Father's Day

The apple does not usually fall far from the tree.
16th century German proverb, of Turkish or Arabic origin

We recall reading somewhere that the word "dada," typically the first recognizable utterance from a baby’s mouth, has nothing to do with a stronger bond between the child and the father than with the mother. Instead, experts tell us that the "m" word, mama, requires an advanced control over the muscles required for speech.

To that, we say, "Balderdash!" Granted, growing up with dad can be confounded with complexities, contradictions and confusion. Al Pacino, in the 1988 crime drama "Sea of Love," delivers a memorable line that suits our subject, if we only substitute the word "father" for "people." "People are work, brother," he utters in exhaustion. "A lot of work. Too much work."

On the other hand, we’re reminded of an often quoted remark by Mark Twain: "When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant, I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years."

Which brings us to the timely topic of Father’s Day. The first, unofficial Father’s Day was observed in Washington state on June 19, 1910. While attending a Mother’s Day sermon in a Spokane Episcopal church the previous year, Sonora Smart Dodd (below) envisioned a similar commemoration for fathers like her own, William Jackson Smart, a veteran of the Civil War who took care of six children after their mother died.

Inspired by Anna Jarvis’ efforts to establish Mother’s Day, Sonora, who, coincidentally, also championed the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, arranged a tribute for fathers on June 19, 1910. Churchgoers were asked to wear roses, red to honor a living father, white in memory of the departed. Dodd herself purportedly journeyed through Spokane in a carriage, presenting gifts to shut-in fathers.

Mother’s Day, understandably, was embraced with warmth and enthusiasm, whereas the notion of Father’s Day was initially greeted with laughter, parody and derision. Bills to make the holiday official were introduced in 1913 and 1916, and President Woodrow Wilson appeared at a Father’s Day event in Spokane, but Congress said no, fearing that such an event would be over-commercialized.

A letter to The New York Times in 1914 proposed that the calendar also include Madien Aunty’s Day and Household Pet Day. Another wit recommended the dandelion as the official flower for Father’s Day, because "the more it is trampled on, the more it grows."

In 1924, President Calvin Coolidge endorsed the holiday, and a national committee was formed in the 1930s by trade groups to make the celebration legitimate. According to Leigh Eric Schmidt, author of Consumer Rites: The Buying and Selling of American Holidays, "By the 1920s, the prevalence of unbecoming Father’s Day ties was already a matter of snide cynicism." One writer noted in 1929, "My appeal to the women-folk is this: Lay off the neckties."

Maine Senator Margaret Chase Smith accused Congress in 1957 of ignoring fathers for four decades while honoring mothers. President Lyndon Johnson offered a proclamation to mark the third Sunday of June as Father’s Day, but of all the commanders-in-chief, it was Richard Nixon whom dads must thank for making it a recognized national holiday in 1972.

Like many life pursuits, the movie-making community has continued a tradition of children following in the professional footsteps of their fathers. The examples, or "apples," offered in the moviehouse stand out for their particular proximity to the tree.

The old adage "Like father, like son" could refer to a striking physical resemblance between a boy and his dad. For a primary case in point, look no further than Dirk Blocker, born in 1957 as son to Dan Blocker, forever beloved as the gentle giant Hoss Cartwright on TV’s "Bonanza." A mere teenager of 14 years when his pa died, Dirk went on to become a familiar face on the popular 1976-78 World War II series "Baa Baa Black Sheep," starring Robert Conrad.

Dirk likewise had memorable supporting roles in director Alan Rudolph’s futuristic film noir "Trouble in Mind" (1985), starring Kris Kistofferson, and John Carpenter’s horror film "Prince of Darkness" (1987). In the 1990s, after Lorne Greene, Michael Landon, and his father had passed away, the young Blocker appeared, along with Michael Landon Jr., in the made-for-television movies "Bonanza: The Return" and "Bonanza: Under Attack."

Has that dimple in Michael Douglas’ chin become more prominent in the passing years if only to strengthen his resemblance to his famous father? The eldest son of Kirk Douglas, Michael won his first of two Academy Awards as producer of 1975’s Best Picture, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest," featuring an Oscar-winning performance by Jack Nicholson as Randle Patrick McMurphy.

