Arnold Schwarzenegger - Total Recall - My Unbelievably True Life Story

The next morning I told Maria, “Running is not the most important thing to me. The family is the most important thing. You are the most important thing, and if this is a tremendous burden for you, then we don’t do it. I just want to tell you that there’s a great opportunity here, and I think that if you want California to do better—”

“No,” she said. “It would be terrible. I don’t want you to do it.”

“Okay, it’s over. I’m not going to do it.”

That evening at the dinner table, she announced to the kids, “You should all thank Daddy because he made a decision that was good for our family: not to run for governor. Because Daddy wanted to run for governor.” Of course, the kids all started talking and having their reactions. “Thank you, Daddy,” said one. And then another one said, “That would be really cool, running for governor, wow.”

Several things unfolded over the next few days. First, Jay Leno called to check in, and I felt obliged to tell him that I was likely not to run. He said, “No problem.” There had been so much speculation about me running that he knew he would get a big audience either way. “You’ll be the first guest,” he said.

Meanwhile, Maria talked to her mother, and Eunice wasn’t happy. She and Sarge were big believers in me and were always encouraging me to serve the public. In fact, after I’d told reporters in June that I was thinking about joining the race, Sarge had sent me a note that read, “You’re making me very happy. I can’t think of any person today that I would rather have in office. If I were a resident of California, I hope you realize that I’d be voting Republican for the first time ever!” As for Eunice, she’d always had the drive to be in public life and the will to move past defeats and tragedies. Maria always joked, “I married my mother.” So now, when Maria told her mother that she didn’t want me to run, Eunice told her to snap out of it. “What happened to you?” she said. “We women in our family always support the men when they want to do something!” I wasn’t there for the conversation, of course, but Maria told me later on. “And by the way,” her mother added, “when a man gets that ambition to run, you can’t put it out. And if you stop him, he’ll be angry for the rest of his life. So don’t complain. Get out there and help him.”

During that time, we were having almost daily talks with my friend Dick Riordan, the former mayor of Los Angeles. He and his wife, Nancy, lived just a mile away. Dick was a moderate Republican like me, who had lost the gubernatorial primary the previous year. Most people expected him to run in the recall, and he had a very good chance to win. He had a terrific campaign manager named Mike Murphy, whom he had already called back in. But then word went around that Dick had taken to skipping political meetings and playing golf instead.

I called to find out what was going on. “I’m not likely to run,” I told him, “and if I’m not running, I want to say I’m endorsing you.”

He thanked me and later invited us to join him and Nancy for dinner at their new beach house in Malibu. We spent the whole meal talking about the Riordans running and us not running. That’s when I noticed a little softening in Maria’s stance.

“Arnold almost decided to run, and then he decided not to because we really didn’t like the idea,” she told them.

“These are the decisions you make,” I added. “I feel good that I made the decision not to run.”

Maria turned to me. “Well, I know this must be really hard on you. But in the end you make the decision that you want to make, and you should do whatever you want to do.”

This threw me. Was she now saying, “I freaked out when I heard about you running, but now I feel a little better about it?”

After dinner, Dick casually took me outside to the terrace. He punched me lightly in the stomach and said bluntly, “You should run.”

“What do you mean?”

“To be honest with you, I don’t have that fire in the belly like you have.” Dick was seventy-three years old. He said, “You should run. Why don’t I endorse you ?”

While driving home, I said to Maria, “You won’t believe what just happened,” and I told her about the conversation.

“I thought that there was something off about him during dinner!” she said. “Well, what did you tell him?”

“I told him the story about you, that you are totally against—”

“Look,” she interrupted, “I don’t want to be a spoiler here. I don’t want that responsibility. Maybe you should run.”

And then I said, “Maria, we’ve got to make up our mind by next week.”

It went back and forth like that for days. I could now see her dilemma. One side of Maria was ballsy and brave and wanted to be a strong partner, and the other side was telling her, “This is the same roller coaster you’ve ridden before. Chances are he’ll lose, and that’ll make you a loser too. You’ll be a fifty-fifty partner in an embarrassing mess you didn’t cause.” She would tell me to make my own decision, but every time I sounded like I was getting serious about running, she would get upset again.

I was off my stride too. Up to now, making a career decision had always been an incredible high. Like when I went into acting, and I said I wasn’t going to compete as a bodybuilder anymore. The vision became clear, I made the leap, and that was that. But making a career decision as a husband and a father was a whole different deal.

Normally, I would have called my friends to talk this through. But declaring a candidacy was so loaded that I couldn’t go to anybody. I emphasized to Maria, “This is just between us. We will figure it out.”

In the middle of all this, Danny DeVito asked me over to his house. He had three movie projects he wanted to pitch, including Twins II and one that he’d written himself that he wanted to direct. I said, “That’s a great idea, Danny, I’d love to work with you again.”

Then I added, “But, Danny, you know, California is in terrible shape.”

“Well, yes, probably. But what’s that got to do with my movies?”

“Well it could be that if my wife agrees, I may run for governor.”

“What! Are you crazy? Let’s do a movie together!”

“Danny, this is more important. California is more important than your career, my career, everyone’s career. I’ve got to run if my wife lets me.” He said okay, figuring that it wasn’t going to happen anyway.

Suddenly it was Wednesday, August 6, the day I was supposed to go on TV. I still didn’t know what I would announce. I was in the bathroom that morning, and I heard Maria call from outside the door, “I’m leaving now. I’m going over to NBC. I wrote up something for you that will help you at The Tonight Show .” And she pushed two pieces of paper under the door.

One was a set of talking points that essentially said, “Yes, Jay, you’re absolutely correct, California is in a disastrous situation, and we need new leadership. There are no two ways about it. That’s why I’m here to announce that I’m going to endorse Dick Riordan to be governor, and I’m going to work with him, but I’m not going to run.” Dick still hadn’t jumped in, but she was figuring he would.

The other piece of paper said essentially, “Yes, Jay, you’re absolutely correct, California is in a disastrous situation, and we need new leadership. This is why I’m announcing today that I am going to run for governor of the state of California. I will make sure that we are going to terminate the problems.” And so on.

By the time I finished reading, Maria was already out the door. “Okay,” I said to myself, “she is leaving this to me. We’ve had this conversation for a week. I am not going to think about it again until I’m on the show. Whatever comes out of my mouth, that is how it will be.” Of course I was leaning toward declaring I would run.