Martha Stewart Reveals Creepy Reason She Broke up With Anthony Hopkins

Martha Stewart once dated actor Anthony Hopkins, but the relationship did not last very long after she saw The Silence of the Lambs. Stewart shared the details of the relationship during a stop on The Ellen DeGeneres Show this week. It's not clear when Stewart and Hopkins dated, since Hopkins was still married to his second wife, Jennifer Lynton, from 1973 until 2002, and he married his third wife, Stella Arroyave in 2003.

Stewart, 80, said she could not picture Hopkins, 84, without envisioning his most famous role, Dr. Hannibal Lecter. "I have a big, scary house in Maine that's way by itself on 100 acres in the forest, and I couldn't even imagine taking Anthony Hopkins there," Stewart told DeGeneres. "I couldn't... all I could think of was him eating, you know..."

"And you stopped because of that?" DeGeneres asked her. "Yeah," Stewart replied as applause broke out from the audience. Stewart was married to Andrew Stewart from 1961 to 1990.

Stewart didn't share breaking news with DeGeneres. She told the story about dating Hopkins during a 2006 stop on Howard Stern's show. "Oh, I loved him, but he was... scary. I was going to invite him up to Maine; I have this beautiful home in Maine... but then I reconsidered because I saw that movie again," she said at the time. "Do you want someone eating your brain while you are sitting in your beautiful dining room in Maine?"

Elsewhere in her interview with DeGeneres this week, Stewart joked about being struck by lightning three times. "I mean, it's like, crazy," Stewart told DeGeneres. "I think it actually is good for you. If it doesn't kill you, I think it's good for you!" When asked what it felt like to be struck by lightning, Stewart said it was "horrible."

Hopkins won his first Best Actor Oscar for playing Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs. In 2021, he won his second for The Father, making him the oldest Best Actor Oscar winner in history. He also has Best Actor nominations for The Remains of the Day and Nixon, and Best Supporting Actor nods for Amistad and The Two Popes. He was knighted in 1993. His next movie is a Florian Zeller's follow-up to The Father, titled The Son.