MAYBE YOU ONLY KNOW Don Johnson from his five-episode run in HBO’s Eastbound & Down, as that asshole Kenny Powers’ dissolute, reprobate dad, strangely named Ed­uardo Sanchez, who upon seeing his son for the first time in years says, “Same ol’ Kenny. Ten pounds of shit in a five-pound bag. And friends with faggots.” Or else maybe you’ve heard him mentioned in connection with Quentin Tarantino’s new movie, Django Unchained, in which he rides tall in the saddle playing a pimping plantation owner named Big Daddy. Or maybe you remember when he was Nash Bridges in the cop show Nash Bridges, 1996-2001, which was drolly amusing and eventually led him to sue the producers for his fair share of the pie, enriching him by as much as $15 million. Or maybe you recollect him from his years, 1984-90, as one of the biggest stars in the country, in Miami Vice, playing undercover detective Sonny Crockett, introducing many of the many grotesque stylings of the day, including pastel-colored T-shirts under Versace jackets, jackets with their sleeves bunched up, pleated, high-waisted linen trousers, slip-on loafers without socks, so-called designer stubble, alligators named Elvis as pets, overuse of the word “pal,” as in, “Mellow out, pal,” etc., etc. Or maybe it’s all coming back to you now, yeah, he’s the guy who hooked up with Melanie Griffith when she was 14 and he was 22 and became well known for loving his booze and loving his blow and saying kooky, proto-Charlie Sheen stuff like, “I can do whatever I want. I’m rich, I’m famous and I’m bigger than you.” Shouldn’t he be running for governor of California?

Actually, he’s in the lobby of the Santa Barbara Four Seasons right now, having just removed his shades. His eyes are as blue and sparkly as ever. The charming little dimples remain charming and little. The sandy-blond center-parted hair still spreads perfectly, like a DeLorean’s gull-wing doors. He’s 63 and looks great, hardly any worse for all the messing around. He ambles across the floor into the bar, stops, looks, chuckles. “Yeah, man,” he says, “in the old days, I would have already been in here for hours.” He goes on, his voice a little Southern, a little raspy, “Actually, I was a multiple-substance kinda guy. I would drink, smoke pot, do cocaine, maybe eat a Quaalude. I could go through a good portion of a quart of vodka, and that was my opener. I’d wake up the next day like I’d been hit by a truck, to the point where my skin would hurt. I can remember that horrible feeling when you get up and go, ‘Ohhhh, no, I didn’t do that. I didn’t take my dick out. Did I?’ And an honest friend says, ‘Oh, yeah, that was you. With your dick out. Waving it in your partner’s face.’ But by six that afternoon, you’re like, ‘Let’s fire this thing up again!’ ” He smiles. “I was a lot of fun, apparently.”