The actor, 82, says the reconciliation was 'mutual', not something he had to earn. Speaking to the Sunday Times ahead of the release of his new memoir, Douglas was asked how he 'won her back' once the split was behind them. He appeared to be unhappy with how the question was framed. 

"What, I won her back? It was mutual," he told the publication. "You know, we had our problems but I love her dearly and, 25 years, you know." He added: "I mean, I don't know about your marital status, but marriage is a lot of work, you know. And so, you know, we're good. We're in good shape. It's all I can say." 

The comments come as Douglas promotes his autobiography, One Helluva Ride, which is released on Tuesday, October 6th. In it, he writes about the break in his marriage 'I never gave up hope that we would reconcile'.

Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones married in 2000 after a year of dating. (Photo by Arnold Jerocki/Getty Images)

Why did Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones break up in 2013? 

Zeta-Jones confirmed in August 2013 that the couple were 'taking some time apart to evaluate and work on their marriage'. The announcement came just months after Douglas controversially blamed developing cancer of the tongue on oral sex. 

His publicist later retracted the remarks, saying he had not been referring to his cancer. The two-time Oscar winner married the Welsh actor, his second wife and 25 years his junior, in 2000 after a year of dating. They welcomed son Dylan that same year, followed by daughter Carys three years later. Douglas is best known for starring in Fatal Attraction (1987), Romancing the Stone (1984) and Behind the Candelabra (2013). Douglas confirmed he fell in love with Romancing the Stone co-star Kathleen Turner while they were filming in Mexico. (Photo by Sunset Boulevard/Corbis via Getty Images)

Did Michael Douglas cheat on Catherine Zeta-Jones? 

Romancing the Stone has been in the news this week too, sitting at the center of another revelation from Douglas' memoir. According to an excerpt from his book, Douglas confirms he fell in love with co-star Kathleen Turner while they were filming in Mexico. 

"Kathleen was smart, funny, and sexy with a deep, sultry voice that became her signature," he wrote. "I instantly liked her, and we were immediately attracted to each other." Douglas married his first wife, Diandra Luker, in 1977, he said the marriage was 'in a bad place' at the time and that both of them were having 'extramarital affairs'. He added: "I left for Mexico still technically married, but separated." Michael Douglas was married to Diandra Luker from March 1977 until 2000. (Photo by Stephane Cardinale/Sygma via Getty Images) He ended the affair after Luker became suspicious and returned to his wife for the sake of their son, Cameron. The couple ultimately divorced in 2000, the same year Douglas married Zeta-Jones. 

Douglas also details the numerous affairs he had while married to Luker, and has said that Zeta-Jones is yet to read the book. 

Fiona, 13, died on September 29. Confirming the news of her death, the family said in a statement that they were 'deeply heartbroken' and asked for privacy during this undeniably difficult time. They went on to describe the late teenager as 'a loving young girl who was smart, creative and loved to dance'. 

It was later revealed that Fiona had taken her own life. People have since been paying tribute to Fiona, who is the daughter of Pretty Little Liars alumni Chad Lowe and the niece of St. Elmo's Fire actor Rob Lowe, online, including her big cousin (and Rob's son) John Owen Lowe. Over the weekend John shared a screenshot of a moving poem by Emily Dickinson to his Instagram Story. John Owen Lowe pictured with his uncle, Chad Lowe, in 2023 (Charley Gallay/Getty Images for Netflix) It read: "HOPE is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without the words, and never stops at all. "And sweetest in the gale is heard; and sore must be the storm that could abash the little bird that kept so many warm. 

"I've heard it in the chillest land, and on the strangest sea; yet, never, in extremity, it asked a crumb of me." His post follows that of Fiona's older sister Mabel who shared a series of beautiful photos with her sibling. She wrote alongside the pictures: "I love you so much Fiona. I wish your short time here was easier and I hope your mind is at ease now. 

"I will honor you forever and keep your memory alive. I love you, I hope you knew just how much." Dozens of famous faces commented on the tear-jerking post and sent their condolences. Leading the comments, Jeremy Renner wrote: "Bless you dear Mabel. My deepest condolences to you and the family."

13-year-old Fiona Lowe passed away on September 29 (@ichadlowe/Instagram) "What a beautiful tribute to your sister," Grey's Anatomy star Jessica Capshaw also said, adding: "I have had you and your family in my thoughts and prayers and I’m sending you all so much love." Kimberly Williams-Paisley commented as well. She said to 17-year-old Mabel: "Mabel, we’ve been thinking of your family all week and sending you prayers and so much love." 

