Playing the patriarch

Kirk Douglas had worked with three of his four sons on movies such as “Posse” and TV’s “Inherit the Wind.” But not until “It Runs in the Family,” opening April 25, has the 86-year-old actor (Oscar-nominated for “Champion,” “The Bad and the Beautiful” and “Lust for Life”) teamed up with Michael, his eldest, a two-time Academy Award winner in his own right. Also featuring Michael’s 24-year-old son, Cameron, and Kirk’s ex-wife Diana, (mother of Michael), it’s a home movie, Hollywood-style.

Jesse Wigutow’s script focuses on three generations of the Gromberg family, a dysfunctional group navigating its way through a host of crises, external and self-imposed. Douglas, who feared he’d never act again after a 1996 stroke impaired his speech, plays the family patriarch coming to grips with his mortality. The film, produced by Michael, is his 85th feature -- a nice follow-up to this year’s Oscar ceremony, when father and son bantered good-naturedly while presenting the best picture award.

Because Michael plays your son and Cameron your grandson, it’s tempting to regard the movie as autobiographical.

I come from a dysfunctional family, one with a lot of conflicts. When my character says he couldn’t say “I love you,” it was my father I drew on. Though I left early and came home late, I think I was a good father. Still, reading the Old Testament, you discover all families are dysfunctional: Cain and Abel, Abraham sacrificing his son, Joseph’s brothers selling him into slavery. I tell screenwriters to study the Bible ... there’s every plot you can think of.

Why did it take so long for you and Michael to team up?

For many years, Michael and I weren’t that close. We weren’t enemies -- he had his first wedding at my home in Santa Barbara. But he’s a very independent guy. Though he’d take money when I gave it to him, he never asked for anything. Then, about 15 years ago, I came into the parking lot and saw this beautiful car with a ribbon on it-- and a note: “You say I don’t ask you for anything, but you’ve given me a lot.” That was the breakthrough, when we first started looking for a movie together.

Michael has said that 9/11 gave impetus to the project, hitting home the importance of family.

9/11 was a wake-up call ... and we’re not awake yet. God has given me so many wake-up calls, he must say, “Is this guy deaf?” There was the [1991] helicopter crash in which two young people were killed and I seriously hurt my back. Then the pacemaker and the stroke, which gave me time to evaluate my life. Being an actor is an egotistical thing, I realized. You are the product -- not something you make or write. To be a grown-up, playing cowboys and Indians, requires a childish quality, a naivete. At some point, however, we start to look at the world.

Your ex-wife says you’re more open and responsive to direction than you were when you worked together in 1955.

At one event, when I was getting an award, Burt Lancaster said that I’d be the first to admit that I’m very difficult ... and that he was the second. I analyzed that. I have strong opinions. I fought for them -- maybe too strongly. Now I rarely get angry -- the hell with it ... it’s too hard to form the words. I like to think I’ve become mellow, the strong silent type.

Has it been hard finding parts?

You’re talking to a working actor. If they want an old man with sloppy speech, they have to come to me. I have a monopoly.

-- Elaine Dutka