Dick Van Dyke’s wife opens up about ‘curse of living to almost 100’

Cinema legend Dick Van Dyke has had a life many would covet but his wife has revealed it’s not all good as he nears 100.

Dick Van Dyke has experienced heartache in ageing.

The 99-year-old Hollywood legend spoke about how he’s lost special people in his life during a recent Q&A where he reflected on Ed Asner’s death in 2021 before they could make a remake of The Odd Couple.

“That would’ve been such fun, and we lost it,” said Van Dyke, per People. “I’ve lost a lot of friends.”

Watch the interview in the video player above.

“He’s outlived everybody,” Van Dyke’s wife, Arlene Silver, added at the event in Malibu, California.

“That’s the curse of living to almost 100,” she shared.

Dick Van Dyke after winning an Emmy last year. Photo by Amy Sussman/Getty Images

Dick Van Dyke and Arlene Silver at the 18th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards in 2012. Photo: AP Photo/Matt Sayles, file

But Silver, 53, also noted that Van Dyke is “still so positive” despite the deaths of so many of his friends and former co-stars.

When asked how he maintains a positive outlook on life, Van Dyke replied, “Well, life’s been good to me. I can’t complain.”

The Mary Poppins star has been married to Silver since 2012.

Van Dyke revealed last month how the couple make their marriage work despite their 46-year age gap.

“We get along so well,” he told People, as Silver added, “We just care about each other so much.”

“Everybody said it wouldn’t work,” Van Dyke recalled.

Along with a happy marriage, Van Dyke has kept up a healthy lifestyle that he’s said involves going to the gym multiple times a week.

“Somebody said, ‘To what do you attribute your age and physical condition?’ I’ve always exercised three days a week,” he shared in January on Ted Danson’s podcastWhere Everybody Knows Your Name.

Actors Dick Van Dyke and Julie Andrews in scene from film Mary Poppins'.

“We go to the gym still, and I think that’s why I’m not stove up like my equals,” Van Dyke said.

Danson, 77, told Van Dyke: “I would go to the same gym you did, and if I got there early enough, I would see you literally work out on some weight machine. And then, almost like you were doing circuit training, you would not walk to the next machine, you’d dance. You literally danced to the next machine.”

While his health is fine, Van Dyke faced a scary incident earlier this year when his home was threatened by the deadly Palisades Fire.

He and Silver did not evacuate their $US8 million house despite the blaze destroying other celebrity mansions in Malibu and adjacent areas.

When the fires hit the couple’s neighbourhood, Van Dyke tried to crawl to the car to escape. Luckily, his neighbours came to his aid at the time.

This story first appeared in the New York Post and was republished with permission.

Originally published as Dick Van Dyke’s wife opens up about ‘curse of living to almost 100’