• December 25, 2000
• Vol. 54
• No. 27

Meg Ryan

A Romance with Russell Crowe Capsizes Her Good-Girl Image

She never wanted to be America's Sweetheart. In a decade atop Hollywood's A-list, the 39-year-old actress has tried plenty to shake off her perky persona—whether playing an alcoholic (in '94's When a Man Loves a Woman) or a stripper (in '98's Hurlyburly) or just striking sexy poses for magazines. But until this year Meg Ryan's efforts have been as futile as a gust of wind to that famous mop of tousled hair, in part because she seemed so content, holed up at home in Los Angeles or Paradise Valley, Mont., with her husband of nine years, actor Dennis Quaid, 46, and their son Jack, 8. Hurt by her own parents' 1976 divorce, Ryan strove to make her family life a model of stability, scheduling work so that either she or Quaid was always home with Jack. But the idyll unraveled in June, when she was caught cuddling on the Concorde, embracing in Ecuador and slow-dancing at a London pub with Russell Crowe, 36, the roguish Aussie star of Gladiator and her leading man in this month's Proof of Life.

A June 28 statement from Ryan and Quaid announcing their "mutual and amicable" parting did little to bring Ryan support, for friends described Quaid as being devastated at home. A sweetheart no longer, Ryan suddenly felt, she told Win November, like "the Scarlet Woman." Vowing never to discuss the details of her separation, however, she simply said, "My marriage was broken. Nobody else broke it up." Today the soon-to-be ex-couple are showing a united front. They will share custody of Jack, and a Ryan associate predicts "it will probably be one of the easiest divorces in Hollywood." Now between projects, Ryan has begun life anew in an $8.9 million house in Bel Air. She is asking for neither sympathy nor spin. "Let my image be what it is," she said last month. "That's just part of the job."