New Movie Focuses on Ronald Reagan’s Life

Actor Dennis Quaid will bring the story of President Ronald Reagan to movie screens this weekend!

Quaid plays the late president in the new movie “Reagan,” hitting theaters August 30.

Reagan was an actor, Governor of California, and president from 1981 through 1989. He was president during a recession, the Cold War, the war on drugs, the invasion of Grenada, the start of the AIDS epidemic, the Libya bombing, the Iran-Contra affair, and the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger. He also survived an assassination attempt in 1981.

Quaid told the Today show that he spent two years preparing to shoot the movie, and it was important to get it right. “He was my favorite president. Reagan is like Muhammad Ali – you show a picture of him to anyone in the world and they’re going to say, “That’s Reagan.” I didn’t want to do an impersonation. I wanted to get to the human being behind the public persona,” Quaid said.

Reagan died in 2004 from Alzheimer’s disease at the age of 93.