Find Out Why Married Actors Exchanged Steamy Love Letters

In a recent interview, actress Naomi Watts revealed to Vogue Australia that she and co-star Matthew McConaughey became unusually close while filming their indie flick, The Sea of Trees.

In real life, both Watts and McConaughey are in committed relationships. The Texas actor has been married to Brazilian model Camila Alves since 2012, while the Aussie actress has been with her partner, Liev Schreiber, since 2005. McConaughey and Alves share three children together, while Watts and Schreiber have two sons.

Neither Watts nor McConaughey had ample time to prepare for their roles in which they played a married couple, so they thought it was best to write steamy love letters to one another.

Watts recalled reaching out to the 45-year-old actor saying, “We didn’t have any time to prep for the movie so when Matthew reached out to me via email, I said: ‘Do you mind if we write to each other in character?’ And he wrote back and said: ‘Write at will, Joan.”

Naomi went on to explain how the exchange of letters improved the intimacy of their characters. She told Vogue Australia,

“So we proceeded to create this relationship through letters. Some would be just a few lines or something fairly benign, and then other times it would be a long letter about how we failed and how we need to change and accusations of giving up; the same old story, your classic marriage problems. Sometimes we would write poetry, sometimes love letters, sometimes stormy letters, sometimes I would leave a voice recording as Joan knowing he was going to be shooting in the forest that day. It was great.”

The Sea of Trees, a drama mystery film directed by Gus Van Sant, was met with harsh critical reception at its May 2015 Cannes Film Festival debut. So maybe the role playing didn’t work as well as they’d hoped it would.

Do you think that married actors exchanging love letters is too intimate, or a great way for two stars to get into character? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.