Stanley Tucci has defended his 21-year age gap with his wife, Felicity Blunt, saying it doesn’t affect their connection. The 65-year-old actor recalled meeting his partner, 45, during Thursday’s episode of Jenna Bush Hager’s podcast, Open Book. He said that after his first wife, Kate Tucci, died from cancer in 2009, he wasn’t sure if he’d “ever remarry.”
“I never thought I would have children again,” Tucci, who welcomed three children with Kate, said. “And when I met [Blunt], it just sort of made sense, even though there is this age gap of 21 years. And obviously, I knew her family, or I knew her sister was one of my best friends. And we just hit it off. We had a lot in common even though we had nothing in common.”
“And it just sort of stuck. But I think she changed my life in the sense that she gave me a sense of security,” he continued. “She gave my children a sense of security. And she's fun. Like, she's fun to hang out with.”
He praised the literary agent’s intelligence, adding, “I mean, her mind is incredible. Her capacity to take in information, not just from a book, but from the world and process it, and turn it into something else is just extraordinary.”
Stanley previously opened up about the age gap in his marriage during a 2025 interview with The Times of London. “I am sad that I won’t see her get old and that I won’t be able to look after her if she needs looking after,” he said. “I think there’s something really beautiful about people aging together. And unless there’s some miracle, that can’t happen.”
In 2006, Stanley attended The Devil Wears Prada premiere alongside his first wife, Kate, and met Blunt. However, he didn’t reconnect with her again until 2010, during her sister Emily Blunt’s wedding to John Krasinski. Stanley and Blunt tied the knot in 2012, before welcoming their two kids, Matteo, 11, and Emilia, eight. Tucci and his first wife also had three kids: fraternal twins Isabel and Nicolo, 26, and Camila, 24.
Elsewhere in the Open Book episode, Stanley confessed that he was “terrified” of death and aging after Kate’s death. “When you lose somebody that you really love, and when I lost my wife, and you see that awful struggle, and you see the effect it has on your children, on family, on yourself, it never goes away. And it does steal you,” he said. “It does give you strength. You have to allow it to give you strength. But I guess there’s always a fear of death, but maybe even more so, because you know what it’s like.”
