Kiefer’s dad almost played Kiefer’s dad
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- April
- 1
Wait, let me try that again.
Donald Sutherland almost played Kiefer Sutherland’s TV dad on 24, but had to turn down the part when he learned just how bad a father the writers wanted him to be, he told the BBC’s Newsbeat.
“We had a long dinner and he asked me to play his dad in 24,” he explained.“I said OK but on one condition, the relationship has to be the same sort of relationship Sean Connery had with Harrison Ford (in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade).
“He said, ‘I’ll go back and see what the writers have in mind’. He came back and said, ‘No dad, they want you to try and kill me’. I said, ‘No way, that’s not going to work’. So they hired James Cromwell instead.”
He did offer to come in at the series’ end, though, and reveal that he’s Jack’s REAL father, that Phillip was merely Jack’s mother’s husband.
Donald Sutherland said he didn’t think they’d ever go for that, but did he watch last season? I mean, c’mon. That’s about all they didn’t do.
The good news he had for 24 fans was that Kiefer’s jail time made him determined to make the next two seasons “the best two years of television in the United States.”
It seems that Kiefer was in solitary 23 hours a day. Here, lemme let Dad tell us about it:
Jail was tough for him. He had 48 days inside, 23 hours a day in solitary. It was very, very cold. There were no windows. He had no community. I also made a deposit at the prison so he could call out. We were given 14 minutes for every call. When he would call, you weren’t prepared and when I got to speak to him I didn’t get to say everything I wanted to. I wrote to him every other day though.
I’ve gotta say, Kiefer showed some class in how he handled his sentence. He hasn’t gone all over the talk shows and talk about how he learned his lesson and will never drink again, he doesn’t bemoan his fate, he didn’t fight it, he doesn’t blame anyone else. He took his sentence, arranged to serve it to best accommodate those who worked with him (he not only spent Christmas in jail, but also his birthday, so it’s not like he chose a boring time of year to serve his time) and served it quietly.
Just makes me have that much more respect for him, so I’m going to believe that if he says the next two seasons are going to bring us the best television in the U.S., I’m going to believe him, dammit.
Donald Sutherland photo: Louis Lanzano/Associated Press; Kiefer Sutherland photo: Courtesy of Fox.
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, April 1st, 2008 at 4:20 pm by Amy Vernon.
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Donald Sutherland was on a TV show this weekend claiming that the only time he has ever starred in anything with his son (A Time To Kill), he was cast without the knowledge Kiefer was involved. At least they’re talking now