Why Shirley MacLaine & Jack Nicholson Never Took Their Romance Off The Big Screen

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Shirley MacLaine, the former "Downton Abbey" guest star, has claimed to have loved and dated many famous men in both the entertainment and political worlds. But three-time Oscar winner Jack Nicholson was not someone MacLaine had a romance with. In 2024, MacLaine told People that she was never romantically interested in Nicholson. "I don't think he would've been my type to have an affair with anyway. I would laugh too much," she said. Nicholson seemingly did not publicly respond to MacLaine's comment.

The two stars played a romantic couple in the 1983 film "Terms of Endearment," which won them both an Oscar. It was the start of a years-long friendship. During the 40th AFI Life Achievement Award gala in 2012, Nicholson said about MacLaine, "You have a characteristic, in all seriousness, that's so valuable to an actor. And really, it's that you're — you are completely available and forthcoming while remaining a mystery." Meanwhile, MacLaine told USA Today in 2017 that she begs Nicholson to get a role in every film she auditions for. "I don't care what it is, I would do anything with him," she said at the time.

Jack Nicholson married once to another actor, Sandra Knight, in 1962, but that marriage lasted about five years. Since then, Nicholson has been in several public relationships, some of which overlapped. Nicholson was in a scandal that rocked the '80s when "Addams Family" star Anjelica Huston ended their 17-year-long on-again-off-again relationship because he had fathered a child with another woman. As of writing, Nicholson has had six kids with five different women.

Similarly, Shirley MacLaine only had one marriage. In 1954, she married Steve Parker, a producer and actor, and the couple had a daughter together. But in 1984, MacLaine told Time she had an open relationship with Parker, in which he lived in Japan while she lived in the U.S., and they both would have romantic relationships with whomever they wanted.

This arrangement worked until the couple divorced in 1982. In her 2011 memoir "I'm All Over That: And Other Confessions," MacLaine spoke about some relationships she had with other men seemingly during her marriage, including the former prime minister of Sweden, Olof Palme, and Hollywood actor Robert Mitchum. But speaking fondly of Parker, MacLaine told The Guardian in 2007, "My husband really was the love of my life."