Sam Robards, 46, is the son of the celebrated Hollywood actors Jason Robards and Lauren Bacall. He has appeared in movies including American Beauty and AI: Artificial Intelligence. On television, he played Greg Brock in The West Wing. He is currently starring as Richard Hannay in The 39 Steps on Broadway. He lives in New York with his wife, Sidsel, and their two sons, aged 9 and 7

Vacations in America hold no real thrill for me. Wherever you go, it’s still America, know what I mean? The same insularity, the same branded shopping in air-conditioned malls. I know people who visit New York and go eat at Applebee’s . . . which is in every town in the States. It’s crazy, man.

I guess it comes from growing up on the road. I didn’t have holidays as a kid; instead, I remember being stranded in Paris during the 1968 student riots. I’d gone there with my mother, who was modelling for Emanuel Ungaro, but we couldn’t get out — we were confined to the hotel for weeks. I was six years old and I’d got a pitched battle going on outside the window. I thought it was a blast.

I was raised on movie sets all over the world. My favourite trip was to Bora Bora in 1978, with my dad, to make a disaster flick called Hurricane — which is a deeply horrendous movie. It was a stunning place for an American teenager to show up. I’d ride out to filming in an outrigger canoe rowed by the islanders, with lemon sharks surfing beside us. There was a real sense of a no-cash economy surviving there, a simpler way of life.

My hols: Michael Caine

The actor has been a bum in Paris, a callow youth in Cannes and a superstar in St Paul de Vence. Not a lot of people know that

My Hols: Anastacia

The American pop star Anastacia recently threw a lavish wedding party in Mexico - but didn’t break the bank

• Frequent flyer: Erin O'Connor

BACKGROUND

• My hols: Phil Daniels

• My hols: Roger Moore

• My hols: David Mitchell

• My hols: Tracey Emin

• My hols: Colin Firth

BACKGROUND

• My hols: Ricky Gervais

• My hols: Sam Robards

• My hols: Jimmy Carr

• My hols: Johnny Vegas

• My hols: Moby

I got a job helping out with special effects on the movie — which included dropping a ton of cement onto the coral reef to make an effects tank. I dunno if you’d get away with that today . . .

I loved the South Pacific so much that I went back with my first wife, Suzy, on honeymoon. We almost didn’t make it — one of the propellers stopped in midair. Suzy was sitting by the wing, so she knew we were about to plummet to our deaths. That’s when you don’t want a wife who’s a licensed pilot. Somehow they got us down safely, but maybe it was an omen. Bora Bora was already halfway spoilt — the old innocence was gone. How many hotels do you need on an island 20 miles around?

Man, I’ve been so lucky with my travels on movies. When Paul Mazursky cast me in my first film, Tempest, they said: “Sorry, you’ll have to go to Greece for a month. And sorry, it’s kinda remote: Aepia, in the Peloponnese. Just three fishing shacks on a beach. Oh, and you’ll need to learn to scuba-dive for the part.” And I thought. . . vacation!

My wife is Danish, so I lived in Copenhagen for three years, and I love it there. For holidays, we’d take off to Langeland, where Sidsel’s family has been going for years. It’s this little island, completely unspoilt: no television, just walks to the beach and blackberry-picking. We stay in a shared house with 60 other people, kinda like a commune, where everybody helps out. It’s all very democratic and Scandinavian — though one or two of the women insist on walking around topless, like it’s still 1969. Which is taking things too far, especially when your kids are trying to eat dinner.

Russia was another big eye-opener. You grow up being told they’re monsters, but I liked the resilience of the people. In Moscow, history pours out of every street and square, and you can walk into a bar and find 22-year-olds having an intense discussion about philosophy. You don’t find that in the States.The bureaucracy was crazy to the point of being hilarious, but the people just bear it. They’re stoic. And some of the food — strange stews made with mystery meat — the locals chow it down, no complaints. I guess that’s why the Russians will never be defeated.

My big holiday dream is to mush off into Alaska and do some winter camping. I like roughing it — it makes you prioritise. I’ve done hut-to-hut trips in Colorado with friends, just lugging your wood and some food, and maybe digging a quinzhee — a sort of snow cave, like a rough igloo.

I’m also into telemark skiing — the Norwegian kind, downhill but with no heel bindings. It’s hardcore, I guess, but it sure makes you focus. How does the mantra go? “Bend your knees, drop a bomb, free your heels and your mind will follow.” I feel more present when I’m doing that. Know what I mean?

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