Kirk Douglas, who first portrayed McMurphy in a 1963 stage production of "One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest" (above), purchased the film rights to the 1962 novel by Ken Kesey in hopes of repeating the role on the screen. He eventually passed the production rights to Michael, who, much to the former’s chagrin, thought his father was now too old for the part. For some time afterward, the elder Douglas was purportedly upset with his son. Among those considered for the lead were Burt Reynolds, James Caan, Gene Hackman, even Marlon Brando.

Kirk Douglas, like his friend and frequent costar Burt Lancaster (they appeared together in seven films), achieved an independent Hollywood career as a producer-star. Especially noteworthy for Douglas were "Paths of Glory" (1957) and "Spartacus" (1960), both directed by Stanley Kubrick. Like his father, Michael Douglas has established himself as a formidable producer-actor, notably with "The China Syndrome" (1979), "Romancing the Stone" (1984) and "Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps" (2010). In 2003, Michael, along with his younger brother Joel, co-produced the dramatic comedy "It Runs in the Family," sharing the screen with his mother Diana Douglas, his son Cameron, and pop Kirk, who had obviously long since overlooked that "Cuckoo’s Nest" snub.

Born in 1968, Josh Brolin, the lookalike son of James Brolin (Barbra Streisand is his stepmother), got interested in acting when he took an improvisation class in high school. He has actively performed on the stage, in television and films since 1985, the year he had his first motion picture role, as Brand, in "The Goonies." More recently, of course, he has racked up a series of acclaimed performances, including "No Country for Old Men," "American Gangster," "Milk" and "W."

There are moments in TV spots for the 2010 summer comedic cop series "The Good Guys" when the young costar looks uncannily like a young Tom Hanks, which isn’t surprising since the actor is Colin Hanks, born in 1977, the son of Tom Hanks (who was 21 at the time) and first wife Samantha Lewes.

Colin Hanks first appeared onscreen as a page in "That Thing You Do!" (1996), the feature film directing debut of Tom Hanks, who also scripted and costarred. The younger Hanks portrayed Katherine Heigl’s boyfriend on the science-fiction series "Roswell" from 1991 to 2001. His best known movie role has been in the teen comedy "Orange County," with Jack Black. In director Peter Jackson’s 2005 remake of "King Kong," Hanks played filmmaker Jack Black’s personal assistant. Colin starred in the 2008 romantic comedy "The House Bunny" and acted in the HBO miniseries "Band of Brothers," the executive producers of which were Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks.

Another case of the son stirring up images of his father in younger years can be seen in the face of Jason Connery, scion of Sean Connery and actress Diane Cilento (Oscar nominee as Best Supporting Actress in 1963’s "Tom Jones").

In 1987, Jason Connery played Robin Hood in the final season of the popular British television series "Robin of Sherwood," a decade after his father starred in "Robin and Marian." And it’s not coincidental at all that the younger Connery portrayed the author who created 007 James Bond in the 1990 TV movie "Spymaker: The Secret Life of Ian Fleming."

The screen’s most beloved Robin Hood, Errol Flynn, welcomed his son, Sean Flynn, into the world in 1941, the only child of Flynn’s marriage to actress Lili Damita. In 1961, two years after his father’s death, Sean signed a contract to star in a sequel to Errol’s star-making film, "Captain Blood" (right), fittingly titled "The Son of Captain Blood" (left).

Sean Flynn soon became bored with acting and, having inherited his father’s wanderlust, migrated to Africa in late 1964 as a big game hunter, safari guide and game warden. Needing money within the year, he went to Spain and Italy to star in a pair of Spaghetti westerns. His eighth and final screen role was in a French-Italian action flick called "Five Ashore in Singapore" (1967).

Flynn evolved himself into a freelance photojournalist under contract to Time magazine. With a natural eye for out-of-the-ordinary images, he wasted no time in embedding himself with Special Forces. Earning a reputation in the Vietnam War as a photographer who would risk anything for the best pictures, he founded his own news service in Saigon with John Steinbeck IV, son of Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck.

"Sean was unlike most photographers," according to award-winning photojournalist Dirck Halstead. "Instead of doing quick operations in the field, Sean wanted to hang out with the Special Forces…in the thickest jungles and the highest, most remote mountain ranges. He would disappear for weeks at a time, and when he returned, it was with only a few rolls of film. But his photos were unlike anyone else’s."

On April 6, 1970, Sean Flynn, age 28, and fellow war correspondent Dana Stone (above) rode a pair of red motorcycles into communist Cambodia and were never seen again. He was declared legally dead in 1984. In May 2010, two men unearthed the remains of a Western hostage believed to be Flynn, apparently executed by Khmer Rouge guerrillas in the Cambodian countryside. DNA tests and dental records have yet to confirm the identity of the remains.

