Fifties are my chance to shine, says Jackie and Alien star Billy
BILLY CRUDUP says he is still trying to find someone to spend the rest of his life with — and is looking forward to being in his fifties.
The US actor, 48, is at the peak of his screen career, having recently starred in Sir Ridley Scott’s Alien: Covenant and opposite Natalie Portman in Jackie. His Netflix drama series with Naomi Watts, Gypsy, is released next week.
“I said to my friend the other day, ‘I feel like my fifties are when I’m going to really shine’,” he told Mr Porter magazine. “I’ve just been working up to becoming a halfway normal human being. My fifties are going to be when I finally get it down.”
Crudup has just been cast as the male lead in the next film from Richard Linklater, an adaptation of the bestselling novel Where’d You Go,
Bernadette?, opposite Cate Blanchett. The actor, who made his film debut in 1996’s dark drama Sleepers, has a 13-year-old son with actress Mary-Louise Parker, whom he left to began a four-year relationship with Homeland’s Claire Danes.
He said: “My son is with me part-time, so if I’m not working, I’m with him. And I have a great group of friends in New York.
“But I’m happiest when I’m in a relationship, for sure. And I have great faith that I’m going to find one to persevere with.
“I try to eat healthy. As I tell my son, I’m for moderation. Just try to find a little of everything and you’ll be fine. I’m not into the new diet with probiotics and you can only eat spinach on Wednesdays at a temperature of 110F.
“I’ve always been physically active. And when I became an actor, running became a big thing for me. I liked running for the psychological ‘release’.
“I really needed that: there’s a lot of pressure in acting, it’s up and down, sometimes you’re on top of the world, sometimes people are shitting all over you, it’s hard to maintain all of your relationships.”
On a recent trip to London, he said he had discovered the local booze can be stronger than in America. “It was funny, I went to a pub — I had two pints of beer and I was shit-faced! It’s so different from American beer!”
Read the full interview in
Mr Porter magazine, out today