Who Is Neil Young's Wife? All About Actress Daryl Hannah

After searching for a heart of gold, Neil Young found love with his wife Daryl Hannah.

The “Heart of Gold” singer married the Splash actress in 2018 after four years of dating. Young and Hannah are said to have “bonded over their activism.”

“Neil’s biggest passion in life is the environment. Daryl is the exact same,” a source told PEOPLE following their secret wedding.

Hannah, who famously dated John F. Kennedy Jr., had never been married prior to Young. However, the former Buffalo Springfield member had been previously married to Susan Acevedo and Pegi Young.

Young and Hannah went public not long after the singer’s marriage to Pegi ended in 2014. “When we got together, even some of my good friends were negative about it, and I could never understand it,” Young recalled in an interview with Yahoo! Entertainment in 2018. “[Daryl is] a wonderful human being, and I’m very lucky to know her. That’s all I was thinking.”

The Grammy winner added that he and Hannah were “very lucky to have found each other. I’m eternally thankful for the opportunity to share my life with her, and she feels the same.”

So who is Neil Young’s wife? Here’s everything to know about Daryl Hannah and her relationship with the singer.

She and Young started dating in 2014

The couple were spotted looking cozy at a restaurant in Westlake, California, in September 2014. The sighting came two months after Young filed for divorce from his wife, Pegi, after 36 years of marriage.

A source told PEOPLE that September that Hannah and Young had been “dating for months.” The source said, “They’ve taken no effort to even hide it. He recorded a new album a few weeks ago, and she was on Skype the entire time, giving him feedback on every take. He even told people in the studio she was his ‘girlfriend.’ ”

Hannah was described as a friend of Young’s in a 2013 HuffPost story about the duo filming a documentary in Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada. Months before their relationship was reported in 2014, they were seen at a Keystone XL pipeline protest in Washington, D.C.

“They’ve appeared at many, many protest rallies together over the past year,” an insider told PEOPLE in September 2014. “The fans have known about this for months.”

She is an actress

Like Young, Hannah is also in the entertainment industry. She’s an actress who has starred alongside Steve Martin, Robert Redford and Tom Hanks. Her film credits include Splash, Roxanne, Legal Eagles, Steel Magnolias, Kill Bill: Volume 1 and Kill Bill: Volume 2.

She is Young’s third wife

Young was married twice before he and Hannah tied the knot. The singer married his first wife Susan Acevedo in 1968, and his second wife, the late Pegi Young, in 1978. He welcomed two children with Pegi before their divorce in 2014.

She and Young had a secret wedding

The couple privately wed in 2018. Hannah sparked marriage rumors when she posted a photo of an owl on Instagram along with the caption, “Someone’s watching over us… love & only love,” referencing the lyrics to Young’s “Love and Only Love.”

Patricia Arquette commented on the picture, “You are the whisperer to all the animals… birds and bees follow you and protect you,” adding, “What a beautiful time of love and magic.”

Meanwhile, on Facebook, guitarist Mark Miller congratulated the couple. “Congratulations to Daryl Hannah and Neil Young on their wedding today,” Miller wrote. “May they have a long and happy relationship."

Ron Fugere, a local boat captain in the San Juan islands, told PEOPLE that he watched a “small, intimate gathering” take place on the singer’s 1913 vintage boat, the W.N. Ragland, on July 27, 2018. The following month, Hannah and Young reportedly held a second wedding ceremony with 100 guests at Santa Margarita Ranch in San Luis Obispo, California.

Young confirmed their marriage on his website

The pair’s marriage was confirmed by the musician in October 2018. Sharing an official live video of his band’s song “Ohio” on his website, Young referred to Hannah as “my wife Daryl” in a message calling for “common sense gun laws,” which came days after 11 people were killed in the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting.

“ ‘Ohio’ was written back in 1970 after seeing the cover of a magazine with a young girl kneeling beside her fallen friend,” Young began. “When the National Guard murdered four students at Ohio’s Kent State University for protesting the Vietnam War, it was a pivotal moment in our history. It was a pivotal moment for me.”

“Today we see what we have become,” he continued. “With no real laws protecting us from guns, and with politicians supporting the NRA because the NRA supports them, we are not well represented.”

Young called today’s students “brave” by “demanding change in violent times.” He wrote, “We stand with them. They are us. We are them. This has been going on for far too long. My wife Daryl and I put this video together for you to reflect on.”

She became a stepmother upon her marriage to Young

Although Hannah and Young don’t have any children together, Hannah became a stepmother when she married Young. The “Harvest Moon” singer shares son Ben and daughter Amber with his second wife, Pegi. Young is also said to have a son named Zeke, his eldest child, from his relationship with Carrie Snodgress.

Young’s son Ben, who has cerebral palsy, joined his dad and Hannah at the premiere of Paradox at the 2018 SXSW Conference and Festivals.

She once dated JFK Jr.

Long before marrying Young, Hannah was linked to famous faces like David Blaine, Val Kilmer, Jackson Browne and John F. Kennedy Jr. The Roxanne star dated JFK Jr. on and off for five years before they split in 1994.

In 1999, PEOPLE reported that she and Kennedy were not in touch, but the actress was “okay with that.” She went on to stay at the time, “It wasn’t as intense. I just think I’ve got a very different life.”

She directed Young in a Netflix film

Hannah made her feature directorial debut in 2018 with Paradox, which she also wrote. The actress directed Young in the Netflix film that is described by the streamer as a ”fantasy, a loud poem and a free-spirited tale of music and love.”

In 2018, she told Yahoo! Entertainment, “I can’t even tell you how many years I told my manager I wanted [to direct].”

Young praised Hannah, calling her “a real artist” in the interview.

“She wrote what everybody said. She gave us good direction throughout the whole thing,” he said. “Daryl is great at what she does. She’s a true professional, and a joy to work with.”

She directed a documentary about the making of one of Young’s albums

Hannah also directed a documentary about the making of Crazy Horse and Neil Young’s album, Barn.

Discussing with Rolling Stone in 2021 what makes his wife a great filmmaker, Young said, "She’s just a natural. She’s wanted to do films since she was old enough to wear sneakers. I mean, she just loves it. She’s incredibly talented and connected. She gets moved by the music and gets really involved.”

She’s helped Young become stronger

The songwriter revealed to Yahoo! Entertainment in 2018 that Hannah has helped him “physically to be stronger.” He shared, “She’s got a really intense physical regimen she follows, and I crawl along behind her. We do Pilates twice a week, sometimes three times a week, and get in the pool with weights. We have routines we do in the pool, a lot of stuff together like that. There’s always something.”

Young dubbed himself fortunate during the interview, adding, “We’re very lucky to have found each other. I’m eternally thankful for the opportunity to share my life with her, and she feels the same.”