Ellen Barkin: 57. Her boyfriend: 26!

Inter-generational rapport ... Ellen Barkin and Sam Levinson at this year's Sundance film festival.

Writer/director Sam Levinson has opened up about his love for girlfriend Ellen Barkin, saying the straight-talking actress is "not that tough" in real life.
The couple's romance hit the headlines earlier this year, when it emerged the Ocean's Thirteen star, 57, was dating the 26-year-old son of famed filmmaker Barry Levinson, the director who launched her film career in 1980s film Diner.
The pair are said to have met while Sam was writing Barkin's 2010 film Operation: Endgame and the actress was subsequently cast as the lead of Sam's latest movie, Another Happy Day.

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Now the young Levinson has confirmed they are dating and living together in New York, and he's adamant Barkin is nothing like the hard characters she plays on screen.
"We've been together for like, three years, under the radar. You know, when you get to know her, she's not that tough. She's beautiful and intelligent and we live creatively together," he tells the New York Daily News.
Barkin was previously married to Irish actor Gabriel Byrne, with whom she has two kids, and her second union to businessman Ronald Perelman ended in a messy divorce in 2006.
WENN


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