Actress Lisa Dillon has accused Sir Patrick Stewart of wrongly describing their five-year relationship as a “silly affair” in his memoir.
Dillon, now 44, was in a relationship with the actor between 2003 and 2007, starting when she was 23 and he was 62.
The duo first met after being cast in Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen’s The Master Builder, when Stewart – famous for his role as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation – was still married to his second wife, producer Wendy Neuss.
His first marriage to Sheila Falconer, who had two children with the star, had already ended following an affair with actress Jennifer Hetrick, making his relationship with Dillon his second to end a marriage.
Dillon said she was at her local Waterstones last fall when she saw a few copies of Stewart’s memoir, Making It So, before picking one up and looking up his name in the index.
Patrick Stewart (as Halvard Solness) and Lisa Dillon (as Hilda Wangel) in the production of ‘The Master Builder’ at the Albery Theater in London
Dillon was in a relationship with the actor between 2003 and 2007, starting when she was 23 and he was 62. The couple is photographed in 2006.
Dillon and Stewart began their relationship while he was still married to his second wife, producer Wendy Neuss.
In his memoir, which will be published in paperback next June, Stewart writes: “And so, another divorce. I felt stupid and responsible… I had cheated on my wife with a younger woman – again… And just like my affair with Jenny Hetrick, my time with Lisa Dillon would also prove relatively short… In a life filled with joy and success, my two failed marriages are my greatest regret.
Dillon said The temperature: ‘The impression he gives is that our relationship was very fleeting – that I was a silly fling that broke up a marriage – and he got caught.
“But it’s not just about our almost five years together – it’s the most enduring friendship of my life. Or rather it was.
Dillon said the pair remained close friends after their relationship ended, with Dillon even introducing Stewart, now 83, to his granddaughter six years ago.
In her memoir, Stewart accuses the couple’s onstage relationship of creating false feelings, the Times reported.
“Life imitates art,” the memoir reads. “I remember the warning I received from an older actor decades ago that if you keep saying ‘I love you’ to someone in a room, you may believe that This feeling is true.”
Dillon said: “I never imagined he would say he wasn’t really in love with me, that it was an occupational hazard to be an actor.”
Dillon said she did not expect the couple’s relationship to be a main part of Stewart’s memoir out of respect for his current wife, singer Sunny Ozell, and added that she would have preferred not to be mentioned at all.
Dillion said the two remained close friends after their relationship ended.
Patrick Stewart and his current wife Sunny Ozell are attending the 2024 Vanity Fair Oscar this month
The couple’s relationship remained secret during the play’s performance, with Dillon making his West End debut on his 24th birthday. “We were already in love at that point,” Dillon said.
“Afterwards (…) things evolved quite quickly. It’s not that we were surprised.
“It was a decision for him to go to America and end the marriage so we could start a life together.”
Dillon said she now looks differently at the relationship and that period of her life after reading the memoir.
“I see my vulnerability in a way I’ve never seen before. For the first time, I asked myself, “What did a 62-year-old man find attractive about me at 23?” “, she said.
Dillon said the relationship broke down when the two were about to play Macbeth together, until Dillon gave up. She described Stewart as a “workaholic” and added that she had become “extraordinarily lonely” – but their split was “not a clean break”.