Make Page Six a Preferred Source Michael O’Keefe, who played Danny Noonan in the 1980 film “Caddyshack,” claimed that cocaine was rife on the set and even budgeted into the film’s costs.
“There was some miscellaneous item,” the actor, 71, told Page Six exclusively in a recent interview about the comedy.
“It was the 70s,” he explained of the movie that filmed over the course of 11 weeks in the fall of 1979. “That’s what was happening back then. People were just treating it like it was toothpaste, and you had to do it twice a day to stay healthy.”
O’Keefe even remembered partaking before shooting scenes on the comedy that starred Ted Knight, Chevy Chase, Bill Murray and Rodney Dangerfield.
“It was not my favorite memory because in retrospect I can see those moments on camera and I’m not too happy about them,” he shared.
“But I can report to you that right after that movie, during that movie, was the last time I ever did anything like cocaine. I realized that it was a terrible thing to get involved [with], and like so many things in the drug world, it looked like fun, but in reality, it wasn’t.”
“The Great Santini” star added that a “huge wake-up call” was Doug Kenney’s death. Kenney co-wrote and produced the flick.
In 1980, Kenney died, at age 33, after walking off a cliff in Hawaii. His death was ruled a suicide.
O’Keefe described Kenney as “one of the most affable, intelligent, funny people in the world… Was strung out on cocaine, got depressed, and committed suicide. It was truly a result of drug addiction, and that was a huge wake-up call.”
The Oscar nominee, who has worked steadily over the years on shows like “Roseanne” and more recently, “Your Friends and Neighbors,” can currently be seen in “A Break in the Rain,” playing a man who has been on the road for ten years after his wife died of cancer. He connects with a Nashville singer, the two hit the road together, and his life changes, yet again.
O’Keefe said he was drawn to the role because it was directed by an old pal — Don Scardino — and because “there’s a kind of emotional journey in the film and rediscovering how you reconnect to a family, and I think that’s one of the major themes.”
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The “Michael Clayton” star shared that he became a father late in life, at age 57, so the themes of family and connection took on an added layer.
O’Keefe, who started working as a teen, is grateful for his long career.
“When you see movies, and you see people on TV, and we get a chance to talk about it. It’s great,” he shared. “It all looks like a lot of fun and exciting, and sometimes even glamorous, and all of that’s true, but the behind-the-scenes is so much different, and I’ve had a 50-year journey.”
“And I’ve really, really had some great experiences over the years and worked with some amazing people. So the fact that I’m still standing is kind of the happiest thing that I have to report.”
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