Claire Danes Reveals 'A Scary Thing' About Her Unfaithful Past—Find Out What Blockbuster Movie Role She Turned Down

Stern felt the need to bring up the past, namely, Claire’s decision to start dating Billy Crudup, 47, back in 2003. At the time, the Almost Famous actor was heavily involved with Mary-Louise Parker, his girlfriend of eight years, who was actually seven months pregnant with his son at the time.

Stern’s tiptoe approach around the subject matter was curious, as he gently asked Claire if it was “a scary thing” for her, with people being so “goddamn judgmental” of her actions back then—as though it were unfair that she was scrutinized.

Chances are it was a lot more scary for the very pregnant Mary-Louise to lose her man, but the Temple Grandin actress agreed that it was, in fact, terrifying for her to steal someone else’s longtime boyfriend, saying “That was a scary thing, that was really hard.”

When Stern asked if the 36-year-old actress thought it may have been a bad move career wise, she expressed no remorse, although she did begin to stutter, “Yeah, I don’t know…I mean I…I could..I didn’t know how to not…do that. I just was in love with him and needed to explore that.”

The Emmy Award-winning actress happily dated Crudup for three years before cheating on him with her Evening costar—now  current husband—Hugh Dancy, with whom she shares a two-year-old son.

Claire also shared a little known tidbit with Stern, admitting that she turned down the role of Rose in the mega-hit Titanic, since she’d already acted with Leonardo DiCaprio in the 1996 romantic tragedy Romeo+Juliet. She felt that acting with him again in another love story so soon “seemed redundant.” It’s safe to say that’s probably one decision she regrets!