Richard Gere is getting a divorce from his wife of 11 years, and reports say Gere’s Buddhism may have come between he and Carey Lowell.
The 64-year-old actor has not been seen with his 52-year-old wife since a screening of his 2012 film Arbitrage, outside of a January appearance at the Golden Globe Awards. Gere and Lowell have reportedly been “spending time apart for quite some time,” a source said.
Another source said that the social life of Carey Lowell , a model and actress, didn’t mesh well with Richard Gere’s quiet Buddhist lifestyle.
“They have a place in Bedford [New York], and he likes it because it’s quiet and he likes the solitude,” said the insider. “She likes being in North Haven in the limelight. They live next door to Jimmy Buffett and his family, and they’re good friends.”
Gere was raised attending Methodist churches but took an interest in Buddhism in his 20s. He studied Zen Buddhism for several years, but after traveling to Nepal in 1978 Gere met many Tibetan monks and lamas, and afterward took up Tibetan Buddhism.
Today Richard Gere is an activist for human rights in Tibet, co-founding the Tibet House and serving as chairman of the board of directors for the International Campaign for Tibet. As an Academy Awards presenter in 1993, Gere denounced the Chinese government and its treatment of Tibet, and in 2007 called for a boycott of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.
Lowell is best known for her role as Bond girl Pam Bouvier in the James Bond movie Licence to Kill and a role as Assistant District Attorney Jamie Ross on the television drama Law & Order.
Richard Gere has been married once before, a union with Cindy Crawford that ended in 1995. He and Carey Lowell have one child together, a son named Homer.
