What was the story behind Julian McMahon and Shannen Doherty's relationship? Romance revisited

Julian McMahon passed away recently at the age of 56 on July 2, 2025, in Clearwater, Florida at the age of 56. His death comes after his private battle with cancer, according to his wife, Kelly McMahon.

McMahon announced his death in a statement shared with “Good Morning America.” It read:

"With an open heart, I wish to share with the world that my beloved husband, Julian McMahon, died peacefully this week after a valiant effort to overcome cancer. Julian loved life. He loved his family. He loved his friends. He loved his work, and he loved his fans. His deepest wish was to bring joy into as many lives as possible."

McMahon’s death comes a year after his Charmed co-star and his former girlfriend, Shannen Doherty’s demise, who passed away in July 2024 at the age of 53 after battling breast cancer, as per a report in the New York Post.

Julian McMahon and Doherty's relationship was brief but highly controversial due to its timing and circumstances. The two actors met and became involved while working together on the TV series Charmed and the 2001 film Another Day.

Here is what else we know about the pair’s romantic relationship.

Revisiting the romantic relationship between Julian McMahon and Shannen Doherty

Julian McMahon and Shannen Doherty shared a brief romance reportedly during the third season of Charmed in 2001, as per a report in Closer magazine.

McMahon played the role of half-demon, Cole Turner in Charmed, who develops an intimate relationship with Doherty’s character, Prue Halliwell. She was one of the three lead characters in the series, alongside Holly Marie Combs and Alyssa Milano.

Doherty left the show in 2001, after working for three seasons, from 1998 to 2006 following her feud with Milano over pay and publicity. In an episode of Let’s Be Clear With Shannen Doherty, she revealed that Milano forced the producers of the show to fire her. Doherty said:

“One can’t keep telling the same story over and over and over again, when it’s not the truth. My representatives, I remember them looking at me at the time and said, ‘No, no, no, your career won’t survive another firing, so we’re just going to say that you chose to leave’. I remember I started laughing, going, ‘Who is going to believe that I’m crazy enough to leave a hit show?’”

Doherty and Julian McMahon briefly dated each other for five months, from May 2001 to September 2001, according to a report in FandomWire. Their relationship was complicated as McMahon was going through a divorce during that time with his wife and Baywatch star, Brooke Burns. The former couple got married in 1999 and share a daughter named Madison, who was born in 2000, as per a report in Us Weekly.

In an interview with Stuff magazine in 2001, Brooks eventually opened up about her divorce (2001) with her husband and his infidelity with Shannon Doherty. Claiming that she came to know about their alleged affair through papers, she said that it had been “the straw that broke the camel's back."

She added,

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“I imagine that he let himself carried away by all the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles.”

After her relationship with McMahon, Doherty reportedly married film producer-turned-professional poker player Rick Salomon in 2002. At the time of her death in July 2024, she was in the process of divorcing her third husband, Kurt Iswarienko. Whereas Julian McMahon was married to Kelly Paniagua.

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