Don’t worry: Taylor Hackford is a fan of Juergen Teller’s “artfully done†photos of his wife, Helen Mirren, in the current issue of New York. “I thought they were fantastic,†he told us last night at a VIP screening of his new film, Love Ranch, in which he directs his wife and Joe Pesci as unfaithfully married brothel owners. â€She told me she did a photo session, and of course I didn’t know what to expect. But, you know, that’s my wife. She’s bold and beautiful!†Hackford wasn’t exactly surprised to see the spread. “When I first first saw her on film, it was a film called Savage Messiah, where she appears in the altogether,†a.k.a completely nude, he explained.
Mirren told us she was “proud†of the sultry photo shoot but joked about it landing her in the “doghouse†— or perhaps, more accurately, all over the Internet. “It was my first experience of a non-paparazzi-type shot going viral. And you suddenly realize … there are no boundaries anymore.â€
Dame Helen bares less of her body in Love Ranch, in which she plays a madam who gets her groove back through an affair with a fiery Argentine boxer, played by Spanish actor Sergio Peris-Mencheta. When it came time to direct the more passionate scenes, Hackford said he urged Peris-Mencheta to really “go for it†with his wife — prompting some inner conflict for the newcomer. “’I was, ‘what the fuck?’ In Spain, you really kiss,†he told us. “Here, with Helen Mirren and Taylor behind the camera, I had to decide between being polite and shy or being rude and Latin.†For the record, he went with the latter, saying: “It worked.â€