Kurt Russell reflected on his decision to leave Los Angeles for Colorado decades ago, a decision that raised eyebrows in Hollywood at the time but one that he never once regretted.
Talk to PEOPLE At the Madison FYC Panel in Los Angeles on May 30, the 75-year-old actor talked about the log ranch he and partner Goldie Hawn, 80, built together in Old Snowmass about 40 years ago, and why life in Colorado suits him in a way that city life simply never did.
“When Goldie and I got together a few years later, we both built a ranch there, where our family grew up,” he said.
“That was 40 years ago.” The move was motivated by a desire to live closer to nature and, eventually, take up ranching, a world away from the industrial city he was leaving behind.
“What I want to see, what I want to be a part of, everything that Colorado has to offer,” he explained.
“I wanted to eventually get into the life of a breeder.”
At the time, the move was seen by many in the industry as career suicide.
“When I did it, no one else was doing it,” Russell recalls. “A lot of people have said to me, ‘Well, that’s goodbye. That’s it.’ I said, ‘Well, we’ll see.'”
He was careful to clarify that this decision was never intended to escape anything.
“I wasn’t running away. I was just living where I live,” he said. “I was lucky that it really didn’t make any difference.”
Years later, he saw others following a similar path from Los Angeles, something he noted with no particular satisfaction.
His feelings about the city itself remain simple.
“I don’t hate Los Angeles. It’s just not my preference in terms of how I like to live my life.” And on the community, he chose instead: “Everyone who lives there, they live there because they want to. I can’t say the same about Los Angeles.”
For Russell, much of the satisfaction came from raising his family in this environment.
He and Hawn share son Wyatt Russell, while also raising his children Oliver and Kate Hudson from his previous relationship with Bill Hudson, alongside Russell’s son Boston from his marriage to Season Hubley.
“They grew up with a healthy dose of what nature has to offer,” he said. “There are difficulties, but there are also great rewards.”
Education reminded him of his own childhood in Maine.
“Once you’re exposed to this stuff, you’re always at home,” he said. “I’m really, really happy that we were able to do this.”
