Alec Baldwin has spent the last few months alongside his family. The 63-year-old actor has six children with his wife, Hilaria, with the oldest being 8-year-old Carmen.
In recent months, Alec Baldwin has been in the spotlight following the tragic accident on the set of the film Rust, where the actor’s prop gun had a live bullet in it and by mistake killed a cinematographer on set. It was an immense tragedy, but now, Baldwin is set to continue his acting career after the horrific accident.
But heading back to work hasn’t been a walk in the park for Baldwin. Through his social media, the actor shared an emotional confession when on his way to work – and it turns out to be one of the hardest things he could ever go through.
Alec Baldwin started working as an actor in his 20s. Born on April 3, 1958 in Amityville, New York, he majored in political science at George Washington University. But at that point, it didn’t look like he was destined to head into the acting business
Alec Baldwin – acting career
But in fact, Baldwin had a great love for acting since his childhood days and decided to pursue a career in the field. After studying at New York University’s drama department – and working as a busboy at the legendary Studio 54 nightclub – he got his breakthrough in the television series The Doctors in 1980.
After years of doing television, Baldwin moved on to work on Broadway in several productions before switching back to the screen. However, it wasn’t only television he was concerned with by that stage.
Baldwin scored roles in Tim Burton’s 1988 film Beetlejuice, Miami Blues, and Glengarry Glen Ross.
In 2004, he received his first – and still only – Academy Award nomination for Best Actor in a Supporting Role in The Cooler.
Since then, Baldwin has proven that he’s a fantastic actor able to play all kinds of characters and be the big star on TV shows, including Emmy-winning work on 30 Rock and Saturday Night Live, where he delivered his now-legendary Donald Trump impression.
Alec Baldwin – wife Hilaria & children
Many know about his great performances across film, television, and Broadway. At the same time, though, Baldwin has been able to keep his private life relatively quiet, despite various happenings over the years that threatened to blow up.
In 2012, Alec Baldwin married his second wife, Hilaria. The couple met at a New York restaurant in 2011 and have welcomed six children.
“I was standing near the door with my friends when he walked up and took my hand and said, ‘I must know you,’” Hilaria recalled of their first meeting. “‘You must know me?’” she replied, adding that Baldwin gave her his card.
“Do you guys know that he shook my hand for six weeks and didn’t kiss me when we met,” she said on Ellen. “He would tell me all these things about like, ‘I’m going to marry you. I’m going to spend the rest of my life with you. We’re going to have a ton of kids,’ and then he would shake my hand at the end of the night.”
But in November of 2021, Baldwin made headlines after a horrific accident.
Alec Baldwin – horrific accident on the movie set
As he was filming the movie Rust in Mexico, Baldwin’s prop gun discharged a live bullet, killing the cinematographer Halya Hutchins and injuring the director, Joel Souza.
“Someone put a live bullet in a gun, a bullet that wasn’t even supposed to be on the property,” Baldwin claimed at the time. “Someone is responsible for what happened, and I can’t say who that is, but I know it’s not me.”
“I don’t know what happened on that set. I don’t know how that bullet arrived in that gun, I don’t know,” he added, “But I’m all for doing anything that will take us to a place where this is less likely to happen again.”
Alec Baldwin turned over his mobile phone to police investigating the fatal shooting. His lawyers were seeking to dismiss a lawsuit, with producers of the film saying it was a “workplace accident.”
As of now, nothing has been decided in court about what will happen moving forward. Baldwin has spent the last number of months with his family. But now, he’s returning to work for the first time after the incident.
Through his Instagram page, Alec Baldwin shared an emotional video recorded at the airport on his way to the new filming project. It’s not yet been revealed what the project is about. However, The Sun reports that Alec Baldwin will be the lead in the upcoming film 97 Minutes.
Emotional new confession
Baldwin told his followers that he was going on a work trip in his video message. The 63-year-old actor made an emotional confession about life, saying how leaving his beloved wife Hilary and their six children is very difficult and “very sad.”
Baldwin further admitted that he hadn’t been able to get much rest, saying that his eyes are “still so puffy.” Leaving his family is tough, and the fact that Baldwin’s eldest child with Hilary is eight years old is “unbelievable” to him.
“I don’t have anything else in my life. I really don’t have anything else in my life that matters to me on that scale, and I really mean that. I’m not asking anyone to pin any medals on me, but I just haven’t done anything else in my life that even remotely means anything to me,” Baldwin said, adding that he’s tried to work as little as possible in the last five years because of his responsibilities at home.
Alec Baldwin concluded the emotional video encouraging his followers to cherish all their time with loved ones.
