He is one of the most beloved actors in Hollywood, but Emmy Award winner and two-time Golden Globe nominee Dennis Quaid says his first love was music. He just released his second album, Fallen: A Gospel Record for Sinners , which has been No. 1 on Top Christian/Gospel charts for some time. The album combines seven classics and five heartfelt, inspiring originals of hope and gratitude written by Quaid. Originally released on the soundtrack for his faith-based film I Can Only Imagine , "On My Way to Heaven" was inspired by his struggle with addiction, which he has been open and honest about. The superstar stopped by the LifeMinute Studios in New York City last week to tell us all about it, plus his latest acting gigs, including his role as Sherrill Lynn, a Deputy U.S. Marshall, in Paramount+'s Lawmen: Bass Reeves . Quaid also portrays the 40th U.S. president in the upcoming biopic Reagan , due out in the New Year. This is a LifeMinute with Dennis Quaid.
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00:00 Hi, I'm Dennis Quaid and you're watching Life Minute TV.
00:17 He's one of the most beloved actors in Hollywood, but Emmy winner and two-time Golden Globe
00:22 nominee Dennis Quaid says his first love was music.
00:26 Music was always a part of my life.
00:28 My dad played piano.
00:29 There was music always in the house.
00:31 I got a guitar when I was 12.
00:33 We spent a lot of alone time as a teenager because we moved from the block I grew up
00:38 in.
00:39 So music was like that of my basset hound or basically my close buddies and it was a
00:43 way to express itself.
00:44 I knew I was never going to be able to shred a guitar, so I think I started being a songwriter
00:51 as kind of a defense.
00:54 And best offense is good defense.
00:57 So it's always been there.
00:59 He's just released his second album, Fallen, a gospel record for sinners that's been number
01:04 one on the Christian charts.
01:06 It's five songs that I wrote and then songs that I grew up with in the Baptist church.
01:12 And it's really kind of, I guess, my story.
01:15 It's a very personal record, I guess, that reflects my personal spiritual journey.
01:21 It's a strong title.
01:22 Yeah, well, you know, apropos, that's where we come in life.
01:27 We struggle, we fall down, we get back up.
01:31 It's really, Fallen refers, I guess, to the prodigal son story, which the Baptist church
01:37 is just about based on.
01:39 I think that's the story of all of us.
01:41 Did you always have that faith growing up or did it come later in life?
01:45 I grew up in the Baptist church, yeah, and so that was there.
01:48 And then I went through a period of when I got to be a teenager in 17, 18, I got very
01:54 disillusioned with the church, but I was always a seeker.
01:58 I really turned to Eastern religions and philosophy.
02:02 I read the Dhammapada, I read the Bhagavad Gita, the Koran, and traveled around the world.
02:09 I've been to India like nine or ten times.
02:13 That also, I was in the culture of the time.
02:17 It finally got to the point where I was in rehab and got out of that, which I call cocaine
02:24 school back in 1990.
02:26 I re-read the Bible and it was the red words of Jesus that really stuck out to me.
02:32 And that's what really brought me back.
02:35 How did you know you were in trouble?
02:37 How did I know I was in trouble?
02:39 I had one of those white light experiences.
02:41 I was cocaine back then.
02:42 It seemed innocuous, you know, at the time in the 80s.
02:45 It was like a party type of drug, I think, that really didn't do any harm.
02:50 But I think that I had a proclivity for it.
02:54 Starts out as fun, then fun with problems, and then just problems.
02:59 And that's when you kind of know when your friends look at you kind of funny.
03:04 But I had one of those white light experiences where I saw myself either dead or in jail
03:08 or losing everything that I'd worked for.
03:12 And luckily I didn't have kids or I wasn't married at the time, too.
03:16 And so I just checked myself in.
03:18 From that, it really kind of rekindled a personal relationship with Jesus, which is really what
03:23 Christianity is all about.
03:25 What would you say to people that have the same struggles?
03:28 First you've got to know that you're struggling.
03:30 You know, you can do it in a heartbeat.
03:33 It's a decision that you make.
03:34 After swearing that you won't for every night.
03:37 I mean, I used to lay in bed and kind of scream at God to please take it away from me.
03:42 And then at about three in the afternoon, everything would be OK.
03:45 I'd be ready to go at it again.
03:48 Take the step.
03:49 Ask for help.
03:51 Pray.
03:52 Whatever it takes.
03:53 You know, it's a higher power that gets you out of it.
03:56 What about acting?
03:57 What came first, music or acting?
03:58 I was going to be a veterinarian.
03:59 That's really what I wanted to be.
04:01 Getting into drama, you know, suddenly a light went off.
04:05 As far as music and everything, I wanted to do it, but I just, I guess I didn't know how.
04:10 And being in Mr. Piggott's class, I was kind of taught as a craft.
