Tottering into the room and speaking with a lisp, both aftereffects from a stroke, Kirk Douglas may not look like the strong and stalwart leading man who made such great films as Spartacus, Detective Story and The Vikings. Still, his wonderful sense of humor and incredible drive to go on reveal the capable and vigorous actor he’s always been.

The Douglas family – Kirk, Michael, his mother Diana and his son Cameron – have assembled in Beverly Hills to talk about their new film It Runs in the Family. Michael and Kirk have wanted to make a movie together for a long time but the idea never jelled.

"I was in NY when 9/11 happened, and all you wanted to do was reach out to your family. I looked at Jesse Wigutow’s script because it had a great part for the grandfather and grandson and my part, which originally sucked," Michael said with a laugh.

So how did his mother get involved? "Fred Schepisi, the director, agreed to go with Cameron, and then I said, ‘Thank you Fred, now I’d like to talk to you about my mother,’ and he asked if this was a set-up. I said, no it just happened."

Rarely do journalists get the chance to address an entire family of talented actors, and part of the fun is retelling statements they make about each other. Such as when Kirk recalled he wanted to take the boys to Hawaii to go surfing while making In Harm’s Way with John Wayne. "I caught Michael smoking pot," said Kirk, "and told him he had to stay home and get a job. Michael became a gas station attendant, and he won Mobile Man of the Month. I was so proud of him. And when he got his two Oscars, I said, ‘Michael, to me the most important prize you ever won was Mobil Man of the Month."

Michael beams with a paradoxical joy when hearing the story. "That’s a weird thing to say," replied Michael. "How could he be more proud of "Mobil Man of the Month" than of my Oscars?"

Now, along with Kirk’s and Michael’s Oscars, Michael’s wife, Catherine Zeta-Jones, has her own (for Chicago) to boast about. What did Michael feel about that moment?

"I can’t even begin to say. When you have such unadulterated love for someone, and to see this opportunity she never thought she’d have to sing and dance again, and all the hard work they did and then to win an Oscar, it’s been a heck of a year."

Working with his son and mother has also been incredible,  Michael said. "I realized that every family is dysfunctional, everyone has skeletons in the closet … most families don’t pay a lot of attention to each other unless there is a crisis and then, when a crisis happens, because you’re blood, you kind of come together. It was everything that I'd hoped for – both us serving the picture, the story of the Gromberg family, and just spending two months with my family."

Kind of like old-home week? "Yes. Sitting around having all of those photographs that we brought, brought back memories. And my mother and father who have been divorced for over fifty years, but who've always been good friends. Talking about things and sharing it with my son, too, is something that I'm just glad we did."

Did working with Cameron change the Michael/Cameron relationship? "It's certainly better," said Michael. "I think for him, even though he grew up with his father being an actor, it's the first time that he really got a sense of what the schedule and the hours are like. His experience now is like, 'Whoa, this is a lot of work here.' So I think that he had a much better understanding of what's been going on and what I've been doing. "

Michael proudly mentioned gaining a lot of respect for Cameron as a result of working with him on It Runs in the Family. He initially worried about his son being on time and realizing the importance of keeping on schedule as well as about his acting. "Truthfully," he said, "I couldn't have done it when I was his age, working with my dad. I would've been too intimidated, and for him to kind of take on his first big part with his father and his grandfather, I was really impressed. So, it's a nice sense that I think he has the talent, that if he really wants to stay with it and have the discipline and do the work, he's going to have a real nice career."

Cameron wasn’t sure at first he wanted to do the film. "After the first day when we were all having such a good time together, they (his family) gave me a lot of genuine love and support which was real nice," he said.

Kirk appreciated working with his son and grandson. "It was the apex of my career. I never thought, especially after my stroke, that I would get a change to work with my son Michael or my grandson. I thought Michael is a good actor, and I thought that I was a good actor, but that Cameron was a good actor, that came as a pleasant surprise."

So how did Michael feel about doing the memorial scene? "That was very weird, yeah, doing a thing where you're pretending that your mom is in the coffin was very strange. As far as the eulogy, we sort of rewrote it reflecting some of the qualities that I think about my mother, but that was bizarre. There were a couple of times that I thought were eerie."

Another joy Michael is anticipating involves the birth of his next child. And he admits, this time he will try harder as a father. " When Cameron came around I was at the height of my production company and still trying to make myself an actor, so my ambitions were running my life, and my family took second place. I think I was a good dad; I didn’t work as much as my father. But with Dillion and our new baby I have no ambitions. I like making movies, but I don’t have as much to worry about so my patience is better."

Patience is also something Kirk has used to overcome his afflictions. "In my book, My Stroke of Luck, I talk about dealing with depression and that no matter how bad things are, they could be worse. I realized that you have to have a sense of humor. It’s very important to be able to laugh at yourself. So now I have a new career," Kirk jests, "because I have the monopoly. If they want an old guy with sloppy speech, they come to me."

Kirk will appear next in Illusions. Michael’s upcoming films are The In-laws and Monkey Face, which also stars his wife.

(Opening date for It Runs in the Family is April 25, 2003.)