Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell have seemingly been in love for decades and they've never married.
But that decision hasn't come without pressure, the couple says.
The two first met on set of "The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band," which was released when Hawn was 22 and Russell was 17.
After watching a group of women audition, Russell's mother predicted that Hawn would land the role.
“My mom leaned into me and said, ‘You see that blonde with a funny haircut? She’s gonna get the job.’ And sure enough, she did,” Russell, 71, told Variety in a recent interview. “I thought she was awfully attractive. You couldn’t miss her. She just had this energy about her.”
In 2012, Hawn, 77, recalled their meeting on set in an interview with People, saying Russell was "adorable, but he was much too young."
About 17 years later, they reconnected while filming "Swing Shift" in 1983, one year after she separated from her former husband, Bill Hudson, with whom she shares Oliver Hudson and Kate Hudson.
"I remembered that I liked him very much when I first met him," she told People. "But we both said we would never go out with another actor so it just shows you never can tell."
They started dating soon after meeting again and welcomed their son, Wyatt, in 1986.
Through starring in movies together like "Overboard" and raising children, the two have shown a never-ending stream of support and love. However, they have stood firm in their choice not to wed.
But, while presenting the award for best directing during the 1989 Oscars, the couple teased the idea of tying the knot in a bit they came up with because they didn’t like what was written for them.
“We’re taking a shower together, getting ready to go,” Russell said, “and we looked at each other and said, ‘There’s gonna be a lot of people watching, so let’s get this right.’ And we started punching it back and forth for about 20 minutes. We didn’t tell anybody anything about going off-script.”
Afterwards, people assumed that their banter was a real exchange, but Russell confirmed to Variety, 30 years later, that it was, indeed, made up.
“At that time, we constantly got asked, ‘When are you going to get married? Why aren’t you married?’ And we were like, ‘Why does anybody care about that?’ We’d asked our kids if they cared about it. They didn’t. We didn’t," he said.
Despite never marrying, the couple is going strong. In 2020, Hawn opened up to People about their years-long relationship, saying, “You’ve just got to want to be together. I don’t think there’s any way other than do it.”
"It’s not about the marriage," she added. "It’s about the people and the relationship, and the will to stay together. And that’s a big one because if you want it, you can have it. You’ve got to give things up, but the joy and the excitement of being together and touching the toes of somebody at night is really a nice feeling."
Most recently, Hawn shared a photo of the two of them kissing in a June 2022 post on Instagram.
Hawn told Variety that Russell is "extraordinarily brilliant and creative and collaborative."
“But really he’s just amazing," she said.
