Barbra Streisand Celebrates 27th Anniversary by Sharing Love Story with James Brolin

Barbra Streisand made a rare personal post on social media Tuesday for a very romantic reason.

The 83-year-old multi-hyphenate, who revealed she was angry at not receiving equal pay on big Hollywood projects, wished her husband James Brolin, 84, a happy anniversary. 

‘We met on a blind date 29 years ago tonight, and we married 27 years ago today. I love you honey. B xo. ❤️’ she wrote next to a throwback photo of the two. 

Best wishes poured in from around the world. 

‘So much love to you both!!!!’ wrote Rita Wilson. 

‘Love you both so so much a wedding a friendship I’ll never forget our journeys I’ll never forget from Israel to Bali to Spain to Italy New York and LA Congratulations my loves miss you all so always in in my heart and soul ❤️love ❤️ forever and ever Happy happy anniversary’ gushed Streisand’s go-to designer Donna Karan. 

Barbra Streisand wished husband James Brolin a happy anniversary  Tuesday. ‘We met on a blind date 29 years ago tonight, and we married 27 years ago today. I love you honey. B xo. ❤️’ she wrote next to a throwback photo of the two

‘Happy Anniversary!!’ penned celebrity photographer Kevin Mazur. 

The couple did indeed meet on a blind date. They were setup at a dinner party thrown by mutual friends.

‘Everyone could see it immediately,’ Brolin’s manager Jeff Wald told McCalls in 1998.

‘They didn’t look up, they didn’t talk to anyone else, I don’t even think they ate. And then at the end, they left together.’

Because of the attention that followed the People singer everywhere, the couple would go driving in Brolin’s truck for dates, often driving an hour or so away to San Bernardino county, California with the Ransom Canyon actor behind the wheel and Streisand making sandwiches in her lap.

‘Barbra’s really never done any of that kind of stuff. She’s never really seen that side of America,’ he told the now-defunct magazine.

One interesting tidbit bout the couple is they remained celibate before tying the knot, and he asked her to marry him three times before she said yes. 

‘I have to try him out for at least three years,’ she joked in an interview with CBS Morning anchor Gayle King.

The couple met via a setup during a dinner party. ‘They didn’t look up, they didn’t talk to anyone else… And then at the end, they left together,’ Streisand’s manager Jeff Wall said in an interview;  Pictured in Los Angeles in January 2003

Because of Streisand’s fame, the couple couldn’t go on regular dates, so they courted by taking long drives in Brolin’s truck;  Pictured in Washington, DC in February 1998

Brolin had to ask Streisand to marry him three times before she said yes;  Pictured in New York City in November 1996

And while promoting her book, My Name is Barbra a couple of years ago, she explained how the two inspired an extremely popular rock ballad. 

In an interview on The Howard Stern Show she revealed she and Brolin were lying in bed, enjoying a little pillow talk.  

‘I don’t want to fall asleep because then I’ll miss you,’ the actor told his beloved. 

It was at that moment the Evergreen singer agreed to his most recent proposal saying, ‘OK, yes, I’ll marry you.’

Streisand shared that story in an interview on 20/20 with Barbra Walters in 1997 and songwriter Diane Warren learned about it. 

Warren verified the anecdote in an interview with Shortlist in 2016. 

‘Someone told me there was an interview with Barbra Streisand and her husband and he had said how he doesn’t like to go to sleep, you know, if he misses her and I was like, “Wow that’s a cool idea for a song if I can figure that out,” and that’s where I got the title from.

The couple accidentally inspired one of the most popular rock ballads of all time 

She and Brolin were lying in bed, enjoying a little pillow talk. ‘I don’t want to fall asleep because then I’ll miss you,’ the actor said and she accepted his most recent proposal saying, ‘OK, yes, I’ll marry you’; Pictured in Beverly Hills in February 2019

After that story got out, Diane Warren was inspired to write I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing, sung by Aerosmith, the band’s only number one hit;  Pictured in Philadelphia in September 2023

The song was included over the closing credits of the film Armageddon.

‘And I kept it in the back of my head and when that movie came round I thought, “You know, I’m gonna write this song because it could be about the end of the world – it could fit that storyline or it could fit this love story.”‘

I Don’t Want To Miss a Thing debuted at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 and is Aerosmith’s only number one song to date. The hit also received an Oscar nomination for Best Original Song. 

The couple seem to have made up for the years of celibacy before their marriage. In an April appearance on Today, Brolin revealed ‘The best investment we ever made is our mattress,’ adding ‘We love to sleep late. We (also) do a lot of our work — on the phone, on paper, reading — right next to each other.’