Veteran actor Jeff Bridges has said in an interview that the longer his 33 year marriage goes on, “the better it gets”.
And the Hollywood superstar has described the secret of a long marriage as “not getting divorced.”
“It’s practice”, he said.
Rare
In an interview in last Saturday’s Telegraph magazine, Bridges confided that, when he first considered marriage to Susan Geston, he didn’t want to lose his autonomy.
But when she said her “biological clock” was “going off”, Bridges proposed and the couple have now been happily married for 33 years and have three grown-up daughters.
Reflecting on his long and happy marriage – a rare thing in Hollywood – Bridges believes that being a good listener during spats is key.
Technique
“We’ll pull up a couple of chairs, facing each other”, the actor explained, “And she would tell me her side; and my task would be just to listen and receive what she’s saying.
“And then she does the same thing for me. And that might scratch the edge, or it might not. And we might walk away in a huff, so we’ll come back and do it again. It’s just a little technique.”
True grit
Summing up the importance of making his marriage work, Bridges said: “Sticking with a marriage. That’s true grit, man.”
Jeff Bridges has starred in several major films, including The Fabulous Baker Boys, Rancho Deluxe and Crazy Heart, for which he won a Best Actor Oscar this year.
He has recently starred in a remake of the classic 1969 John Wayne film, True Grit.