Gary Sinise was all wrapped up with work in November 2017, but he decided to find the time to go on an eight-day road trip, just him and his then 26-year-old son, McCanna “Mac” Sinise.
The “Forrest Gump” star remains eternally grateful he made that decision. Mac was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer called chordoma the next year. He died at 33 in 2024.
Sinise, 71, is sharing Mac’s story in the book, “Graceful Warrior: The True Story of a Son, a Father, and a Family Who Carried Each Other Through.” The book was released on Nov. 10, which would’ve been Mac’s 36th birthday.
The “CSI: NY” star spoke with Jenna Bush Hager and Willie Geist on TODAY Nov. 10 about his advice for parents after what he and his wife, Moira Harris, experienced with their son. He said before their road trip, Mac was “going through a lot of anguish” and had moved back home to regroup. The two broached the subject of a road trip, which they hadn’t done since he was a child.
“If I would’ve put that off — because I was very, very busy and I had to find the time — if I would’ve put that off, we wouldn’t have gotten to it,” Sinise said. “And so I’m so grateful that we took that time, father and son, to go on this road trip. It was very, very meaningful.
“I encourage all fathers — you do a lot with your kids when they’re at home, but take advantage of the times that you can when they’re adults and spend that time with them,” he added. “It’s something I’ll always be grateful for.”
Sinise posted photos from their road trip on his Facebook page ahead of the book’s publication, calling the experience “one of the most meaningful and special things I did with my son in the last few years of his life.” The two traveled to Johnson Space Center in Houston, New Orleans and Savannah, Georgia.
During the TODAY interview, Sinise also shared remembrances of his son, a musician. Mac played drums in high school and became a composer after attending the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music.
“He was just kind of an inspirational guy,” Sinise said. “Very humble guy.”
Mac Sinise was touring overseas when he began to develop intense pain in his tailbone, according to his father. A CT scan in 2018 found a large tumor, and he was diagnosed with chordoma, a slow-growing bone cancer that most often forms at the top or bottom of the spine, according to Mayo Clinic.
“Through it all, Mac was just incredible in the way he was dealing with it,” Gary Sinise said. “Very strong faith. He persevered through this with such courage.”
Sinise kept his son’s cancer journey private. After his death on Jan. 5, 2024, he shared an obituary for Mac on his nonprofit’s website. The response was so overwhelming that it prompted Sinise to write the book about his son.
“I got responses from fathers and mothers who had gone through something similar and contained a lot of their pain and their grief, and hadn’t really talked about it,” Sinise said. “By sharing the story of Mac, they felt like they wanted to do that also. I thought, ‘OK, maybe that story is helping some folks, let me go deeper here.’”
