This ‘Trees’ star is finally rooted
Anne Heche has gotten her act together – in more ways than one.
Heche – who was involved in a torrid tabloid romance with Ellen DeGeneres six years ago – is happily married, the mother of a 4-year-old son and the star of a new series on ABC.
Any one of those situations could be considered an achievement, especially given that her breakup with DeGeneres was followed by a widely publicized emotional collapse.
“I feel well, I feel healthy,” Heche says. “My whole life was a journey of trying to find peace with myself and find my own health. So I would say every single step along the way toward my marriage was probably a catalyst – even the dark roads were a catalyst to help me understand where I wanted to go.
“And if I saw places I didn’t want to be, that redirected me toward where I wanted to be. It was a 30-year journey to my health.”
Heche is not about to reiterate her troubles: “Read my book (‘Call Me Crazy’),” she says.
She does confess to having a troubled childhood. Her father and brother died when she was 14 and the family moved often.
“It was a complicated life and unsettled life,” she says. “We moved around a lot. When I decided to have a son or a daughter I decided to give them a stable life if I could, if I could find a way to do it, I would make that a goal. …
“I thought the best way I could provide that stability for my son was to be on a TV show. And I wanted to find one that was like making movies if I possibly could.”
What she found is the dramedy “Men in Trees,” which premieres Tuesday at 10 p.m. on ABC (KXLY-4 in Spokane). The series will land in its regular time slot Friday at 9 p.m.
Heche plays Marin Frist, a self-confident relationship expert who finds herself undermined when her fiance is unfaithful.
She winds up in Alaska, where she can observe the male species at close range and retool her assumptions.
“The clarity of who you are is the journey,” Heche says, “and that’s, of course, what this show is about – the woman thinking she knew what her life was, thinking she had an understanding and she realizes she had no understanding and she has to then go back and question each one of the things she built her life around, which of course, is such a vulnerable position to be in …”
Heche and her husband, photographer Coleman Laffoon, have worked out their own lives in a unique way. She’s the breadwinner; he does everything else, including the finances, most of the cooking, caring for their son and consulting on her career.
“He’s great at running the household, being the stay-at-home-dad, being sure our business, our finance are in order,” Heche says. “And I’m really good at going off and bringing home the paycheck. …
“It’s not that he is involved in my acting career, although I ask his opinions about everything, it’s that you’re a working, functioning machine. And that machine is a unit, and it’s a marriage, and it’s also a family. And there are jobs that need to be done.”
The birthday bunch
Director Brian De Palma is 66. Guitarist Leo Kottke is 61. Actor Scott Patterson (“Gilmore Girls”) is 48. Actress Kristy McNichol is 44. Actress Virginia Madsen (“American Dreams”) is 43. Musician Moby is 41. Singer Harry Connick Jr. is 39. Rapper Ludacris is 29.