Along the Way Read online

  In this remarkable dual memoir, film legend Martin Sheen and accomplished actor/filmmaker Emilio Estevez recount their lives as father and son. In alternating chapters—and in voices that are as eloquent as they are different—they tell stories spanning more than fifty years of family history, and reflect on their journeys into two different kinds of faith.

  At twenty-one, still a struggling actor living hand to mouth, Martin and his wife, Janet, welcomed their firstborn, Emilio, an experience of profound joy for the young couple, who soon had three more children: Ramon, Charlie, and Renée. As Martin’s career moved from stage to screen, the family moved from New York City to Malibu, while traveling together to film locations around the world, from Mexico for Catch-22 to Colorado for Badlands to the Philippines for the legendary Apocalypse Now shoot. As the firstborn, Emilio had a special relationship with Martin: They often mirrored each other’s passions and sometimes clashed in their differences. After Martin and Emilio traveled together to India for the movie Gandhi, each felt the beginnings of a spiritual awakening that soon led Martin back to his Catholic roots, and eventually led both men to Spain, from where Martin’s father had emigrated to the United States. Along the famed Camino de Santiago pilgrimage path, Emilio directed Martin in their acclaimed film, The Way, bringing three generations of Estevez men together in the region of Spain where Martin’s father was born, and near where Emilio’s own son had moved to marry and live.

  With vivid, behind-the-scenes anecdotes of this multitalented father’s and son’s work with other notable actors and directors, Along the Way is a striking, stirring, funny story—a family saga that readers will recognize as universal in its rebellions and regrets, aspirations and triumphs. Strikingly candid, searchingly honest, this heartfelt portrait reveals two strong-minded, admirable men of many important roles, perhaps the greatest of which are as fathers and sons.

  MARTIN SHEEN was born (and still is) Ramon Antonio Gerardo Estevez. Sheen is perhaps best known for his unforgettable performances in Badlands, Apocalypse Now, and Wall Street, and as President Josiah Bartlet on television’s The West Wing. A longtime activist for social justice and human rights, he resides in Malibu, California, with Janet, his wife of fifty years.

  EMILIO ESTEVEZ is known for his roles in The Outsiders, The Breakfast Club, St. Elmo’s Fire, and The Mighty Ducks and as writer and director of The War at Home, Bobby, and The Way, films with substantive social subjects. He is coproprietor of Casa Dumetz vineyards in Malibu, with partner Sonja Magdevski, where they live.

  HOPE EDELMAN is the author of five prior nonfiction books, including the international bestseller Motherless Daughters. She lives with her husband and two daughters in Topanga Canyon, California.

  MEET THE AUTHORS, WATCH VIDEOS AND MORE AT

  SimonandSchuster.com

  • THE SOURCE FOR READING GROUPS •

  JACKET DESIGN BY ERIC FUENTECILLA

  FRONT JACKET PHOTOGRAPH © JANET SHEEN

  BACK JACKET PHOTOGRAPH BY DAVID ALEXANIAN

  COPYRIGHT © 2012 SIMON & SCHUSTER

  Thank you for purchasing this Free Press eBook.

  Sign up for our newsletter and receive special offers, access to bonus content, and info on the latest new releases and other great eBooks from Free Press and Simon & Schuster.

  or visit us online to sign up at

  eBookNews.SimonandSchuster.com

  FREE PRESS

  A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Copyright © 2012 by Shenkowitz Productions, Inc. and Estevez Productions, Inc. Photographs © Janet Sheen, Martin Sheen, Emilio Estevez, Renée Estevez,

  Ramon Estevez, and David Alexanian

  Front jacket photograph © Janet Sheen

  Back jacket photograph by David Alexanian

  Poem “Emilio” by Charles Frank Laughton

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Free Press Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

  First Free Press hardcover edition May 2012

  FREE PRESS and colophon are trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  The Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau can bring authors to your live event.

  For more information or to book an event contact the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau at 1-866-248-3049 or visit our website at www.simonspeakers.com.

  DESIGNED BY ERICH HOBBING

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Sheen, Martin.

