Liam Neeson is opening up about the death of his wife Natasha Richardson, beginning with the scene he encountered when he arrived at the Montreal hospital where she was taken after the skiing accident that abuptly ended her life two years ago.
"I walked into the emergency -- it's like 70, 80 people, broken arms, black eyes, all that — and for the first time in years, nobody recognizes me. Not the nurses. The patients. No one. And I've come all this way, and they won't let me see her," Neeson said in the March issue of Esquire. "I pull out a cell phone -- and a security guard comes up, starts saying, 'Sorry, sir, you can't use that in here,' and I'm about to ask him if he knew me, when he disappears to answer a phone call or something. So I went outside. It's freezing cold, and I thought, What am I gonna do? How am I going to get past the security?
"And I see two nurses, ladies, having a cigarette. I walk up, and luckily one of them recognizes me. And I'll tell you, I was so f---ing grateful -- for the first time in I don't know how long --to be recognized. And this one, she says, 'Go in that back door there.' She points me to it. 'Make a left. She's in a room there.' So I get there, just in time. And all these young doctors, who look all of 18 years of age, they tell me the worst. The worst."
Neeson said he's still dealing with the grief from losing his wife. "It hits you in the middle of the night -- well, it hits me in the middle of the night. I'm out walking. I'm feeling quite content. And it's like suddenly, boom. It's like you've just done that in your chest."
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