“We Loved Each Other Very, Very Much. I Love Him Deeply to This Day," ‘The Queen’ Actress admitted.
Screen legends Liam Neeson and Helen Mirren dated for years in the '80s and even lived together before splitting up. The two who were in a relationship from 1980 to 1985 share a great fondness for each other to this day. Speaking to AARP The Magazine for its cover story published on Tuesday the 77-year-old actress revealed the Taken actor was one of many boyfriends she gifted homemade shirts to from scratch. “I did make one for Liam, oddly enough,” she told the outlet. “We loved each other. We were not meant to be together in that way, but we loved each other very, very much. I love him deeply to this day. He’s such an amazing guy.” According to HuffPost the couple split in 1985, as their careers took priority over their romance.
Liam Neeson, Helen Mirren and Ciaran Hinds in EXCALIBUR (1981) pic.twitter.com/Ic1G3M3z0m
— Нил Юнг (@BohemiaStable) February 20, 2017
The actors first met on the set of the 1981 King Arthur fantasy film Excalibur. During an appearance on The Graham Norton Show, Mirren revealed, “We lived together for four years. We were a serious item for a while,” Mirren said on the talk show. “Lucky me!” Added Neeson on the first time he saw her. “I remember being on the set and standing with Ciarán Hinds as Helen walked towards us dressed in her full Morgana Le Fey costume and we both went, ‘Oh f*ck,’” Neeson recalled. “I was smitten. I think Ciarán was too, but I was very smitten!” Mirren replied sweetly, “I never knew that. You’ve never told me that before. It’s amazing.”
After their relationship ended, Mirren met director Taylor Hackford during her audition for his 1985 movie White Nights. Helen Mirren never thought she would marry until after she met the Ray director when she was 38 years old. She tied the knot with Hackford in 1997 after a 10-year relationship. The Queen actress admitted that for a long time she made her career a priority, but decided to make her relationship a priority after meeting the esteemed filmmaker. After years of dating, she finally gave in to marriage. Mirren told AARP in 2016 "We got married in the end because we realized that we were going to be together forever. We got married, ultimately, for legal reasons more than anything else. Estate planning and other complicated things like that. And our families, we sensed, wanted us to be married. I always said I have nothing against marriage; it just wasn't to my taste, like turnips. It took me a very long time to come round to acquiring the taste. I just had to meet the right turnip."
References:
https://www.aarp.org/entertainment/celebrities/info-2022/helen-mirren.html
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/helen-mirren-liam-neeson-ex_n_637cdca5e4b0f04daf577784
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoY0J5jSbTM&ab_channel=TheGrahamNortonShow
Cover Image Source: Getty Images (L) Photo by Frazer Harrison (R) Photo by Michael Loccisano
