Dick Van Dyke is in great shape approaching his 100th birthday Saturday.
The actor spoke about his physical health during an interview with Good Morning America, published Friday.
“I'm so lucky. I don't have any ache or pain,” he said, noting he aims to go to the gym three times a week with his 54-year-old wife, Arlene Silver, whom he wed in 2012.
“I think that saved me from the pain. That's good advice for anybody,” Van Dyke explained.
However, he said that there are some physical drawbacks to being 100, including missing “movement.”
“I’ve got one game leg from I don't know what. I sill try to dance” the Mary Poppins star added. “You know I played old men a lot. And I always played 'em as angry, and cantankerous. It's not really that way.
“I don't know any other 100-year-old, but I can speak for myself.”
According to Van Dyke, 100 years is not enough time for him to be alive. “You wanna live more, which I plan to,” he noted.
He acknowledged that while he’s reaching the milestone age on December 13, his wife has helped him feel young.
“She gives me energy, she gives me humor, and all kinds of support,” he said on GMA, while Silver added: “It's a privilege and an honor to take care of him and make him happy.”
The couple 2006 Screen Actors Guild Awards, where Silver was working, and Van Dyke was appearing during the ceremony. Although Van Dyke was 81 and she was 35 at the time, the two didn’t strike up a romance until after Van Dyke’s longtime partner, Michelle Triola Marvin, died from lung cancer in 2009.
Van Dyke isn’t having a big celebration for his upcoming 100th birthday, according to his wife, and that’s just how he wants it.
“He doesn't want to do anything,” Silver told People at the premiere of Dick Van Dyke's 100th Celebration in California earlier this week. “He wants to be in his room watching Jeopardy! reruns with me.”
Earlier this month, Van Dyke shared his secrets to living a long life. He told People he has successfully avoided anger and hate, which is “one of the chief things that kept me going.” According to the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang star, he was “never really able to work up a feeling of hate” and attributes reaching 99 to his “brighter outlook.”
“I’ve always thought that anger is one thing that eats up a person’s insides – and hate,” he explained. “There were things I didn’t like, people I don’t like and disapprove of. But I never really was able to do a white heat kind of hate.”
However, in a health diary for The Times, also published in November, he confessed that he feels “diminished” both “physically and socially.” He also revealed that “every single one of my dearest lifelong friends is gone, which feels just as lonely as it sounds.”
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