  Along the way : the journey of a father and son / Martin Sheen and Emilio Estevez; with Hope Edelman.—1st Free Press hardcover ed.

  p. cm.

  Includes index.

  1. Sheen, Martin. 2. Estevez, Emilio, 1962– 3. Motion picture actors—United States—Biography. 4. Fathers and sons—United States—Biography.

  I. Estevez, Emilio, 1962– II. Edelman, Hope. III. Title.

  PN2287.S3715A3 2012

  791.4302’8092—dc23 2012001765

  [B]

  ISBN 978-1-4516-4368-8

  ISBN 978-1-4516-4377-0 (ebook)

  To Janet,

  wife and mother,

  and Ramon, Charlie, and Renée

  CONTENTS

  Prologue

  St.-Jean-Pied-de-Port, France, September 2009: Emilio

  Chapter 1: MARTIN, 1940–1959

  Chapter 2: MARTIN, 1962–1968

  Chapter 3: EMILIO, 1967–1969

  Chapter 4: MARTIN, 1969

  Chapter 5: EMILIO, 1970–1972

  Outside Pamplona, Spain, September 2009: Martin

  Chapter 6: EMILIO, 1972–1974

  Chapter 7: MARTIN, 1973–1976

  Chapter 8: MARTIN, 1976

  Chapter 9: EMILIO, 1976

  Chapter 10: MARTIN, 1976

  Haro, Spain, October 2009: Emilio

  Chapter 11: EMILIO, 1976–1977

  Chapter 12: MARTIN, 1977–1979

  Chapter 13: EMILIO, 1979–1980

  Chapter 14: MARTIN, 1981

  Chapter 15: EMILIO, 1981

  Burgos, Spain, October 2009: Emilio

  Chapter 16: MARTIN, 1981

  Chapter 17: EMILIO, 1981–1983

  Chapter 18: EMILIO, 1983–1987

  Chapter 19: MARTIN, 1984–1989

  Chapter 20: EMILIO, 1990–1994

  Chapter 21: EMILIO, 2000–2012

  Santiago de Compostela, Spain, November 2009: Martin

  Epilogue: EMILIO: 2000–2012

  Photographs

  Acknowledgments

  Index

  About the Authors

  PROLOGUE

  We never get over our fathers, and we’re not required to.

  —Old Irish saying

  MARTIN

  In the summer of 2010 I got a call from my oldest son, Emilio. He was calling from the editing room where he was working on The Way, our film about a father-and-son pilgrimage, written and directed by Emilio, in which I play his father. We’d spent forty days filming in southwest France and northern Spain along the Camino de Santiago, the thousand-year-old, 500-mile route leading to the cathedral in Santiago de Compostela, where the remains of Saint James the Apostle are believed to be interred.

  The Camino de Santiago, also known as the Way of Saint James, is a sacred path for Christians and, in recent years, walking its length has become a spiritual endeavor for people of all religions and backgrounds. The Camino ends in Galicia, a region of northern Spain to which four generations of Estevez men are tied. My father, Francisco, was born and raised there and my grandson, Emilio’s son Taylor, lives in Spain with his wife, Julia.

/>   Working with Emilio on The Way was one of the most extraordinary and satisfying projects of my life, and I longed for another father-son adventure with him. And that day Emilio was calling with just such a project.

  “Hey, listen,” Emilio said. “Would you be interested in writing a dual memoir?”

  “A memoir? You mean a book?”

  “Yeah. A father-son memoir. Whatta ya say?”

  I was intrigued. To my knowledge no such memoir had ever been published, at least not in our profession. Married couples have written books together, but not a father and son. The possibility began to excite me and I bombarded him with questions.

  “Hold on!” he said. “I just want to know if you’re interested.”

  “Of course I’m interested,” I assured him. “I’d work with you on anything. Do you have an offer from a publisher?”

  “Not exactly, but I have a meeting with a literary agent at my house this weekend. We’re going to have lunch, chat, and see if there are enough reasons to pursue this.” Then he hung up.

  I almost called him back to invite myself over for that lunch. After all, Emilio only lives a few hundred yards down the street from me and his mother, Janet. But I restrained myself and waited for him to report back.

