In the world of Hollywood, it’s rare to find a couple that is able to make their marriage last. That’s what makes Academy Award winner Jeff Bridges and his wife Susan so unique, as they have been married for 41 years!

In an interview with “Today” host Willie Geist, Jeff opened up about his marriage. Though it has been extremely successful, the star said that it was not easy initially to convince Susan to go out with him. They met while he was filming the 1975 film Rancho Deluxe in Paradise Valley, Montana, where Susan worked as a waitress.

“I’m doing this scene with Sam Waterston and Harry Dean Stanton and I cannot take my eyes off this gorgeous, I didn’t know what she was, a maid, a waitress, I couldn’t take my eyes off of her,” Jeff said. “Gorgeous girl with two black eyes and a broken nose. That juxtaposition of that disfigurement and the beauty, it had me!”

Jeff said that when he “finally got the courage to ask her out” she “said no.”

“I said, ‘really?’” he recalled. “She says no.”

Though the rejection stung, Jeff knew that Paradise Valley was a small town and that he would likely bump into her again. Sure enough, he did!

“She came to the wrap party and we danced and we fell in love and boom that was it,” Jeff said. “I actually have a photograph of that moment, when we met and my wife saying no. Somebody just took a picture of that. I have that.”

When asked what the secret is to making a marriage last in Hollywood, Jeff had a simple response.

“The easy answer about how to keep a marriage going is you don’t get a divorce,” he said. “Its when those big challenges, those upsets come up in your relationship, those are real opportunities to get to know each other more and become more intimate with each other, try to see what makes each other tick.”

The couple married in 1977, and they have stayed together ever since!