Sean’s dad, Errol, was part of a close-knit circle of hard-drinking pals that included W.C. Fields and John Barrymore. Barrymore, a member of a multi-generational theater dynasty which also included older siblings Lionel and Ethel, became renowned on stage for his groundbreaking interpretations of Shakespeare’s "Hamlet" and "Richard III." His success handily carried over into silent and then sound motion pictures. Copious consumption of alcohol, much of which might have been poisonous booze distilled during Prohibition, precipitated his declining health in his later years, and he died, age 60, in 1942.

His son, John Drew Barrymore (left), who was born June 4, 1932, as John Sidney Blyth Barrymore Jr., shared his father’s famous profile and signed a film contract as a teenager but repeatedly sidestepped leading roles. Beginning in 1958, he starred in a number of Italian productions, including "The Cossacks," "The Centurion," "Pontius Pilate" and "The Trojan Horse," the latter featuring sword-and-sandal strongman Steve Reeves.

Barrymore’s growing antisocial disposition eventually interfered with his acting assignments, and, during the 1960s, he often found himself in jail for drug use, public drunkenness and spousal abuse. Although he would appear occasionally in dramatic roles on TV, including a 1967 remake of the classic western "Winchester ’73," starring Tom Tryon, he became, more or less, a reclusive derelict.

His physical and mental health crumbled as he grew estranged from family and friends. In 2003, his daughter, Drew Barrymore (right), despite their differences, physically moved him near her home and took charge of his medical bills until his death, at the age of 72, from cancer in 2004. (John Drew Barrymore’s half-sister, actress Diana Barrymore, died at the age of 38 in 1960 from an overdose of sleeping pills and alcohol.)

If you look closely, we’re certain you appreciate the resemblance between Jeff Bridges and his dad, Lloyd Bridges, especially as the former gracefully moves past middle age. For fans of early television, Lloyd is best remembered as the scuba diver Mike Nelson in "Sea Hunt," the top series in 1958. By the end of his film career, which started in the late 1930s, Bridges (who died in 1998) had reinvented himself as a gifted comedic talent in such screen parodies as "Airplane!", "Airplane II: The Sequel," "Hot Shots!", "Hot Shots! Part Deux" and "Jane Austen’s Mafia!"

Jeff was born to Lloyd and his actress-wife, Dorothy Bridges, in December of 1949. He enjoyed a close childhood relationship with older brother Beau (born in 1941), and as teenagers, the siblings appeared on their father’s anthology series "The Lloyd Bridges Show."

Jeff Bridges’ first major screen role was in director Peter Bogdanovich’s "The Last Picture Show" (1971), which earned him an Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor. He was nominated for the same award for "Thunderbolt and Lightfoot" (1974). After two further nominations, for Best Actor in "Starman " (1985) and Best Supporting Actor in "The Contender" (2000), he finally garnered the Best Actor Oscar for his revered performance in "Crazy Heart" (2009). It’s no wonder that esteemed film critic Pauline Kael once wrote that Jeff Bridges "may be the most natural and least self-conscious screen actor that has ever lived."

Just one look will tell you that James Mitchum, the eldest son of Robert Mitchum, obviously inherited his dad’s sleepy-eyed handsomeness, which ended up being both a help and hindrance to his career. The first role he received screen credit for was, coincidentally, as Robert Mitchum’s kid brother (above) in the cult moonshine hit "Thunder Road" (1958). In 1962, James starred in "Young Guns of Texas," a low-budget western that featured fellow second-generation Hollywood hopefuls Alana Ladd (Alan Ladd’s daughter) and Jody McCrea (son of horse opera stalwart Joel McCrea).

Patrick Wayne, the second son of John Wayne and first wife Josephine Saenz, made his motion picture debut as an 11-year-old extra in his dad’s "Rio Grande" (1950). A fourth of Patrick’s films consisted of bit or supporting roles with the Duke, most memorably in "The Searchers," "The Alamo," "The Comancheros" and "Big Jake."

Early in his career, the younger Wayne garnered a Golden Globe in 1958 as Most Promising Newcomer. His first starring role was in a 1959 B-western, "The Young Land," costarring Dennis Hopper and Yvonne Craig (TV’s Batgirl on the Adam West series "Batman"). Never emerging from his father’s imposing shadow, he did enjoy stardom, to a modest degree, in the late 1970s in the fantasy genre flicks "The People That Time Forgot" and "Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger."

