Site stats On-Screen Romantic Partners with the Biggest Age Gaps – Brain Berries

On-Screen Romantic Partners with the Biggest Age Gaps

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In most movies and TV shows, we see more or less evenly matched couples in terms of age. But some writers and directors bend that rule by casting actors on the opposite ends of the age spectrum. Sometimes it’s justified by the story, and other times it just happens.

Here are several movies where actors playing couples have a huge age difference.

1. Six Days Seven Nights — 27-year difference

When Ivan Reitman gave the lead roles in Six Days Seven Nights to 56-year-old Harrison Ford and 29-year-old Anne Heche, he didn’t know people would hate him. First of all, the on-screen romance looked completely fake due to the huge age difference. And secondly, just before the start of filming, he found out that Heche lives with a woman — actress Ellen DeGeneres. So the on-screen love scenes were painful to film and impossible to watch without cringing.

2. Blaze — 28-year difference

The 45th governor of Louisiana, Earl Long, made history by at one point in time he was doing his work from a psychiatric hospital. The whats and hows are not important here. It’s the why that’s interesting. One of the reasons for Long’s hospitalization was his affair with the renowned stripper and burlesque star Blaze Starr. A few decades later, this scandalous story was made into Ron Shelton’s comedy biopic Blaze, starring 64-year-old Paul Newman and 28-year-old Lolita Davidovich.

3. Third Person — 32-year difference

You have to give credit to director Paul Haggis for sticking to his casting decision. Sure, The Third Person is considered a mediocre movie, but it’s not because of 29-year-old Olivia Wilde and 61-year-old Liam Neeson. The 32-year difference is a weird occurrence in the world of romantic stories, but at least the movie does not portray this union as something cute and admirable. On the contrary, it is quite clear that Neeson character’s life would be easier if he stayed with his wife, played by Kim Basinger, who’s conveniently the same age as him. But love is blind and often very stupid.

4. Shopgirl — 34-year difference

It’s sometimes hard to be a Hollywood star. Today you play Juliet and kiss young Leonardo DiCaprio, and tomorrow your on-screen partner turns out to be 60-year-old Steve Martin. But if you’re a 26-year-old actress named Claire Danes, you give it your best shot anyway. At least by the end of the movie, her character chooses a much younger stud. Although, Jason Schwartzman is no DiCaprio either.

5. Entrapment — 39-year difference

After watching John Emiel’s movie about the relationship between a professional thief and a female detective from an insurance company, we can confirm that the only ones who were “entrapped” here are the viewers. We just wanted to see 30-year-old Catherine Zeta-Jones romance some handsome devil, but we got 69-year-old Sean Connery instead. He could very well be her grandfather!

6. Harold and Maude — 52-year difference

In 1971, at the dawn of the new era of Hollywood, director Hal Ashby released a dark comedy about a death-obsessed man who starts an affair with a 79-year-old woman. Their strange relationship between the polar opposites instilled in him a more positive outlook on life. The main roles in the film were played by 24-year-old Bud Cort and 76-year-old Ruth Gordon, who, by the way, started her acting career when the silent films were still revolutionary.