Michael Douglas opened the Taormina Film Festival this week in Italy. Michael is 80 years old, and it looks like he has his parents’ longevity genes – his mother passed in her 90s, his father (Kirk Douglas) passed away at the age of 103. Michael did a Q&A session to open the festival, and he reflected back on his career, the 50th anniversary of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (which Michael produced), and what’s happening politically in America right now. He did that thing which so many American celebrities are doing when they travel abroad – apologizing for what America has become, and trying to explain how f–king awful it is right now. Some highlights from his conversation:
The worst time of Michael’s life: “I was born in 1944, at the end of World War II. But in my lifetime, this is the worst time that I could ever remember. There’s much too much conflict in the world. I am not happy to see the defense budgets increasing across the board. My country in particular insisted in demanding other countries increase their military budgets. I have a hard time understanding why, with all the AI and how intelligent we are as human beings, how we possibly could be having as many wars and conflicts as we are. It’s ridiculous.
Apologies: “I realize that my country bears a lot of the responsibility to the chaos that exists in the world. I apologize to my friends, be it my neighbors in Canada or Mexico, or all the countries in the EU and NATO. I’m embarrassed. But beyond that, I really do not want to even give the benefit of having more discussion about our president. No, no.”
His biggest disappointment: “This last election in our country. Immigration is a problem in every country. But this president created such drama, that all these immigrants were murderers and rapists. This is before he got elected.” Now that Trump is president again, Douglas explained to his Italian audience, he’s been able to bypass Congress in an attempt to enforce draconian immigration enforcement. “And my question to our government is, when or how do we stop this executive power?”
A longtime Californian: “The state of California is the fourth largest GDP in the world. You have the United States, China, India—then the state of California. Bigger than Japan. The San Joaquin Valley in California supplies 60% of all the food in America.” And much of it is picked by seasonal workers who come from Spanish-speaking countries, some of whom stay in the U.S. even after the work is done. “There’s no possible reason that you should call out the National Guard or the US Army” to deport these people, said Douglas. “To go into these middle-class neighborhoods—these are people who all have had jobs, been living in the country for 30 years or whatever. A very heavy-handed approach which isn’t resolving anything.”
“I have a hard time understanding why, with all the AI and how intelligent we are as human beings, how we possibly could be having as many wars and conflicts as we are.” Because Americans elected a Russian puppet moron for the second g–damn time? Because America is being dumbed down? Because everyone is being dumbed down by technology? But I digress. I like what he says about California, and if you get certain Californians going, it really sounds like they’re prepared to secede from America if this sh-t keeps happening. Michael is also right to say that this whole sh-tshow is such a f–king embarrassment.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.
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