Actor and race car driver Paul Newman “was always a philanthropist at heart”, his youngest daughter Clea Newman explains; “he was always just a very giving person”.
Now, Clea is global ambassador for SeriousFun, a network of medical speciality camps, which was founded by her father, providing therapeutic programmes across the world to children living with serious illnesses. The first camp was set up in Connecticut in 1988.
Ireland’s Barretstown, in Co Kildare, was the third camp founded in the network, and the first outside of the US. Barretstown celebrated its 30th birthday in 2024.
Each member camp is independently managed and relies on private funding to support free-of-charge programming.
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“When I was growing up I remember both my parents [Clea’s mother is former actor Joanne Woodward] saying to us, ‘we are so lucky’ [and] if you’re lucky enough to have a good life, it’s almost part of being a good person to give back.
“Even when he [her father] was ill, this is what gave him joy.”
Paul Newman had a “really complex childhood”, Clea says. “Camp, for him was a true escape. It gave him a community, friends, outside of the complexity of family life.”
She described his parents as “very disconnected”, with a father who drank a lot and a mother who was “overbearing and yet removed”. But, she adds, his parents instilled in him “a lot of amazing things”, such as his father’s “extraordinary work ethic”.
“My father had a work ethic like you’ve never seen”, she says. “He was always working, being passionate about things and being driven.”
Meanwhile, from his mother he learned to be “protective”. “He could create this, kind of, armour. It was hard sometimes as a parent. As he got older, he lost that,” she adds.
Growing up with Paul Newman as a father, she admits was sometimes “a little hard” because of his long work schedule. “When he would come back from all of that, it would take him a little bit of time to re-enter the family. And that was a little tough ... just because we were so dying for his attention ... but when he was home, he was truly the most fun.
“He was kind of like a big kid himself. He loved to just play with you. And play tricks on all of us. And read us stories. And read us scary stories. And get all of his friends in on it.”
She said it was her father’s love of “clowning around” that resonated with the core of SeriousFun. “Giving the kids a chance to kick back, and just be kids. That was his happy place.”
It was seeing children who had cancer in the corridors of a hospital, where one of Paul Newman’s friends was being treated for cancer, that led him to create the children’s network.
“Their parents ... would talk about how their children being treated in this hospital, mostly with cancer at the time, were missing out on their childhood. And that they were losing all their friends. They had no fun any more. They never saw their children smile any more. And it just broke my dad’s heart.”
Clea says her father became “a mentor” to her as she got older, but was “always my dad”.
“There was never an emergency or a time when I needed my parents, even when they were working at the height of their busyness, that they weren’t there immediately. I can remember times when I was going through hard times and they showed up.”
She adds this was one of the most important lessons her mother told her as a child: “For the people, and the things, that you care about, you’ve got to show up”.
Her parents’ relationship was “so unusually special”, she says, with her father describing her mother as “the talented one in the family”.
“My mom was an incredibly independent human being, very independent, crazy talented ... but she was also an incredible support to him. They supported each other beautifully. My dad would even go to the opera with her, which was not something that truly he loved all that much.
“But her support of him, also helping him … my mother had a kind of strength. A kind of quiet drive and focus that was overwhelmingly surprising, because she was so charming, and just the greatest hostess and the most fabulous actress. But she also had this incredible, as so many women do, way to supporting the people she loved.”
So, was it inevitable that Clea would follow in her father’s footsteps? “I thought I was going to be a lawyer,” she says, from studying pre-law in university and going on to work for a law firm.
“The law firm that I worked for, we represented a lot of pretty unsavoury people and I found that I just was too much of a soft touch for that kind of lifestyle, maybe.
“I think lawyers are amazing, some, but I realised that that wasn’t for me. When I came home, my dad said to me, ’maybe, what you need is to go and take the focus off yourself and go volunteer as a counsellor at the camp’.
“I can honestly say I was probably a pretty spoiled twenty-something person. And, at the time, I was kind of focused on myself. I literally drove in one person, and drove out 10 days later a completely changed person.”
Clea explains that being young at the time and wanting to spread her wings a little, she didn’t want to stay working under the family. She got involved with a number of other charitable organisations that were focused on children. She remained, however, connected to SeriousFun camp, with regular visits, even spending Thanksgivings there.
“A number of years before my dad got sick, he asked me to oversee his philanthropic legacy. Now, this is my full-time passion. I can’t even say it’s a full-time job because I live and breathe it seven days a week, and it makes me happy.”
It comes as no surprise to Clea that a recent study, conducted by UCD, DCU and King’s College London, which examined the role of SeriousFun camps, such as Barretstown, found that they may provide unique benefits distinct from traditional healthcare settings, promoting psychological wellbeing, fostering hope, and building community and belonging.
“What’s so amazing and what my father believed so strongly, is that we are stronger together.”
