Cameron Douglas, former drug addict and con, scion of the leading Hollywood dynasty of Kirk and Michael Douglas has written a frank memoir Long Way Home. It winds through his seemingly privileged but in reality tumultuous childhood with inadequate and erratic parenting, both parents being unfaithful and his father doing drugs. He started on marijuana as a young teen and graduated to heroin, liquid cocaine and crystal meth, was dried out myriad times and ended up in prison for dealing, with his sentence lengthened when he was found with drugs inside. He eventually served seven years with two in solitary confinement.
Born 13 December 1978 in Santa Barbara, CA, he’s a Sun conjunct Neptune in Sagittarius in a creative and neurotic square to Saturn in Virgo and perhaps opposition a Gemini Moon – very scattered and unfocussed as well as addictive prone with Sun close to Neptune.
His father Michael Douglas, 25 September 1944 10.30 am New Brunswick, New Jersey, is also a Sun conjunct Neptune, in his case in Libra, square Saturn. He’s got more Cardinal planets with Mars Venus also in Libra, a Capricorn Moon and Saturn in Cancer, so is blessed with more initiative and a self-starting drive. Michael’s partial excuse for not being a better role model for Cameron was that he was trying to get out from under the shadow of his own father Kirk Douglas.
Kirk, 9 December 1916 10.15 am New York, is a hard driving and aggressive Sun Sagittarius, with a ruthlessly determined Pluto opposition Mars in Capricorn which falls on Michael’s Capricorn Moon and square Michael’s Libra Sun Neptune – so he would make Michael feel trapped and scared.
What may not have helped, though they are very different temperaments, is that Cameron shares several of his grandfather’s planets – Sagittarius Sun, Mars in Capricorn and Venus in Scorpio. And Cameron’s Saturn is also conjunct Michael’s Jupiter in the 10th, so he’d dent Michael’s confidence and undermine his reputation.
What a complicated family. Kirk Douglas’s tough beginning in a poverty-stricken New York childhood, son of a ragman, straightened his spine but it didn’t make life easier for what came next.
What exactly does “Sun Neptune” mean?