Winona Ryder Reveals She Once Professed Her Love to Al Pacino — and the Unexpected Way He Let Her Down

Winona Ryder fondly reminisced on the days she worked alongside Al Pacino, revealing she was absolutely smitten with the box office superstar after signing on to appear in his 1996 directorial debut, Looking for Richard.

The Stranger Things actress was in her early 20s at the time while the Godfather star was in his 50s — and the pair bonded while touring unique coffee spots in the Big Apple together.

“I was absolutely in love with Al Pacino when I was working with him. We were doing that workshop for Richard III, which I didn’t know was gonna be a movie. I was actively in love with him. He was obsessed with coffee, and he would take me all over New York – like, to the weirdest places — to try different coffees,” she shared in a new interview with Elle UK.

Ryder, 53, portrayed Lady Anne next to Pacino, 85, who tackled the title role in the documentary-drama film..

“Finally, he’s dropping me off wherever I’m staying, and I’m like, ‘I love you, you know. I really am completely in love with you,’” Ryder, shared, revealing his sympathetic response. “And he was like — she pretends to be Pacino reaching out to touch her hand pityingly – ‘Aw, honey, noooo.’”

Ryder and Pacino would go on to work together again, both appearing in the 2002 flick S1m0ne.

The Beetlejuice Beetlejuice star said that around 10 years after Looking for Richard, she met Pacino’s girlfriend, “who’s younger than me.”

It’s speculated she was referring to the Scarface icon’s former girlfriend Lucila Solá — whom he dated from 2008 to 2018 — although she didn’t clarify.

“Dude, I’m f**king throwing myself at you,” Ryder confessed to thinking at the time. She laughed at her infatuation with the actor, then shared, “I still play poker with him sometimes. It’s the best.”

Pacino was last romantically involved with 31-year-old Noor Alfallah and the now-exes welcomed a son in June 2023. The former couple’s relationship began in April 2022 but they called it quits shortly after the birth of their child.

Pacino — a dad of four — also shares a 35-year-old daughter with acting coach Jan Tarrant and 24-year-old twins with actress Beverly D’Angelo.

As for Ryder, she has been in a relationship with fashion designer Scott Mackinlay Hahn since 2011, one year after the pair met at the premiere of her hit movie Black Swan.

In the decades since her collaboration with Pacino, both stars have continued to show their acting prowess, with the famed movie mobster appearing in the 2025 horror film The Ritual.

Meanwhile, fans are counting down the days until Ryder returns as Joyce Byers in the highly anticipated fifth and final season of Stranger Things, which is set to be released later this year.