London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Saturday, Jul 26, 2025

Times Celebrities Married Normal People

Times Celebrities Married Normal People

It’s corny, but it’s true: Sometimes opposites attract.

“I got lucky,” Matt Damon once said of his bride, Luciana Barroso. “I fell in love with a civilian.” Sure, it’s sweet to think that opposites attract, but the likelihood of a Hollywood star and an average Joe (or Jane!) getting together seems like a better fit for a story that unfolds on the big screen-which makes the times that it does happen all the more romantic. For proof that there’s plenty of love to be found beyond the limelight, here we’re taking a look at 17 couples who demonstrate that love knows no star power (or lack thereof).

Riz Ahmed and Fatima Farheen Mirza




Married: Late 2020

This actor-writer pair made waves at the 2021 Oscars when Ahmed stopped to fix Mirza’s hair, and their meet-cute was no less romantic: the two met at the same table in a coffee shop. As Ahmed recalled on The Tonight Show, “We were both jostling over the same laptop plug points.” A secret pandemic wedding followed: “We did it in a backyard, which is nice in lots of ways,” Ahmed revealed. “And I think the nicest thing about it was you didn’t have 500 aunties hanging around you, pinching your cheeks.”

Meryl Streep and Don Gummer




Married: September 1978

You might expect one of Hollywood’s greatest living actresses to have a spouse similarly high up in the entertainment industry, but that’s not the case for Meryl Streep; her husband, Don Gummer, is a sculptor, and the pair have four children together. “First, I’m going to thank Don, because when you thank your husband at the end of the speech they play him out with the music, and I want him to know that everything I value most in our lives, you’ve given me,” Streep said in 2012, as she accepted the best-actress Oscar for her role in The Iron Lady.

Wanda Sykes and Alex Niedbalski




Married: October 2008

Sykes met her wife, French businesswoman Alex Niedbalski, on a ferry to Fire Island, where Niedbalski was deep in conversation with a young child. “Something really said to me-like, audibly-Wow, that’s what you need, Wanda,’” Sykes told The Guardian in 2018. The two have been married for over a decade, and are now parents to twins, Olivia Lou and Lucas Claude.

Matt Damon and Luciana Barroso




Married: December 2005

Damon met Barroso, then a bartender at Miami’s Crobar, when he was in town filming Stuck On You. After a long day of shooting, some crew members invited Damon to get a drink. “They said, ‘Come on,’ and kind of dragged me along,” Damon told Ellen DeGeneres in 2011. “I literally saw her across a crowded room and eight years and four kids later, that’s my life. I don’t know how else our paths would have crossed if that didn’t happen.” The moral of the story? “When you’re tired, suck it up and go to the bar and you might meet your wife,” says Damon. The couple renewed their marriage vows in April 2013 with a small sunset ceremony in St. Lucia.

Jon Stewart and Tracey McShane




Married: May 2000

Stewart met then–veterinary technician McShane on a blind date at a Mexican restaurant in 1996, just one month after Stewart was fired from his show on MTV. “It’s a fairy tale from my end,” McShane later told Oprah. “I had just gotten out of a seven-year relationship. I was depressed, and my friends were trying to set me up all the time. After a bad date, they’d ask, ‘What are you looking for?’ I had discovered The Jon Stewart Show, so I said, ‘Someone funny and sweet, like Jon Stewart.’” As fate would have it, McShane’s roommate at the time was working as a production assistant on Wishful Thinking and played matchmaker when Stewart stopped by the set. In February 1999, Stewart proposed to McShane through The New York Times, having enlisted the newspaper’s crossword puzzle editor for help (among the clues specific to the couple? The answers to “Valentine’s Day Request” and “Recipient of the Request” were “Will You Marry Me” and “Tracey”).

Anne Hathaway and Adam Shulman




Married: September 2012

Hathaway met Shulman, an actor-slash-jewelry-designer, at the Palm Springs Film Festival in 2008, through a mutual friend. Their chemistry was so apparent that Hathaway told her pal: I’m going to marry that man. “I think he thought I was a little nuts, which I am a bit, but I’m also nice,” Hathaway has said. “I knew from the second I met him that he was the love of my life.” While Shulman’s acting career hasn’t mirrored the same success as his wife’s, aside from a part in the 2015 Meryl Streep dramedy, Ricki and the Flash and producing Song One, which Hathaway also starred in, he has a jewelry line called James Banks. He even helped design Hathaway’s ethically sourced, six-carat diamond engagement ring when he proposed in 2011.

