Alan Alda is 87! Actor celebrates birthday with wife of 65 years Arlene amidst Parkinson's diagnosis
LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK: Veteran actor Alan Alda turned 87 on Saturday, January 28. The seasoned actor is spending his 87th birthday with Arlene Alda, his wife of 65 years. He and his wife, 89, met in the most unusual way and fell in love.
"In 1956, while attending Fordham, Alda met Arlene Weiss, who was attending Hunter College," Alda's Wikipedia page reads. "They bonded at a mutual friend's dinner party; when a rum cake accidentally fell onto the kitchen floor, they were the only two guests who did not hesitate to eat it." The couple married a year later, and the two are still together at almost 90 years old, and still very much in love.
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"The hostess of the evening had made a rum cake, and she put it on the refrigerator to cool. The refrigerator shook, and the cake fell off the refrigerator and hit the floor," Alan later revealed in 2015. "Arlene and I were the only two people who went in with spoons and ate it off the floor. That's how you know. When two people eat a cake off the floor, that's it for life." Alan acknowledged he fell head over heels in love with his future wife after that encounter but was unable to force himself to get in touch with her, "I was so intensely shy and inexperienced. I felt I needed to ask her out on the perfect date."
The 'M*A*S*H' actor admitted they had to chip in to save up money to get married because they did not have enough for their getaway. "We could barely afford a wedding trip. We added up her savings and mine, figuring out how much we had to start life with; it came out to six hundred dollars between us." The couple got married in 1957 and welcomed three daughters: Elizabeth, Eve, and Beatrice.
In July 2018, Alan revealed that he had been diagnosed with Parkinson's. He expressed his desire to share the information with others "to inspire" them "to take action" and emphasized his positive response to the diagnosis. The well-known celebrity claimed that despite the passage of time since his diagnosis, he continued to be physically active. "I decided to let people know I have Parkinson’s to encourage others to take action. I was Diagnosed 3 and a half years ago, but my life is full. I act, I give talks, I help with the Alda Center for Communicating Science, and I do my podcast, which I love. If you get a diagnosis, keep moving! I take boxing lessons 3 days a week, play singles tennis twice a week, and take a mild pill – all Dr. recommended. I even juggle a little. And I’m not entering dementia. I’m no more demented than I was before," wrote the 'Ray Donovan' actor on Facebook. "Really, I’m good."