Celebrity couples with big age gaps: From Michael Douglas & Catherine Zeta-Jones to Dick Van Dyke & Arlene Silver

Dick Van Dyke will celebrate his 13th wedding anniversary with his wife Arlene Silver in 2025 after they met in 2007, when she was 35 years old, and he was 81.

The couple connected at the 2007 Screen Actors Guild Awards and despite their 46-year age gap, they hit it off immediately. 

“He said, ‘Hi, I’m Dick.’ The first thing I asked him was, ‘Weren’t you in Mary Poppins?’ We got along immediately as friends, so it didn’t feel like he was so much older than me,” the former makeup artist told Closer.

Dick hired Arlene for several other projects and eventually, they fell in love and married in 2012. 

Hollywood’s sweethearts Catherine Zeta-Jones and Michael Douglas may share the same birthday – September 25 – but the couple have 25 years between them. 

They met in 1998 at the Deauville Film Festival, with Michael cheekily telling the actress: “You know, I’m going to be the father of your children.”

Catherine wasn’t immediately impressed but told Access Hollywood in 2019: “You know what the worst thing is?… He was right.”

The couple got married in November 2000 during a lavish ceremony held at the New York Plaza Hotel and went on to welcome two children – Dylan and Carys.

Sam Taylor-Johnson and Aaron Taylor-Johnson met in 2008 when she directed him in the John Lennon biopic, Nowhere Boy. He was 19 at the time while she was 42.

The pair became extremely close while working together and at the premiere of Nowhere Boy in October 2009, the director and the lead actor walked the red carpet as a couple.

Their relationship garnered quite a lot of press at the time due to their age difference, which Sam admitted was “intense”.

“I guess that interest was more when we got together, which was now 14 years — at the beginning, was quite intense,” the Back to Black director admitted on BBC Radio 4’s This Cultural Life.

“And that sort of fascination, because he’s younger than me, which you know, we couldn’t really fathom the fascination… it’s sort of gone away a little bit.”

They married in 2012 and share two daughters, Wylda Rae and Romy Hero. Aaron is also a stepfather to Sam’s older daughters Angelica and Jessie Phoenix.

Harrison Ford and Calista Flockhart first met at the 2002 Golden Globes. The Indiana Jones actor was still married to his second wife, Melissa Mathison, at the time, although they had separated. 

They made their red carpet debut in September 2002 and got engaged on Valentine’s Day in 2009 and married a year later in New Mexico. 

Their 22-year age gap wasn’t an issue for Calista, as she told Hello! in 2003. “It doesn’t faze me. Sometimes I even say, ‘Wow, I keep forgetting that he’s 22 years older than me.’ It doesn’t factor into our relationship at all.” 

They kept their love largely under wraps throughout the years, apart from the occasional red-carpet appearance or family outing with their son, Liam.  

Music royalty Beyonce and Jay-Z were first rumored to be a couple when the singer appeared as Jay-Z’s girlfriend in the music video for 03 Bonnie & Clyde. 

They first met when she was 18 and started dating after her 19th birthday. In a candid chat with Oprah Winfrey, she said: “We were friends first for a year and a half before we went on any dates.”

The lovebirds are known for their private relationship, so it comes as no surprise that they said “I do” in secret in 2008.

Opening up about their big day, Jay-Z told Vibe magazine: “I just think it’s really a part of your life that you gotta keep to yourself… You have to, or you’ll go insane in this type of business.”

The couple are now parents to daughter Blue Ivy and twins Rumi and Carter.

Ryan Reynolds previously revealed that he fell for his wife Blake Lively when he was actually on a date with someone else. The actor and the actress had agreed to go on a double date with other people, about a year after filming Green Lantern together.

“That was the most awkward date for the respective parties because we were just fireworks coming across,” Ryan told SiriusXM. “It was weird at first, but we were buddies for a long time. I think it’s the best way to have a relationship, to start as friends.”

Blake and Ryan married in September 2012, and in December 2014 they welcomed their daughter James, followed by Inez in 2016, Betty in 2019, and their son Olin in 2022.