Being George Clooney is tougher than it looks

‘Making peace with failure was always hard,’ says the 61-year-old actor. ‘Nothing rolls off my back.’

Actor George Clooney in Studio City, Calif., on Nov. 3.
19 min

LOS ANGELES

George Clooney opens the heavy wooden front door of his Tudor-style mansion, today festooned with a sweetly scrawled “Welcome home” sign, the handiwork of Alexander and Ella, the 5-year-old twins he shares with his wife, Amal. Inside, the house is in a state of quietly controlled uproar: Amal, a human rights attorney, is working upstairs while an HVAC crew fixes a recalcitrant air conditioning system. The twins are hanging with the nanny in their playroom while Rosie, the 2-year-old Saint Bernard, barrels through the kitchen to destinations unknown.