When I started reading Michael Douglas’ memoir One Helluva Ride, one thought came to mind: “like father, like son”.
That expression refers to the best-selling 1988 memoir The Ragman’s Son, penned by his father, the late legendary actor Kirk Douglas. I found The Ragman’s Son to be one of the most engrossing, entertaining and deeply honest Hollywood memoirs to be written by a product of Hollywood’s golden age.
And like Kirk, Michael’s memoir is just as engrossing, entertaining and deeply honest. As well, it debuted in the #1 position on the New York Times hardcover nonfiction best seller list. That’s pretty good for a Hollywood offspring who not only wanted to echo his father’s career in motion pictures, but also succeeded on his own terms, not as “Kirk Douglas’ son”.
The book is typically chronological. However, the focus of most of the chapters centres on the 13 TV shows and movies that shaped his life and career, from The Streets of San Francisco, to Wall Street, to Falling Down, to Behind the Candelabra.
With all those years of experience behind and in front of the camera, one should have a wealth of anecdotes and behind-the-scenes stories to share. And Michael shares an abundance of them in his book. From trying to simultaneously juggle the producer and actor responsibilities to filming in the most distasteful of conditions (especially during Romancing the Stone and Jewel of the Nile), there are plenty of stories to constantly keep the reader entertained.
A personal favourite story involved the shooting of the 1989 dark comedy The War of the Roses, which also featured his Stone/Nile co-stars Kathleen Turner and long time friend Danny DeVito (who also served as its director). To film the final scene, Michael and Kathleen were attached to a chandelier suspended 35 feet above the floor. Once DeVito had them secured and elevated, he then ordered the crew to break for lunch. His rationale for that surprise move was the following:
“You remember the mud in Mexico on Romancing, Mikey? You remember you made me sit under that mule in Morocco in Jewel of the Nile?…Do you remember how you made me spend multiple days puking on the boat for Cuckoo’s Nest? Well, this is payback, babe. Don’t worry about lunch, I’ll have it brought up to you. You’re not getting down for a loooong time.”
Probably the most intense—and reaffirming—part of the book is how he chronicled the up-and-down relationship he had with his father. He recognized that Kirk Douglas was not only his father, but a Hollywood screen legend who starred in over 90 movies throughout a 60-year career. He also realized that his father was the son of a Russian immigrant who was a volatile alcoholic, spent his money on booze, and frequently beat up his wife and seven children, especially his only son (who was born Issur Danielovitch).
“For millions of fans, he was a heroic, larger-than-life figure, but to me he was just out of reach, in and out of focus…Kirk Douglas was my father, a flawed man with a ferocious temper and a burning ambition. He charged through life with an unstoppable tenacity that left little room for quiet, prosaic domesticity,” he writes.
But being Kirk Douglas’ son also had its benefits, as Michael visited the locations and sets during the shooting of some of his films (including 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea), and even let him work as an on-set gofer or production assistant, which gave him the best on-the-job training to learn about how a movie was made. However, it was Kirk’s survival of a serious helicopter crash in 1991 and the severe stroke he suffered in 1996 that softened his resolve—not to mention his strong return to the principles of his Jewish faith—that led to a father/son reconciliation that lasted until his death in 2020 at the age of 103.
The book’s intense personal aspect isn’t confined to this father/son dynamic. It is also extended to Michael’s personal ups and downs, which included his dysfunctional first marriage, his drug addiction and alcholism, the accidental overdose death of his younger brother Eric, his oldest son Cameron’s drug problem that led to serving several years in prison, and especially his successful battle with stage IV throat cancer, which could not have been possible without the endless help and support from his second wife Catherine Zeta-Jones, his three children (including son Dylan and daughter Carys from his marriage to Jones) and especially Kirk, who at a Halloween celebration that took place during the course of his cancer treatments, arrived dressed as a clown, complete with fright wig, round nose and floppy shoes (the photo of that moment of levity during that difficult time is featured in the book).
These days, at the age of 82, Michael Douglas is a happy man. His health is restored; he has a wonderful family and network of friends; he is still involved in motion pictures (although not on the same hectic scale as he did about 50 years ago), and finally, he could be satisfied with the fact that he accomplished this tough, uphill ascent his own way, without having the label “Kirk Douglas’ Son” attached to him. His memoir is a bold testament to how he not only became a successful, award-winning producer/actor, but as a true Hollywood survivor, too.
To put it succinctly, One Helluva Ride is one helluva a showbiz memoir. Kirk would have been proud.
