David Harbour realised how "thin" his life was "without a family" thanks to 'Stranger Things'.
David Harbour
The 46-year-old actor admitted seeing his alter ego Jim Hopper become a father figure to Millie Bobby Brown's Eleven changed his perspective and made him feel he needed a more full personal life.
David - who is now married to Lily Allen and is stepfather to her and Sam Cooper's daughters Ethel, nine, and eight-year-old Marnie - said: "TV definitely helped me in my life.
"I'm very much a New York sort of city rat. I liked my freedom, my independence. And then it was really this part that did change a lot of that perspective.
"The show sort of opened my heart in a lot of different ways, and one of the ways that it did was it started to make me realise how thin my existence was without a family."
And David explained how seeing his character "maturing into a father" was "something clearly my subconscious was crying out to do."
He added on the 'That Scene with Dan Patrick' podcast: "I think that's partially why things are so successful because there's some unique alchemy between the performer and the role.
"I feel like there was something in Hopper that had a deep need for family, and there was something in me that had it too but that I wasn't even aware of."
"As I began to explore this role, the role allowed me to do that in my real life."
David previously revealed Lily's daughters made him realise he needed to marry the 'Not Fair' singer.
The 'Black Widow' actor - who tied the knot with the 36-year-old star last September - said: "We got engaged right before the pandemic. Then the pandemic hit and nothing was happening.
"We were riding around beginning of pandemic — she has two kids, these beautiful daughters, eight and nine — and we were riding bikes out in the country trying to figure out what we were gonna do for the next year or however long it was going to take.
"And the little one was riding along and she was going like, 'David, dad, David, dad.' Because the D got her confused.
"And the older one got very upset with that, which I understand. She was like, 'He's not our dad! He's not our dad!'
"And then younger one was like, 'Well what is he? He's kind of our dad.' She's like, 'No he's not, he's our stepdad.' And she goes, 'What is he?' And she goes, 'He's just some guy in our lives!' "
He jokingly added: "I was like, 'I need to marry this woman.' Because the emotional fallout ... "
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