Michael Caine Retiring From Acting After 70 Years: 'You Don't Have Leading Men at 90'

Michael Caine is stepping out of the spotlight.

After 70 years of acting, the 90-year-old announced his retirement from acting.

"I keep saying I’m going to retire. Well, I am now. I’ve figured, I’ve had a picture where I’ve played the lead and had incredible reviews… What am I going to do that will beat this?” he said on BBC Radio 4’s Today.

“The only parts I’m liable to get now are 90-year-old men. Or maybe 85,” he added, noting, “They’re not going to be the lead. You don’t have leading men at 90, you’re going to have young handsome boys and girls. So I thought, I might as well leave with all this.”

The famous actor has starred in over 160 films over his career that spanned seven decades. The Oscar, Golden Globe and Bafta-winning actor is well known for his performances in Zulu and Alfie as well as more recent films such as Interstellar and Inception.

His final movie, The Great Escaper, was released on October 6, where he played a World War II veteran named Bernie Jordan.

News of the star’s retirement came a month before the release of his novel Deadly Game, which follows rouge detective DCI Harry Taylor.

In June, Caine discussed his goal for the book, saying, “It’s been my ambition for years to write a thriller. It’s the genre I most love to read, and I’ve really got a buzz out of working on Deadly Game and teaming up with Hodder once again to publish it. I hope readers enjoy getting to know Harry Taylor as much as I did.”

For 90, Caine is in good health, though he does walk with a cane as he broke his ankle in 2018 and never fully recovered. At the premiere of his most recent movie, the celeb was accompanied by his wife, Shakira Caine, and two daughters, Dominique, 67 and Natasha, 50.

The Jekyll & Hyde alum has previously opened up about how his relationship to food during World War II taught him how to eat healthy for the remainder of his life.

“I was born in Bermondsey which is South London, but I’m a Cockney because I was born in a part of Bermondsey which is opposite Bow Bells, and if you’re born within the sound of Bow Bells you’re a Cockney,” he stated.

Caine continued: "My memory of food is this, my father was a Billingsgate fish market porter and he was a big gambler so he never bought steak because it was too dear but he used to nick a lot of fish. So for 15 years I ate fish, every kind of fish you can imagine and I later realized it was a very healthy thing.

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"Another accidental healthy thing for me was the Second World War, you couldn’t get any sugar you couldn’t get any of those drinks you have now with all this sugar in it. Then I was evacuated to the country away from the smog which in Bermondsey then was terrible because everyone had coal fires," the famous Brit added.