Sharon Horgan has revealed her romance with a younger Bad Sisters co-star and gave her take on their nearly 10-year age gap.
The 55-year-old Irish actress opened up about having a “younger partner” on Modern Family alum Jesse Tyler Ferguson’s podcast Dinner’s on Me.
The Daily Mail has named Horgan’s new flame as Barry Ward, her co-star in Bad Sisters and the comedy-drama Dating Amber. Buzz about a possible romance between them began in March.
Horgan told Ferguson she initially “got off on” the age difference and would round the nine-year gap up, before it eventually “freaked me out.”
“I think initially I was like, ‘Oh, that’s exotic being 10 years older,” she said. “I sort of got off on it, and then I was like, ‘Oh, no, that’s not good.’”
The relationship, Horgan said, “was unexpected” after moving into single life following her 2019 divorce from Jeremy Rainbird, her husband of 14 years and the father of her two daughters.
“It’s different when you’re my age,” she said. “Being single again at my age is kind of a whole thing.”
The creator and star of Bad Sisters said she first met Ward, 44, in 2019 while filming Dating Amber, a comedy in which the two played a married couple.
“We met years ago doing a film together, and then, you know, became friendly,” Sharon said. “And then a good few years later—this wasn’t on purpose by the way—I cast him in Bad Sisters. Honestly, it wasn’t on purpose.”
In between, Horgan also dated The Charlatans frontman Tim Burgess, beginning in 2022, before they split earlier this year, according to the Mail.
On Bad Sisters, Horgan plays Eva, the eldest sister of the Garvey family caught in a murder plot. Ward plays Detective Inspector Fergal Loftus, who gets romantically involved with one of Horgan’s on-screen sisters.
Rumors of an off-screen relationship between Horgan and Ward began swirling a few months after season two of Bad Sisters premiered in the U.S.
It was reported that she visited him in March on the set of Trespasses, his new drama series starring Gillian Anderson.
Horgan gushed about their bond in her appearance on Ferguson’s podcast.
“It just feels like so much fun just to meet someone who you can have a laugh with and connect with. It’s surprising.”
