John Travolta stars in Wild Hogs, which opens in cinemas today Call it a midlife crisis or just another good Hollywood pay day: John Travolta goes middle-aged road movie with Wild Hogs. Alongside William H Macy, Tim Allen and Martin Lawrence the 53-year-old actor, dancer and aviator leaves normal life behind and hits the road with his gang for a few days on Harley Davidsons. Unfortunately the adventure turns out to be much wilder than they anticipated. A veteran of over 30 years on screen, the likeable Grease, Pulp Fiction and Get Shorty star has some simple advice for any guys getting the middle-aged blues. "Get distracted, be productive, get your mind off it. If you still have your health and you're in good shape to be productive and to get something done in life, then get busy doing it." There's nothing you can do about mortality, he muses. "Even if it's having fun once in a while go and do it, because nothing is going to change that lineage that takes us to the end of life." His own positive attitude made it difficult relating to the midlife crisis of his Wild Hogs character, John admits. "We're too blessed to be stressed," he says about life with actress-wife Kelly Preston and their two children. "The only thing I ran into (in the film) is that I have a wanderlust as far as travel and adventure go." John has a jet airliner pilot's license and his own private Boeing 707, which he can land at a special runway near his Florida estate. The plane is named Jett Clipper Ella after his son Jett and daughter Ella Bleu. "I will go off on any given moment with family and friends to explore the world. I go around the world once a year. I'll go to Africa, Russia, whatever. That's probably the only thing I identify with my character." The film's really about four friends who learn to say how much they love each other, he maintains. "It's an appealing subject matter. There haven't been any comedies about middle-aged men on motorcycles going out on a road trip." It was boys-joking-about set, John admits. "We bypassed friendship and we went right to brotherhood. Only brothers could antagonise each other at the level we did." John also takes credit for the cameo appearance by Peter Fonda, who featured in the classic biker movie Easy Rider 40 years ago. "It was my idea. I was 13 when I saw him in Easy Rider and I was pretty wowed. I thought it would be a rather classy cherry on the cake idea to bring him in to save the day again." | 
