Celebrity Tip: Colin Firth on Why Parents Are the Best Econ Teachers

Colin Firth, known for his work in Bridget Jones’s Diary and Love Actually (GE), is the star of the upcoming film When Did You Last See Your Father? which is about a man's relationship with his dying father. “This is one of my favorite books,” says Firth, of the memoir by Blake Morrison. “[It’s] one of the few books I’ve read more than once.”

The English actor, who is now busy at work on the film Mamma Mia, recently sat down with MainStreet to talk about aging, his relationship with his own father, and the lessons families can teach each other about financial responsibility.

How did doing this movie affect your views on aging and caring for the elderly?
I think that we have such a taboo about death in our society, we put a great deal of emphasis on the abilities we have until about middle age and then after that we haven’t gotten the same facilities anymore, you have nothing to use, and you have nothing to wait for but the grave. We don’t really want to watch that happen.

I think we all suffer as a result, and I’ve always felt strongly about this. I think that in societies that give old people roles, I find that they free themselves up. If the grandparents do some of the primary parenting, then the young parents don’t have to pay for nannies, daycare and all the rest of it.

What was your relationship like with your father?
He is so unlike [the father in the movie] Arthur Morrison. If polar opposites exist in personalities, he would be one. He’s a very kind, gentle, thoughtful, unimposing sort of man. He was very much loved as a teacher because of all those qualities.