Idris Elba was "done with love" before he met his now-wife Sabrina.
Idris Elba was 'done with love' before meeting wife Sabrina
The 49-year-old star - who was previously married to Kim Noorgard and Sonya Nicole Hamlin - was going through a "really difficult time" personally and professionally when he first came face-to-face with the former Miss Vancouver in 2017, but she made him "open to the idea" of getting involved with someone again.
He recalled to Sunday Times Style magazine: “I was going through a really difficult time.
“I was 44, my father had passed away, I felt bitter about acting and was done with relationships and love. I started to train as a professional fighter [after studying boxing as a teenager, he trained to become a professional kickboxing fighter in 2016, winning his debut professional fight]. I stopped drinking, got clean and had this amazing clarity.
“I flew to Canada to shoot a film ['Molly’s Game']. I was starring with Jessica Chastain, who’s so passionate about her craft, she made me fall in love with acting again.
"Then I flew to Vancouver to shoot a film about unrequited love with Kate Winslet ['The Mountain Between Us'] and the irony wasn’t lost on me: the last thing I wanted to think about was love. I was done with love. And it was there that I met Sabrina in a bar. She made me open to the idea of love again."
Idris - who has daughter Isan, 20, from his first marriage and son Winston, eight, with former partner Naiyana Garth - used to keep his personal life private but Sabrina has encouraged him to be more open.
He said: “I was quite closed off before, then meeting her and doing these projects together, like the podcast, she has helped me open up.
"I remember the first song I played to her was Closer to Fine by the Indigo Girls, with its lyric ‘And the best thing you ever done for me/ Is to help me take my life less seriously’. And that’s what she did. I was really wound up and she’s like, ‘What if we just laughed?’”
Tagged in Idris Elba Kate Winslet Jessica Chastain