So I'm talking on the phone with Lee Majors about his new snowboarding movie, Out Cold, 
and he's turning out to be quite a nice, polite guy. He asks how Mark Brunell's doing.
He asks whether I'm a Seminole or a Gator. He tells me how he got a real kick out of making
Out Cold, although he could have done without some of the language that the "kids" in it 
used. 

And he tells of how years of playing football and doing his own stunts have left him, 
at 60, feeling pretty beat up. In fact, he may need to get a knee replacement. 

I can rarely resist a bad joke, so I attempt another one here. I interrupt: "We can rebuild
 him . . . better than he was before." 

Like he's never heard that one before. 

Majors politely ignores me. I told you how he was a nice guy. 

His TV role in the mid-'70s as bionic Steve Austin, The Six Million Dollar Man, is what
he'll forever be known for. And he doesn't mind talking about it: "That show will
never die," he says. 

But for now, he's doing publicity for Out Cold, in which he took a generic character and 
made him into a swaggering guy with a cowboy hat and Hummer. For most people, he's the 
one recognizable face in the snowboarding comedy, which aims at the teen audience and 
does manage to be funny, in a raucous way, with plenty of partying and lots of snowboarding
wipeouts. 

"I didn't see how some of those guys walked away from some of those spills. It's amazing 
what those kids can do," Majors says. "If I strapped those things on, I'd fall flat on my 
butt." 

He's a long way from his days as a '70s icon or as the husband of Farrah Fawcett or as
the bionic Six Million Dollar Man. A long way from his role as a stunt man in The Fall Guy.
And an even longer way from his roles in those TV Westerns of the '60s, The Big Valley
and The Virginian. 

Until this month, Majors lived in South Florida, taking care of his mother, watching his 
kids grow up. But then his mother died and his ex-wife moved, with his kids, out of state. 

So after 11 years in Florida, Majors moved to Southern California to be closer to work
and to his oldest son, Lee Majors Jr. Besides, he was flying cross-country on Sept. 11,
and suddenly flying doesn't seem like a good idea. 

He has been doing some acting all along. He won Best Actor at the Santa Monica Film 
Festival for his role as a hit man in a short film called Here. He made an English sitcom,
too Much Sun, with Mark Addy, the burly guy from The Full Monty. It was set in Beverly
Hills, and Majors played a closeted gay landlord who was usually found in a hot tub with
beautiful blond women. 

And early next year, he'll be in Big Fat Liar, a comedy with Frankie Muniz of Malcolm in 
the Middle. His role in that film? "Believe it or not, I play a stuntman," he says. 
"Typecasting, I guess." Movie critic Matt Soergel can be reached at (904) 359-4082 or
via e-mail at msoergel@jacksonville.com.