“If there’s Oscars for how to handle divorce, Maria and I should get it,” the 75-year-old said.
Arnold Schwarzenegger opened up about his divorce from Maria Shriver. In a new cover interview with The Hollywood Reporter, which was published on Tuesday, May 16, the 75-year-old actor reminisced on his "very difficult" divorce from his wife of 25 years and called it "my failure."
The actor plays the character of Luke in his new Netflix CIA series FUBAR whose marriage is failing in part because he cheated. When asked if it was "deliberately autobiographical," Schwarzenegger responded, “It feels like it’s a documentary.”
Schwarzenegger got candid about his divorce, calling it “my failure." https://t.co/iVUJ7Gjpgn
— TODAY (@TODAYshow) May 17, 2023
“But in [my real-life marriage to Shriver], it was my fuckup. It was my failure,” he said as he candidly revealed what went wrong between the two. Schwarzenegger openly acknowledged he had fathered a kid, Joseph Baena, 25, with the family's longstanding maid Mildred Baena two months before Shiver, 67, filed for divorce in July 2011, according to PEOPLE. When asked whether he misses being married, The Terminator star said, “No. [The divorce] was very, very difficult in the beginning. Eventually, you move on. I have a wonderful girlfriend, [physical therapist] Heather Milligan, who is very successful. I’m really proud of her, and I love her,” he said.
“At the same time, I love my wife. She and I are really good friends and very close, and we are very proud of the way we raised our kids. Even though we had this drama, we did Easter together, Mother’s Day together, the Christmases together, all birthdays — everything together,” he continued as he talked about his ex-wife. Talking about the successful co-parenting the couple did despite the separation the actor told the news outlet, “If there’s Oscars for how to handle divorce, Maria and I should get it for having the least amount of impact on the kids.”
Sharing about his children, Schwarzenegger said that some of the important traits his children carried on with is a result of their parenting. “The sweetness and kindness you see in them, that’s from my wife. The discipline and work ethic is from me,” he said as he disclosed how the ex-couple inculcated their best values while bringing up their children.
Daughters Katherine, 33, and Christina, 31, and boys Patrick, 29, and Christopher, 25, make up the former couple's family of four. In February, Shriver also discussed the couple's divorce and said that when their marriage ended, she visited a convent to get life counsel she disclosed in her appearance on the Making Space with Hoda Kotb podcast.
References:
https://people.com/movies/arnold-schwarzenegger-maria-shriver-divorce-difficult/
Cover Image Source: Getty Images | Photo by Ethan Miller