John Travolta experienced a white Christmas this year, taking his daughter Ella Bleu, 23, and son Benjamin, 13, on a holiday skiing trip
The 69-year-old actor took to Instagram on Christmas Day, sharing a snap of the happy family on the slopes together.
‘Merry Christmas to everyone, we love you!!’ Travolta said in the caption, with Ella Bleu sharing the same snap on her IG, captioned, ‘Wishing everyone a merry Christmas, from our family to yours.’
The holiday trip came exactly one month after the Pulp Fiction star celebrated his son Benjamin’s 13th birthday.
It also came after the actor recounted a near-death experience in 1992, which inspired him to star in the Disney Plus film The Shepherd.
John Travolta experienced a white Christmas this year, taking his daughter Ella Bleu , 23, and son Benjamin, 13, on a holiday skiing trip
The holiday trip came exactly one month after the Pulp Fiction star celebrated his son Benjamin’s 13th birthday
Travolta is an experienced pilot, first getting his pilot’s license back in 1976, though he recalled thinking he wouldn’t survive during a 1992 flight when the plane suffered a complete electrical failure.
His experience mirrored that of young pilot Freddie Hooke (Ben Radcliffe), a young Royal Air Force pilot flying home for Christmas across the North Sea.
Suddenly his Havilland Vampire jet suffers total electrical failure, when he comes across a mysterious pilot (Travolta) who guides him to safety.
Travolta revealed he wanted to take on this role because he could abslolutely relate to the experience told in Frederick Forsyth’s 1975 novella the film is based on.
‘I actually experienced a total electrical failure, not in a Vampire but in a corporate jet over Washington D.C. So when I read [Forsyth’s] book, it resonated even more because of this experience I had personally had,’ he said.
‘I knew what it felt like to absolutely think you’re going to die. I had two good jet engines but I had no instruments, no electric, nothing. And I thought it was over,’ he said.
The incident happened on Thanksgiving Day in 1992 when Travolta was piloting a Gulfstream II from Florida to Maine for the holiday.
‘And then as if by a miracle, we descended as per the rules to a lower altitude. I saw that Washington D.C. monument and identified that Washington National Airport was right next to it and I made a landing just like [Freddie] does in the film,’ Travolta said.
Travolta is an experienced pilot, first getting his pilot’s license back in 1976, though he recalled thinking he wouldn’t survive during a 1992 flight when the plane suffered a complete electrical failure
Shortly after the near-death experience, Travolta stumbled across Forsyth’s book, adding he ‘instantly fell in love’ with the story
Shortly after the near-death experience, Travolta stumbled across Forsyth’s book, adding he ‘instantly fell in love’ with the story.
‘So I’m reading this book saying, “I’ve lived with this.” And of course, I was young enough then that I could have played this part [of Freddie]. But I had to wait 30 years to play the Shepherd,’ he said.
He added that, after his career took off again after Pulp Fiction he was, ‘doing one movie after another’ and didn’t have time for this project then.
‘After 10 years, I just let it go and decided that I was never going to really get to do it,’ he said, though it was director Iain Softley who connected with Travolta and got him back on board.
The 38-minute film was originally supposed to be a full-length feature, though COVID stalled the development further before it was turned into a short.