India, July 26 -- Helen Mirren turns 80 on Saturday, July 26, 2025, and she is marking the occasion with the man who has been by her side for nearly three decades - director Taylor Hackford. The two have been married for 27 years, though marriage was not something Mirren ever saw as essential.

"I always said I have nothing against marriage," she told AARP back in 2016.

"It just wasn't to my taste, like turnips. I just had to meet the right turnip," she said. That "right turnip" turned out to be Hackford, who she met on the set of his 1985 film White Nights.

They got married in 1997, a full decade after they began dating. "We got married in the end because we realized that we were going to be together forever," Mirren said.

While Mirre...