Helen Mirren, 77, Opens Up About Her Ex, Liam Neeson, 70, and Reveals She Still Has Love for Him 37 Years After Their Split

4 decades ago, Hollywood stars Helen Mirren and Liam Neeson were 2 young people completely enamored with one another. And even though they didn’t make it as a couple, they are still deeply fond of each other, even to this very day. This proves that once we fall in love with someone, it’s hard to completely erase them from our memory because they have reserved a special spot in our hearts for eternity.

They fell in love on a movie set.

Before becoming an Academy Award-winning A-lister and a blockbuster action hero, Helen Mirren and Liam Neeson were 2 young, ambitious actors trying to make it in the movie industry. And this is how fate brought them together on the set of their 1981 medieval fantasy movie, Excalibur.

Even decades later, Neeson recalled his experience on that movie set with enthusiasm, saying, “Can you imagine riding horses in shiny suits of armor, having sword fights and stuff, and you’re falling in love with Helen Mirren? It doesn’t get any better than that.”

However, Neeson had admitted that he was in awe of the actress years before working with her. He first saw her on stage when she portrayed Lady Macbeth, and he explained, ’’She was as beautiful up close as on stage. Just so human. I was in love with this extraordinary human being."

They were a ’’serious item’’ for 5 years.

The love story of the 2 actors started in 1980 when Mirren was 35 and Neeson was 28. The couple’s relationship lasted for 5 years. They lived together for 4 years, and the actress even took the less experienced actor under her wing and helped him get an agent.

Speaking of their romance years later, Mirren noted, ’’We were a serious item for a while. Lucky me!" She even made her then-boyfriend a shirt that she described as ’’very bad."

They moved on with other people.

Although the pair formed a dreamy couple, their romance didn’t last forever, and the 2 split in 1985. 8 years later, Neeson met his wife, Natasha Richardson, with whom he had 2 sons, Micheál and Daniel. Sadly, Richardson passed away in 2009 in a skiing accident.

In her turn, Mirren started dating director Taylor Hackford a year after she parted ways with Neeson. She met Hackford after getting cast in his movie in 1985. The couple is still happily together 25 years after tying the knot.

They still both have a place in each other’s hearts.

The couple may have broken up 37 years ago, but these 2 A-listers still have warm feelings for each other. In 2018, the pair were reunited on The Graham Norton Show, where they reminisced about their old days together.

Neeson confessed that he was “very smitten” by Mirren and even described the very moment he truly fell for her, which was when he saw the actress on the set of their Excalibur film walking toward him in her character’s costume. To this, Mirren replied, “I never knew that. You’ve never told me that before. It’s amazing.”

And during a recent 2022 interview, Mirren mentioned, again, the time the 2 were a pair, and explained, “We loved each other very, very much.” The actress acknowledges that destiny had other plans for them, saying, “We were not meant to be together in that way.” Nevertheless, she insisted that she still has some love for her ex, admitting, ’’I love him deeply to this day. He’s such an amazing guy."

What do you think of this pair as a couple? Do you believe that we always have a special place for our exes in our hearts no matter how much time passes?