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Eastwood developed his prudence as a child of the Depression. His family roamed Northern California and the Northwest as his father searched for work. The determination of the father shaped the son's bedrock respect for honest labor. There are no exceptions. Of the potential career of his 21-year-old daughter Alison as an actress, Eastwood says, "She has to decide if she wants to work at it."
Eastwood attended eight grammar schools in eight years, an experience that taught him self-reliance and a suspicion of the intentions of strangers. "When you're the new kid in town, you always have to punch it out with the other kids the first day or so before they accept you," he says. If they didn't, Eastwood did not let it trouble him.
Like most natives of the San Francisco area, Eastwood grew up scorning Los Angeles. Unlike other actors whose careers drew them toward the studios, Eastwood kept his distance. He created two lives, one based in his office on the Warner lot in Burbank, the other up the coast in Carmel. His friends there have included a schoolteacher, a former bar owner and an itinerant barber. Film is rarely a topic of conversation. Carmel residents protect his privacy, even those who disagreed with his policies -- such as a modest liberalization of the zoning laws -- when he was mayor in 1986-87.
No one in L.A. could figure out why the most powerful actor in the industry would want to be mayor of a village of 4,700 people. Unless, of course, Eastwood had larger ambitions. That made sense to them. The more Eastwood denied it, the more convinced became those who breathe the rarefied air in Bel Air and Beverly Hills that Eastwood was grooming himself to become the next Ronald Reagan. It was far simpler than that. Eastwood felt his town government wasn't working, and he was willing to sacrifice his privacy to try to fix it. Eastwood, like the Man with No Name or Dirty Harry, acts decisively on his convictions.
"I wasn't wild when he became mayor," Daly says. "He went from two films / to one a year." Once in office, Eastwood discovered that it is easier to build consensus when directing a film crew than in a city council. Sessions descended into fights over such topics as whether ice cream cones should be banned in public and whether fireworks would be permitted on the village beach for the Fourth of July. He says now he is happy he did not run for city council instead, where the term is four years instead of two.
At 63, Eastwood stands at another juncture. Finally, he has been embraced by those who practice his craft. He reigns as the richest and most powerful man in an industry where the two attributes are virtually synonymous. Yet his focus is on the next task. In the Line of Fire, a film about the Secret Service, is due for release this spring. He'll be taking the crew to Texas soon to get started on A Perfect World, a crime drama about a Texas sheriff chasing an escaped convict who has kidnapped a child. Neither may win any awards. "Hollywood pays too much attention to home runs," he says. "Singles and doubles can win the game when longevity is the goal. Besides, if all I ever did was hit one home run, the only thing I'd be now is a celebrity has- been."
That would be out of character.