I knew a ton of actors and was friends with them, but I never

In the councils of fame where torches burn day and night, a measured voice offers a modest creed: “I knew a ton of actors and was friends with them, but I never dated actresses. I tried to date ‘normal’ people because the Hollywood dating rule is ‘one star per couple’—for it is a trial to yoke the egos of two actors.” Hear how the sentence moves like a traveler who knows the road’s dangers: fellowship without entanglement, affection without conflagration. Zach Galligan speaks from the threshold between camaraderie and courtship, choosing still water over mirrored fire.

The proverb’s first lamp is caution against doubling the same flame. Two public faces—two practiced entrances, two calendars commanded by “call time”—can turn a shared table into a stage where applause must be divided. In the house of Hollywood, where the oxygen is attention, the pairing of twin torches risks theft of breath. Hence the folk law: one star per couple. Not because one must always be dim, but because someone must be free to tend the lanterns of ordinary life—supper, silence, the faithful return.

Mark, then, the turn toward “normal” people—those who do their work without armies of eyes. This is not disdain; it is a longing for ballast. Fame is a wind that changes without warning; a partner rooted outside the gale can keep the mast steady. The line confesses a human hunger: to be greeted by a gaze that is not keeping score; to sit with someone whose day was not an opening night. In that quiet, an embattled self finds its true size again.

History keeps a ledger of such wisdom. Consider Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall—both brilliant, both famous—who endured not by outshining each other but by discovering a third, quieter star: the marriage itself. They chose the discipline of privacy, the ritual of writing and reading in the same room, the craft of making home a sanctuary from set. Contrast them with tempestuous unions where two loud egos wrestled for the same spotlight until the roof shook. The lesson is not “never wed a performer,” but rather, “wed the person who can consent to turn from audience to ally.”

Let us place beside this an ordinary parable. A stage actor—call him Marcus—fell in love with a pediatric nurse. He brought rehearsals and bouquets of notes; she brought stories of night shifts and the precise mercy of measured doses. When he despaired over a lukewarm review, she reminded him how a small child had slept at last because someone stayed to sing. Their worlds did not compete; they completed. The marriage taught Marcus to bow to a humbler applause: the applause of a life that works after the curtain falls.

What counsel, then, springs from Galligan’s line? First, honor the chemistry of complement. Whether you love within Hollywood or far beyond it, ask not only, “Do we shine?” but, “Do we shelter?” Second, examine the furniture of your union: are there two chairs and one mirror, or two mirrors and nowhere to sit? Third, keep a covenant against comparison; in a house of equals, the victories of one are provisions for both. Fourth, learn to set the ego down like a heavy cloak at the door, and enter as a person, not a persona.

Let the actions be practical and brave. Share schedules, not just stories; trade premiers for potlucks; keep a sabbath from publicity where no one is famous and both are known. If you are two actors, appoint a ritual of reversal: one week, one leads and one lifts; the next, you exchange—so each learns both arts. If you love a normal partner, let reverence guide you: publish gratitude privately and publicly, and let your light warm rather than blind. In this way, the old rule—one star per couple—becomes less a limit than a blessing: one heart taking its turn to blaze, the other to keep the hearth, and both to build a constellation that outlasts the final bow.