Dame Emma Thompson revealed that the real secret to her two-decade marriage to actor Greg Wise is not being fooled into thinking love is all one big fairy tale.

The actor has been in a relationship with her second husband since they first met in 1995 on the set of Sense and Sensibility, and she's also taken a very levelheaded approach to fostering that relationship. In an interview with the Radio Times, she explained, “It's philosophically helpful and uplifting to remember that romantic love is a myth and quite dangerous. We really do have to take it with a massive pinch of salt. To think sensibly about love and the way it can grow is essential.” Thompson concluded, “Long-term relationships are hugely difficult and complicated. If anyone thinks that happy ever after has a place in our lives, forget it.”

The two-time Oscar winner currently has relationships on the brain as she's starring in a new romantic comedy called What's Love Got to Do With It? which explores the topic of arranged marriages. Thompson has also learned a lot about sustaining a healthy relationship after the very public break up of her first marriage to actor Sir Kenneth Branagh. The two stars wed in 1989, but divorced in 1995 after it was discovered that Branagh had an affair with Helena Bonham Carter while directing her in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Following their divorce, Branagh continued to date Carter until they broke up in 1999.

In 2018 during a fundraiser for the Tricycle Theatre, Thompson revealed that she drew from that real-life experiences for her role in Love Actually. In the film, her character Karen discovers that her husband, played by Alan Rickman, has betrayed her by flirting with his secretary and buying her a gold necklace for Christmas. “That scene where my character is standing by the bed crying is so well known because it's something everyone's been through,” she said at the time. “I had my heart very badly broken by Ken. So I knew what it was like to find the necklace that wasn’t meant for me. Well, it wasn’t exactly that, but we’ve all been through it.” The actor added in a follow-up interview with The Telegraph, “I’ve had so much bloody practice at crying in a bedroom, then having to go out and be cheerful, gathering up the pieces of my heart and putting them in a drawer.” However, she also noted in a conversation with the Sunday Times that she has no ill will towards Carter for her involvement in the dissolution of her marriage. “That is...all blood under the bridge,” she concluded. “You can’t hold on to anything like that. It’s pointless. I haven’t got the energy for it...Helena and I made our peace years and years ago...she’s a wonderful woman.”