Pierce Brosnan has given a rare interview addressing the deaths of his first wife, Cassandra Harris, and his daughter, Charlotte.
Cassandra, an Australian-born actress, passed away in 1991 from ovarian cancer, and more than two decades later, in 2013, their daughter, Charlotte, was taken by the same disease.
Charlotte and her brother Christopher – Cassie’s children from a previous marriage – were adopted by Pierce after their father’s death in 1986. The children chose to take the Brosnan name.
Speaking to Esquire magazine, while promoting his new show The Son, the 63-year-old actor explained that the twin tragedies have indeed affected his outlook on life.
“I don’t look at the cup as half full, believe me,” he told the publication. “The dark, melancholy Irish black dog sits beside me from time to time.”
The 63-year-old actor adopted late-wife Cassie’s kids in 1986.
Speaking shortly after his daughter’s death, Pierce told People: “Charlotte fought her cancer with grace and humanity, courage and dignity. Our hearts are heavy with the loss of our beautiful dear girl.”
“We pray for her and that the cure for this wretched disease will be close at hand soon.”
Pierce is pictured with daughter Charlotte in 2006.
The star, who is perhaps most well known for his portrayal of the iconic character James Bond, from 1994 to 2005, also opened up about his tumultuous upbringing.
He explained that his father, Thomas Brosnan, abandoned him and his family when he was just an infant living in Ireland. His mother soon left too – in search of work in London – leaving Pierce to live with relatives before moving into a share-room in a boardinghouse.
“There were two lodgers — workingmen, one in the factory and one in the sawmill,” he said. “I had a metal bed with a curtain around it…. That was my room and my haven and my space.”
Pierce remarried in 2001 to Keely Shaye Smith.
Pierce, who remarried in 2001 to Keely Shaye Smith, a journalist and television personality, now splits his time between the couple’s two homes in Malibu and Hawaii.
But he admits a “big house” isn’t necessary.
“You don’t need a big home. You need a good table to sit at, a good bed to sleep in, a view, and a great bottle of wine.”
