Dick Van Dyke’s marriage to wife Arlene Silver is supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.
The actor, 99, recently shed light onto how he makes his union with the 53-year-old work, despite their 46-year age gap.
“We get along so well,” Van Dyke told People on Sunday, as Silver chimed in: “We just care about each other so much.”
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“Everybody said it wouldn’t work,” the “Mary Poppins” actor said of their 13-year marriage.
“Yeah,” the actress agreed. “I mean it’s like eerie how well it works. People the same age don’t last.”
“I never said hello to a strange girl in my life. I was too scared,” Van Dyke told the outlet about how the couple met. “But I was at a show backstage and she walked by, and for some reason, I just jumped up and said, ‘Hi, I’m Dick.’ There’s something about her that got me, and I was right.”
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Silver gushed that her other half has “made me feel like I can do anything” before Van Dyke sweetly added, “And you can.”
As Silver put it, they are “very supportive of each other.”
The pair also detailed their perfect date night together.
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“We just love being home. We love Malibu, and it’s our favorite place, our house especially. So this is like our, you’re at our house,” Silver expressed. “We’re so grateful. Our house did get hit by the Franklin fire, but in the scheme of things, we got very lucky.”
Along with being together for over a decade, Van Dyke has another milestone coming around the corner: his next birthday.
“And I’m seven months from a hundred,” he shared.
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Van Dyke was previously married to Margie Willett, who died in 2008, from 1948 to 1976. The exesshared four children together: Christian, Barry, Stacy and Carrie Beth.
During his marriage to Willett, Van Dyke began an affair with Michelle Triola, whom he was with for 35 years until her death in 2009.
The Emmy winner and Silver met during the 13th annual SAG Awards in 2007, two years prior to the death of his longtime partner.
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“I remember seeing Dick at the catering table with his bow tie and his big smile. Right when I sat down, he was sitting next to me. He said, ‘Hi, I’m Dick.’ The first thing I asked him was, ‘Weren’t you in‘Mary Poppins?’’ I wasn’t sure,” Silver recalled tothe Huffington Postin 2013. “I knew who he was but I wasn’t sure why I knew who he was. I was not familiar with all his work. He has so much work I can’t believe I missed it.”
Marvin’s passing was a turning point in Van Dyke’s friendship with the makeup artist, and the two struck up a romance.
“Arlene would come by after work and bring me food.She was such a support, I fell in love,” he told People in 2013.
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The couple tied the knot in February 2012 onLeap Dayin an intimate Malibu ceremony. Van Dyke was 86 and Silver was 40 at the time.
In February 2022, the actor credited Silver for keeping him young at heart.
“Havinga beautiful young wife half my ageto take care of me — that works!” he told Yahoo! Entertainment at the time. “My positive attitude, I get that from my wife.”
