Back From The Edge

By Jess Cagle Sunday, Nov. 10, 2002
    • Two years ago, Dennis Quaid's house in Brentwood, Calif., was under siege. He and actress Meg Ryan had split, and she was dating Russell Crowe. The love triangle made global headlines. Helicopters buzzed overhead. Vans full of surveillance equipment were parked on the street.

    Quaid and Ryan have divorced, but he still lives here. A big New England — style house shielded by a great wall of trees, it's more subdued now, except for the rowdy Border Terrier puppy belonging to their son Jack, 10. "I love this house," says Quaid, 48, standing in the kitchen in the early morning, pouring coffee. "I'm finally getting around now to redoing it."


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    His career has also undergone a major renovation. After he received accolades for Breaking Away in 1979, high-profile roles in such films as The Right Stuff and Innerspace made Quaid one of the 1980s' most promising leading men. (He has more than 40 films on his resume.) Then came the 1990s, when cocaine and a string of forgettable movies derailed his career. But these days he's very much back in play. Earlier this year he starred in The Rookie, a hit baseball drama about an aging jock with one last chance to join the major leagues. It was quintessential Quaid: a chance to show off his body (kept as trim as a 20-year-old's with yoga, weight training and lucky genetic wiring) and a handsome face that's grown craggier but gentler after more than two decades in the movies.

    Now he's scoring with critics in Far from Heaven, an affecting, stylish homage to director Douglas Sirk, whose soapy melodramas like All That Heaven Allows (1955) are respected by film buffs for their baroque sentimentality and cynical undertones. Directed by Todd Haynes, Far from Heaven stars Julianne Moore as a white 1950s housewife who falls for her black gardener (Dennis Haysbert), scandalizing the suburban populace of Hartford, Conn. Quaid is her overachieving husband, who confesses to her that he's gay. The expertly rendered performance (plus his own comeback story) could get Quaid his first Oscar nomination. "I had success back in the '80s, but I never really appreciated it then," he says. "I was on drugs. I took it for granted. This time around, it's all the more sweet."

    A native of Houston, Quaid discovered his true calling — acting — at age 18. He discovered cocaine after following his big brother Randy to Hollywood in the 1970s. One of his last roles before getting sober was the womanizing, pot-smoking producer in 1990's Postcards from the Edge. "That character was basically me," says Quaid. "It was fun to do." But then, he says, "I had one of those white-light experiences. I realized I was going to die." He says he became drug free thanks in part to Ryan, whom he married in 1991. "She stuck with me," he says, "and she really helped me during that period."

    After taking 1991 off to get sober, "I was no longer the hot guy," says Quaid. "Hollywood has a really short memory." Meanwhile, Ryan's career was flourishing. "I was happy for her success, but at the same time her success made what I was going through feel even lower." He began plotting his comeback in the late 1990s, "taking supporting roles in good movies and working with good directors," he says. "I thought that was my best chance." Movies with Oliver Stone (Any Given Sunday) and Steven Soderbergh (Traffic) followed. When Haynes was casting Far from Heaven, "I wanted an actor with a ruddy masculinity who's associated with very different kinds of characters," says the director. So be prepared to see Quaid kiss a man onscreen. "That was a nervous day," says Quaid, "but then I was like, 'What the hell.' On Take 1, we went at each other like a couple of linebackers. Todd came up and said, 'Hey, guys, it's a 1950s screen kiss. Tone it down.'"

    To prepare for the role, Quaid recalled the experiences of an old friend who was married with children and came out of the closet. "And I also drew on my own secret life when I was addicted to cocaine," he says. "At the time it was a secret I was hiding from the world, so I carried around a lot of shame."

    Just as Quaid's career was blossoming in 2000, his marriage to Ryan withered. "We were better parents than we were a couple," he admits. "We weren't spending time together, so we drifted apart." When her relationship with Crowe became public, the ensuing media storm was "devastating, embarrassing, humiliating," says Quaid. "It provoked rage. To have it played out so publicly was horrible. Really, really horrible."

    Today Quaid and Ryan are friends and share custody of their son. "Meg and I, we have a great relationship," he says. "We talk on the phone every other day about Jack. People make mistakes. She made mistakes. I made mistakes. It's fine now." Quaid kept the Brentwood house because "this is Jack's home," he says. "I wanted him to have that security." Quaid walks across his front hall, which is littered with large, square color samples. "I'm gonna repaint," he explains. The renovation seems well under way.