46 years ago, Michael Caine saw a girl in a commercial, and she saved his life

Michael Caine has acted in over 100 films. He is an actor who is always in demand at whatever age he is, but it wasn’t always that way. His success is largely due to his beloved wife, who has brought stability to his life. Shakira Baksh has been his wife and partner for 46 years. The story of how they met is as impressive as his movies.

O awesome.club was inspired by this beautiful love story between the British actor and the Guyanese model. So, let’s tell you how it all happened. Check out!

Shakira and Michael with daughter Natasha, 1973.

Shakira Baksh was born in what was then British Guiana, now the Republic of Guyana. At age 16, she dropped out of school and took a job as a secretary in an American company’s office. During protests against the US government, the office was bombed, so she now has a scar on her face as a reminder of those events.

In her homeland, things were not easy either, so she decided that she wanted to try life abroad. A participation in a beauty contest was what propelled her to fulfill her dream. After winning the title of “Miss Guyana”, the young model had the opportunity to participate in the “Miss World” contest in 1967, in which she took 3rd place.

Shakira Baksh (left) at the “Miss World” competition in 1967.

Participating in “Miss World” was the beginning of her career as an international model and that’s what gave her the opportunity to live in London. As a result, such advertisement appeared, thanks to which she met her future husband Michael Caine.

The first 10 years of the actor’s career were quite difficult and, as he himself said, they were more like purgatory than paradise. During this period, he met his first wife, actress Patricia Hines.

Caine remembers that he had many unpleasant jobs: he washed dishes in a restaurant, worked in a laundry and also worked as a plumber. He was also called upon to play sporadic roles, but this happened rarely. He even believed that Patricia was more talented and more likely to succeed in the film industry.

The marriage ended after 7 years. According to Michael, he was “too young and immature to face poverty, as well as professional and personal failures.” Two years later, he continued to strive for a film career and landed a role as an aristocratic lieutenant in the historical war film Zulu, which earned him his greatest recognition so far. The artist only met the woman he was destined to live with for most of his life 9 years after their divorce.

Caine described in his autobiography exactly what it was like the night he saw his future wife in a commercial. He and his friend Paul were watching a TV show when a Maxwell House coffee commercial began to air. At that moment, the artist was about to change channels with the controller in hand, but something caught his attention.

In the picture was a girl he couldn’t take his eyes off. “My heart started beating faster, and my hands were sweating,” the actor recalled. When her face was shown closer, he sat in front of the TV on his knees to admire her.

“What’s going on with you?” asked Paul, perplexed.

“This girl is beautiful,” Caine replied.

“I know,” Paul said. “And?”

“I want to meet her,” said the actor. Initially, he thought she was Brazilian, and then asked if Paul would accompany him to Brazil, to which he received the answer: “Friend, you are crazy!”. In the end, Caine managed to convince his friend to buy the closest flight.

Michael was planning to call the Maxwell House office to find out who the people hired for the commercial were. But he was very euphoric, so he and his friend decided to cool off at the bar. As they were about to leave, an acquaintance of the actor approached to talk, and Caine told him he was in love.

When asked who the mystery woman was, he calmly replied, “The girl I saw on TV tonight.” Believe it or not, this acquaintance worked for the same company that had filmed the commercial. It was a big coincidence.

After Caine told him about his plans to go to Brazil in search of the girl, the boy laughed. The model was not Brazilian, as he had thought, but from Guyana. At the time, however, she was living and working in London.

Caine called his future wife and was turned down 11 times, until she finally agreed to go out with him. “I fell in love with her after about 8 minutes, and she fell in love with me after 2 hours,” the actor says of the encounter.

Shakira remembers that he was nothing like she had imagined. In the movies, he appeared to be an aggressive person, but in real life he was charming and very kind, and with whom he decided to share his life.

Michael and Shakira’s wedding, 1973.

When they first met, Caine drank a bottle of vodka and smoked a few packs of cigarettes a day. According to the actor, without Shakira, he would become an alcoholic. “She didn’t say I should stop drinking, but I wanted to be sober and in good shape by her side.” Since then, he’s only had one glass of wine with dinner. They married after two years of dating, and in 1973 they had a daughter, Natasha.

The Caines with daughter Natasha, 1998.

Shakira was always the person who made the actor want to get home faster, with whom he truly felt like a family man. “Wherever I am, even if it’s the most luxurious hotel room in the world, I love coming home,” she says.

Caine received a number of awards and was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. Shakira starred in films and TV series, but put her career on hold to accompany her husband on his work trips. For Michael, it was a way for them not to be separated from each other and to preserve the family due to the actor’s fast pace of life. Despite his advanced age, he continues his film career.

Shakira Baksh and Michael Caine have been together for 46 years. When they met, none of the people around them could have predicted that this relationship would last so long. Even though many friends thought the artist was crazy, falling in love with a girl from a TV commercial and wanting to do anything to go after her, he was right. Shakira really brought harmony and peace to her husband’s life.

Photo from 2019. Shakira is now 72 years old, and Michael 86. We must admit they are still as gorgeous as they were many years ago, don’t you think?

Do you believe this relationship was “written in the stars”? Would you have the courage to go to another country looking for a person you saw in a commercial?