04:15 There was a pathway that I could see there.
04:17 But I always thought the two would intersect.
04:19 Sure did.
04:21 My grandfather bought you that guitar.
04:23 Yeah, he bought it at Western Auto.
04:28 Western Auto was selling some pretty mean guitars back at that time.
04:31 Did you have lessons?
04:32 No, I never really had a lesson.
04:35 I just got a chord book, did it that way, just picked things up from people along the
04:40 way.
04:41 That's amazing.
04:42 And you auditioned in a coffee shop as a teenager and somebody told you.
04:45 Yeah.
04:46 That was where that intersection really kind of split.
04:49 They had clubs back then, that was kind of the folk era as well.
04:55 It was like '69, '71, something like that.
05:02 And they called them coffee houses.
05:04 I went and auditioned.
05:05 This lady was behind the desk smoking a cigarette.
05:09 And she said, "What you have will be good for living rooms, but you'll never make it."
05:16 So I believed her and went out to my car and said, "Well, I guess it's acting."
05:23 But now when I do shows, I just tell people, "Welcome to my living room."
05:28 That's great.
05:29 If she could see you now, I wish she could.
05:32 And you're from Texas, so that's kind of a given, you're kind of country, I'd say.
05:36 Yeah, I grew up in Houston.
05:38 Houston is almost like West Louisiana in a way.
05:42 It's got such a mix of incredible music from the regions there.
05:48 It was country, then you had all the Louisiana, Zydeco music, Cajun music.
05:55 Houston was very cosmopolitan and stuff.
05:57 My dad was really into Bing Crosby and Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra and all that.
06:03 And then of course the Beatles came along.
06:05 So it was in rock and roll.
06:07 It was a very wide variety.
06:08 I was thinking last night when you played the
06:16 killer too, and you really were playing, weren't you?
06:19 Yeah, Jerry Lee Lewis, I got that role, I think it was '33.
06:24 I had a year to prepare for it.
06:26 And so I was at the piano like 12 hours a day.
06:29 I was on cocaine at the time, so I was like, "Sorry."
06:34 You could sit there for all night, but I had a year to prepare for it.
06:38 And Jerry Lee was one of my teachers actually.
06:40 That must have been amazing for you.
06:42 Yeah, it was quite an experience.
06:44 And Bass Reeves is fantastic too.
06:46 Tell us about that.
06:47 I'm really proud of that.
06:48 Taylor Sheridan, Western, about Bass Reeves, who was the first black U.S. deputy marshal.
06:54 We're talking about 1870s, back in Oklahoma, what they called Indian country back then.
07:02 And David Oyelewa is playing Bass Reeves.
07:06 It's great to do Westerns.
07:07 They're just so much fun to do.
07:09 You ride a horse, you shoot.
07:11 It's very authentic, as all of Taylor Sheridan's stuff is.
07:15 I love it.
07:16 Really good.
07:17 Paramount plus.
07:18 And then you're portraying Ronald Reagan in a film coming out?
07:21 Yeah, that's coming out in May of 2024.
07:25 And we made it three years ago.
07:27 It's been a long time in post, and it's time for it to come out.
07:31 How did you prepare for that role?
07:33 He was already my favorite president.
07:35 He was the first president I voted for.
07:38 I voted for him when I came back to the apartment I was living in.
07:41 I had a roommate, and he asked me who I voted for.
07:44 I said Reagan.
07:45 He said, "You were kicked out of the hippies."
07:48 There was a lot of videotape.
07:49 I went back and reviewed.
07:51 It was rather daunting to play somebody so well-known.
07:55 I've played a lot of real people before, but I think it was the most intimidating.
07:59 It was also very hard to get to because he was kind of unknowable in a way to, I think,
08:05 the world.
08:06 What's your favorite role you've ever done?
08:08 My favorite role?
08:09 The right stuff.
08:10 How come?
08:11 Playing an astronaut is the ultimate boys' fun game.
08:14 I wanted to be an astronaut when I was a kid.
08:16 I was playing my favorite astronaut.
08:18 I got my pilot's license out of that.
08:20 Is there anything this guy can't do?
08:21 My God.
08:22 All you need is time.
08:23 If you have time on your hands, you can do anything.
08:27 I love that.
08:28 That's good.
08:29 Last time we spoke, you were planning your wedding.
08:30 How's your married life been?
08:32 I love it.
08:33 I have the closest relationship with Laura and I do.
08:36 Every day is an adventure.
08:38 What would your current self say to your younger self?
08:40 Take it easy.
08:41 And since this is Life Minute, what's your best life advice?
08:45 Take it easy.
08:48 To see more of this interview, visit our website, lifeminute.tv.
08:53 And don't forget to subscribe to our podcast, Life Minute TV.
08:56 (upbeat music)