Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell's Relationship Timeline

The secret to an everlasting Hollywood love story? Not getting married, apparently. Just ask Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell, who never tied the knot over the span of their 40-year relationship.

For those who find that to be unromantic, Hawn and Russell — who have both been married before — would argue otherwise. “If you have independence, if you have enough money and sense of independence and you like your independence, there’s something psychological about not being married because it gives you the freedom to make decisions one way or the other,” Hawn once said during a 2016 interview, adding: “For me, I chose to stay, Kurt chose to stay, and we like the choice.”

It's a choice they've been making since 1983. While the two first met on the set of Disney's live-action movie musical The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band in 1966, they didn't start dating until 17 years later. At that time, Goldie and Kurt were both divorced with kids from their previous marriages, and since blending their families, they welcomed a son, Wyatt, and share seven grandchildren.

Here, take a look back at Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell's relationship.

1966: Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell meet for the first time.

Goldie and Russell originally met while filming Disney's 1968 live-action movie musical The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band. She was 21, he was 16 — and while the actress thought he was too young to date at the time, she remembered him making a strong first impression.

"I thought he was adorable but he was much too young," the actress said in 2012. "And then, years later, we met up again and I liked him and I remembered that I liked him very much when I first met him. But we both said we would never go out with another actor, so it just shows you never can tell."

1983: Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell reconnect on the set of Swing Shift and start dating.

Nearly two decades after they first met, Goldie and Kurt reconnected again on the set of Swing Shift, where Russell made the first move with a cringe-worthy pick-up line.

"I didn't know Goldie at all outside of having worked with her many years before," he recalled to Conan O'Brien of meeting Hawn again. "I just didn't know in my mind what I was going to see. She had a great body, and so the first that came out was 'Man, you got a great figure.' And it kind of came out quickly and it could've been wrong and she said, 'Why, thank you.'"

Soon after, they went on their first date at the Playboy Club in Los Angeles and their wild night ended with the police walking in on them having sex at a home Hawn was renovating at the time. "We eventually found our way upstairs, looking around at imaginary furniture, and we were in the imaginary bedroom, now, and we are realistically having sex," Russell said.

He added, "The police walked in because we had to break into the place to get in. That was our first date. It was a lot of fun, I'll tell you what. I can't believe it was a long time ago."

July 1986: Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell welcome their first child together. 

On July 10, 1986, Hawn and Russell welcomed their first child together, a son named Wyatt Russell. Goldie was already a mom to two children — Kate and Oliver — from her previous marriage with Bill Hudson, while Kurt shared a son, Boston, with his ex-wife Season Hubley.

1987: Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell return to the big screen with Overboard.

In 1987, Goldie and Kurt took their real-life chemistry to the big screen and starred in the movie that is perhaps their best known: Overboard. In the film, Hawn plays a wealthy heiress who loses her memory and is convinced by the carpenter she fired, Russell, that they're married.

More than 30 years later, the pair watched the movie together unplanned in 2020. "It was us! It was us in Overboard," she said of what was on the TV one night during an appearance on Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen. "So, the two of us forgot what we were gonna do, and we ended up watching the movie."

"It was so fabulous ... how we started looking at what we did together," Hawn added. "It was great!"

March 1989: Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell have a memorable moment onstage at the Oscars. 

Goldie and Kurt almost left the 1989 Academy Awards engaged after presenting the Best Directing award. Kicking off their introduction, Hawn told the audience, “We fit in completely to the theme of the show. Because we’re co-stars, we’re compadres, we’re companions and we’re a couple.” Kurt then said, “There’s only one thing we’re not … married,” to which his partner asked, “Is that a proposal?”

Following cheers from the crowd, the actor then changed the subject, adding: "Oh, they want us to speed things up ... listen, we'll talk about it later tonight." Hawn jokingly replied, "We will talk about that later."

September 1996: Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell attend the First Wives Club premiere with their children. 

Russell — along with his and Hawn's three children, Kate, Oliver, and Wyatt — hit the red carpet at the New York premiere of The First Wives Club in support of Hawn, who starred in the film alongside Bette Midler and Diane Keaton.

January 2004: Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell become first-time grandparents.

Hawn and Russell became grandparents when Goldie's daughter Kate welcomed her first child, Ryder Robinson, with her then-husband Chris Robinson on January 8, 2004.

June 2015: Goldie Hawn shares the secret to her long-lasting relationship with Kurt Russell. 

During an interview with Porter magazine in 2015, Hawn talked about what makes her relationship with Russell work after so many years together. "A lasting relationship isn’t about marriage. It’s about compatibility and communication. And you both need to want it to work,” Hawn explained. “If one person does not want it to work, it isn’t going to work. Intention is the key. It’s also about not losing yourself in each other. Being together, two pillars holding up the house and the roof, and being different, not having to agree on everything, learning how to deal with not agreeing. Everything’s a choice.”

May 2017: Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell are both honored with stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

In 2017, Goldie and Kurt both received stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles. At the ceremony, the two shared a kiss by their neighboring stars, and in a heartfelt speech, Russell said he would always "cherish" Hawn.

"Simply put, Goldie, I cherish you. All the stars in the sky or on the boulevard can't hold a candle to that," he said. "There's no one else I'd rather be next to for all of that than Goldie Hawn."

November 2018: Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell co-star in The Christmas Chronicles.

Three decades after filming Overboard, Goldie and Kurt made on-screen magic again as Mrs. and Mr. Clause in Netflix's The Christmas Chronicles. Their son, Oliver, also made a cameo in the film.

July 2023: Goldie Hawn explains why she and Kurt Russell never got married. 

Goldie and Kurt not being married has long been a topic of discussion in the media over the years. In July 2023, the actress explained that the idea of divorce is partially what deterred them from making it official in the first place. “It’s always ugly,” the actress said of divorce during an interview with CNN's Chris Wallace. “Somebody actually has to take a look and say, ‘How many divorces actually are fun? How many divorces actually don’t cost money? How many divorces actually make you hate the person more than you did before? How many divorces have hurt children?’"

She added, "I like the idea that I can wake up in the morning and make decisions every day if I want to be here.”