Stanley Tucci Reveals He Once Tried to Break up With Wife Felicity

Stanley Tucci initially was so worried about the 21-year age gap between him and now-wife Felicity Blunt that he tried to break things off. The 62-year-old actor, who in 2012 married the elder sister of his The Devil Wears Prada co-star Emily Blunt, also struggled with getting into a serious relationship following the death of his first wife, Kate Tucci, who passed away in 2009 due to breast cancer.

Tucci opened up about Kate’s death and his second shot at love on BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs, revealing that his late wife and current wife actually met during the 2006 premiere of The Devil Wears Prada, where they “talked a lot.” Following Kate’s passing, Tucci reconnected with Felicity at Emily’s 2010 wedding to Jack Ryan actor John Krasinski.

“I was afraid to get into a relationship and I kept trying to break it off,” Tucci said. “I’m 21 years older than she is and I didn’t want to feel old for the rest of my life! But I knew that this was an incredibly special person.” Tucci also opened up about Felicity’s impact on his family, which includes his and Kate’s daughters Isabel and Nicolo, both 23 and Camilla, 21. Tucci and Felicity have gone on to welcome two children together – son Matteo, 8, and daughter Emilia, 5. “Felicity has been so incredible taking on a widower and three children whose mother died,” the Easy A actor continued. “That’s a huge thing, at a very young age too. If anybody made things better for all of us, it’s her. She’s the one.”

Tucci noted that it was the support of his friends and family that helped him cope with the loss of his first wife. “I didn’t work for almost a year,” the Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy host explained. “It was hard. It was awful. Still is, in a way. You never really get over it.” The actor also felt guilty “because I couldn’t help her, and I thought I could help her,” revealing that he wasn’t able to be by Kate’s side when she died.

“I was afraid it would affect me so greatly that I wouldn’t be able to go on and take care of the kids. That it would overwhelm me, so I had to step away,” Tucci said. “Other people were there with her, my stepdaughter and friends, and that was a good thing. I did what I had to do to help the kids get along. But you still feel guilty about it, you feel sad.”