Kirk Douglas - The Role of a Lifetime

By Peter Laufer

Do you remember the opening scene of the movie Spartacus? It is a panorama of an open pit mine in Libya and slaves are working under an obviously hot desert sun. The camera moves in on one of the slaves. He is Kirk Douglas, playing Spartacus, the leader of a slave rebellion against the Roman Empire. As Douglas/ Spartacus labors, a narrator intones the words of the film's writer, Dalton Trumbo, "There, under whip and chain and sun, he lived out his youth and his young manhood, dreaming the death of slavery, two thousand years before it would finally die."

Douglas recalls that after the film was finished, he was personally tormented by the idea of perpetuating the Hollywood Blacklist. "It was the most important decision that I made in my career," Douglas writes. "We never held a press conference but word got out. People said I had ruined my career, that I would never work again." He quotes from a Hedda Hopper review slamming the movie as being "from a book written by a Commie and the screen script written by a Commie, so don't go see it."

"A few people wrote threatening letters," Douglas adds, "but the sky didn't fall in. The blacklist was broken. And the movie was a success. I can't think of anything in my life that made me more proud. Our freedoms-freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom to believe what we want to believe-are very fragile and they must constantly be protected. Yes even now."

If you decide to watch the movie after reading the following interview with Douglas,be sure to watch the credits. On current DVDs of the epic, Dalton Trumbo is publicly identified as screenwriter, finally.

With his wife Anne, Douglas has used his wealth to found and perpetuate the Douglas Foundation. The foundation supports a wide variety of philanthropic causes from health care research and the arts, to such grass roots activities as repairing playgrounds left in disarray by the overworked public works personnel and inadequate budget of the city of Los Angeles-hundreds of playgrounds have been rehabilitated. The couple took their zeal for the value of safe and fun child play to the Middle East, where they've funded playgrounds in Israel in hopes that Jewish and Arabic children will find common ground on common playgrounds.

Following Anne Douglas's fight with breast cancer they raised millions of dollars to create and fund Research for Women's Cancers, a unit of the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. They founded an Alzheimer's disease care facility at the Motion Picture and Television Fund Home and named it "Harry's Haven," after Kirk Douglas's father. Although his father did not suffer from Alzheimer's, Douglas, who is harshly critical of his father's parenting skills, says he felt "it was time to give my father the recognition he never gave me." The homeless of Los Angeles are another Douglas cause, and their foundation created the Anne Douglas Center for Women at the Los Angeles Mission, a care facility for homeless women suffering from substance abuse, depression, and family problems.

All these good works are supported not just from the Douglas's good fortune, but also by funding the family convinces others to contribute. As Ken Scherer of the Motion Picture Television Fund Foundation told The Hollywood Reporter several years ago, "What they've done so effectively is not just give their own money, but inspire others to do so. To me, that's the ultimate donor. You give of yourself as well as your resources."

I caught up with Kirk Douglas via telephone from the San Francisco airport while I was en route to Europe. The public address system was announcing destinations in the background as he said hello and he asked me where I was going. I told him I had an appointment in Berlin.

Kirk Douglas: Berlin! One of my favorite cities. [Douglas won a Golden Bear for lifetime

achievement at the Berlin Film Festival in 2001; he also received a special Academy Award in 1996 for his moral contributions to the motion picture community. Other honors for Douglas include the Presidential Medal of Honor.] What can I do for you?

Peter Laufer : We at Aware magazine would like our readers to know more about the role philanthropy plays in your life.

Douglas: I must say I found out that someone said, "Be ashamed to die before you have won some victory for humanity." [It was abolitionist and educator Horace Mann who made that statement in his commencement address to Antioch College graduates in 1859. He was the founding president of Antioch and the credo "Be ashamed to die before you have won some victory for humanity" has been repeated each year since to all graduating seniors at the now-struggling school.] That impressed me greatly. You have to do something for others. My feeling is that's what being worthy is all about. Humility makes you a better person to care for others; that's the best religion for you.

Laufer: How do you think one best achieves such humility?

Douglas: More and more in my whole life I have found that as I get older I get less egotistical, and I think more of others. Because I have been lucky. I was born in poverty. My mother and father were peasants from Russia and had no education. So I have a lot to be thankful for. And I think that those who have more should help those who have less.

Philanthropy and the role it plays in his life is a recurring theme in Let's Face It, a work Douglas calls his last book. "At ninety you no longer can do much for yourself, but you certainly can do a lot for others," he writes. "Helping others is now my great adventure." He muses in the book about his impoverished family and the role his background played in his later personal life. "I was already down; I had nowhere to go but up. I do think that you have more of an incentive to achieve your goals in life when you're born poor ."

Laufer: It seems only after we grow older that many of us come to the realization that helping others is so important and satisfying? Why do you believe this is?

Douglas: Because when we're younger we're too narcissistic. We're too wrapped up in ourselves. My book, Let's Face It, is a book to be hopeful for every generation, because let's face it: the world is in a mess. But I have a simple proposal for every generation: I say life begins at eighty. Really, really. Because then you're capable of ridding yourself of your self-centeredness and think more about other people, whether it's development work or people who need help. You're mature. Some people mature earlier than others.

Laufer: When did this epiphany occur in your own life? Was it any one moment? Did it happen with Dalton Trumbo and breaking the Hollywood Blacklist?

