1.
In late 2016, Ewan McGregor — who had been married to Eve Mavrakis for 22 years — joined the cast of FX’s third season of Fargo, playing the dual role of the Stussy brothers, one of whom was lovers with Nikki, played by Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who was also married. Well, life imitated art as photos emerged in October 2017 of McGregor and Winstead kissing and getting cuddly at a London restaurant. The previous May, McGregor had separated from his wife (though they were still legally married), and — wouldn’t you know it? — that same month, Winstead announced the end of her marriage.
All drama aside, McGregor and Winstead have since married and welcomed a son, and last year, when McGregor received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, his daughters, Winstead, and their son were all by his side.
2.
Want to hear how a Lifetime movie launched one of the most scandalous affairs of the late 2000s? Well, that’s what happened when LeAnn Rimes and Eddie Cibrian met filming Northern Lights in 2008. At the time, Rimes (the singer and actor) was married to dancer Dean Sheremet, and Third Watch star Cibrian was married to Brandi Glanville, who would later channel the fallout into a Real Housewives career. The affair started on set — with kisses caught on a restaurant security camera, according to US magazine — and was obvious to Sheremet when he visited. He said, “There was this bar that everyone hung out at after set and I remember coming down the stairs and seeing the two of them shooting pool together. I could just tell by the body language that everything had changed. My stomach dropped… I literally felt like I got hit.”
By 2009, Rimes and Cibrian had separated from their spouses, finalizing divorces the following year. The backlash was brutal, especially for Rimes, who’d built her career as a sweet country ingénue, and was suddenly painted in a negative light. She later told People, “I did one of the most selfish things that I possibly could do, in hurting someone else. I take responsibility for everything I’ve done. I hate that people got hurt, but I don’t regret the outcome.” Despite the scandalous start, their love has lasted…they are still married today.
3.
Let’s continue with a wild one (even if it didn’t break up a marriage). In the late ’90s, Billy Bob Thornton and Laura Dern were in a serious relationship and even lived together. But then Thornton was cast alongside Angelina Jolie in the air traffic controller comedy Pushing Tin. While filming, Thornton and the nearly 20 years younger Jolie hit it off, and in May 2000, they married in Vegas in a move that shocked everyone, but no one more than Laura Dern. She told Talk magazine, “I left our home to work on a movie (likely the Hallmark movie A Season for Miracles) and while I was away, my boyfriend got married. I’ve never heard from him again. It’s like a sudden death. You don’t get to mourn or negotiate.”
Meanwhile, the Thornton-Jolie relationship was…strange. They wore vials of each other’s blood around their necks, made out on red carpets (and bragged about having sex in the limo on the way over), and gave interviews that made even hardened publicists need a vacation. The couple divorced in 2003.
4.
You’d think Jolie would’ve sworn off romances with taken costars after her experience with Thornton, but in 2004, she met Brad Pitt — who was married to Friends icon Jennifer Aniston — on the set of Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Rumors immediately swirled about an on-set affair, but Jolie and Pitt denied them, insisting they were just costars who got along well. Hmmm. However, just months after Pitt and Aniston announced their separation in January 2005 after five years of marriage, Pitt and Jolie were filmed on a beach in Kenya with Maddox, her adopted son. The stars, of course, would marry and have six kids together. Did Aniston buy Pitt’s claim that he didn’t cheat on her before they separated? “I choose to believe my husband,” she told Vanity Fair at the time. “At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised by anything, but I would much rather choose to believe him.”
Pitt and Jolie were together for over a decade, but divorced just two years after tying the knot following a dramatic airplane incident where Jolie alleged that an inebriated Pitt physically accosted her and the children. Pitt, for his part, denies he got physical with his family. Regardless, the marriage was over.
5.
In 2002, The Devil Wears Prada star Stanley Tucci costarred with Edie Falco (you know, from The Sopranos) on Broadway in the play Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune which required them to be naked onstage, portraying people who had just had a sexual encounter. But the nudity, it seems, didn’t stay onstage. Rumors grew that the stars were having a real-life affair, and soon after, Tucci separated from Kate Spath, his wife since 1995, with whom he shared three children.
Whatever was going on with Tucci and Falco didn’t last, though, and Tucci reconciled with his wife. Falco later addressed the affair with the New York Times, saying, “We were together and then we broke up. Because there’s no way for that to be a good thing. He’s a lovely man, and he’s back with his wife and kids, and I’m thrilled.” Other than that, neither Tucci nor Falco has spoken about their affair. Sadly, Spath died of breast cancer in 2009 at age 47.
6.
In 2003, Billy Crudup — the star of Almost Famous and The Morning Show — was eight years into a relationship with Mary-Louise Parker (you know, from Weeds), who was pregnant with their first child. But when the 35-year-old actor stepped onto the set of Stage Beauty and met his 24-year-old costar Claire Danes, well, by now so you know what happened. Soon Crudup left his seven-month pregnant partner, and Danes, for good measure, left her boyfriend, Australian musician Ben Lee.
Crudup and Danes broke up in 2006, and Danes met her now husband Hugh Dancy that same year. She and Dancy have been together for 19 years and have three children. Crudup is also now in a long-term relationship, married to actor Naomi Watts, whom he met in 2016.
7.
And lastly, let’s go back in time for one of the most infamous Hollywood scandals ever. In the early 1960s, 20th Century Fox set out to make Cleopatra, a lavish historical epic starring Elizabeth Taylor as the Egyptian queen. If you’ve heard about it today, it’s likely because it was a runaway production that ended up the most expensive movie ever made at the time, costing the equivalent of nearly $500 million today. But what really blew up wasn’t the budget — it was the affair that exploded on set. When shooting began in Rome, Taylor was married to singer Eddie Fisher, and her costar, Richard Burton, who played Mark Antony, was married to actor Sybil Williams. The two had CHEMISTRY playing onscreen lovers, and according to director Joseph L. Mankiewicz, the chemistry wasn’t just for the cameras. He reportedly warned producer Walter Wanger: “Liz and Burton are not just playing Antony and Cleopatra.”
