'Dad and I have good genes' says Michael Douglas

Film star Michael Douglas has said “good genes” is one explanation for the Hollywood success of his father Kirk and himself.

Douglas co-starred with his father for the first time last year in It Runs In The Family.

Soon, he will have something else to share with his father: the Cecil B DeMille Award.

The 59-year-old actor will receive the career achievement award from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association during the January 25 Golden Globes ceremony in Beverly Hills, California.

Father Kirk, 87, took home the same honour in 1968, making them the first father-son recipients.

“We’ve got good genes – longevity and endurance,” Michael Douglas told The Associated Press from Bermuda, where he lives part-time with his wife, British star Catherine Zeta-Jones, and their two children, son Dylan, three, and daughter Carys, seven months.

“It’s sort of weird – looking in the mirror I feel like I haven’t finished the race yet, that I’m in the third lap and someone’s giving lovely, nice kudos.

“Do they know something I don’t know?”

Douglas is a long-time favourite at the Golden Globes, noted for their party atmosphere compared with the more traditional Oscars.

He won for best actor award in a drama for Wall Street (1987) and for co-producing 1975’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975), which won best drama.

He’s also been nominated for the films Hail, Hero! The War Of The Roses, The American President and Wonder Boys, and the TV series The Streets Of San Francisco.

This time, he said, he’s looking forward to seeing old friends.

Among them: “Aaron Sorkin from The West Wing – when I did American President, he wrote American President.

“My friends from Will & Grace, I did a guest episode on that. Marty Sheen was in American President with me, too. Karl Malden, and Saul Zaentz, who I produced Cuckoo’s Nest with.

“Plus, you can drink,” he added with a laugh.

Other previous Cecil B DeMille recipients include Gene Hackman, Harrison Ford, Al Pacino, Dustin Hoffman, Shirley MacLaine, Jack Nicholson, Sean Connery and Sophia Loren.