Emma Thompson Reveals the Real-Life Heartbreak That Inspired THAT Love Actually Scene

Dame Emma Thompson has revealed her real-life heartbreak that inspired her highly emotional reaction in that famous scene from Love Actually.

The actress, 63, played Alan Rickman’s on-screen wife in the romantic comedy film and a famous scene sees her find out that her husband is cheating on her.

In the heartbreaking moment, Emma’s character Karen breaks down in tears when she realizes that her husband, Harry, has bought a necklace for another woman.

She had previously discovered the beautiful necklace in her husband’s jacket pocket, but was later devastated when he gave her a Joni Mitchell CD for Christmas.

Karen then excuses herself and collapses in her bedroom before wiping away her tears and returning to join her husband and two smiling children.

Emotional: The actress, 63, played Alan Rickman’s on-screen wife in the rom-com flick and a famous scene sees her find out her husband is cheating on her

And Emma has revealed that her own real-life heartbreak actually inspired her highly emotional reaction to the 2003 Christmas classic.

She shared that while filming the moment, she channeled her feelings of betrayal after her very public break with her first husband, Sir Kenneth Branagh.

Emma and Kenneth married in 1989 and were the golden couple of the British acting scene until Kenneth had an affair with Helena Bonham Carter while directing her in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

Speaking of her devastation, Emma said her heart had been broken “very badly” and that she understood what it was like to find “the necklace that wasn’t for me”.

“That scene where my character is standing by the bed crying is very well known because it’s something everyone has been through,” he said at a fundraiser in 2018.

‘Ken broke my heart so much. Then I knew what it was like to find the necklace that wasn’t for me.

‘Well, it wasn’t exactly that, but we’ve all been there.’

Emma and Kenneth were married just two years after they met, but his affair with Helena ended their six-year marriage in 1995.

‘We’ve all been there’: Emma was left heartbroken when her first husband, Sir Kenneth Branagh (pictured 1993), had an affair with Helena Bonham Carter

Subject: Helena is believed to have started an affair with Kenneth in 1994 while playing his love interest in his version of Frankenstein. They continued to have a five-year relationship.

Helena is believed to have started an affair with Kenneth in 1994 while playing his love interest in her version of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. They continued to have a five-year relationship.

It’s not the first time Emma has spoken of her upset after finding out about the affair, having previously admitted that she felt “unfriendly” after the end of her first marriage.

she told the New Yorker: ‘I was completely blind to the fact that he had relationships with other women on set.

‘What I learned was how easy it is to be blinded by your own desire to fool yourself.’

He was half alive. Any sense of being a lovable or dignified person was completely gone,” he added.

Two years before Helena met Kenneth and began their affair, he had worked with Emma in the 1992 romantic drama film Howard’s End.

From the subject, the couple also worked together on the Harry Potter series, with Emma playing Professor Trelawney and Helena playing Bellatrix Lestrange.

However, Emma previously admitted that she had “forgave” Helena over the affair, saying in 2013 that they had “made amends” years ago.

Revealing how she bounced back from the devastation, Emma said it was her now-husband of 27 years, Greg Wise, who “picked up the pieces and put them back together.”

Moving on: Emma has previously admitted that she has “forgave” Helena (both pictured) over the affair, saying in 2013 that they had “made amends” years ago.

Love: Revealing how she bounced back from the devastation, Emma said it was her now-husband of 27 years Greg Wise (pictured Feb. 19) who ‘picked up the pieces’

Reflecting on her marriage to Greg, she added: “I’ve learned more from my second marriage simply by being married. As my mother says, “The first twenty years are the hardest.”

Emma met Greg while filming Sense and Sensibility in 1995, which won a Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay.

However, the news of her and Kenneth’s breakup had not yet been made public at the time she was filming the period drama.

Emma and Greg now share a daughter Gaia, 23, and a son Tindyebwa. The couple adopted their son Tindyebwa, a former child soldier in Rwanda, in 2003 when he was 16.