Jack Nicholson's Oscar-winning ex-girlfriend of 17 years who called him a 'world-class philanderer'

The former couple first met at Jack's 36th birthday party in April 1973 at his house on Mulholland Drive in LA, where they spent the night together after flirting for hours.

Despite soon falling madly in love, Jack had a wandering eye throughout their relationship and was dubbed a "world-class philanderer" by Anjelica.

"It kind of grew over time, I think – that idea of Jack: he's so baaad! Even though Warren Beatty was one of his best friends, I didn't recognise Jack as a world-class philanderer at the time," she wrote in her 2014 memoir, Watch Me.

"For as prolific as he seems to have been, and as I have heard reported, he was actually quite discreet. Occasionally, I'd find a piece of female apparel – once a jacket of mine turned up on a girl in the street – or I'd find some hand cream, or a trinket might get left behind in the soap dish.

"Sometimes I'd take to wearing the jewellery to see if anybody would come up and claim it, but that never happened."

Even though it appears their relationship wasn't without its issues, Jack claimed in a joint interview with People in 1985 that he asked Anjelica to marry him "all the time".

"Sometimes she turns me down, sometimes she says yes, and we don't get around to it. I'm sure at some point – probably," he said.

Anjelica admitted, though, that she wasn't sold on tying the knot with Jack. "We both believe in keeping our freedom," she explained.

"If you have a long relationship, as we've had, you go through changes. You want times together and times apart. We see each other when we want to, and at our best.

"I don't like the word commitment. It has a gloomy sound. When I hear it, I see myself enduring a long, dreary ritual. Understanding is a better word than commitment. Jack and I have an understanding."

She had a change of heart in 1986, however, and decided it was time to marry Jack after she won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for 1985's Prizzi's Honor, which starred Jack and was directed by her father, John Huston.

Deciding to share the news with her boyfriend, Anjelica was left "humiliated" by his reaction.

"Everything went according to plan until Jack came downstairs… I told him what we had discussed, and he said, 'Are you serious about this?'" she wrote. "I burst into tears, turned on my heels, and left the house. It was humiliating for both Jack and me."

Anjelica said she later told her father: "It's Jack. He's unfaithful. It really hurts me. I can't live with it."

Their relationship began to change after that, and the couple drifted apart, finally ending their union in 1990 after Jack revealed he had fathered a child outside of their relationship with actress Rebecca Broussard.

Anjelica claimed Jack told her he didn't want their relationship to change, to which she responded: "There's only room for one of us women in this picture, and I am going to retire from it."

Despite their ups and downs, Jack and Anjelica still have an "important" friendship today – he even offered up his home to her when she evacuated her ranch during the LA wildfires in January.

"The phone just rang out of nowhere, and it was him," Anjelica told People. "It's always a comfort when he calls. It was heartbreakingly sweet."

"I've gone back over it ­several times in my head, and I think next time I'd accept the invitation."