MAC-LAYIN’
Shirley touts benefits of open marriage
EVERYONE NEEDS to have “Terms of Endearment” with more than one person at a time.
That’s actress Shirley MacLaine’s recipe for marital happiness — a position she personally took during her 28-year “open marriage” to hubby Steve Parker.
“I think that’s the basis for a long-lasting marriage,” she told entertainment journalist Jess Cagle.
“I would say better to stay friends and we don’t have enough time to talk about the sexuality of all. I was very open about all of that and so was he,” she said.
Screw monogamy. In fact, screw other people.
The 81-year-old film star and her producer husband often went weeks without seeing each other due to their demanding schedules. In 1954, for example, she was filming in America while he was on a long shoot in Japan.
So naturally, they did what came naturally.
“No one understood it, we did. He lived in Japan basically. I lived in America working, and this and that.
“We’d meet up, always great friends, traveled sometimes together,” she told Cagle during a Sirius XM broadcast.
It lasted for nearly three decades before she and Parker eventually divorced in 1982.
MacLaine still swears by her “Easy Rider”-era values.
Other Hollywood couples have openly followed suit. Actress Tilda Swinton and her exhusband John Byrne were also known to have an open marriage during their time together from 1989 to 2003.
Angelina Jolie said in 2009 that it wouldn’t be the end of the world if she or Brad Pitt committed what some believe is the ultimate taboo once in awhile.
“I doubt that fidelity is absolutely essential for a relationship,” she told Germany’s Das Neue magazine.
“It’s worse to leave your partner and talk badly about him afterward,” Jolie said.