Sally Field has spent more than six decades building a career defined by emotional honesty, artistic discipline, and an unwillingness to simplify the complicated truths of her own life. But in recent reflections, the acclaimed actress has opened up about one of the most intense relationships of her past—her years with Burt Reynolds—describing it as a mixture of deep affection, fear, and lasting emotional contradiction.
In a recent conversation with People Magazine, Field revisited pivotal moments from her career and personal life, including her time working and living alongside Reynolds during the late 1970s. The two first met while filming the hit 1977 action-comedy Smokey and the Bandit, a film that would become a cultural phenomenon and also mark the beginning of a turbulent five-year relationship that would shape both of their lives in unexpected ways.
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When shown a photograph from that era, Field did not hesitate to acknowledge the complexity behind the smiles.
“It was a very complicated relationship,” said Field, now 79. “There were parts of Burt that were so wonderful and lovable, and then there were parts that were really frightening.”
She added that the emotional contradiction reminded her of earlier experiences in her life, particularly her difficult relationship with her stepfather, a comparison she has spoken about in previous interviews and her memoir In Pieces.
“That’s the complication of what loving a very complicated person is,” she explained. “Especially when you’re a child, because my stepfather was both wonderful and evil. So, he taught me that love is wonderful and dangerous.”
The actress’s reflections reveal a recurring theme in her life story: the blurred line between affection and control, attraction and fear, devotion and self-preservation. While her relationship with Reynolds brought moments of joy and professional collaboration, it also placed her in emotionally difficult situations that she would only fully understand years later.
Field and Reynolds were among Hollywood’s most talked-about couples during their time together. Their on-screen chemistry in films like Hooper and Smokey and the Bandit made them tabloid fixtures, while their off-screen relationship often played out under intense public scrutiny.
Despite the glamour surrounding them, Field has consistently described a dynamic that was far more complicated behind closed doors.
“I eventually could stand up to Burt and I could eventually walk away,” she said. “Because Burt wanted to control my work. He could hurt me, he could humiliate me, but don’t mess with my work because it meant more to me than anything.”
Those tensions reportedly came to a breaking point during the development of the 1979 drama Norma Rae, the role that would earn Field her first Academy Award and fundamentally shift her trajectory in Hollywood.
According to Field, Reynolds was openly dismissive of the project and critical of its subject matter.
“He called her a whore because she had some sexual past,” she recalled of the character she played. “He threw the script at me and said, ‘Boy, you’re letting this get the better of you.’ And I said, ‘This is the better of me.’”
That moment, she says, marked a turning point in both her personal independence and her artistic identity.
“It was the beginning of me pulling away,” Field said. “I did the film, but it was the beginning of me finding my legs.”
Working with director Martin Ritt on Norma Rae became a formative experience, allowing Field to channel personal pain into performance in a way she had never done before. The role not only earned her critical acclaim but also helped her understand the emotional power she could bring to her craft when fully committed.
“And I really think the roles that I’ve been lucky enough to have… they changed me,” she reflected. “Being Norma at that time was exactly what I needed, because to learn how to stand in her shoes, I could feel my own legs.”
As Field’s career rose, however, the strain in her relationship with Reynolds reportedly intensified. While she was receiving widespread acclaim for Norma Rae, including an Oscar nomination, tensions between them reportedly grew over issues of control, ambition, and recognition.
In Dave Karger’s book 50 Oscar Nights, Field recalled planning to attend the Cannes Film Festival in support of the film, only to find Reynolds unsupportive of her growing success.
She also remembered him questioning her chances of winning awards and declining to accompany her to major industry events, including the 1980 Academy Awards ceremony.
“He really was not a nice guy around me then,” Field admitted.
Even decades later, the relationship continues to be analyzed by film historians and industry observers as one of Hollywood’s most complicated high-profile romances. Some have suggested that Reynolds struggled with jealousy as Field’s career reached new heights, while others interpret the dynamic as a clash between two strong personalities navigating fame at different stages of their lives.
Reynolds himself would later reflect on the relationship in a 2015 interview with Vanity Fair, calling Field the “love of my life,” a statement that added another layer of complexity to the public’s understanding of their history.
Field, however, has always been careful to avoid reducing their relationship to a single narrative. In her memoir, released in 2018 shortly after Reynolds’ death, she described their bond as “immediate and intense,” but also deeply complicated and often painful.
“We were a perfect match of flaws,” she wrote. “Blindly, I fell into a rut that had long ago formed in my road.”
She also revealed that she did not speak to Reynolds for decades before his passing, a distance that underscored how fully their lives had diverged after their breakup in 1982.
In interviews with The New York Times, Field emphasized that while the relationship was meaningful, it was also ultimately unsustainable.
“Confusing and complicated, and not without loving and caring,” she said, “but really complicated and hurtful to me.”
Following Reynolds’ death in 2018, Field offered a brief but emotional reflection on their shared history.
“There are times in your life that are so indelible, they never fade away,” she said. “My years with Burt never leave my mind.”
Looking back now, Field’s perspective is neither nostalgic nor dismissive. Instead, it reflects a lifetime of learning how to sit with contradiction—how to hold love and pain in the same memory without forcing either one to disappear.
As she continues her work today, including her recent role in Netflix’s Remarkably Bright Creatures, Field remains focused not on defining her legacy, but on continuing to evolve as an artist.
“I don’t stand at a distance to see it,” she once said of her career. “I’m still inside it.”
And for an actress whose life has been shaped by both extraordinary success and deeply personal complexity, that perspective may be the only one that truly fits.
