‘I’M A RESTLESS PERSON’ Ethan Hawke’s brand new hot streak
Former ’90s heart-throb Ethan Hawke is at peace —and on a hot streak
Smart? Yes. Brooding? Sometimes. Sexy? Of course. But no-one could ever accuse Ethan Hawke – Hollywood’s leading Generation-x heart-throb – of being lazy or complacent.
Hawke, 47, has made more than 75 movies in almost 35 years as an actor – and when he’s not on camera he’s tackling an Off-broadway play, directing a passion project or writing a screenplay or book [his graphic novel about the Apache Wars was a 2016 New York Times bestseller]. “I’m a pretty restless person,” Hawke says with a laugh. But even he notes that he’s never had a US summer as busy as this one. “This has hit some new level,” Hawke says, of releasing three back-toback movies over the past couple of months.
There was the critically acclaimed drama First Reformed, then the rom-com Juliet, Naked, opposite Aussie Rose Byrne. Next up, he’s releasing the music biopic Blaze, which he both wrote and directed. “I don’t know exactly how it happened,” he says. “To do three such different things, and act in my first romantic comedy since Reality Bites … it’s been a great summer.”
The father of four is feeling fulfilled in his personal life too – and that hasn’t always been easy. After dealing with depression after his 2005 divorce from first wife Uma Thurman, he recently celebrated a happy 10th anniversary with his second wife, producer Ryan Hawke, 39 [whom he met when she was briefly a babysitter to his older kids]. The couple live in Brooklyn and Hawke relishes being a dad to his daughter Maya, 20, and son Levon, 16, with Thurman, and daughters Clementine Jane ,10, and Indiana, 7, with Ryan. He’s thrilled with Maya’s burgeoning acting career – she earned rave reviews for her first major TV role as Jo in an adaptation of Little Women. Now, Maya is filming Season 3 of Stranger Things in Atlanta, Levon and Clementine are busy with soccer, and Hawke jokes that the house feels empty. “My youngest wants to know why everybody’s not at home,” he says.
Hawke himself became a movie star as a teenager. Born in Austin, Texas, in 1970 to college sweethearts Leslie and James Hawke [who had him when they were just 18], he was mostly raised in New Jersey by his single mum after his parents divorced. He started acting in school productions and at the age of 14 was cast in the very first movie he auditioned for – 1985’s Explorers with River Phoenix. At 18 he co-starred in 1989’s Dead Poets Society – a role that still resonates deeply for him. “As I get older, I start to see the power Dead Poets Society had on my life,” he says. “It turned me into an actor. To work with Robin Williams, and those young men who became some of my closest friends ... it really, really changed everything.”
But work wasn’t always fun for him. He has said he suffered from depression and started disliking the Hollywood machine after his divorce from Thurman. “I’m not sure it’s fair to say I was anti-hollywood,” he says. “But I was seeing a lot of the negative aspects of it, like the loss of privacy.”
He says he’s now made peace with his level of fame – except when people insist he’s Mark Wahlberg and they loved him in Shooter. “When you’re like, ‘No, that wasn’t me’ and they’re like ‘No it was you dude!’ it’s a little frustrating,” Hawke admits. The fans who approach him are as varied as his career. “If I see a woman my age coming up to me, chances are high that Reality Bites is going to come up,” he says.
Hawke acknowledges that his world can still be filled with competing pressures – and that adulting can be hard, no matter who you are. “I think one of the aspects that makes 2018 so difficult is we’re supposed to have everything,” he says. “We’re supposed to be great parents, but also have vibrant, meaningful careers. We’re supposed to be good people and do volunteer work, and also be richer than anyone could imagine. You better be in great shape, but you better not be vain. We’re creating these scenarios where you actually can’t feel good about yourself.”
Still, he actively chooses to focus on what’s good in his life. “There’s so much suffering in the world that it seems incredibly asinine for me not to be pleased with how much I have,” he says. “I have four healthy kids and a wife who loves me that I love, and I get to do meaningful work. I’m really happy with that.”