and famous movie star.

"What you are really saying is, `How will I know when a woman likes me just for me?'

"I don't really care. I'll let them shine me on for a little while until we figure something out."



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