Following the death of his older brother, Michael Wayne, in 2003, Patrick became chairman of the John Wayne Cancer Institute. "I’m not pursuing a career," he recently said. "If somebody asks, I’m always open. But I’ve made 40 films, five TV shows, done theatrical engagements, and I put three kids through college."

In 2007, to commemorate the centennial of John Wayne’s birth, the Newport Beach Film Festival, near the site of Wayne’s California coastal home, screened a comprehensive collection of the Duke’s pictures. At the time, the website Box Office Mojo interviewed then 67-year-old Patrick Wayne and his half-brother, 45-year-old Ethan Wayne (above).

Ethan Wayne - sometime stuntman ("The Blues Brothers"), sometime actor ("The Bold and the Beautiful," "The New Adam-12") - made his feature film debut as Little Jake, the Duke’s grandson, in "Big Jake" (1971). "It was fun," Ethan recalled. "My dad was there…my brother, Patrick, was in it, my brother, Michael, was producing it, so it was really a fun place for me to be at eight years old."

When asked by Box Office Mojo what the top misconception about being the son of John Wayne is (Ethan replied, "That you’re rich"), Patrick commented, "Early on, as I was going out to pursue an actor’s career, I was really just (regarded as) John Wayne’s son, not Patrick Wayne. There’s an expectation, a predetermined mindset, just a natural human tendency - we all do it, if there’s a brand out there - to look for that (comparison)…There is still that presence and I’m living in the shadow of it. I do today, and I did then, but the benefits far outweigh the drawbacks, and…we’re using the benefits to find a cure for cancer."

Questioned about any "valuable advice" as an actor his father might have bestowed, Patrick said, "He wasn’t a person to give advice. Most lessons were by example. He came to work prepared, he knew his lines and he was ready. That’s an important lesson especially if you choose to work in action pictures."

For Box Office Mojo, Patrick pointed out that the biggest misconception about his father is "that he wasn’t really an actor. He had a craft and he was a professional performer and a person that, over the years, developed his craft, and he became a richer and more complex actor and reached a high point in ‘The Shootist.’"

Summing up his father’s due, Patrick Wayne declared, "There’s something unmistakable and indelible and, in these troubled times, maybe, when there’s so much questioning about what we’re doing, there’s something reassuring - a moral clarity - about him."

Henry Fonda’s relationship with his children has been politely described as emotionally distant. In his 1998 autobiography Don’t Tell Dad, son Peter Fonda described how he was never sure how his father felt about him, until the latter was elderly and infirm, and Peter finally heard the words, "I love you, son."

Henry Fonda admitted his shortcomings as a father in an interview, explaining that he tried to do his best to stay out of the way of Peter and daughter Jane’s careers. For him, it was important for his children to know that any success was achieved through their hard work, not due to the old man’s name and fame.

Peter Fonda made a squeaky-clean film debut in the innocuous romantic drama "Tammy and the Doctor" (1963). Within three years, he was no longer a cookie-cutter leading man. Playboy magazine declared he had established a "solid reputation as a dropout," and his first counterculture starring role was as Hell’s Angels leader Heavenly Blues in "The Wild Angels" (1966), followed by "The Trip" (1967) and the pillar-shaking "Easy Rider" (1969), which he also produced.

In 1980, as the 75-year-old father’s health worsened, Peter visited him often in Los Angles. "Dad and I had been on the phone," Peter related in his book, "and the spirit was in me. ‘Dad. If I have enough ego to call myself an actor, writer, producer and director, there is this little scene I am going to write and direct. And you’re going to star in it…I’m writing this little scene and I’m going to direct this great actor in it - that’s you, Dad - and the name of the scene is "I Love You Very Much, Son."’ He sputtered for a moment, then hung up the phone."

Another phone conversation with Peter proclaiming, "I love you very much, Dad," ended again with the old man hanging up. After more than a half dozen such exchanges, Henry finally beat the boy to the punch with, "I love you very much." In his autobiography, My Life, Henry Fonda noted, "I was very tentative about telling him at first. I thank Peter for making it all possible."