Natalie Ortega, Jenna Ortega's mom, went on to say: "Beautiful pictures, beautiful memories. May God give your family the strength you all need right now. I can’t begin to understand the heartbreak you all are feeling. I’m so, so sorry." 

If you or someone you know needs mental health assistance right now, call National Suicide Prevention Helpline on 1-800-273-TALK (8255). The Helpline is a free, confidential crisis hotline that is available to everyone 24 hours a day, seven days a week. 

Former US Army major Nidal Malik Hasan will face death by firing squad. The 56-year-old fatally shot 13 unarmed US soldiers at Fort Hood in 2009, injuring another 32, and has been on death row since 2013. 

But while nearly all inmates in the US are put to death via lethal injection - which is under renewed scrutiny in the recent case of Christa Pike - the Pentagon announced Hasan's unusual fate in a statement yesterday (October 5). 

Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell wrote: "Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has recommended - and President Donald J. Trump has approved - death by US Army firing squad for convicted terrorist Nidal Malik Hasan, the jihadist who opened fire on unarmed American soldiers at Fort Hood in 2009. A date is yet to be set for his execution (US Government Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences via Getty Images) "He killed 13 people and wounded 32 others while shouting 'Allahu Akbar' during the attack. The Secretary of the Army will set the time and place of the execution. He added: "Judgement day for Hasan has finally come." 

The last military execution by firing squad in the US was Pvt. Eddie Slovik, 24, who was convicted of desertion during the Second World War after being drafted. The most recent military execution was Pvt. John Bennett, who was hanged in 1961 for raping an 11-year-old girl. 

"Please don't, my baby" 

The mass murder, which unfolded on 5 November 2009, was the deadliest ever non-combat attack on an American military base. KUT News reported that witnesses told the court in 2013 that they thought it was a training exercise and that they had been hit by paintballs, until they saw blood. 

Sgt. 1st Class Maria Guerra (as per NBC): "There was no movement. There was no sound. So I yelled out, 'Is everybody OK?' I started hearing, 'Help me. I'm bleeding. I've been shot. Help me.'" She alleged she heard a woman cry out: “Please don’t, please don’t, my baby, my baby.” 

The New York Times reported this was Pvt. Francheska Velez, 21, who was due to return home from Iraq as she was pregnant with her first child, before she was shot dead by Hasan. Hasan, who defended himself in court, said he wanted to put forward the legal argument that he acted in 'defense of others'. When the judge pressed him on who he was defending, he said: “The leadership of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, the Taliban."

He has spent the last 13 years on military death row (Bell County Sheriff's Office via Getty Images) Hasan is just one of four inmates on the US military's death row. The others are Ronald Gray, sentenced in 1988 on 14 charges, including two murders and three rapes; triple murderer Timothy Hennis, sentenced in 2010; and Hasan Akbar, who killed two officers and injured 14 soldiers in Kuwait and was sentenced to death in 2005. 

During his court hearing, he admitted to the crime and apologized for 'any mistakes' he had made. Death by firing squad was among several methods of capital punishment recently approved by the Trump administration for the most serious federal crimes, alongside electrocution and gas asphyxiation. 

In a statement following yesterday's announcement, Death Penalty Action, which opposes capital punishment, said: "There is nothing Donald Trump loves more than the power to kill. In his first term he oversaw more executions than any president since FDR. "If it actually happens, this will be the first military execution since 1961. Truly, this is just another distraction and a ploy to stem his record low approval ratings." 

The organization added: "Just as we led protests outside the prison opposing every one of his federal executions, Death Penalty Action will oppose military executions as well." According to military law, a military execution requires approval from the US president.

The American actress was at the centre of perhaps the biggest celebrity court case in history when she accused her ex-husband Johnny Depp of multiple instances of domestic abuse and sexual assault during their relationship. 

However, it would be the Pirates of the Caribbean actor who won the legal battle, successfully suing his ex-wife of defamation in the process and claiming over $10 million in damages. This came after a jury found that Heard's op-ed in the Washington Post about domestic violence contained statements that were false, defamatory, and made with malice, following the intense six-week court case in 2022.

Although it meant that Heard's career on the screen seemed to be over, with her last, admittedly brief, appearance coming in the second Aquaman film, it seems for all intents and purposes that the 40-year-old is loving her new life in Europe. Amber Heard is rarely spotted by the media these days (Francisco Guerra/Europa Press via Getty Images)

Where Amber Heard lives now and what she's been up to 

She sold her California home months after Depp triumphed in the defamation trial and headed to Spain and turned her back on fame, even reportedly changing her name to the pseudonym Martha Jane Cannary in an attempt to cut ties with her past. 

