‘Reagan’: Faith, Love, Communism And Second Chances

Hitting theaters on Aug. 30, Reagan profiles a small-town boy who became a Hollywood star, then a world figure and inspiration to many. But along the way, he faced failure, disappointment and defeat.

But, as Winston Churchill said (and as I slightly misquote in the video below):

Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.

Reagan and the Fight Against Communism

Directed by Sean McNamara (Soul Surfer, The Miracle Season), from a screenplay by Howard Klausner (Space Cowboys), and based in part on the book The Crusader, by biographer Paul Kengor, Reagan frames the life of actor-turned-politician Ronald Reagan in terms of his lifelong foe: Communism.

As the film shows, Reagan was inspired as a young man to defend American freedoms against the rise of Communism.

As vice-president, and later president, of the Screen Actors Guild, Reagan fought the ideology directly in its attempts to overtake Hollywood’s entertainment unions.

Many nations have embraced Communism, but in the Cold War era, the chief exporter and proponent of it was the Soviet Union. Much of the film focuses on the ongoing, and often tense, relationship between Reagan and the USSR.

Jon Voight plays Viktor Petrovich, a fictional retired KGB officer who has long followed the career of Ronald Reagan — played by Tommy Ragen as a boy, David Henrie as a young man, and Dennis Quaid as an adult.

In the wake of the fall of the Soviet Union, Petrovich relates Reagan’s story as a cautionary tale to an up-and-coming Russian leader (Alex Sparrow).

The Importance of Belief and Not Giving Up

The film also emphasizes the themes of faith and perseverance.

With the help of his mother, Nelle — played by Amanda Righetti as a young woman, and Jennifer O’Neill in later years — Reagan survived having a charismatic but alcoholic father (Justin Chatwin). Nelle also instilled in him a strong and abiding Christian faith.

Reagan’s father was a Catholic of Irish descent, but Protestant Nelle was his chief spiritual influence.

At a panel discussion for the film at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum in Simi Valley, California, Righetti said of Nelle:

[She] raised her children in the faith of God, and really led them with that strong hand and a very strong moral compass. I think she dove into the church world.

I don’t know if it was a way to escape the hardships of her own life, but she survived influenza of 1918, she almost died. And her faith in God really grew strong.

And that was something that she profoundly put upon her children and raised her children with that compass.

As an actor, union leader, the 33rd governor of California, and the 40th U.S. president (succeeding in 1980 after failing in 1976), Reagan pushed past doubt and loss. That included the collapse of his first marriage, to actress Jane Wyman (Mena Suvari).

Reagan’s film career also began to sputter, as he was forced to relinquish the status of leading man to working as commercial pitchman.

But, upon meeting his second wife, actress Nancy Davis (Penelope Ann Miller), Reagan found someone who would support and protect him, to the end of his life.

Also starring are C. Thomas Howell, Kevin Dillon, Kevin Sorbo, Xander Berkeley, Lesley-Anne Down, Robert Davi, Trevor Donovan, Nick Searcy, Dan Lauria, Elya Baskin and Pat Boone.

The Musical Side of Reagan

The film has some interesting musical offerings, reflecting one of the varied interests of its producer, Mark Joseph, who is also an award-winning record producer.

Creed lead vocalist Scott Stapp appears as Frank Sinatra. KISS’ Gene Simmons contributed a new version of the 1930s torch song Stormy Weather; and Clint Black’s cover of John Denver’s Country Roads closes out the film. Tanya Tucker also contributed a song.

Most notably, Bob Dylan recorded a cover of Cole Porter’s Don’t Fence Me In, first popularized by Gene Autry in the 1940s, for the end-title credits.

Dennis Quaid — a third cousin of Autry — said to Spin Magazine:

“I was honored to have Bob join our film,” says Quaid. “We gave him the freedom to do any song he wanted to do, whether an original or a cover, and he chose ‘Don’t Fence Me In.’ That was extra special since it was a song that Gene made famous.

“Bob is a great lover of the American Songbook and we were delighted with the way he delivered the song. He’s a national treasure and was the perfect addition to the film.

“Gene and Clint were also generous with their time and Tanya has been a friend of many years, and I’m thrilled to have her song as well.”

Like Reagan, the Film Had a Lot to Overcome

The film had nearly as many troubles as Ronald Reagan. Twice, COVID-19 caused shutdowns, delaying production by nearly a year

Then, ironically, for a film about a Hollywood labor leader, came the actors’ strike.

Filming started in 2020 in the small town of Guthrie, Oklahoma. The film also shot at the Reagan Ranch, a k a Rancho del Cielo, in the Santa Ynez Mountains. Now owned by the Young America’s Foundation, the small ranch house and land are preserved as they were when the Reagans lived there.

In a rare move, filming also took place on Reagan’s actual Air Force One, a modified Boeing 707 built in 1962. Available to tour, it’s mounted on pylons in a glass-walled hangar attached to the Reagan Library.

The plane has also formed the impressive backdrop for a few GOP presidential debates.

The Happy Warrior

As Quaid noted during the panel discussion at the Reagan Library, Reagan was the model of the “happy warrior,” but that ready smile and good humor doesn’t mean he wasn’t effective.

Said Quaid:

He had a sunny disposition. He liked people, and they liked him. And thank God for him, his idea that he formed even before his presidency was to bankrupt them. That would be the way to bring down the Soviet Union. And it turned out to be right.

The film also hearkens back to a time when, although Republicans and Democrats disagreed, they weren’t at each other’s throats.

The House of Representatives was in Democrat hands for Republican Reagan’s tenure in office, almost entirely under Speaker Tip O’Neill (played by Dan Lauria).

O’Neill was an old-line Massachusetts Democrat, and an Irish Catholic. But, along with Nancy Reagan, he was one of the first to visit Reagan in the hospital after a 1981 assassination attempt.

For that scene in the movie, Lauria brought along his grandmother’s Rosary.

At the panel, Quaid said:

Well, that scene actually really happened, and it became where Tip O’Neill was over at the White House a lot more than he had to be. Because they were friends, they would in advance try to figure out some kind of compromise and come closer to each other, than it’s going to be my way or the highway.

Compromise is what America was built on. And Reagan had a great way of saying it. He would say, “Just because he disagrees with me about 20% of this issue, he’s not a 20% enemy. He’s an 80% friend.”

And they had a way of coming together. I mean, it’s emblematic of the way I wish we could be like, and we still can be, to get back to working together as Americans.