Marriage can be bad for your health.
Ailing actor Dennis Hopper — currently embroiled in a bitter divorce battle with wife No. 5 — claims that his doctor told him the less time he spends with his wife, the longer he will live.
In court documents made public today, Hopper’s lawyer, Joe Mannis, said that while his client undergoes chemotherapy as he continues to battle cancer, the actor’s 42-year-old wife Victoria Duffy has “repeatedly subjected [him] to severe emotional distress.”
According to a declaration by Dr. David Agus that was included in the papers, the “presence of his estranged wife is hampering Mr. Hopper’s present cancer care.”
“It is my belief and recommendation that the less Mr. Hopper has to do with his estranged wife at this time, the more likely he is to have his life extended,” Agus added.
The 73-year-old actor — famous for his role in the 1979 movie “Apocalypse Now” — has been married five times.
Hopper also asked, and obtained, from a California judge an order keeping Duffy at least 10 yards away from him, his adult son, Henry; his daughter, Marin; and his assistant, Emily Davis.
The judge also ruled that Duffy may not enter the actor’s main residence in Venice, Calif. and gave Hopper visitation rights to their daughter Galen every day for two hours starting at 5 p.m.
The “Easy Rider” actor, who suffers from inoperable prostate cancer, filed for divorce last month — to limit the amount his wife gets when he dies — after 14 years of marriage.
Duffy claims Hopper’s adult kids want to cut her out of his will.
Under the pre-nup agreement in 1996 between Hopper and Duffy, if the couple divorces she loses her 25 percent cut of his estate.
The Post reported last month that Duffy fled their Venice Beach estate on Dec. 19 in a truck loaded up with expensive art and silver, vowing that she was leaving Hopper for good.
The always-slender Duffy looked “X-ray thin,” said a friend, and complained that she was exhausted and depressed.
The trophy wife later came crawling back.
“Victoria realized that maybe this was a mistake and returned just before New Year’s,” the friend said.
Duffy is currently living alone in one of Hopper’s Frank Gehry-designed houses in Los Angeles, separated from the rest of the family, who have gathered around Hopper’s deathbed in Venice Beach.