The Softer Side of A HOLLYWOOD TOUGH GUY
ALISON EASTWOOD SHARES SWEET MEMORIES OF HER LEGENDARY DAD AND REVEALS HOW HE STILL INSPIRES HER
When Alison Eastwood was a little girl, she loved to clack the clapper board on her father’s movie sets. “It’s usually the camera department who does it,” she tells Closer, “but my father let me do it.”
The daughter of Clint Eastwood and his first wife, Maggie Johnson, Alison, 50, grew up visiting movie sets but didn’t have a Hollywood upbringing. Instead, her parents raised her and her brother Kyle in Pebble Beach on California’s Carmel Bay. “It’s a magical spot on the ocean, and there’s lots of wildlife,” she says.
Clint and Maggie, who wed in 1953, moved to escape Hollywood. “When we were kids, my dad would take my brother and I for dinner and people would come up to him for autographs,” she recalls. “He’s not someone who craves that. He’s downto-earth, enjoys nature and jazz and hanging out and having a beer.”
A GROUNDED FAMILY
She saw less of her father after her parents divorced in 1984, but Alison and Clint, who turned 92 on May 31, are close today. “I see my dad more than ever,” Alison says. The actor-director also remains “good friends” with Alison’s mother. The entire blended Eastwood clan even comes together for Thanksgiving every year. “It’s very much an extended family,” she says.
Clint always told his eight children to follow their passions. That led Alison, an actress, to found Eastwood Ranch Foundation, a nonprofit animal rescue group. “Both my parents are kind, loving people. I think that’s probably why I have such a deep love for animals,” says Alison. “My father also says there’s no reason to be here unless you’re making the most of your life and doing what you want to do. So we’re setting up a rescue facility and adoption center to give dogs and kittens a loving home.” For more information, go to eastwoodranch.org.