Michael Douglas Shares Why He’s Stepping Away from Acting

Eighty-year-old Michael Douglas has shocked fans by saying he feels it is time to quit acting before he becomes, as he described it, dead on the set after nearly 60 years in Hollywood.

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Douglas said that having worked continuously since his early twenties, he has chosen to leave the relentless rhythm of film and television work, and has taken a conscious break since 2022.

Douglas started his career in the early 1970s and soon left his mark behind the camera, winning his first Academy Award in 1976 as a producer of One Flew Over the Cuckoo Nest.

He was only 31 and already influencing the future of the modern cinema.

By the 1980s and 1990s he was a staple of the screen, and was known to add charm and intensity to his characters.

He starred in Wall Street, where he won his second Oscar as Gordon Gekko, and in such memorable thrillers as Fatal Attraction and Basic Instinct.

These characters contributed to the re-imagining of the Hollywood complex male lead.

More recently, Douglas has been discovered by new audiences playing Dr. Hank Pym in the Marvel Ant-Man franchise.

In 2023, he appeared in his final performance in the role in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.

Looking back on that experience, Douglas stated that he was eager to accept it since he had never done a green screen film.

During the same interview with Deadline, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of One Flew Over the Cuckoo Nest, he remembered that his father, Kirk Douglas, had granted him the rights to make the film.

He also said that he accepted The Kominsky Method to collaborate with Chuck Lorre and to delve into comedy, demonstrating his readiness to enter new genres even at the end of his career.

Acting and his production work became tiresome at some point.

Douglas established the independent production company Further Films in 1997, which financed such films as Don t Say a Word, One Night at McCool s, and the 2020 Netflix series Ratched.

He acknowledged that it was a strain to run the company and still perform and he is enjoying the break he is currently on.

Douglas was speaking at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, and he made it clear that his decision to slow down is not accidental.

He said his career is very busy and he does not want to work himself to the edge of a breakdown.

Although he is not technically retired, he added that nothing short of something special would lure him back to the acting scene.

The last role of Douglas was as Benjamin Franklin in the 2024 Apple TV+ miniseries Franklin.

Nowadays, he is concentrated on his personal life and spending time at home.

He said he was glad that he could see his wife, actress Catherine Zeta-Jones, at work rather than always being away on set himself.

In his performance at the festival, Douglas also looked back on one of the biggest personal challenges: his fight against stage IV cancer in 2010.

He received chemotherapy and radiation and feels fortunate to have not had to undergo surgery which would have taken away a portion of his jaw and interfered with his speech.

He was straightforward in his discussion of the experience, stating, Stage 4 cancer is not a vacation, and admitted to how close he was to losing his ability to act.

Douglas is retiring to regular work, but fans will continue to see him on the screen in the new film Looking Through Water, originally titled Blood Knot.

The post-production project, in which his son Cameron Douglas, 46, co-stars, is especially significant since his son last appeared in the 2022 action film Wire Room with Bruce Willis.