  EMILIO

  That weekend, I sat on my outdoor patio with literary agent Scott Waxman and David Alexanian of Elixir Films, the producer for The Way. We were drinking wine that my partner Sonja and I had made and lunching on vegetables picked just two hours earlier from our backyard microfarm.

  “Emil, maybe you should tell Scott about the kind of book you have in mind,” David said.

  I chewed on one of my homegrown cucumbers and stalled for time to come up with something pithy and meaningful.

  “It’s a father-son story,” I said.

  “Yes, that’s what attracted me to it initially,” Waxman said. “So it’s not only about the filming and the experience?”

  “Right. It’s about how we got here, as men and as artists. Everyone thinks they already know the story. Truth is most folks don’t know the half of it.”

  Scott leaned forward. He was interested in those stories, too, he said.

  So, here it is. These are the stories you thought you knew but didn’t. Stories you can’t find through a Google search, scenes that we’ve recreated from our memories, to the best of our abilities. In the course of our dual acting careers, we’ve been involved in more than 250 movies and television shows. It would be impossible to mention them all here, so we’ve highlighted only the ones that had the most impact on our relationship and on our emerging careers. As a result, we had to leave out some notable ones.

  We joined forces with Hope Edelman, an accomplished memoirist in her own right, for the writing. Hope tolerated our madness, our impossible schedules, and our considerable distractions. She truly has the patience of Job and listened to our stories, the good ones and the bad, and pulled them together in our own voices. We showed our scars and our triumphs, and sometimes our asses. In many ways, the entire exercise was like a long, drawn-out therapy session with Hope as our trinity—counselor/confessor/writer.

  We’ve chosen to be honest, even when it was painful to do so, and even when a scene is less than flattering to one or both of us. We’ve done this in the hope that our story will inspire other fathers and sons to reflect on their journeys together and to inspire them to honor and give thanks for each other, in whatever way they can.

  This is our journey on the metaphorical “road,” the camino that all fathers and sons travel in some form or another. Our road sometimes gets a little bumpy, as roads often do. But on this road, nobody gets thrown under the bus while we’re behind the wheel.

  Let’s go!

  ALONG THE WAY

  EMILIO

  St.-Jean-Pied-de-Port, France

  First Day of Filming

  September 19, 2009

  The fog in the French Pyrenees is so thick it’s like driving straight into a cloud. A half hour ago, as we left the French Basque town of St.-Jean-Pied-de-Port, we saw hundreds of ivory sheep grazing the steep green slopes by the roadside. Then the fog rolled in. Now the sheep are concealed by the mist, but we can still hear their bells, faintly ringing out from somewhere beyond our reach.

  My father and I are here on a Saturday morning to scout locations for our new movie, The Way. We’ve got the camera equipment, six magazines of Super 16 mm film, and a small crew in two pickup trucks we borrowed this morning. Our schedule says filming officially starts on Monday, but, if an opportunity presents itself today, we’ll take it. With a tight budget and only forty days to shoot the film, we need all the cooperation and good luck that comes our way.

  I’m sitting in the open bed of the first truck, wearing the orange windbreaker and brown hiking boots of my character, Daniel Avery. I’m playing a small role as a world traveler who dies on his first day out hiking the Camino de Santiago. My father, in a role I wrote specifically for him, is playing Daniel’s father, Tom, a privileged country-club golfer and lapsed Catholic who decides to walk his son’s ashes 500 miles to the cathedral in Santiago de Compostela. Along the way he becomes part of a small community of fellow travelers from all over the world, each of whom has a burden to carry.

  With me in the truck today are my twenty-five-year-old son, Taylor, my assistant and associate producer on the film; Juanmi, our Spanish cinematographer; Tanya, who’s in charge of props; and Anna, the wardrobe mistress. My father is up front in the cab with Jean-Jacques, the Basque inn owner who lent us his Toyota pickup this morning and then offered his services as a driver.

  “I’ll take you a back way here!” Jean-Jacques had shouted enthusiastically as he steered us out of St.-Jean. He knows the roads like the lifelong resident he is, and he’s taking this one fast. Really fast. We’re driving over rocks the size of a couch, hanging on to the edges of the truck bed as if our lives depend on it. Which, come to think of it, they might.

