ET is looking back at the moments we shared with Kelly Preston. On July 12, 2020, the actress died after a two-year battle with cancer. On the one-year anniversary of her passing, ET is celebrating her life and her unbreakable bond with husband John Travolta.
Preston first met the love of her life when they went in for a screen test together for the 1987 comedy The Experts, and it was clear that the two had chemistry right from the start.
However, the two were just friends back when they met, as she was married to actor Kevin Gage. Preston and Gage split the same year, after which Preston briefly dated George Clooney and was later engaged to Charlie Sheen before they split up in 1990. She and Travolta began dating later that year.
The two tied the knot in 1991, and fans got to watch their decades-long love affair unfold before their eyes.
When speaking with ET over the years, she didn’t shy away from talking about her steamy romance with her husband. During an interview in 1998, Preston marveled at how good a kisser Travolta truly was, sharing, “My husband’s’ got great lips, really great lips. Even if he wasn’t my husband I’d really like kissing him.”
That being said, Preston also admitted that she hated watching Travolta perform in steamy scenes with his co-stars.
“I know it’s just a film but if the kissing’s lasting a little too long I don’t like it,” Preston told ET with a laugh during a press junket for her 1997 rom-com Addicted to Love. “I’m sorry, but it makes me [think], ‘You kiss me like that! That little romantic thing, that’s ours and ours alone!'”
The couple have starred together several times over the years, most recently in the 2018 crime drama biopic Gotti. Preston told ET at the time, “We love working together. It’s just easy… It’s effortless. We make each other laugh and we have a shorthand so it’s nice in that way.”
“We met on screen. So that’s the most familiar territory for us,” Travolta added. ‘That’s where we’re the most comfortable, because that’s what we share.”
