Burt Reynolds was not able to get over Sally Field even 30 years after their bitter breakup: 'She was the love of my life'
Burt Reynolds carried his love for Sally Field to his grave as he admitted that he was still in love with her before his death.
In a Vanity Fair interview that he gave in 2015, the screen legend called his former costar “the love of my life.” He died on Thursday morning, aged 82, at the Jupiter Medical in Florida, his manager Erik Kritzer told media.
Reynolds and Field, who met on the set of their film 'Smokey and the Bandit' in 1977, started dating soon after. They starred in four films together and went on to date for five years before finally calling it quits. “I miss her terribly,” Reynolds told the magazine at the time. “Even now, it’s hard on me. I don’t know why I was so stupid. Men are like that, you know. You find the perfect person, and then you do everything you can to screw it up.”
Even in his 2015 memoir, called 'But Enough About Me', the actor revealed that one of his biggest regrets was not making their relationship work. And the same year, he told People magazine in an interview that he “really adored” Field, calling their relationship “real.” “She’s very, very special,” he said. “Her mother and I… I loved her mother.”
Field's mother told him, “I know you’re going to break her heart, but please be gentle.” “I said, ‘I don’t know how you could break somebody’s heart and be gentle, but I don’t intend to break her heart,” Reynolds said. “You never intend to.”
That same year, in another interview, he revealed that he continues to speak about his feelings because he still missed the actress. “I do miss her. I think she was one of the most underrated actresses, you know?” he told the outlet. “She was the best actress I ever worked with.” When asked about being the one who got away, Field told Jess Cagle in 2016, “Well, yeah.”
Before Field, Reynolds dated Dinah Shore, a singer and TV personality. Although she was 20 years his senior, the two broke up after Shore revealed that she did not wish to have kids and Reynolds did. “There’s nobody better,” he said at the time of Shore. “I never, ever heard her say anything bad about anybody. Ever. I don’t know how she did it.”
When it came to both women, “I moved on from them much too soon,” he revealed, “and they probably moved on a little too late.”
Reynolds also was married to Loni Anderson from 1988 until their separation in 1994, calling their union a mistake, and in his 2015 interview, called it “a really dumb move on my part.” The couple also had one son together, 30-year-old Quinton Anderson Reynolds. “I should have known that you don’t marry an actress,” he said.
“She bought everything in triplicate, from everyday dresses to jewelry to china and linens,” he wrote in his memoir. “‘I never wear a dress after it has been photographed,’ she said. ‘I have to dress like a star.’”
“I gave her a platinum American Express card with a $45,000 credit limit,” he wrote. “She maxed it out in half an hour.”
Field was aware of Reynolds' feelings but chose never to really dwell on them or respond extensively. However, mourning the death of Reynolds, Field had released an emotional statement saying: “There are times in your life that are so indelible, they never fade away. They stay alive, even forty years later. My years with Burt never leave my mind. He will be in my history and my heart, for as long as I live. Rest, Buddy.”
Reynolds married twice. He and his first wife, Judy Carne, were married from 1963 to 1965. He then married Loni Anderson in 1988. The two divorced in 1993.