Ben Stiller insists his split from wife Christine Taylor was never meant to be permanent

Ben Stiller insists his split from wife Christine Taylor was never meant to be permanent.

The 59-year-old actor has opened up about his years-long breakup from Christine Taylor - with whom he has children Ella, 22, and Quinlin, 19 - before they rekindled their relationship during the pandemic.

Speaking to The New York Times, he said: "When we separated, it was just having space to see what our relationship was, what my life felt like when we weren’t in that relationship, how much I loved our family unit.

"It was like three or four years that we weren’t together but we always were connected. In my mind, I never didn’t want us to be together.

"I don’t know where Christine was, you’d have to ask her, but Covid put us all together in the same house."

The couple - who got married in 2000 - moved back in together during the early days of the pandemic in 2020, but it took time for them to get back together.

He recalled: "It was almost a year of living in the same house before we were actually together.

"But I’m so grateful for it, and I think not that many people do come back together when they separate.

"There’s nothing like that, when you come back. You have so much more appreciation for what you have, because we know we could not have it."