Natasha Richardson Once Threatened to Dump Liam Neeson Over a Movie Role
Liam Neeson and Natasha Richardson were happily married for 15 years. According to Neeson, part of the reason he was able to meet Richardson at the altar was because he turned down a film role. Neeson could have made his debut as James Bond in GoldenEye, but Richardson did not want this. He shared why he thought she didn’t want him to take the role.
Natasha Richardson did not want Liam Neeson to play James Bond
In the 1990s, Neeson fell under consideration to become the next James Bond. While he didn’t get an outright offer to star in the film, he was under consideration for the iconic role.
“I was not offered James Bond,” he told Rolling Stone. “I know the Broccolis. They looked at a bunch of actors. Schindler’s List had come out and Barbara [Broccoli] had called me a couple of times to ask if I was interested, and I said, ‘Yes, I would be interested.'”
Richardson did not want him to take the part, though. According to him, he didn’t take her ultimatum all that hard.
“And then my lovely wife [Natasha Richardson], god rest her soul, said to me while we were shooting Nell down in the Carolinas, ‘Liam, I want to tell you something: If you play James Bond, we’re not getting married,'” he said. “So I would tease her by going behind her back, making my fingers as though I’m holding a gun, and then [hums the James Bond theme]. I loved doing that s***!”
He shared that he thought her decision had to do with the presence of Bond girls.
“She gave me a James Bond ultimatum. And she meant it!” he said. “Come on, there’s all those gorgeous girls in various countries getting into bed and getting out of bed. I’m sure a lot of her decision-making was based on that! [Laughs].”
When did Liam Neeson and Natasha Richardson get married?
Neeson didn’t take the part of Bond and, as a result, was able to marry Richardson. The couple wed in 1994. Neeson revealed that at the wedding, Richardson surprised him by singing the Van Morrison song “Crazy Love.”
“Behind my back Natasha had been taking singing lessons to sing it to me,” he said on Radio Andy, per Entertainment Weekly. “After the ceremony we were all going out to start the night’s festivities and she grabbed the microphone and she sang me this. She had learned it and I was like, ‘Wow!'”
The couple remained married until Richardson’s death.
The actor revealed that he still talks to his wife
Richardson died following a ski accident in 2009. Eleven years after her death, Neeson revealed that he still speaks to her daily. He walks to her grave every day to talk to her.
“I speak to her every day at her grave which is about a mile and a half down the road,” he told Inquirer.net in 2020 (via The Standard). “I go down there quite often, so I do speak to her as if she’s here. Not that she answers me.”
