Gwyneth Paltrow is always quick to share some love for her family on social media, including her late father Bruce.
Gwyneth, 51, has spoken over the years about her enduring love and grief for her father who died over 21 years ago.
On November 27, the actress marked what would have been a significant milestone in her late father’s life – his 80th birthday.
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The Iron Man star shared a sweet message to her Instagram story alongside a snap of a black and white framed picture of her father.
“I wish you were here to celebrate your 80th today,” she wrote on the picture.
“I miss you and love you more than ever, if that were possible,” she added.
Gwyneth has shared many comments over the years about her late father.
Here’s everything you need to know about their father-daughter bond and how Gwyneth is choosing to remember her dad years after his death.
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What happened to Bruce Paltrow?
Bruce Paltrow died over two decades ago in 2002 at the age of 58 after battling throat cancer since his diagnosis in 1999.
Bruce died October 3rd from pneumonia, related to his ongoing health struggles.
The film director was visiting Gwyneth in Italy to celebrate her birthday when he suddenly succumbed to illness.
Bruce had worked as a director and film producer on titles such as Duets, The White Shadow and High, which starred his daughter Gwyneth in her film debut.
The 58-year-old was married to Hollywood royalty Blythe Danner at the time of his death.
The couple had been married since 1969 and shared daughter Gwyneth as well as their son Jake Paltrow, 48.
Just last year, Danner revealed she was in remission after she had been heartbreakingly diagnosed with the same cancer as her late husband in 2018.
How old was Gwyneth Paltrow when her father died?
Before his tragic death, Bruce Paltrow had travelled to Italy to celebrate his daughter’s 30th birthday the previous month on September 27.
Gwyneth revealed on her Goop Podcast that she had been unable to visit Italy for nearly a decade after her father died on their trip.
“I had a real aversion to Italy for a long time,” she said.
Over the years, the actress has opened up about how she struggled with the “physical” grief of losing her dad.
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Speaking on the By the Light of The Moon podcast in 2022, Gwyneth recalled waking up in the middle of the night after her dad’s death feeling like she was “having a heart attack”.
“Honestly, I thought I was dying. It was really, really tough,” she told host Holly Willoughby, sharing that the first year after losing her dad was particularly difficult on her family.
“Anyone will tell you, who loses a love of their life like that, there’s just no other way but through,” she said.
Were Gwyneth Paltrow and her father close?
The Sliding Doors actress has spoken about her close relationship with her father in the years after his death.
During an appearance on The Graham Norton Show in 2019, Gwyneth recalled a memorable exchange with her father where he helped keep her grounded amid her rising fame in Hollywood.
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Gwyneth told host Graham Norton that she had ”started just behaving a little strangely or a little weird” after winning the 1999 Best Actress Oscar for Shakespeare in Love when her father eventually stepped in.
“He said, in his inimitable Brooklyn way, ‘Um, you’re kind of turning into an a—,” she recalled his candid intervention.
“He really burst a bubble for me where I could see, oh, this is actually really dangerous.”
The actress even revealed to People magazine one of the reasons she fell in love with her now husband Brad Falchuk is that he has the same “heart of gold and a great sense of humor” as her late father.
How did the death of Gwyneth Paltrow’s father inspire her to start Goop?
Bruce Paltrow’s years long struggle with cancer actually helped inspire Paltrow to start her now successful wellness company Goop in 2008 – six years after his death.
Speaking to Town & Country, the actress revealed how her dad’s health journey inspired her to research and become interested in nutrition.
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“His treatment was so brutal, I was thinking, almost out of desperation, that we had to be able to do something else to help him,” she told the magazine.
“I really believe that being alive is just a process of – if you’re not wasting your f—— life – figuring out how you can impact the world positively,” she added.
The actress has made headlines over the years for her questionably named wellness products, including a candle called This Smells Like My Vagina.