‘Bumpkin’ Costner Wants ‘Chill’ Smarts

Kevin Costner says he wishes he were smart, like the actors in the movie “The Big Chill.”

“Those guys are really smart, really clever. I’m a bit of a bumpkin,” he told Parade magazine in an interview published in this weekend’s editions.

“I wish I was smarter. I wish I was more disciplined. I wish I was better read. I read all the time, and then I think of all the books that I won’t have time to read before I die, and it frustrates me,” said the actor, who directed and stars in the film “Dances With Wolves.”

Before he became famous in movies such as “No Way Out” and “Field of Dreams,” Costner was in “The Big Chill”--as the corpse of the man whose suicide brings together the other characters in the movie. Among the players in the 1983 film were William Hurt, Kevin Kline and Glenn Close.

A family man, Costner said he works hard to maintain his marriage of 12 years with wife Cindy.

“We don’t have a perfect marriage by any means, but we work at it,” he said. “People are surprised our marriage works. It seems they wish it didn’t because you’re a star and so your marriage isn’t supposed to work.”