Michael Douglas says he’s not retired, but has ‘no real intentions” of acting again

Michael Douglas may not be officially retired, but the legendary actor says he has no real plans to return to the screen anytime soon.

While speaking at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, where he presented a newly restored print of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest — the 1975 classic for which he won an Oscar as a producer — the 80-year-old was candid about his current stance on acting.

“I have not worked since 2022 purposefully because I realized I had to stop,” Douglas said, via Variety. “I had been working pretty hard for almost 60 years, and I did not want to be one of those people who dropped dead on the set. I have no real intentions of going back. I say I’m not retired because if something special came up, I’d go back, but otherwise, no.”

Douglas’s last on-screen appearances were in Marvel’s Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) and the Apple TV+ series Franklin (2024), in which he portrayed Benjamin Franklin. Both projects wrapped filming three years ago, and Douglas has not stepped in front of the camera since.

Although he teased the possibility of “one little independent movie” he’s developing, he admitted it’s contingent on getting the script right. Beyond that, Douglas says he’s content staying out of the spotlight — and supporting his wife, actress Catherine Zeta-Jones.

“I am happy for Catherine to go to work – and she is very busy,” he said. “I am happy to play the wife.”

© Getty Images

Douglas’s reflections on his career came after he spoke openly about his past battle with tongue cancer. He credits his decision to undergo chemotherapy and radiation — rather than surgery — with allowing him to continue working for another decade.

“Stage 4 cancer is not a holiday, but there aren’t many choices, are there? I went with the program, involving chemo and radiation, and was fortunate,” Douglas shared, noting that his friend, actor Larry Hagman, died of a similar diagnosis. “The surgery would have meant not being able to talk and removing part of my jaw and that would have been limiting as an actor.”