“I hate to leave my family. I’m turning down jobs I think I shouldn’t do because I hate to be away from my kids. I hate to be away from my wife and kids. I’m on my way to go on a trip and leave my family – it’s not that long – but I hate it. I really hate it,” he said, adding that he feels very fortunate to come home and have his kids “mesmerize” him.
“Hug your kids and love your kids”
“They pull me into a world I never dreamed I would be a part of. It’s unbelievable. I have a good partner. Hug your kids and love your kids and make every day count,” Alec Baldwin said.
Alec Baldwin sure has a lot of love for his children. Besides being the father of six young children, he also has an older daughter, Ireland, from his first marriage to Kim Bssinger.
But that part of his life is entirely different from what the actor is used to today. It was mainly because it involved a lot of drama and bad blood between the family members.
Alec was in the middle of conquering Hollywood when he met his first wife, Kim Basinger when the two worked on the 1990 film The Marrying Man.
According to the film’s director, Jerry Rees, it seemed like Baldwin and Basinger had a connection even before they met for the first time.
Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Basinger saw her and Baldwin’s pictures alongside each other in Rees’ office and remarked: “We are going to make a terrific couple.”
As it happened, it didn’t take long before Baldwin and Basinger actually became a couple, though things didn’t go that great at first.
Alec Baldwin’s first wife, Kim Basinger
The two were out for dinner, discussing films when Baldwin suddenly took it upon himself to make a rather grand and romantic gesture.
“He kissed me and then asked me if I wanted kids,” Basinger recalled in an interview with People. In response, she called him “psychotic” and said that he should instead focus on the movie.
Baldwin went on to call his friend, saying that Basinger was “driving me insane,” and, “we’re getting married.”
It turned out Baldwin was right. In 1993, the couple married at his Long Island beach house. Two years later, daughter Ireland was born. Then, in 1994, the couple reached the zenith of Hollywood status when they headlined Saturday Night Live together in what became a classic monologue.
“The reason I fell in love with Kim is that she’s so odd,” Baldwin told Variety in 2000. “With that kind of beauty, this is a woman who could have married the head of a studio or a big director or a movie star who gets $20 million a movie.”
“She could have everyone shining her ass 24 hours a day. She could have played ball. But she’s a very odd woman. I’ve done plays by Tennessee Williams; he was really able to enunciate certain southern characters. I’m from Long Island — I never really knew they existed. But my wife is one of those people — an absolutely maddeningly peculiar, exotic, lovely person.”
Alec Baldwin’s relationship with daughter Ireland Baldwin
It seemed like Baldwin and his wife Kim had a great marriage. But then, less than a year after the lovely words from Baldwin in the Variety interview, Kim filed for divorce.
“I’ve known for a year and a half that she was thinking about this,” Kim’s father, Don Basinger, told People. “I love Alec, he’s the most kind and generous man I’ve ever known in my life, and he’s overcome some very difficult things.
“All but one: his anger,” he added. “This has happened publicly. But it’s when it started happening in front of Ireland that Kim finally said, ‘Well, I’m not going to put up with that.’”
Daughter Ireland was just five years old when her parents went through with the divorce. Unfortunately, she ended up in the middle of a nasty court battle when Kim and Alec fought for custody of her.
Today, Alec and daughter Ireland’s relationship is back to “normal.” However, he still regrets that he never gave his daughter more time as she was growing up.
“You look at all the time that was lost … If you did an analysis of the actual days I spent with Ireland [when she was growing up], you’d be appalled at how little it was,” Baldwin said. Back then, the father-of-six was obsessed with work.
Ireland responded in a comedy roast
“Trying to make it in the business and not getting that right, never getting that right. I married somebody who was successful. She was a very successful actress. Kim was kind of peaking. She was 37, and I was 32. We got married. We both were working all the time. [Ireland] would go with Kim on location, and I would go and meet them. Then we got divorced. There was a very acrimonious custody battle. Painful. Painful.”
The voicemail became a very tough thing for Baldwin and his daughter to handle. Today, though, Ireland can look back on it with humor.
When she appeared on the Comedy Central Roast of her father, she once again brought the voicemail up.
“Hi Dad, I’m Ireland. It’s good to be here. I almost didn’t even know about it because I haven’t checked my voice mails from my dad from the last 12 years or something?” she jokingly said.
“I actually have a lot in common with the people in this roast,” she added. “Because like them, I don’t really know you that well either.”
It sure is tough to leave your family for a longer time, especially when you have small children. We wish Alec Baldwin all the best with his next project and hope he will see his children and wife soon.