Earlier this week, we reported that the country music star Billy Ray Cyrus is dating the former Austin Powers actress Elizabeth Hurley. Now, Cyrus is speaking out to praise Hurley as he confirms that they truly are an item.
Cyrus Praises Hurley
While appearing on Apple Music Country’s The Ty Bentli Show, Cyrus, 63, revealed how he and Hurley, 59, recently reconnected. They’d actually met years ago on a movie set. It turns out that it was Hurley who actually reached out to Cyrus to get back in touch via text.
“We did a film two years ago down in the Caribbean and we did very few scenes together, but the couple times we were in the same scene, there was a chemistry there that [I] felt,” Cyrus recalled. “We just laughed, and it was at a time [when] I wasn’t laughing a lot and I found out the oddest thing.”
This was a reference to their 2022 movie Christmas in Paradise. On the film’s set, the Kentucky-native Cyrus and the British Hurley found that they “had way more in common than we had different.” Once filming wrapped, however, the two of them didn’t speak for a few years.
“Then two more years of life went by, and it was this evolution that some might’ve looked at and certainly I felt like, ‘Wow, can life get any harder? Can it get any tougher for me?’” Cyrus admitted, referring to his headspace at the time that Hurley returned to his life. “At a certain point it was like, ‘You can’t get knocked down any flatter than laying on your back when life is kicking you in the gut.’”
Backstory: Billy Ray Cyrus Is Officially Dating Elizabeth Hurley – She’s ‘Perfect’ For Him
Hurley Reaches Out
It was then that Hurley reached out to him via text.
“I didn’t even know the number, and it’s like, ‘Hey, it looks like life might be a little bit tough and just wanted you to know I’m in your corner. You got a friend in your corner,’” Cyrus recounted.
This immediately touched Cyrus, as her message reminded him of something that Johnny Cash wrote to him in 1992. At the time, Cyrus was “taking a pretty good pounding.” Cash stepped in to tell the younger country musician, “Hey, just remember that all things that are good come from Almighty God above. The good outweighs the bad. Let ’em have it. I’m in your corner.”
Partly because of this, Hurley’s text message felt like a sign to Cyrus.
“I go, ‘Who is this?’ And it’s, like, ‘Elizabeth Hurley.’” Cyrus said. “All the people to reach out to me in that second that maybe I needed most.”
When asked if he and Hurley are in an “actual relationship,” Cyrus tried to play it coy.
“I would say it feels very … she’s a great human being,” he gushed. “If all we ever were [are] the friends that we are [now], I would take that.”
“She’s so impressively brilliant. She reminds me a lot of Dolly Parton. She’s a very smart businesswoman,” Cyrus concluded. “If you can laugh together, you can make it through everything.”
Cyrus And Hurley Go Public As A Couple
This comes days after the couple went public with their relationship on Hurley’s Instagram page. Indeed, she posted a photo of her and Cyrus kissing on Easter Sunday. Cyrus even sported bunny ears for the photo!
“Happy Easter,” Hurley captioned the post alongside a heart emoji.
“Liz is great and visited him for Easter. They’ve been seeing each other romantically for a little bit,” a source close to Hurley told People Magazine. “And how lucky is he? Liz is lovely. She’s very warm, positive and the best to be around.”
“They had a great time shooting that movie together — it was beautiful and relaxed, and it really stuck with him,” the source added.
This comes at a difficult time for Cyrus, as he has just gone through two bitter divorces over the course of only two years. We can only hope that this relationship continues to be a success, and that Cyrus and Hurley have many years of happiness together to come!
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