Jamie Dornan Reveals He Once Kissed a Horse on a TV Set — Despite Being Highly Allergic: 'My Lips Absolutely Blew Up'

"We couldn't shoot the rest of the day," the Irish actor explained of the aftermath of his equine encounter

Jamie Dornan is recalling his very regrettable close encounter with a horse.

While appearing on The Graham Norton Show on Friday, the Irish actor, 41, regaled the audience with a hilarious story about how he once kissed a horse on a TV set despite being "highly allergic" to the animals.

"I like them as a species, I just can't get close," Dornan said, before explaining that he made the grievous error of locking lips with the equine despite previously running into trouble with a horse while filming Marie Antoinette — his first-ever acting role — back in 2006.

"My character [Count Axel Fersen] pretty much has to spend the whole movie on a horse," he recounted. "And I forgot I hadn't been around horses for a long time."

To get ready for filming, he underwent two weeks of riding training outside Paris. "So I'm trotting around this place … and in the back, one of the runner's faces just looked [shocked]," he said of the crew member's reaction to his appearance. "I was itchy, and my whole face had become a giant hive."

He continued, "I had to get EpiPens. Then they almost couldn't insure me to do the movie."

To continue the job, he needed to be medicated whenever he was near a horse. "So if you see me on a horse, I'm very heavily medicated," he joked.

Related: Jamie Dornan Celebrates Milestone Birthday with Backyard Rodeo: 'This Is 40'

Despite this extreme allergic reaction, Dornan went on to work with horses again in the 2012 historical drama New Worlds. It seems the Fifty Shades of Grey actor developed quite an affinity for his assigned horse on the series' set.

"I really liked the horse I had. And I thought, 'It's the final day. You know what? I love this horse.' So I gave her a kiss on the lips," he said, prompting Norton, 60, to jokingly interject, "What medication were you on?"

As the audience laughed, Dornan continued his story, "I went, 'You know what, we're nearly over. I have half a day left.' The horse was picture wrapped. So I gave it a kiss."

Not surprisingly, the sweet moment did not end well for Dornan. "And then my lips absolutely blew up," he recounted. "And we couldn't shoot the rest of the day."

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Related: Jamie Dornan Admits to Kissing a Photo of Crush Liv Tyler 'Every Night Before I Went to Bed' as Teen

Last year, Dornan made another surprising kiss confession. During a game of "Never Have I Ever" with his Belfast costar Caitríona Balfe for British Vogue, he admitted that his celebrity crush was Liv Tyler — and that he used to smooch a photo of her "every night" before going to sleep when he was a teenager.

"I had a black-and-white picture of Liv Tyler by my bed and I used to kiss it every night before I went to bed," Dornan said while appearing on The Kelly Clarkson Show.

"And when I was in New York I met her, my friend knew this and said, 'Jamie, did you tell Liv about that time?' And I had to tell Liv Tyler to her face that I used to kiss a black-and-white picture of her every night."

"She was so lovely about it. But it was mortifying for me," he added.

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