Alan Cumming believes the “secret” to a happy marriage is communication.
Alan Cumming has shared the secrets to why his marriage is a success
The ‘Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion’ star believes the key to having a successful union with New Yorker cartoonist Grant Shaffer - his husband of 14 years - is not letting issues “fester too long” and actually airing them with one other.
The 56-year-old actor told the American version of Closer magazine: “I think the secret is that we talk to each other, we listen to each other. If anything is wrong, we don’t let it fester too long and we actually speak about it. We met when we were 39, so we were both grown-ups and been around the block a few times. We went into it very in love, but also very understanding of the other’s past and failures. Being honest changes everything. We also make each other laugh.”
These are some of the themes the Tony Award winner explored in ‘Baggage: Tales From A Fully Packed Life’ - his second memoir after the critically acclaimed ‘Not my Father’s Son’ - and believes“it’s good to have baggage” in your life.
The ‘Emma’ actor said: “I’m trying to turn that into a positive. Everyone has baggage. Everyone has stuff that they deal with in their life. You don’t have to have had a traumatic childhood. The idea is that you have a past and it’s good to have baggage. It makes you a stronger, more full, more wise person.”
While the ‘Spice World’ star wrote the book, he was able to develop “compassion” for himself and his own mistakes and foibles.
The ‘Good Wife’ actor said: “I felt a lot of compassion for my younger self, because at the start of this book I’m sort of flailing a bit after the fallout from remembering all the stuff from my childhood. I saw patterns of behaviour in myself. Because of my dad, I had this thing about trying to fix angry people. I realised you can’t do that. They don’t want to be fixed, and you can’t make them happy.”
This has contributed to Cumming's content marriage as they are “independent people” who “don’t rely on each other to make ourselves happy”.
The three-time Emmy Award nominee accepts that he and Grant are “very different people" but well suited to one another.
He explained:"We complement each other in a good way. I kind of pull off the brink when he gets too anxious about something, and he kind of pulls me back when I want to take my clothes off and jump in the pool."
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