Rita Moreno, the award-winning actor and one of the few remaining stars from Hollywood’s Golden Age, has revealed that her former partner Marlon Brando slapped her so hard that she saw stars. In a recent interview, Moreno shared details of her tumultuous relationship with the legendary actor.

The two first met on the set of the 1954 film “Désirée,” in which they starred opposite each other. Moreno and Brando had instant chemistry and began an affair. However, their relationship was far from simple. Moreno has said that they fought often, and Brando was never faithful, fathering children with other women while they were together.

In 1968, the couple starred in the crime drama “The Night of the Following Day,” in which their characters were at odds with each other. One scene called for Moreno to slap Brando, but she didn’t expect his response. “I hauled off and slapped him in this scene…And to my absolute astonishment, he not only slapped me back; he slapped me back so hard I…understood what it meant when you said, ‘I saw stars,'” Moreno said in the interview.

Despite the difficulties in their relationship, Moreno was unable to resist Brando’s charms. “He was the king…He loved me…He was the daddy that I couldn’t please,” she admitted in a documentary about her life. “I wasn’t aware of that at all, but he was the one I needed to please. He was the one I wanted to be married to.”

Eventually, Moreno and Brando ended their relationship for good. It took a few years, but they were eventually able to establish a friendship that lasted until Brando’s death. Moreno still keeps a photo of him in her home, calling him the “lust of [her] life,” but she has said that her husband, Leonard Gordon, who she was married to for 45 years until his death in 2010, was the true love of her life.

In addition to her relationship with Brando, Moreno has had a successful and enduring career in entertainment. She is one of only a handful of performers to have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony, and she continues to act and perform to this day. She has been open about her relationships and experiences in her memoir, published in 2013, and in various interviews throughout the years.

Brando’s affairs

Marlon Brando may have had a romantic rendezvous with Marilyn Monroe, according to rumors.

In the documentary “Listen To Me Marlon,” Brando claims that he spoke to Monroe on the phone two days before she passed away. Some have suggested that the two casually dated in 1955 and slept together at least once.

However, Brando’s friend and biographer George Englund wrote that Brando had the opportunity to sleep with Monroe but didn’t take it, saying that she “wasn’t his type.”

Brando was also rumored to have had a “friends with benefits” arrangement with Shelley Winters.

In her 1980 autobiography, Winters claimed that Brando’s allure was undeniable, saying: “All you could do was feel, the sexual [stimulation] was so complete. The only other time I experienced it was when I saw Elvis Presley perform live in Las Vegas.”

There are also rumors that Brando had a homoerotic, kinky side, which he expressed by putting out lit cigarettes on James Dean. In “James Dean: Tomorrow Never Comes,” authors Darwin Porter and Danforth Prince claimed that Brando was the dominant partner in an S&M relationship with the more submissive Dean.

The authors claimed that while Dean was in love, Brando was entertained by the idea of toying with him.

Brando also reportedly had a tryst with Jackie Kennedy.

In David Heymann’s 2009 book “Bobby and Jackie: A Love Story,” the author claimed that the former First Lady had a brief fling with Brando in 1964, the year after her husband, President John F. Kennedy, was killed.

Heymann claimed that Kennedy and Brando went out to dinner, danced, and “made out.” He then uses Brando’s voice to explain how the evening progressed: “When I failed to make a move she took matters into her own hands and popped the magic question, ‘Would you like to spend the night?’ I said, ‘I thought you’d never ask.'” Heymann claimed that Kennedy called off the affair after spending two nights together.