Working Couple Caulfield and Mills Team Up for ‘In and Out the Window’

Maxwell Caulfield couldn’t be happier about the impending prospect of middle age.

“Now that the boyish features are falling away,” the actor says with a laugh, “hopefully we’ll be able to find more work together.” Caulfield’s acting partner of choice is his wife, Juliet Mills. The British-born duo is paired onstage at the Tiffany Theatre in Jean Van Tuyle’s 1930s drama “In and Out the Window,” in which Caulfield plays a good-hearted hobo who becomes a surrogate father to Mills’ runaway teen-age son.

“We have to be careful--we can’t play too familiar,” says Mills of the characters’ tentative relationship. “But working with someone you love and trust is the best. Maxwell is a lovely actor; I love seeing him onstage. He’s in his element.” Caulfield, who was “instantly smitten” with Mills when they met 12 years ago in a touring production of “The Elephant Man,” is equally complimentary: “Juliet is the revelation of this play.”

Later this summer, Mills (who became an American star with the ‘60s series “Nanny and the Professor”) will return to England to co-star with sister Hayley Mills in a revival of godfather Noel Coward’s “Fallen Angels,” marking the first time the siblings have worked together--unless you count a “Love Boat” episode in which the sisters and their father, John, co-starred but had separate storylines.

Offstage, Mills and Caulfield keep busy growing their own fruits and vegetables and tending to their “zoo” on their Carpenteria ranch. And although they cherish the idea of working together (Caulfield predicts, “We’re going to do something wonderful one of these days, like ‘Streetcar’ or ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ in England”), they passed up one such chance last year when the actor agreed to reprise his bad-boy Miles character on TV’s “Dynasty” reunion.

“The less said about that the better,” he says dryly. “I make no comment on its validity or sense.”