While she was already a mother to Oonah Paige, in 2025 she announced she had welcomed twins - daughter Agnes and son Ocean - and it seems that she and her three kids are living a beautiful life in the Spanish capital of Madrid. 

Her Instagram posts don't come with the same regularity as other celebrities but she does provide updates on her life, and the latest saw her complete a half-marathon in San Sebastian, following in the footsteps of nearly everyone else who is obsessed with running these days. 

She's certainly committed herself to Spanish culture as well, as she used the notoriously difficult basque language in her Instagram post, writing: "Eskerrik asko Donosti!" This translates as 'thank you very much San Sebastian'. The actress recently posted on Instagram showing off her marathon accomplishment in San Sebastian (Instagram/@amberheard)

'Living her best life' 

Just one look at her Instagram page shows that she's seemingly living the dream in Spain, showing snaps of her cooking at home, spending time with her children and taking part in yoga classes and marathons - all in all, very wholesome and well rounded. 

This is clearly what Heard has been working towards, as a source exclusively told Us Magazine in June 2023: "Amber is living her best life," noting that she felt like 'a pariah' after the end of her and Depp’s court battle. The insider also added that Heard 'has been so much happier' since moving overseas and away from the Hollywood spotlight. It seems Heard is now living her best life in Spain with her children (Instagram/@amberheard)

Does Amber Heard still act? 

Although we haven't seen her on our TV screens in a while, Heard hasn't lost her love of acting either, with reports suggesting that she starred as Genevieve in a theatre production of Spirit of the People, written by Jeremy O. Harris. 

Considering Heard actually took home over $2 million in damages from the defamation trial of her own, despite losing, it's unlikely that she's going to be struggling for money and it seems as if she's spent it wisely so far. 

Perhaps more Hollywood actors will follow suit and opt for the quieter life away from the spotlight, because although we can't judge a whole life from social media, everything we've seen from the Texas-born actress in the last few years suggests that she's certainly doing something right.

According to the Tennessee Department of Correction, while incarcerated, Pike was convicted of attempted first degree murder in the assault on inmate Patricia Jones in 2001. Court docs from the Court of Criminal Appeals state that the incident took place at the Tennessee Prison for Women, now known as the Debra K. Johnson Rehabilitation Center. 

Because of a fire in the prison’s maximum-security unit, several inmates were evacuated from their cells. After Pike, Patricia Jones and another prisoner, Natasha Cornett, were placed together in a recreation cage, an argument developed between Jones and Cornett. 

Jones testified that Cornett attempted to strike her but missed. As Jones prepared to fight Cornett, Pike came up behind Jones and began choking her. Jones eventually lost consciousness.

Christa Pike, 50, survived a botched execution attempt on Wednesday (Tennessee Department of Corrections) The evidence presented at Pike’s later trial indicated that Pike used a heavy shoe or boot lace to strangle Jones. Prosecutors argued that the attack amounted to a premeditated attempt to kill her, as Pike disputed that interpretation, maintaining that she had intervened to protect Cornett from Jones. 

Court records discussed recorded telephone conversations made after the attack, and in one conversation with her mother, Pike said that she had ‘premeditated the hell out of this’. Evidence also indicated that Pike believed Jones would have died had the strangulation continued for approximately another thirty seconds. 

These statements supported the prosecution’s argument that Pike intended to kill Jones rather than merely stop a fight. Jones survived the attack and Pike was convicted of attempted first-degree premeditated murder, receiving an additional 25-year prison sentence. Pike's legal team argued that her death sentence was disproportionate due to her severe childhood trauma (Knox County Sheriff's Department) The death row inmate, now 50, survived two rounds of lethal injection drugs of pentobarbital on Wednesday (30 September), and was subsequently hospitalised for life-saving medical care. But any second execution attempt could face significant constitutional challenges, according to Charley Dugdale, Associate Head of Law and Associate Professor at St Mary’s University Twickenham. 

“If she survives and becomes medically stable, she would remain under her existing death sentence unless it was overturned or commuted. At the time of writing, her precise medical condition has not been publicly confirmed,” she says. 

“The execution date set by the Tennessee Supreme Court has now passed. Tennessee could not simply return Pike to the execution chamber whenever it chose. “A new execution date would need to be lawfully set by the Tennessee Supreme Court before the state could make another attempt, and it would be difficult to seek another date before the comprehensive third-party review was completed. Given the unusual circumstances, the precise procedure may itself become the subject of legal argument.” 

