Add Movieguide® as preferred on Google
By Movieguide® Staff
FOX Nation is giving audiences a look behind the curtain of one of Hollywood’s more stubborn passion projects — a biopic that took two decades, a pandemic and an actors’ strike to reach the screen.
“Reagan’s story has always been one of resilience and determination, and what made this project so compelling was how those same qualities were reflected in the film’s own journey to the screen,” said Gavin Hadden, SVP of Production and FOX Nation.
MAKING REAGAN, a new documentary premiering on FOX Nation on July 2, chronicles that two-decade push to bring REAGAN to theaters. The doc features never-before-seen behind-the-scenes footage, original interviews with producer Mark Joseph and cast members Elya Baskin, Will Wallace and Kevin Dillon, along with archival footage of the 40th president and key moments from the movie itself.
Producer Mark Joseph spent nearly 20 years working to get Reagan’s story onto the big screen — a journey that ran straight through some genuinely difficult terrain. COVID-19 shut down production. The Hollywood actors’ strike added more complications. The documentary traces how the filmmakers kept moving anyway, with direct access to the production and the people who drove it.
REAGAN hit theaters on Aug. 30, 2024, starring Dennis Quaid as the actor-turned-commander in chief. The movie traces Reagan’s life from his childhood in Dixon, Illinois, through his work as president of the Screen Actors Guild, his time as California’s governor and finally the Oval Office. Jon Voight plays Viktor Petrovich, a retired Soviet KGB analyst who spends the movie watching Reagan’s rise and trying to make sense of it. Penelope Ann Miller is Nancy Reagan.
Related: REAGAN Will Get a Rerelease for America’s 250th Birthday
Director Sean McNamara already has the extended cut on his mind.
“One of the hardest things about directing a feature film is leaving behind incredible moments on the cutting room floor,” McNamara said. “I’m so happy to have some of my favorite scenes back in the film for audiences to experience them for the first time.”
A special edition of REAGAN with 10 additional minutes of footage returns to limited screens on July 4 in over a dozen cities, followed by a wider theatrical rerelease Sept. 18 in 600 theaters — timed to America’s 250th anniversary. The new scenes include moments between Reagan and Nancy in the Oval Office, a scene with his alcoholic father Jack and footage from their Santa Barbara ranch.
Movieguide® was in the REAGAN corner from the start. The movie earned a perfect four out of four stars for quality, with our review praising its “very strong Christian, moral, patriotic worldview” and Quaid’s “bravura performance.” Quaid is just as convincing in Reagan’s quiet, private moments as he is delivering the speeches everyone already knows. REAGAN went on to win the Faith & Freedom Award for Movies at Movieguide®’s 32nd Annual Faith & Values Awards Gala, held Feb. 7, 2025, at the Avalon Theatre in Hollywood.
The movie’s narrative backbone is Reagan’s lifelong fight against communism, from his early battles against Soviet infiltration in the Screen Actors Guild to his 1987 speech at the Berlin Wall: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” That thread gives REAGAN what many political biopics miss — a story with genuine stakes and a through-line that holds.
His Christian faith runs just as deep. Reagan’s mother Nelle shaped him early. Later, a novel he read as a boy — about a young man who becomes a Christian and transforms his town through the Gospel — put him on a path he never left. The movie takes that faith seriously. It doesn’t decorate the story with it; it lets the faith explain the man.
MAKING REAGAN premieres on FOX Nation on July 2. The expanded theatrical cut of REAGAN opens in select cities July 4 and wide Sept. 18.
Read Next: Watch These Actors’ Hilarious Take on What Ronald Reagan Would Ask Jesus
Questions or comments? Please write to us here.
Add Movieguide® as preferred on GoogleShare:
- Content: +2
- Content: +3