Hawke Deals With Disappointment Of Divorce
Ethan Hawke opens up about the aftermath of his divorce from Uma Thurman in the new issue of Parade magazine.
"Our burden is just getting along, not hurting each other's feelings, and letting each other grow — letting the tides take our lives away from each other and dealing with the disappointment of a dream that didn't happen," says Hawke, who split from Thurman in 2004.
The actor, who is starring in "The Coast of Utopia" at New York's Lincoln Center, says that New York is a great place for divorced couples to live.
"We live down the street from each other. If we lived down the street from each other in Minneapolis, I'd have to watch every car go in and out of the driveway. I'd know how late she stayed out. I don't have to know any of that stuff," the actor says.
Thurman, who has two children with Hawke, plans all her movies to shoot in New York to be close to the children, Hawke says.Photos: Uma Thurman
He says that fame didn't help his marriage with Thurman stay together.
"To be honest, it was an undue pressure on my marriage. I didn't like being famous when I was single, and what it did to my celebrity status to be married to another famous person was a huge pressure — one I didn't enjoy. And it had nothing to do with her. Nothing to do with her," Hawke says.
The actor has always been tight-lipped about what caused the split, and there's a reason for that.
"She's my children's mother," he says. "You have to keep that above anything else. If you bring two people into the world together, that supersedes anything else. No matter what you do, getting divorced is a very painful thing. But I think we're both really lucky, because we both want to excel as parents."
"It's the greatest pleasure in my life," he says of being a father. "It's the only role that, if I fail, I will consider my life a failure."