We have another brave, honest, and well-respected woman on our hands who is opening up about her personal life. In an interview with The Guardian, actress Saffron Burrows revealed she's married to Alison Balian. Burrows is known for giving very few interviews, because she is a very private person, but that isn't stopping her from speaking now about her marriage to longtime girlfriend Bailan, a writer for The Ellen DeGeneres Show. Last August, Burrows and Balian eloped after the U.S. Supreme Court passed the Marriage Equality act. The duo have been together for six and a half years, and two years ago Burrows gave birth to their son. "I always liked the idea of being with someone for a while and then getting married, but I didn’t know if I’d do it." She added, "I’m quite a romantic, I probably thought I would do it."
Why did they decide to finally tie the knot? "Well, I don’t think I want to answer that, only because it’s so private, but I will say that we did elope," she revealed. "We hadn’t told anyone and then I called my mum and she said, 'You haven’t eloped! You only elope when you’re young and in trouble!'"
Even though she is part of a same-sex marriage, Burrows doesn't believe in labeling herself. It's no secret she was engaged to The Good Wife's Alan Cumming and in a long-term relationship with director Mike Figgis. With that said, there was no coming out for her, because, as she says, "This is what I am." However, she does find importance in others proclaiming their sexual orientation and same-sex relationships.
For people in general, I think they should name themselves in whatever way they wish. The flourishing of the gay movement in America is clearly very necessary and the identity that people could proudly lay claim to is crucial. Lives are lost every day because of bigotry in this country. So I think that should not prevail.
Maybe that's why she's making such a declaration now? Per Burrows, she's speaking now because she "doesn't want to lie by omission and [she] want[s] to be very straightforward about [her] life." She also wants wants everyone to know how proud she is of herself and her family, who she calls her "proudest achievement." Also, she wants to be open with her son and for them all to "live a very honest life."
For Burrows, she just avoided the conversation on whether she was straight or not, because she didn't want to be "labelled in some way that [she] felt was limiting and not actually true to who [she is]." As she says, "I really salute these young women who come out, but if I said I was gay that wouldn’t be true." Later on Burrows added, "There’s no coming out to do because I’ve always just followed my heart and I was lucky enough to have parents who didn’t impose any bigotry on me. So to come out would actually be an untruth because the men I’ve loved were very vivid, real, loving relationships."
With all of that said, let's give Burrows a huge congratulations on her marriage and for publicly speaking about her relationship in a way that will most likely inspire others to feel they can do so as well.
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