SEE JANE RUN
Seymour keeps busy reinventing herself and ‘having a really great life’
This is Jane. Jane is 68. But Jane may as well be 42.
See Jane act. See Jane pose for Playboy — if you were her, wouldn’t you?
The Jane in question is Jane Seymour, who, depending on the generation you’re in, is best known as Solitaire in Live and Let Die, the lead in Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, or the frisky mom in the movie Wedding Crashers.
The point is, Seymour has made a habit of reinventing herself over her 50-year career — and she’s only getting started.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been busier than I am right now. I’m having a really great life, and I have no signs of slowing down. If anything, I’m sort of ramping up,” she says.
“I feel very young. Certain moments I don’t, like if my back goes out or I can’t run up a hill as fast as I used to. But I have an enormous sense of freedom at my age, because I’ve been there and done that. It’s about ‘what am I doing for me?’”
A lot, actually.
Seymour is working on a reboot of Dr. Quinn, has jewelry and home decor lines, paints and sculpts, collaborates with beauty brands and runs the Open Hearts Foundation, which empowers non-profit organizations.
She’s also a longtime supporter of The Reeve Foundation, named for actor Christopher Reeve, with whom Seymour worked in the 1980 movie Somewhere in Time.
“I really want to dedicate as much time as I have left on this planet to seeing what I can do from my perspective, with my abilities. Obviously I can’t cure the entire world, but I want to do what I can to help make a difference in many different areas,” she says.
“I feel like I’m at the beginning of doing my best work.”
Her latest onscreen project is The Kominsky Method, created by Chuck Lorre, and starring Michael Douglas as an actor-turned-acting coach and Alan Arkin as his agent and friend. In its second season, now streaming on Netflix, Seymour guest-stars as a recent widow who rekindles a romance with Arkin’s character after several decades.
“The part of Madelyn is really fun because very rarely do you see a relationship between people in their later years and all the baggage that comes with it — the kids, a long marriage, love and loss, and what you’re used to,” says Seymour, who divorced her fourth husband, James Keach, in 2015.
“Being older and finding myself after a long marriage, and being suddenly single again and attempting a relationship with someone I knew a long time ago, it mirrored slightly what’s going on in my life too.”
In The Kominsky Method, Seymour covers her signature auburn hair with a grey wig to appear the same age as 85-year-old Arkin. The follicular transformation was enough to fool even Douglas, who’s known Seymour for more than 40 years.
“Two days after the first readthrough with him, I was on the set and he shook my hand and said, ‘Hi, I’m Michael Douglas.’ I said, ‘You know me, Michael, I’m Jane.’ He didn’t even recognize me and we had a good laugh about that. As much fun as it is to play younger than you are, because it’s flattering, it’s definitely exciting to be able to play your age and older,” Seymour says.
Playing an older woman who’s sexually expressive is particularly intriguing and rare, but Seymour embraced that aspect of Madelyn. After all, the actress posed for Playboy last year — her third time for the publication after appearing in the July 1973 and January 1987 issues. Seymour says Arkin had one request before the two filmed their love scenes.
“It occurred to him that he would need permission from his wife. It was the sweetest thing ever. One day he said, ‘Could we have brunch with my wife?’ and I said, ‘Of course.’ We just had the loveliest time. She’s really lovely, and it was beautiful and so poignant and real.”
Moving forward, Seymour has several other film and TV projects on the go, including the upcoming family movie The War With Grandpa co-starring Robert De Niro, and the ABC pilot The Hypnotist’s Love Story, based on the like-named Liane Moriarty book.
“There is definitely a major spring in my step and I’m just enjoying life as much as I possibly can,” says Seymour, musing about the concept of aging well. “I think it’s what’s inside of you. I think a lot of people just quit and say ‘oh, I’m middle-aged now and the kids have left the nest and I’m done.’ I’ve just never thought of things that way.”