Ryan Reynolds has been fairly open about his relationship with Blake Lively and his children, taking every opportunity to discuss his family during interviews and on social media. However, he’s less open about his childhood and even more so about his parents, particularly his father.
James Chester Reynolds was, by Ryan’s admission, a tough and emotionally distant man. Following his death in 2015 after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease, Ryan has spoken more openly about his father’s experiences to help educate others facing similar challenges.
Here’s everything we know about James Chester Reynolds.
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Who Is James Chester Reynolds?
James Chester Reynolds is best known as the father of award-winning Hollywood actor Ryan Reynolds.
He was born on August 3, 1941, in Alberta, Canada, to father Chester Ambrose Reynolds and mother Helen Mary Long Reynolds.
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Chester Ambrose was a Canadian politician who had served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1940 to 1944, while Helen Mary Long was a housewife. He grew up alongside his siblings Sheila, Cathie, and brother Rod.
James Chester Reynolds passed away on October 25, 2015, at age 74 due to complications from Parkinson’s Disease. He was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease in 1995 and began to experience hallucinations and delusions roughly 10 years after his diagnosis.
Ryan Reynolds has spoken publicly about the challenges he and his family faced due to the illness. “At the time, I just thought, ‘My dad’s losing his mind.’ My father was really slipping down a rabbit hole where he was struggling to differentiate between reality and fiction.” Ryan told People Magazine.
James Reynolds was married to Tamara Lee “Tammy” Stewart. Together, they welcomed four boys: Jeff, Terry, Patrick, and Ryan Reynolds. James worked as a policeman for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) before later becoming a food wholesaler.
James was a proud and hardworking man, according to Ryan. “My father was a man who did not share his feelings. He was a boxer, a cop, a hard a**. Pride was just so ingrained in him that it dictated almost everything that he did.”
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Diagnosis of Parkinson’s Disease
James Reynolds was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease when his son Ryan was 22 years old, marking the beginning of a nearly 20-year battle with the degenerative neurological disorder.
As a refresher, Parkinson’s Disease is a movement disorder that worsens over time. It causes slowed movements, balance problems, tremors, and difficulty speaking and thinking.
James rarely spoke openly about his condition. “He said the word ‘Parkinson’s’ maybe three times as far as I knew, and one of them wasn’t to me,” Ryan Reynolds told People. “There was a ton of denial, a ton of hiding.”
The disease progressively affected James’ physical abilities and mental state, later resulting in the onset of hallucinations and delusions. Ryan described this period as watching his father “slipping down a rabbit hole where he was struggling to differentiate between reality and fiction.”
“At the time, I just thought, ‘My dad’s losing his mind,’” he shared. “It really destabilized my relationship with him because I didn’t really know what was happening.”
As James’s Parkinson’s worsened, Tammy took on the role of the primary caregiver. Ryan recalled the toll it had taken on his mother, mentioning that he had experienced “caregiver fatigue” and a burden similar to “carrying a bag of rocks.”
James didn’t make it easy for her, either. “When you have somebody who’s very prideful like that, [my father] isn’t going to accept help from anyone else.”
Ryan’s Advocacy for Parkinson’s Disease
Since his father’s diagnosis, Ryan has become one of the largest advocates of Parkinson’s disease.
He ran the 2008 New York City Marathon for Team Fox, raising over $100,000 for Parkinson’s research in honor of his father.
Ryan also joined the Board of Directors of The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research in 2009. He has openly expressed his admiration for Michael J. Fox, stating that Fox “took all of that energy and turned it into something that has helped so many people feel less alone, myself included, and even my dad felt less alone.”
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In 2024, Ryan partnered with Acadia Pharmaceuticals to launch the “More to Parkinson’s” campaign, aimed to educate patients, caregivers, and healthcare providers about the lesser-known, non-motor symptoms of Parkinson’s—particularly hallucinations and delusions, to which his father experienced extensively—as well as potential treatments.
“It’s something I had no idea about back then,” Ryan said in an interview with USA Today. “I would have loved to have seen treatments like this, which are available now to handle specifically those non-motor symptoms. It would have really changed the course of full relationships.”
James Chester Reynolds’ Relationship With Ryan Reynolds
Ryan Reynolds had a complicated relationship with his father. He struggled to connect with his James, stating that although he was good in many ways, he was tough on him and his brothers.
Ryan has had anxiety his whole life, and his upbringing likely played a role in that development. “Growing up in my house, it was never relaxing or easy, and I know that, throughout my life, I’ve dealt with anxiety in different ways,” he shared with Mr. Porter.
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Ryan also expressed his anger about his father’s secretive and prideful nature, especially when it came to his disease. “I’m constantly putting pieces of the story together. I wasn’t really accepting my own responsibility. It was very easy for me to dine off the idea that my father and I do not see eye to eye on anything and that an actual relationship with him is impossible.”
In the end, though, Ryan has come to appreciate his father more and more. “I realized as I’m older, people are nuanced, including my father. I wish I knew him better. I wish I knew more about him. I wish he were more conversational and forthcoming about what he feels and thinks.”
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