Boy Meets World indeed.
William Daniels, 99, and Bonnie Bartlett, 96, who are celebrating their 75th wedding anniversary next month, clarified earlier remarks made about their “open marriage.”
“It’s funny, the press will pick up on something and make more of it than it was,’ the “St. Elsewhere” alum told The Daily Mail in a recent interview. “There was never any discussion as to what we were going to do, but in 75 years, the two of you together, you know, it would be abnormal if you… weren’t attracted occasionally to other people.”
Barlett added that, “there have been times, yeah, both of us, on both sides,” which she wrote about in her 2023 memoir, “Middle of the Rainbow.”
The actress explained that the couple never discussed the arrangement.
“Bill and I never have sit down and make rules,” she revealed. “We never sit down and talk about these things. We just don’t. We just live our lives. And if he’s away for a year, he’s away for a year.
“Our lives just went on, but we never got unhinged…. We never got unhinged, but our lives did go in different directions occasionally.”
“The Little House on the Prairie” alum had previously revealed that the two had an “open marriage,” which was “very painful” and “didn’t work well.”
“And it was a time when people were doing that,” she continued. “It was at a time in New York when there was a lot of sex and a lot of people doing all kinds of things, you know — very free.”
Barlett confessed to having had an affair “that lasted a few months” with a “slightly boring” actor around 1959, eight years after she married Daniels.
The actress — who married Daniels in 1951 — went on to reveal she had “an affair that lasted a few months” with an actor who was “slightly boring” sometime around 1959.
However, Daniels had an affair with a producer in the 70s that left Bartlett “devastated” and realized she “could no longer tolerate any kind of open marriage.”
Bartlett sounds a little shocked that the couple will be celebrating a milestone anniversary.
“You don’t plan for it. You really don’t plan for it,” she said. “I’m not at all romantic or anything like that. I’m a big believer in today, you know? And then all of a sudden it’s 75 years. It’s kind of amazing, I must say.
Meanwhile, the “Boy Meets World” alum sounds as besotted with Barlett as the day he first spied her at Northwestern University.
“I wouldn’t be with anyone else in my life than this woman sitting next to me,” he gushed.
During their marriage, they played each other’s spouses in three different projects, including “Boy Meets World” and “St. Elsewhere.”
Ten years into their marriage, they welcomed a son named William Jr., who died 24 hours later. They went on to adopt two sons.
