Jealous Burt Reynolds refused to accompany Sally Field when she won 1st Oscar

Burt Reynolds may have claimed that Sally Field was the “the love of his life,” but she has described how he didn’t treat her in the most loving way when they were a Hollywood golden couple and she was nominated for her first Academy Award for her career-changing performance in the 1979 film “Norma Rae.”

In a new book about Academy Awards history, Field said that Reynolds, her boyfriend at the time, “was not happy” with the buzz she was receiving for playing a union organizer in “Norma Rae” — a role that completed her transition from perky TV and film comedy star to a serious actor cast in and major movies.

“He really was not a nice guy around me then,” said the two-time winner of the best actress trophy in the new book “50 Oscar Nights,” by Dave Karger, People reported.

Ahead of the 52nd Academy Awards ceremony in 1980, the 77-year-old Field said that Reynolds “was not going to go” as her date, People reported. She was left to rely on her friends, actor and comedian David Steinberg and his then-wife, Judy, to take her.

“David said, ‘Well, for God’s sakes, we’ll take you,’” Field said in the book. “He and Judy made it a big celebration. They picked me up in a limousine and had champagne in the car. They made it just wonderful fun.”

Reynolds’ refusal to play the role of Field’s red-carpet escort shouldn’t have come as a surprise, given that he had not been enthusiastic about her participation in “Norma Rae,” she said in the book, People reported.

“He did not want me to go to Cannes (Film Festival) at all,” Field said in the book. When it came to the Academy Awards, Field said Reynolds told her, “You don’t think you’re going to win anything, do you?”

Field has opened up before about her “complicated” relationship with Reynolds, who died in September 2018 at the age of 82. The relationship began when Reynolds cast her as his romantic lead in his 1977 hit action comedy “Smokey and the Bandit” and ended in 1982.

In the years since, Field and Reynolds have offered different takes on their storied but tumultuous romance. While promoting his 2015 autobiography, “But Enough About Me,” Reynolds expressed regret that things didn’t work out between them. In interviews, he described her as “the love of his life” and said, “I think we would have been very happy.”

Several months before his death, Reynolds also claimed on the “Today” show that he admired Field’s talent, finding it sexy. That’s why he cast her in “Smoky and the Bandit,” he told Hoda Kotb.

Field clearly felt differently, telling People in 2016 that they had not stayed in contact. She also explained to the New York Times in 2018 that their relationship was “loving” but “really complicated and hurtful to me.”

In her memoir, “In Pieces,” which was released shortly after Reynolds’ death, Field portrayed him as charismatic and swaggering, the New York Times reported. Their connection was “intense,” according to the memoir. In other interviews, Field said it thrilled her that Reynolds, then one of Hollywood’s reigning sex symbols, thought her attractive enough to be his love interest in “Smokey and the Bandit.”

“He gave me a feeling that I was sexy, and I wanted to be everything he ever wanted,” said Field. “(But) that was terrible, because what happened is that I stopped existing. I dressed for him, looked for him, walked for him.”

According to her memoir, Field eventually found that Reynolds could be controlling. He accepted certain aspects of her life and personality, but disapproved of others. She said he asked her to marry him “many times,” and they starred together in several more light-hearted comedies, including the 1980 “Smokey and the Bandit” sequel.

But they parted ways, in part because she felt his heart wasn’t into getting married, the New York Times reported. She also said he had begun to regularly use Percodan, Valium and barbiturates, enough that she became concerned about his physical and mental health. But he dismissed her concerns and said he wouldn’t consider going to therapy.

As their relationship struggled, Field’s career took a turn towards more dramatic, prestigious roles. After winning her first Oscar for “Norma Rae” in 1980, she won her second for “Places in the Heart” in 1984. By that time, they had broken up, and Reynolds’ career waned somewhat. It rebounded briefly in the late 1990s when he won an Oscar nomination for supporting actor, playing a paternal adult film director in Paul Thomas Anderson’s “Boogie Nights,” an acclaimed epic about the 1970s porn industry.

After Reynolds’ death, Field said she was left with a confusing mix of “feelings and nostalgia.” In a statement, she said: “There are times in your life that are so indelible, they never fade away. They stay alive, even forty years later. My years with Burt never leave my mind. He will be in my history and my heart, for as long as I live.”

But she also admitted to the New York Times that she was happy he would never read her memoir, including the way she described him as controlling and compared him to her abusive stepfather.

“This would hurt him,” she said. “I felt glad that he wasn’t going to read it, he wasn’t going to be asked about it, and he wasn’t going to have to defend himself or lash out, which he probably would have. I did not want to hurt him any further.”