Why Pike is on death row Pike was sentenced to death for the murder of Colleen Slemmer (Find a Grave) At the age of 18, she carried out what a judge called the ‘horrific’ and ‘brutal’ murder of Colleen Slemmer in Knoxville in 1995. Pike and two friends lured the 19-year-old into the woods, where they beat, tortured, and killed her. Pike was sentenced to death when she was 20 a year later. 

Tennessee Supreme Court docs obtained by news.com.au state that Pike ‘told her friend Kim Iloilo, who was also a student at the facility, that she intended to kill another student, Colleen Slemmer, because she 'had just felt mean that day'. 

“Pike went to Iloilo’s room and told Iloilo that she had just killed Slemmer and that she had brought back a piece of the victim’s skull as a souvenir,” the documents state. “Pike said that a pentagram had been carved onto the victim’s forehead and chest. Iloilo said that Pike was dancing in a circle, smiling, and singing ‘la, la, la’ while she related these details about the murder. 

“When Iloilo saw Pike at breakfast the next morning she asked Pike what she had done with the piece of the victim’s skull. Pike replied that it was in her pocket and then said, ‘And, yes, I’m eating breakfast with it’.” Pike's legal team argued that her death sentence was disproportionate due to her severe childhood trauma. 

The failed execution attempt of the murder has made repeated headlines since she was taken to hospital for ‘live-saving’ measures on 30 September.  The now 50-year-old was supposed to become the first woman put to death in Tennessee in two centuries after being sent to prison for the 1995 murder of Colleen Slemmer. 

However the attempts failed, and she was taken to hospital having survived two doses of the lethal injection. Pike reportedly 'remains critically ill' and is being treated at a hospital in Nashville, Texas, with her legal team claiming she 'may not fully recover'.

Michael Goessling was put up for adoption when he was still just an infant, and said that while he 'always knew' that he had been adopted, he was curious about the identity of his biological parents. Goessling, from St. Louis, Missouri, told KMOV: “I had a wonderful childhood." Of his adoptive parents Paul and Kay, he said: "I could not have handpicked two finer folks to raise me.” 

But his curiosity was further piqued when he received a notification that a half-brother he wasn't even aware of had taken a 23andMe DNA test. It led him to discover that his biological father was none other than five-time Grammy Award-winning musician Michael McDonald. 

McDonald is the lead singer of Californian rock band the Doobie Brothers, who scored number one hits in the US in the 1970s with 'What a Fool Believes' and 'Black Water'.

Michael Goessling (left) with Michael McDonald (KMOV) Goessling told CNN: "I was a crazy Doobie Brothers fan and people remember me singing along to ‘China Grove’ and listening to their music like ‘Black Water’ back in the day. I was always a bit of a music nut and it’s starting to make sense nowadays.” 

KMOV reported that both McDonald and Goessling’s mother were 14 years old when he was conceived, meaning he was put up for adoption. They have remained friends over the years. Goessling was soon able to connect with his birth mother, meeting her in person, and then spoke to his biological father by phone, asking what he did for work, being told that he was a musician and was touring in St Louis that very summer. 

The 58-year-old recalled how he eventually dropped the inevitable question, saying: “And then I finally said, ‘Are you Michael McDonald?’” Goessling said. “And he said, ‘Yeah, I’m afraid so.’” Goessling said it was pure coincidence that they share the same first name, saying: “I was unnamed, so it was my mom, Kay, who named me." 

McDonald has also opened up about finding out what had happened to his son, and paid tribute to Paul and Kay, who adopted Goessling. “I always carried that guilt with me, but just to know that he was okay and that he had a good life, and a life certainly that I wouldn’t have been able to afford him at that time in my life, was a great reward," said McDonald. "The real rock stars in this story for us are his adoptive parents, who really gave Michael everything a child needs in terms of love and security.” Father and son were able to meet in person (Theo Wargo/Getty Images for Songwriters Hall Of Fame) After speaking over the phone at first, the father and son were reunited in person. “He just put his arms out, just gave me a big old bear hug and told me he loved me, and I told him the same,” said Goessling. Recalling the moment, McDonald said: “It was a wonderful, wonderful experience to see Michael and get to meet my son after all these years thinking about him."

As if that wasn't enough of a huge revelation for both men, McDonald also found out that he is a grandfather. “Yeah, that’s still sinking in for me. What a gift,” McDonald said. “My daughter-in-law is just the daughter-in-law you’d hope for as a parent. And the kids are two of the greatest kids you’d ever meet. I’m just so proud of them.” McDonald is known for his membership of the Doobie Brothers, and was also a member of Steely Dan.