This picture was taken last week. It's Stephen Baldwin along with local talk show host, Shannon Burke. Stephen was the speaker at a downtown leadership prayer breakfast that my sons and others host each year. He did a great job.
Stephen is the born again, conservative republican Baldwin.
Daniel is the celebrity rehab, bad boy Baldwin.
Billy is the successful, married to the same wife forever Baldwin.
This morning I read a long article in the New Yorker about Alec, the oldest and most famous Baldwin.
Billy says in the article that if you want to know how Alec feels about his brothers, here's an example.
Alec once wrote a screenplay where he and his brothers were to portray a family of gunfighters.
As Billy tells it:
Basically it was: Daniel's the outlaw, I'm (Billy) the riverboat gambler who gets all the (women,) the shallow, good looking sap; Stephen's the village idiot; and he's (Alec) the #*!# hero. ...the one who saves the day in the end.
I think I'd call Alec the complicated one. We all know that he's a divorced dad. (We've all heard that famous and painful voice mail to his daughter.) On the other hand, he's a smart, funny, extremely talented actor, writer and director and very passionate about life - and his brothers.
He's also perpetually unhappy.
Lorne Michaels, the SNL producer and model for Alec's character on "30 Rock" said to him:
Alec, you have one of the best writers in television (Tina Fey) writing this part for you. It's shot in New York, where you choose to live. You work three days week, you get paid a lot of money, you're getting awards. It's a great time in your life. It's an all-good thing. And, if you were capable of enjoying it, it would be even better.
Some might say that Alec should go the way of his brother, Stephen. But Alec is a non drinking, church going, praying, vegetarian democrat.
My take on the Baldwin brothers (and their two sisters) is that they're much like many other big families - only rich and famous.
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