Neil Patrick Harris Has A Romantic History With Ben Stiller's Wife Christine Taylor
What better way to celebrate Pride Month than looking back to before actor Neil Patrick Harris came out of the closet? Kidding aside, it's almost hard to imagine a time when Harris — who is married to longtime love David Burtka and has two children with him — was not public about his sexuality.
Of course, the Tony-winning actor first came to prominence when he was cast as the medical prodigy lead character in "Doogie Howser, M.D.," which ran from 1989 to 1993. He was just 16 years old when the show premiered (math: birth year = 1973, 1989-1973 = 16), and Harris later revealed in his 2014 autobiography (via Out) that he knew he was attracted to the same sex from a young age, yet dated women for a long time and considered himself to be bisexual. In the book, the "How I Met Your Mother" actor divulged that an on-set "joke" kiss from Burt Reynolds in a 1989 episode of "B.L. Stryker" helped confirm his homosexuality.
It was during his in-the-closet era that Harris was linked to another celebrity's wife — Ben Stiller's future spouse, actor Christine Taylor!
Neil Patrick Harris saw his lack of 'spark' with Christine Taylor as a sign
As you can already guess, it didn't really work out between young actors Neil Patrick Harris and Christine Taylor when they dated back in the day. While Harris was raking in that network sitcom money, Taylor scored her breakout role as Marcia Brady in 1995's "The Brady Bunch Movie" and went on to star alongside her future husband, Ben Stiller, in "Zoolander." The couple got together in 1997, but their relationship lasted one year with them splitting in 1998. In a 2008 interview on "The Howard Stern Show" (via E! News), Harris reflected on their relationship, definitely putting most of the blame on himself for the breakup.
"She's like the coolest, nicest chick ever," he gushed about the "Dodgeball" actor. "She's an absolute catch, and I thought, 'If I'm not going to feel the super sparks with her ... then it probably means that I'm gay.'"
Fortunately, Harris would soon discover his true sexual identity, and Taylor went on to meet her husband, Stiller, on the set of an unaired pilot in 1999. Before Taylor, the Emmy-winning actor briefly dated his "Doogie Howser" love interest, Robyn Lively, who also happens to be Blake Lively's half-sister. She went on to marry Bart Johnson (who played Zach Efron's dad in "High School Musical"). It's a pretty small world, after all!
Neil Patrick Harris' coming out was complicated
Well, Neil Patrick Harris wasn't the one who initially chose to come out due to pressure from infamous gossip blogger Perez Hilton. The Broadway actor recalled in a retrospective with The Hollywood Reporter in 2020 how the blogger was triggered by a 2006 interview that wrote that Harris' publicist denied he was gay by saying he "was 'not of that persuasion.'" After Hilton uploaded posts to his website questioning Harris "and asking people to come forward with truths or stories," the actor felt like he "needed" to release a "decisive" statement on his sexuality. In 2006, he exclusively revealed to People that he was "a very content gay man."
At the time of his coming out, Harris was nearly two years into his relationship with then-boyfriend David Burtka. In a 2013 interview on HuffPost Live (via E! News), the "Uncoupled" actor reflected that he also, in part, felt compelled to come out in order to not "disrespect" or hide his relationship with Burtka. The two went on to make their red carpet debut as a couple at the 2007 Emmy Awards.
Happily wed and a father of two, Harris shared in a 2019 interview with AP that he feels content with his life and not trying to represent himself as the end-all-be-all of the LGBTQIA+ community. "I think normal is a very subjective term, especially in the gay community," he commented. "I legitimately have no interest in being a representative or an ambassador for anything except my kids."