If life is like a game of poker for actor Lou Diamond Phillips, then his attitude about life and the business of acting should garner him either a Royal Flush or an Oscar. “I feel like I’m the luckiest person I know. I’ve had lots of dreams and they’ve come true,” said Phillips, the Tony and Golden Globe-nominated actor during an exclusive interview with The Magazine of Santa Clarita.
Phillips is best known for film roles like rock ‘n roll performer Ritchie Valens in the 20-year-old film La Bamba (1987), the belligerent teen in Stand and Deliver (1988) and an Army staff Sergeant in Courage Under Fire with Denzel Washington.
Quoting a line from the film Casablanca and sounding every bit as much like Humphrey Bogart, Phillips said during the interview, “I’m no good at being noble, but it doesn’t take much to see that the problems of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world.”
With an approach to being charitable and unselfish, Phillips takes on the outlook of Bogart’s character, Rick in real life and gives unselfishly of his time to those in need or those who he wants to guide toward their dreams.
That’s one reason he will appear at the March Soroptimist International of Santa Clarita’s 32nd annual fundraiser, Back to the Sixties at the Hyatt Valencia Hotel. The other is his friendship and admiration for Soroptimist auction co-chair Terri Lee Cadiente, a woman he considers to be one of the best stunt people in the movie business.
Sitting next to Yvonne Boismier, the woman he calls his personal muse, the 45-year-old actor still carries the charisma of a strong leading man. The two have been a couple since they met three years ago on a film set in Vancouver. She is a make-up artist and graphic designer.
“She is a great sounding board and she gets what I go through when it comes to all the difficulties in this business,” says Phillips, “I look to her for advice and approval.”
A trait not necessarily so evident in the character Phillips played on Broadway in The King and I. While some advised he was taking on an insurmountable feat trying to step into the role of the King played by the legendary late Yul Brynner in the same show, Phillips found a new take on it and the critics were impressed.
“If you work hard, you see the pay-off,” says Phillips who keeps one reminder of his success in La Bamba hanging in the game room of his Woodland Hills home where he gathers with his actor buddies to play poker on Monday nights. One wall of the room is the coveted spot for the guitar he played in the film.
Today, his true pride and joy are his three daughters.
“My kids don’t look anything like me. I have 9-year-old fraternal twins, Isabella has blue eyes and Gracie has dark eyes and my older girl Lili has hazel-colored eyes. I look like the gardener next to them,” jokes Phillips.
Following in their father’s footsteps and blessed with inheriting his talents, they all love to act. One of them has already appeared in the television show, 24.
Believing in always giving back to the community, Phillips supports Book Pals, the California Teacher’s Foundation and the needs of Autistic children. He also steps in on acting classes to teach young actors and keep them motivated and impassioned.
Remembering back to a time when medicine man Thomas One Wolf told him, “You have a thunder voice. What you say goes far beyond the horizon.”
It does and probably will continue to, as the actor who once played Linus in a 6th grade production of Charlie Brown. Who would have thought that the boy who stole his mother’s best towels to use as blankets as he spoke the prophetic words of Linus would go on to do great things?
Just as Linus may have given up his prized possession, the security blanket for someone in need, so will Phillips at the SCV charity event when he surrenders a cherished sweater for a good cause.
“I’ve been saving this sweater from La Bamba for a long time for something special,” says Phillips about the vintage cardigan as he wears it during a photo shoot for The Magazine.
He no longer needs the sweater as a reminder of a break-out film roll, just as he doesn’t really need a Royal Flush in a poker game or an Oscar for his acting. Although both most certainly would be welcome, it’s not a deal-breaker. Life for him is all about embracing the moment and making a memory.
Doing a fairly authentic sounding impersonation of Jimmy Stewart in the film, It’s a Wonderful Life Phillips regurgitates the famous line to Boismeir, “What do you want, do you want the moon? If you want it, I’ll throw a lasso around it and pull it down for you. Hey! That’s a pretty good idea! I’ll give you the moon.”
I think if the humanitarian actor could, he would.
