Here’s the latest from the crossroads of faith, media & culture: 09/20/24

The Reagan prophecy? That Reagan biopic that that critics tried to bury is now entering its fourth crowd-pleasing week at the box office closing in on earning $25-million at the box office. The star-studded cast includes Dennis Quaid as the 40th president, Penolepe Ann Miller as Nancy Reagan, Jon Voight as a fictional KGB agent who studied his life and Pat Boone as the real-life Rev. George Otis, a preacher who some say prophesied the Reagan presidency. Boone, who was a friend of Reagan, knows something about that event since he was there when it happened. The legendary singer and actor (who turned 90 in June) told me all about it when we chatted recently.

JWK: First of all, I recently spoke with your friend Eric Close about his upcoming movie Average Joe. He says “Hi.” If you recall, I spoke to both of you when you were co-starring in The Mulligan.

Pat Boone: I do! Tell him “Hi, right back!” I like him very much. He’s a fine actor and Christian and a good man.

JWK: So, tell me about Reagan.

PB: Well, in real life, my wife and I were friends with the Reagans. We moved to California where I could do TV, music and all of the rest of the stuff I was doing from one place. We settled in Beverly Hills. Our kids went to school with the Reagan kids. So, we got to know each other very well.

When he was making his speeches for GE, touring the country (and) not acting anymore, saying things like “Government is not the solution to our problems. Government is our problem!” people were beginning to want him to run for office. I agreed. I thought he would make a great congressman. So, we had those conversations – but then he became governor!

Then, while he was governor, my wife Shirley and I and George Otis, a deeply spiritual Christian (visited him). I called him “the electric man” because when he was talking about things of the Spirit his hands would just quiver in excitement. So, on an afternoon in Sacramento – after a Kathryn Kuhlman meeting at an arena downtown – we went out to the governor’s mansion just to have a few minutes with him, at his invitation, before we caught our plane back to LA. So, George Otis and several others – including Shirley and me – were in the room and he said “Governor, before we leave can we have a word of prayer with you?” Reagan said “Well, sure.” So, he gave us his hands and we gathered around in a circle. We started voicing a prayer individually. When he got to George – who was on Reagan’s right hand; I didn’t think of it then but Reagan was feeling that quivering in George’s hand – he started a normal sounding prayer. “Lord, we thank You for this country, we thank You for our freedoms and Lord, we thank You for this man.” And he stopped. There was an awkward pause. Then, in a different voice coming out of George Otis, we heard “My son, I am well pleased with you. If you continue to walk uprightly before me, you will dwell in 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.”

JWK: Wow!

PB: And there was another silence. Then George ended the prayer. We all looked up at Reagan. He was glassy-eyed. He said “Well,that was something.” Which it was! What it was a Holy Spirit prophesy. He didn’t understand that yet.

The time came when I went to the Republican Convention after that knowing that he was gonna be the president – (but) he was not nominated. Gerald Ford was. Reagan came home very disappointed. He didn’t want to run again – but his wife Nancy said “Ron, you remember what that preacher said that day in Sacramento?” Reagan said “Well, you thought he was a crackpot.” She said “Well, maybe – but maybe he was right.” So, they talked him into running again and, of course, he was elected.

Now, on the night that he was elected, I was in Washington – I don’t remember why but I was – when Dan Rather and the other TV hosts were starting to say to people, almost regrettably, “It looks like the Governor of California is going to be our next president.” I picked up the phone on an impulse and called Pacific Palisades and, sure enough, Reagan was still there waiting to know whether he was going to the hotel to concede or accept.

He said “Hello.” I said “This is Pat Boone. May I be the first to call you Mr. President.” (He said) “Well, Pat, that’s just premature. They’re still counting the votes.” I said “No, Brokaw, Jennings and Dan Rather are saying you are the next president. Do you remember that moment in Sacramento several years ago in 1970 when the man George Otis gave that word of prophecy?” Reagan said “I’ve thought about it many times in the last few months.”

Of course, it was a word of prophecy. So, Mark Joseph who produced this film on Reagan – which is magnificent, by the way – said that scene has got to be in the film.” But I couldn’t play Pat Boone! So, I played George Otis. There’s a young kid actor playing me and a young actress playing Shirley next to me in that scene in the film. I don’t know if there’s ever been a scene like it – where I was playing someone else and someone was playing me in that same scene! So, that’s what happened. It was true and it just had to be part of the story.

Reagan was selected by God and foretold that he would be president. He devoted his life and his career – even after he was shot, if you remember, like Trump was recently – (to God). (He said) “I believe God spared me and I devote the rest of my life to doing whatever I know He wants me do to.”

So, that was something that has not been in any other film, certainly, about Reagan. I think Dennis Quaid is gonna get an Academy nomination, if not the award – because he became Ronald Reagan in that film.

JWK: I agree he was very good but, in today’s Hollywood, I’m not sure he’ll be getting a nomination. Maybe I’ll be surprised.

PB: I think you may be because it’s a great love story. I won’t be totally surprised if he does not because the film shows accurately that when Reagan was president of the Screen Actors Guild (when he was) still an actor, he was already combating communism that was trying to infiltrate and take over the entertainment industry. In fact, they were doing it quite openly. There were known communists in offices. They were promoting socialism and communism right then before Reagan ever became governor or sought to run for office…Reagan was fighting something then and, if he was right now with us, he would be fighting it still. So, (Dennis Quaid) might not get the nomination which he deserves.

JWK: What are you thoughts on how Hollywood, Washington and the country have changed since the era of Reagan?

