Elizabeth Hurley reveals Hugh Grant's one-word response to famous Versace dress

Actress and model Elizabeth Hurley has spoken of Hugh Grant's jaw-dropping comment after he saw her in the famous saftey-pin Versace dress which catapulted her to stardom

Hugh Grant's reaction to seeing Elizabeth Hurley in the famous safety pin dress has been revealed.

The actress, 59, left the world gobsmacked when she stepped out with her former boyfriend Grant, 64, at the premiere for his movie Four Weddings and a Funeral back in 1994. The pair dated between 1987 and 2000 but have remained close friends with one another. Although the attention was initially on Hugh, having starred in the film, it soon turned towards Hurley and instantly changed the trajectory of her career.

Hurley's Versace gown which cost a whopping £3,000 instantly sparked a frenzy and saw her on the front cover of every newspaper – with her later admitting it was a "pretty daring" dress. However, her former boyfriend Hugh had a much simpler response after he saw Liz in the striking gown.

Speaking on a new podcast, Elizabeth opened up about the moment Hugh first saw her and the Love Actually appeared to have been lost for words as he struggled to form a sentence together. She said: "When he saw me in it for the first time he just went 'Christ!'," she said on The Coop with Kit.

Speaking in 2019 about the dress, designer Donatella Versace told InStyle: "That's when we started to realise the power of the red carpet and celebrities in creating topics of conversation. No one could really fathom such an astonishing reaction, or that Liz would steal the spotlight."

However, Liz had never anticipated the response to her jaw-dropping dress which she herself described as "daring". Speaking in a Disney+ documentary, she commented: "I must have been photographed 800,000 billion times that night. The next day we were on the front page of every newspaper, we were like 'What the hell is this?' I remember I was just looking at it thinking 'What' then going 'Well it was actually a pretty daring dress wasn't it?'"

At the time, she had no idea about the fashion house Versace and took the famous dress home on the tube in a "white plastic bag," not realising the impact it would have on popular culture. "I remember touching my toes and stretching up in it, and nothing moved, so I galloped down the stairs and that was that. The next day we were on the front page of every newspaper and I'm like, 'What the hell is this?' The next day we were on the front page of every newspaper and I'm like, 'What the hell is this?'"

Elsewhere on the podcast, Elizabeth revealed she had suffered a "tough year" having had friends and family who have been hit by illnesses but admitted she was "valuing" her time with those around her on a more personal level. "I feel like I've made a break through with a lot of people this year, through not having a great time," she commented, before adding that people have been suffering "incessant problems".

But while Elizabeth is known for her striking glamorous looks, she told the host that this hadn't always been the case. She commented: "I had pink hair, a nose ring and I thought I was the bees knees and I remember going to my first drama lesson with quite a strict drama teacher, ew were all introduced and he looked at me and went 'Very castable, I'm sure there's going to be the odd part where they look like you'." This moment saw Elizabeth "morph" herself into the star we often see these days.

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