Actress Bonnie Bartlett Daniels, 93, says she and husband William Daniels, 95, “never felt tied to fidelity” in the beginning of their relationship. Bonnie is promoting her new memoir, Middle of the Rainbow, and has been married to Boy Meets World star William Daniels for over 70 years.
“I guess it was a little bit of an open marriage at first, but that was very painful,” Bonnie told Fox News Digital.
“That didn’t work well,” she admitted.
The pair, who have appeared on shows together and have both won awards for their acting achievements, had a bumpy start to their marriage.
“And it was a time when people were doing that,” she explained.
“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,” she added.
The St. Elsewhere actress went on to explain that she had “an affair that lasted a few months” with an actor who was “slightly boring” sometime around 1959.
She and William married back in 1951.
It was her husband’s affair, though, which happened sometime in the 1970s, that left her “devastated” and changed the way they saw their marriage.
The actress learned at that point that she “could no longer tolerate any kind of open marriage.”
She also noted that the pair moved “forward day-by-day” to fix the damage in their relationship.
“It was very painful for the both of us,” she told the outlet in the interview. “But it was something we had to go through because we never went through it.”
The two have a long history together, which helped them to work through those harder years in their marriage.
“When we got together I was 18,” she continued. “Bill was my first boyfriend … We just had to go through all that and still, we loved each other very much and always have.”
She continued to explain the factors that she believes have helped their relationship survive more than half a century.
“[We] have always been there for each other. That’s what matters — if you’re there for the person and help [them] along in a relationship, [have] respect for them and what they’re doing and being there for them… [You have to] be together on the other side.”
In March of last year, William told Forbes what he believes is the secret to making a marriage work.
"What you really have to do is learn to respect the other person and their feelings and try to be as easy (laughs) to live with as you possibly can," he said.