Douglas: I think you hit on a point that made me think of others, and that was when I broke the blacklist and put Dalton Trumbo's name on the screen. In my family there are those who knew me when I was just out of the Navy and I was 27 years old, and those who know me now. When I look at those who have ethics, there is a mix of maturity and youth. Youth has many advantages. Youth can give you the impulsiveness to do things. But maturity gives you judgment and a feeling for others. One of my first [epiphanies] was when I read about Alzheimer's disease. My sympathy was not for the ones that get it-that's unfortunate- but for the loved ones who have to live with it. And they have to live with the loved one who doesn't know who they are. That's why I took over the Alzheimer's Unit at the Motion Picture and Television Home. This is a place where they will be taken care of. The relatives can come to visit. It relieves them of the awful responsibility of living with someone who doesn't know who you are.

Laufer: You are your wife decided to sell paintings in your valuable collection-works by Picasso, Chagall, Miró, and others-to bolster funds available for the charitable work by the Douglas Foundation. What motivated you to give up those things you acquired

and obviously loved?

Douglas: You see, I think giving is almost a selfish process because it makes you feel good. When you do something good for others, you do feel good. My wife and I have almost finished 400 playgrounds for children in the [Los Angeles public] schools because we learned years ago that the playgrounds were dangerous with asphalt failing and filled with holes, so my wife said, "Let's fix them."

Laufer: How does such a philanthropic mentality transfer from one person to another? Are you able to teach charitable attitudes to your children, for example, or do they have to learn for themselves?

Douglas: Well, I don't know if I taught it to my kids, but they are very, very philanthropic. Peter is the head of our foundation. And they all have seen their way to do something to help other people. I've had nothing to do with it. I've found that they would practice whatever religion they wanted. I've always said if you believe in being a good person and helping others, that's enough religion for you.

Laufer: With so much need in the world, how do you make decisions regarding where and what to give? How do you narrow your work and focus it? All of us have only so much of a reserve.

Douglas: You do what you can within your capacity. I admire Bill Gates andWarren Buffet, who really been trying to eradicate diseases. You do what you can. For instance, my wife endowed a shelter for poor homeless women. I am amazed at the results, how much it helped them. They learned how to use a computer and they say it changed their whole life. Each person has to do what he can.

Laufer: Would you agree that philanthropy is more than giving money and material goods? Is it a philosophy and a way of life, or can it be simply writing the check?

Douglas: You can help folks, definitely, but the result is you have to write the check. Whatever prompts you to do that, the point is to actively do something. My industry doesn't get the attention for all the people who have decided to do something meaningful. I am proud of the people in my industry who help. If all industries did that, we would be a much better world. Do you understand my impaired speech?

Laufer: Yes, thank you again for taking the time and making the effort to talk with me.

A stroke, some ten years ago, left Douglas with impaired speech, and he was most gracious accepting my questions, despite the fact that speaking for a consequential length of time is exhausting for him. While we talked there were times when the words flowed and were easy to understand. But at other times during our conversation it was extremely difficult to follow what he was saying and his responses seemed labored; it sounded as if it were almost painful for him to speak.

Douglas writes about his post-stroke speech therapy in Let's Face It. "In the morning, while driving with my wife to the gym, I do speech exercises. At every red light, I repeat the lip and tongue movements. One of these is sticking my tongue out as far as I can and holding it for five seconds. People in cars alongside us usually look at me strangely, and some of them stick out their tongues in response."

Laufer: Did the helicopter crash you miraculously survived and the stroke you suffered stimulate your philanthropy, or was giving already part of your life?

Douglas: I began to think that God doesn't want me here. Maybe I have things to do on this earth because I've had several skirmishes with death. So I thought I better do something worthwhile. And that sustains me.

Laufer: Do you believe most people need some sort of life-or-death test to motivate them to think about others and not just themselves?

Douglas: Well I don't know if they need that, but itsurely helps. It surely helps. If you're a thinking person, when you survive a near-death experience, it changes your whole outlook on life.

Laufer: And religion? You write that you're not a pious Jew, but you've developed more interest in Judaism late in life, studying with rabbis and even engaging in a second bar mitzvah at the age of eighty-three. Did embracing your religion play a role in your work to help others?

Douglas: I don't know if religion played a role; probably it did. I maybe don't give it as much credit as I should, because every religion tries to make you a better person. But you don't change into a better person because you go to the synagogue or the church every week. You become a better person if you spend your day-to-day activities and your day-to-day relationships with other people.

Laufer: You cite Warren Buffet and Bill Gates as examples of successful businessmen using their wealth to help others. But those day-today relationships with other people you just talked about, those day-to-day activities, if they are helpful to others, can be as philanthropic as Warren Buffet writing a big check.

Douglas: Exactly, exactly. I think our country- what I've seen in my travels-I think our country is exceedingly philanthropic. And we should be. We should be the conscience of the world. We should set an example. I don't believe in spreading democracy by military force. I believe in spreading it by example. So we have to work harder to make our country better to be the example for the world to follow.

In my book, Let's Face It, I propose to the younger generation that they should try to have our country make a formal apology for slavery. And this way we apologize for all forms of slavery, the slavery we effected many years ago and the slavery that exists now with the slavery of Third World workers and kidnapped victims sold as sex slaves. We should make a formal apology that would resonate around the world about our attitude toward that.

Laufer: And that is an example of philanthropy that does not require the exchange of money.

Douglas: You can call it that, but it's more living like a decent human being. I hope you have enough because it's really difficult for me to talk too much.

Laufer: I understand and I very much appreciate the opportunity to talk with you. Both the philanthropic work you're doing now and the artistry of your acting career are iconic, and the chance to have this conversation with you is an honor.

Douglas: You're too kind.