Issue Date: January 29, 2006
This star acts his age
At 63, Harrison Ford doesn't work hard to keep in shape, but he exercises his brain and his heart to stay interested.
By Mark Morrison
Ask Harrison Ford if love keeps him young, and his hazel eyes cloud with consternation. The rugged actor is as famous for guarding his personal life as he is for playing Han Solo and Indiana Jones. Particularly because these days, his life includes press-shy actress Calista Flockhart, 41, and her son, Liam, 5.
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About this special issue
USA WEEKEND brings you today's most compelling health reporting through partnerships with America's finest magazines. For this must-read report, we team with "AARP The Magazine," the No. 1 publication aimed at people ages 50 and over.
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But on this rainy L.A. morning, Ford is in an accommodating mood. "Does love keep me young?" he echoes back. "I don't know if it keeps me young, but it keeps me interested."
He may be grayer at the temples and his face suggests the wear of time, but in person, Ford still exudes the unlikely mix of geeky boyishness and roguish derring-do he brought to "Raiders of the Lost Ark" 25 years ago. In fact, he is talking about shooting a third sequel with Steven Spielberg and George Lucas later this year.
Surprisingly, when it comes to his real life, Ford, still one of the highest-grossing box-office stars of all time, isn't into pretending.
"The main deal for me now is to gracefully accept the reality of my age," says Ford, 63, looking a decade younger in tan chinos and a snug T-shirt that reveals no signs of paunch. "I look in the mirror and see an older guy, and I don't have any problem with it -- except when people try and force me into something that is inappropriate. For instance, casting a woman to play my wife who is too young."
While many of his peers star opposite women half their age, Ford generally chooses to act with more mature beauties like Michelle Pfeiffer, 47, and Sela Ward, 49. Virginia Madsen, 42, who plays his on-screen wife in "Firewall," a new thriller opening next week, is no mere girl either. Nor, for that matter, is the post-Ally McBeal Flockhart.
Love aside, Ford likes to say he owes his good health to "tennis and genetics." He was deep in his middle age when he picked up a racket and now plays three times a week. "I was about 45 and felt I needed some kind of regular exercise," he says. "I'm half good at the game -- better than fair and not quite Andy Roddick." Ford was in his 50s when he learned how to fly; he now owns a small fleet of planes and had just piloted himself back from a film location in Vancouver. "To try and learn new things -- that, as much as anything, is what keeps you in the game," he says.
As for genetics, his father was an ad executive who lived to be 92, and his mother died two years ago at 87. "They were not heavy people," Ford says. "They were healthy to the end. I'm not a huge eater. When I do let myself go, I don't get much fatter. I guess I'm lucky."
A grandfather of two, Ford now finds himself helping Flockhart raise Liam, whom he says his four other children have embraced as a little brother. "Home is where the kids are in school," he says, referring to his two teenagers -- which explains why he is spending more time in his Cape Cod-style L.A. house, not at his 800-acre Jackson Hole, Wyo., ranch or his New York City loft.
In "Firewall," Ford plays a bank security expert whose wife and kids are held hostage while he is forced to raid his own computer system and hand over $100 million. True to form, the actor was active in all aspects of the film, from casting to stunts. That meant a big fight scene with the film's heavy, 34-year-old Paul Bettany. "I don't usually work hard to stay in shape," Ford says, "but when I have a role this physical, I try and make sure I can bend in all the appropriate places. There will probably come a day where it won't feel so good."
Mark Morrison is West Coast editor of "In Style" magazine.
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