  My father doesn’t like rough roads or dangerous driving and this definitely qualifies as both. I knock on the glass between us.

  “How you doing up there, Ramon?” I shout.

  Ramon is my father’s given name. Ramon Antonio Gerard Estevez. He took the stage name Martin Sheen in 1959 when he moved to New York City from Dayton, Ohio. On location I call him either Ramon or Martin to keep from looking too familiar with him in front of the crew. It’s also a way to remind them to treat him as one of the actors instead of as the director’s father or as the Hollywood icon that he is. Other directors may look at him and think, “That’s Captain Willard from Apocalypse Now!” or “That’s President Josiah Bartlet from The West Wing!” but when we’re on set together, I’m thinking, “That’s Dad.” This is my third time directing him, and it’s always a balancing act between being his boss and being his son.

  Inside the cab, my father waves back in an “I’m okay” motion. He’s wearing a royal blue parka and the same hiking boots I am. Actually, they are my boots. We wear the same size and I bought a two-for-one in Madrid six weeks ago. This morning at the hotel in St.-Jean we traded boots when I realized he hadn’t broken in his pair. I can’t say I’d take the shoes off my feet for any actor, but that kind of thing happens when your leading man is also your dad.

  In the course of six feature films I’ve directed dozens of actors, including screen legends like Sir Anthony Hopkins and Harry Belafonte; friends like Laurence Fishburne and Demi Moore; up-and-coming actors like Lindsay Lohan and Shia LaBeouf; and family members like my brother Charlie and my sister Renée. Even so, my father is my favorite actor to work with. He’s incredibly talented and committed to his art. Also, as his son I don’t give a damn that he’s an icon. I know what he’s capable of as an artist and I don’t let him fall back on his regular bag of tricks, which I’ve come to know well over the years. I know exactly when and how to push him to get his best performance, and also when to back off.

  The first time I directed him in a film was in 1995, for t
he Vietnam War–era drama The War at Home, based on a stage play by James Duff. It was the story of a young veteran, played by me, who returns from overseas to his family in Texas, where his domineering father—played by “Ramon”—can’t and doesn’t want to acknowledge the horrors the son has experienced.

  We next worked together on my 2006 film Bobby, set in Los Angeles’s Ambassador Hotel on the night Bobby Kennedy was assassinated there. My father played a stockbroker and Kennedy supporter married to a much younger woman, played by Helen Hunt. My dad was one of my biggest champions on that film, which took nearly seven years to make. When The West Wing was honored by the Robert F. Kennedy Foundation my father was given a bust of Kennedy as a gift. He put it on my writing desk to give me inspiration as I was shaping the script. It sits there to this day.

  By now my father trusts me as a director. He knows I won’t let him look foolish. I’ll showcase his strengths and not his weaknesses. As the oldest of his four kids, I’ve always felt responsible for him, maybe even more responsible than he needs me to be. He was so young when I was born, only twenty-one, that in some ways we grew up together. When we’re on set people say that sometimes it’s easy to forget who’s the father and who’s the son.

  That doesn’t mean we always get along. We don’t. We disagree, a lot. He’s a devout and practicing Catholic, whereas I have my own ideas about spirituality and a strong connection to the earth. Where he’s outgoing and impulsive, I’m introspective and cautious. He lives very much in each moment. I’m always living a year ahead. Case in point: He’s in the truck right now mentally preparing for a location scout this morning. Me, I’m already in the theater, watching the film.

  Nonetheless, we agree on one thing: that we have more in common than not. We both adore my mother, we love our children fiercely, and we take our art seriously. He’s stubborn, I’m stubborn, and we can get angrier at each other than anyone would ever expect. Even when I got so furious that I took a swing at him in the Philippines and shouted at him in Paris and left him alone on a sidewalk, I always came back. I knew how much he loved us and that our family meant everything to him. Everything. Throughout it all, I understood his frustration and celebrated his triumphs the way a son does. Maybe the way only a son can.