Age-gap romances hit the spotlight
While partners from different generations may be happy together, they can face external pressures.
Art imitates life
The age-gap genre is a staple of fiction, with many movies and books focusing on these romances.
Recent movies involving an older woman with a younger man include Lonely Planet (with Laura Dern and Liam Hemsworth), The Idea of You (Anne Hathaway and Nicholas Galitzine), and A Family Affair (Nicole Kidman and Zac Efron).
Films with an older male protagonist include Sabrina (with Humphrey Bogart and Audrey Hepburn in the original, and Harrison Ford and Julia Ormond in the remake), As Good as It Gets (Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt), and Lost in Translation (Bill Murray and Scarlet Johansson).
Al Pacino, the star of such films as Scarface, The Godfather, and Scent of a Woman, hit the headlines recently for reasons you may not expect.
At 84, he’s promoting a new autobiography, called Sonny Boy, and fielding lots of questions about his relationship with a much younger woman, which led to the birth of a son, Roman, now aged 18 months.
While Pacino and the child’s mother, film producer Noor Alfallah, now 30, are no longer together, their relationship has led to a lot of speculation about the wisdom of age-gap romances and raising children in one’s senior years.
Pacino, who has adult children from previous relationships, says he enjoys fatherhood and it has changed him for the better.
In a nod to his age, he told the BBC, “I want to be around for this child. And I hope I am. I hope I stay healthy, and he knows who his dad is, of course.”
Pacino is hardly the only celebrity to have a relationship with somebody much younger, while Alfallah seems to prefer older men, having previously dated Clint Eastwood and Mick Jagger.
These “May-December” relationships tend to be between an older man and a younger woman, but there are exceptions.
British writer, actor, and everyman, Stephen Fry, 67, is married to comedian Elliot Spencer, who is 30 years his junior.
Both have faced criticism on social media, with Elliot telling detractors, “I don’t care what people think. Stephen is the love of my life, the light of my life.”
Actors Holland Taylor and Sarah Paulson are 32 years apart in age, and 15 years separates Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi.
There is some evidence that many men and women are open to relationships with people up to 15 years younger or older – and research indicating that people in age-gap romances may be happier than other couples.
In heterosexual unions, the attraction may indicate an evolutionary impulse to select a partner with “good genes” or the ability to provide financially for a family.
But age-gap relationships are often subject to criticism that there is a power imbalance and one partner is taking advantage of the other.
These relationships also come with some challenges, including coping with the “generation gap”, where the two people have very different interests, friendship groups, and cultural references.
There is also the question of what happens if the older partner gets ill and infirm.
As always when it comes to human relationships, each case is different – and as long as the individuals are happy and no harm is being done, what they do is nobody else’s business.
Related reading: CNN, news.com.au, BBC, The Conversation, The Sun
