“Is there anything worse than an actor with a cause?” asks an annoyed Jane Wyman, Ronald Reagan’s first wife, early in “Reagan,” the new biopic starring Dennis Quaid.
Well, after watching two more hours of this story, an adoring look back at the man who served two terms as our 40th president, we can report that there is definitely one thing worse: An actor without a movie.
Let’s not blame the star, though. Quaid, who has played more than one president, has certainly got the charismatic grin, the pomaded hair and especially that distinctive, folksy voice down — close your eyes, and it sounds VERY familiar. If he were to appear on “Saturday Night Live” in the role, it would feel like a casting coup akin to Larry David as Bernie Sanders.
But this is not an “SNL” skit, despite the fact that Jon Voight appears throughout with a heavy Russian accent as a KGB spy, but we’ll get to that. This is a 135-minute film that demands a lot more depth. And, so, to co-opt a political phrase from Bill Clinton, whom Quaid also has played: It’s the script, stupid.
Lovingly directed by Sean McNamara with a screenplay by Howard Klausner, “Reagan” begins with a chilling event (and a parallel to a recent one): the assassination attempt on Reagan in Washington in March 1981, only two months after he became president.
There are those who say Reagan cemented his relationship with the public by surviving that attempt; he famously told wife Nancy from his bed: “Honey, I forgot to duck.” In any case, the filmmakers use the event to set up their story, and will return to it later on, chronologically.
But their early point is that Reagan came away from the scare with a divine plan. “My mother used to say that everything in life happens for a reason,...