When father and son got together at the former’s house, "he took me by the shoulders," Peter remembered. "Tears were streaming down his cheek. Slowly and choking on the high-powered emotion, he said, ‘I love you very much, son. I wanted you to know that.’ I hugged him so hard, I could feel the pacemaker in his chest. Tears streaming down my own cheeks, I told him I loved him very much and kissed him on the lips. Something we had never done before. I quickly drove off…to have the good cry I needed. It had been done and done with real emotions…Years of frustration fell off my heart like melting snow slides off a roof."

Peter’s older sister, Jane Fonda, strove for her own epiphany with Henry, when they costarred in "On Golden Pond" (1981). Especially in the early years of her career, she felt detached from her father. Although Henry introduced her to Lee Strasberg, who became her acting teacher and helped her utililze the techniques of the "Method," he himself stated in a 1960s article for The Saturday Evening Post, "I can’t articulate about the Method, because I never studied it…I don’t know what the Method is, and I don’t care what the Method is…Jane sometimes says I use the Method…without being aware of it. Maybe I do. It doesn’t matter."

Frustrated with her father’s seemingly effortless approach to acting, Jane once asked him how he prepared for a role, only to be even more perplexed by his response: "I don’t know, I stand there, I think about my wife, I don’t know."

"My father can’t articulate the way he works," Jane admitted. "He’s not even conscious of what he does, and it made him nervous for me to try to articulate what I was trying to do…so we did very little talking about it…he said, ‘Shut up, I don’t want to hear about it.’"

By the time Henry Fonda and Jane Fonda shared the screen, for the first and only time, as father and daughter, in Henry’s last (and only Oscar-winning) film, "On Golden Pond," costar Katharine Hepburn noted that "these days, Jane and Henry mean a great deal to each other. They’re both reaching for something they’ve missed."

Mirroring her role as Chelsea, Jane observed, "I had to get over the desperate need I once had for his approval, and to conquer my fear of him. We’ve never been intimate. My dad simply is not intimate. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t love." As for Henry, he remarked, "I’m not a religious man, but I thank God every morning that I lived long enough to play that role."

Postscript:

Like father like daughter? Check out Jane Fonda’s performance in "Comes a Horseman" (1978), a drama set in the American West of the 1940s. Fonda, who never looked more like her dad, and James Caan portray independent ranchers vying with corrupt land baron Jason Robards. Time magazine’s review pointed out that director Alan J. Pakula "coaxed a performance from Fonda that is superior to her rather saintly appearances in ‘Julia’ and ‘Coming Home.’ Her face as weather-beaten as her dad in ‘The Grapes of Wrath,’ this beautiful woman manages to capture the essence of frontier toughness."

Peter Fonda himself evoked striking memories of his father with his Oscar-nominated role in "Ulee’s Gold" (1997), "a small gem," according to critic Leonard Maltin, "about a taciturn beekeeper in northern Florida whose ordered life is disrupted when his son sends an SOS from prison." Critic Roger Ebert lauded that "he has found the role of a lifetime." In an interview at the time, Fonda said, "Ulee is the best character I’ve ever read…I also found a lot of Ulee in my father…As I began to develop Ulee, I used a lot of the way my father was to us as kids, the way he was to us as a family and the way he was to himself."

Post-Postscript (the last one, we promise, but it’s worth it - just get out the handkerchiefs):

In 1979, Peter Fonda talked his father into doing a cameo in "Wanda Nevada," which Peter was directing and starring in. Set in 1950’s Arizona, the picture is a wonderfully laid-back fairy tale about a gambling drifter (Peter Fonda) who wins the title character, a feisty 14-year-old orphan (Brooke Shields), in a poker game, sparking an unlikely search for hidden gold in the Grand Canyon.

For his sole screen appearance alongside his son, the elder Fonda is almost unrecognizable as a prospecting geezer in goggles and (intentionally humorous?) fake beard. Peter later recalled, "What a kick to be able to direct him!"

Afterward, Henry wrote his son a letter. In Don’t Tell Dad, Peter recounted, "It was the third or fourth letter he ever sent me, not counting the letters he sent me from the Pacific during the war. I was too young to understand those. This one was very different."

Writing about "Wanda Nevada" in the letter, Henry told his son, "It meant a lot to me that you asked me to participate, and I so wanted it to be meaningful to the picture…It would have been such a gas if it had worked…I want you to know how proud I am of you. Your whole company obviously worships you, and it’s a beautiful thing to see. And I haven’t seen it so often in 43 years that it doesn’t impress me. And you’re a very good director. You are a thoughtful man, and I love you."