Eric Roberts knows how to keep the spark alive.
68-year-old Robert openly revealed the secret of his 32-year marital life with his wife Eliza Roberts.
“My wife doesn’t like this answer, but I will give it,” Roberts told The Post exclusively on Tuesday’s “Dancing With the Stars.” “She will get mad at me.”
Despite Eliza's protests, the actor advised maintaining a strong relationship between him and his wife, whom he married in 1992.
“Honesty, but don't use words that don't mean anything. Honesty is hard. And so is sex,” Roberts said.
The couple first met on a flight from New York City to Los Angeles and have remained friends ever since, as Roberts was in a relationship at the time. After that, the Oscar-nominated couple welcomed their daughter Emma Roberts in 1991 with his then-girlfriend Kelly Cunningham, but split just a few months later.
That same year, Roberts began dating Eliza.
“I was in another relationship at the time,” he told Howard Stern in 1994. “I'm reading a script, she's reading a script, I tell her who my favorite writer is, the name is David Rayfield … he's her father.”
And 26 years later, Roberts is still as in love as ever.
“My wife is my hero,” he said.Love, Drugs and Hollywood, podcast in 2020. “She's smarter than me and she's just as talented as me and more so. She's prettier than me… and she's taught me how to be an adult to some extent.”
The 'Wrong Cops' star added: “She saved me from my ridiculous, stupid childhood, and that's something I really treasure.”
In an interview with 2022 The Hollywood ReporterRoberts said his wife manages his schedule and he receives multiple project offers every day.
“We're always moving things around,” Eliza told the outlet. “It's so weird. But considering they give you all these brain exercises to keep your brain sharp as you get older… I don't think we need them!”
Despite a strong marriage and being a father, Roberts recently admitted that he wasn't fully prepared to be a parent to the 33-year-old “American Horror Story” star following his split from Cunningham.
“I left Kelly when Emma was just seven months old,” Roberts writes of his former partner and daughter in his new memoir, “Runaway Train: Or, the Story of My Life So Far.” Entertainment Weekly“We went through a lot, and (Kelly) saw me at my worst – yet she stayed for a while, although I'm sure she questioned whether she should. We both wanted a child – maybe I wanted it more than she did – but we both wanted to be parents.”
The “Star 80” alum also recalled the excitement of being a young father, despite its shortcomings. “I loved my little daughter with the strength of Hercules, despite my own weaknesses,” Roberts wrote. “However, I couldn't handle the realities of an infant coming into my life, and I couldn't handle the job of being a parent! I'm still not much of a father. Emma, on the other hand, certainly knows what that role is — now grown and a mother herself. She is that person for her first child, Rhodes.”
At one point, there were rumors that her sister Julia Roberts had become involved in her separation from Cunningham due to the custody battle for Emma, causing tension between the two.
But this is far from the truth.
“The question has always been asked whether Julia and I had a huge custody battle over Emma. I want to clear that up once and for all,” Roberts said. “I never thought of myself as someone who deserved physical custody of Emma, not in a million years. We both knew better. Kelly never claimed I was trying to get physical custody of Emma, so Julia never took Kelly's side in the custody battle. There really was no custody battle. I'm just happy to have this matter settled.”
Roberts credited her sister with helping the former spouses financially during their separation.
“When Kelly and I separated, we had to arrange for child support and visitation,” the star explained. “The legal fees were enormous, and I paid as much as I could for Kelly's lawyer and my lawyer. Thankfully, Julia helped out for Emma's sake and because she could. I appreciate that so much.”