PB: Well, I put all my thoughts into this song called Where Did America Go? We needed a song like Bob Dylan’s Blowin’ in the Wind which in the sixties got America to considering prejudices and other wrongs in our society. I thought he did us a great service. I thought it was a masterpiece. I thought, well, we need that now. We need another song like it. I tried to get Bob to help me write it but he was on the road with The Outlaws singing and we couldn’t make a connection. I went ahead and wrote the song (with) Mike Lloyd across the street, a great producer. We produced it. We made it sound like Dylan’s Blowin’ in the Wind with just a guitar and harmonica. Now, it’s sweeping the internet, John. It’s going nuts on TikTok and all the music services. We’re into the millions.

JWK: I actually watched it. It’s amazing! You’re in a top movie and a viral video. You’re hot!

PB: The song is really going crazy. I know it’s what we need. Some of the verses (are) “Where has America gone? Where are Abraham, Martin and John? We drowned out their voices. We gave up our choices. Do we have the strength to move on?” Then I talk about (how) we’ve given up our own Holy Grail, the Constitution. It still holds the way we can win but we sold our influence, we sold our choices for gold. I forget the exact words. I’m trying to say too much. I know we don’t have much time but the song says it all very well. Even our elected politicians sell their authority for their own personal gain.

JWK: Getting back the movie, critics have unsurprisingly panned it. I gave it a good review. More importantly, the audience has responded at the box office. It has what they call “legs.” Why do you think the audience has responded so well?

PB: Because they see themselves. They see what they saw in Ronald Reagan and Nancy. What they see are people living by tried-and-true principles and standing up for them with courage. (Reagan said) “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”, the thing his advisors told him not to do. The people that see the film see raw courage. Then they see a real love story that was not made up. It wasn’t for show. It was a man and his wife trying to live their lives the best they knew how and according to tried-and-true principles, including the Constitution and the Bible. So, the people that see this film tell other people. They’re the main promotion. Of course, there has to be other promotion and there is paid promotion for the film.

JWK: Do you have any thoughts about this election and how it compares to Reagan’s era?

PB: I sure do, yes. More than almost any other (election), it is a battle for morality (and) for the principles that made America great which are all being tested and destroyed, really, in many cases.

For instance, the craziness of abortion and also burning the flag. The Supreme Court has even said you can burn the flag, you can spit on it, urinate on it, defecate on it and tear it up because it’s freedom of speech or freedom of expression. I went back to Washington with Jon Voight to appear before Congress, begging them to protect the flag and compared it to the dollar bill. It’s still an offense to desecrate a dollar bill – but you can desecrate and urinate on the flag and that’s okay! You can burn it! We’re losing our way.

So, now abortion, the craziness of it. They’re fighting for IVF, in vitro fertilization. Why would that not be legal? But it’s disputed. Meanwhile, they’re fighting to be able destroy at least a million babies a year through abortion. It’s the taking of a human life from the womb. I’ve been trying got get somebody to ask the current female candidate…”Were you ever an embryo? Yes or no? Were you ever a fetus? Yes or no? In the fifth month of your mother’s pregnancy, were you a human being? In the last month before she broke water and you came into this world, were you a human being? One last question, do you think that you were worth more as a human being than any other baby born under the same circumstances?” Let her answer those questions.

JWK: I just want to be clear. Are you saying that you favor IVF or you don’t favor IVF.

PB: I do, of course!

JWK: I just wanted to be clear on that.

PB: These people are trying every way they can to have a baby, meanwhile, others are fighting to destroy children by the millions. I mean that’s where we are as a country.

JWK: Looking ahead, I see that your next movie is called The American Miracle and you’re playing Thomas Jefferson.

PB: Yeah, I very happily play Thomas Jefferson in his last days. Kevin Sorbo plays a younger Jefferson when he and Adams were disputing about the Louisiana Purchase. Adams didn’t think we should. Jefferson, knowing it would double the size of the country and bring all the qualities, produce and resources of that part of the world to be part of America, rightly defended it. Of course, they made the purchase. I don’t want to spoil it for anybody but I play the death scene of Thomas Jefferson when he is lamenting that he couldn’t be at the 50th anniversary of the nation because (of his) health.

JWK: Just briefly, I know you have to go for your SiriusXM show, but I have one quick question. You’ve now taken ninety trips around the sun. You’re so active!

PB: I am, yes.

JWK: What have you learned that you’d like to pass onto this generation? What’s the secret of a happy life?

PB: Well, I guess I could sum it. I’m asked that in various ways. I think we need to count our blessings, for one. We’re the most fortunate people in the world to live in the country that is the freest in the world…We have been “one nation under God.” Now, polls say that fewer than 50% of Americans go to any place of worship. They don’t know the Bible and, if they pray at all, they don’t know if anybody’s listening. So, we are not literally “one nation under God.” We’re a divided nation with less than half of the people still adhering to, or even knowing, what the foundational principles were.

People even like, unfortunately, Obama, who is a constitutional scholar, have said the Constitution is a flawed document. What?! (Obama has argued that), yes, it tells (government what it) can’t do but it should be telling people what they should do. No! That was the whole idea of the Constitution – that free men and women could make up their own minds (about) what they should or shouldn’t do. Government was not created to tell them what they had to do. If we’re giving up our principles, we’re giving up our country. This is what I’m crying out you can’t do. Let’s please not be a nation that’s not still seeking the blessing and the guidance of God and His Word.

JWK: So, thank you, very much. That was really good! You’ve got the movie coming up and your SiriusXM show. Anything else ahead for you?

PB: I’ll be playing in a golf tournament at Pepperdine at the Riviera (Country Club) in October. So, I’m getting better, not worse.

John W. Kennedy is a writer, producer and media development consultant specializing in television and movie projects that uphold positive timeless values, including trust in God.