Michael Douglas reflects on marriage 'time out' with Catherine Zeta-Jones
Actor Michael Douglas is sharing new details about his decades-long career in Hollywood, and the dramatic life he lived off the screen as well.
Douglas, now 82, said he met the love of his life, actress Catherine Zeta-Jones, after she first caught his attention on the big screen in the 1998 movie "The Mask of Zorro."
"Then soon after that, I read ... some magazine profile piece on Catherine, and I'm reading the piece, and it says that she likes older men, so I said, 'Whoa,'" Douglas, who is 25 years older than Zeta-Jones, told ABC News' Diane Sawyer in an interview that aired Tuesday on "Good Morning America."
Douglas went on to meet Zeta-Jones at a dinner and the couple, who share two children, will celebrate their 26th wedding anniversary in November.
Their marriage through the years survived a brief separation, which Douglas called a "time out" in their union.
"We both had to change," he told Sawyer of their time apart. "And sometimes I think it's just good to kind of call time out and just talk as two human beings."
In his new memoir, "One Helluva Ride," Douglas describes not only his love affair with Zeta-Jones, but also the previous affairs he had throughout his life, including one with his "Romancing the Stone" co-star Kathleen Turner that they kept secret for 40 years.
The "Fatal Attraction" actor also opens up in the memoir about his own battle with substance abuse, the addiction struggles faced by his son, Cameron Douglas, and about being born into Hollywood royalty as the son of actors Diana Douglas and Kirk Douglas.
It was his dad, a three-time Oscar nominee whom Michael Douglas describes as "larger than life," whose shadow loomed large over his son, both as a father and in Hollywood.
"I think he meant well, but he was out of that generation where you smacked around a fair amount," Michael Douglas told ABC News' Diane Sawyer, describing his father's temper that he said left him shy throughout his childhood.
In his 20s, Michael Douglas followed his dad into the world of acting, and said he soon had to turn down his own dad for a role.
While producing "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," Michael Douglas said that though his dad desperately wanted the role of Randle Patrick McMurphy, the studio head and director felt that Kirk Douglas was too old for the part. Michael instead cast Jack Nicholson, who would go on to win an Oscar.
Over 50 years later, Michael Douglas told Sawyer that telling Kirk Douglas -- who died in 2020 at age 103 -- that he didn't get the role remains the "hardest thing I ever had to do."
Years later, when Michael Douglas was undergoing treatment for cancer, he remembers his famous dad showing a softer side, surprising him by dressing as a clown to cheer him up.
Reflecting on the legendary life he's had, full of ups and downs and second chances, Douglas writes in his memoir that he sees himself now as a "lucky" guy.
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