Jerry Seinfeld and Jessica Sklar




Married: December 1999

Sklar was a newlywed at the Reebok gym on the Upper West Side, wearing headphones and filling a water bottle when she met Seinfeld. “I was going through a difficult time, and I was approached by Jerry Seinfeld and he attempted to make me laugh, and I was really not interested in being entertained at that moment,” Sklar has said. “He came around again and said something funny, and I actually had to laugh.” At the time, Sklar was a PR executive for Tommy Hilfiger and had just married Eric Nederlander, the son of theater magnate Robert Nederlander, two months earlier. (When they were wed, guests’ invitations were styled after Playbills and indicated Sklar was “making her Broadway debut.”) Soon after meeting Seinfeld, Sklar broke things off with her marriage and became engaged to Seinfeld a year later, after he proposed at Soho’s Balthazar.

Reese Witherspoon and Jim Toth




Married: March 2011

The Oscar-winning actress first crossed paths with the talent agent at a friend’s party when a drunk guest was hitting on her and Toth intervened. “He was like, [slurring, scowling, pointing finger in her face] ‘You don’t know me,’ ” Witherspoon recalled in a 2012 interview. “Jim came over and said, ‘Please excuse my friend. He's just broken up with someone.’ ” Witherspoon and Toth hit it off and were married the next year. Since then, Toth has continued his career as an agent at the Creative Artists Agency in Los Angeles, where he has represented everyone from Scarlett Johansson to Robert Downey Jr. and Matthew McConaughey.

Eddie Redmayne and Hannah Bagshawe




Married: December 2014

Redmayne and Bagshawe started out as friends. Redmayne was studying at Eton College, the English all-boys boarding school, while Bagshawe attended a neighboring boarding school for girls. When Bagshawe and her classmates organized a fashion show for charity, Redmayne volunteered to walk the runway. Shirtless. “I was this pasty, freckly guy and when I came on, the girls in the audience didn’t take much notice of me,” Redmayne later recalled. Someone did take notice, however, and so began the 12-year-long friendship: Redmayne caught glimpse of Bagshawe from across the room at an after-party: “She was very beautiful and very funny and she loves the arts and theater just as I do, so we became friends.” The actor and the former financial publicist began dating in 2012, before making their red carpet debut together that December at the London premiere of Les Misérables.

Patrick Dempsey and Jillian Fink




Married: July 1999

The Grey’s Anatomy star found his match at Fink’s salon, Delux, in 1994. When the hairstylist noticed there was an appointment under the name “Patrick Dempsey,” she wrote it off as a joke. “I was shocked,” Fink said of her surprise when Patrick Dempsey himself came in for a trim. “But at the same time, I was happy because he was so cute.” Both were in relationships with other people, and it took three years of regular haircuts before the two got together.

Alec Baldwin and Hilaria Thomas




Married: June 2012

Baldwin and Thomas were first introduced in February 2011 at Pure Food and Wine, a since-closed vegan restaurant in Union Square. As Thomas recapped the event for the couple’s New York Times wedding announcement: “I was standing near the door with my friends when he walked up and took my hand and said, ‘I must know you.’ ” (The actor has since admitted his opening line was “none too clever.”) Thomas was 27 years old and working as an instructor at Yoga Vida, a studio she helped open upon graduating from NYU. “I saw right away that she was very dedicated,” Baldwin told the Times. “She’s the yoga queen of the Village.”

Vince Vaughn and Kyla Weber




Married: January 2010

Vaughn’s movie-producer friend reportedly introduced him to Weber at a wedding in 2008. A former Calgarian from rural Alberta, Weber was raised on a small farm in Blackie (population est. 400) and worked as a real estate agent. “Because she lived far away, at first I was nervous to date her because it’s one of my best friends’ wife’s best friend from childhood…. If it goes wrong, you’re talking about awkward,” Vaughn said during an appearance on Live! with Regis and Kelly. “She’s a civilian, which is good.” According to Vaughn, they started off by exchanging emails and phone calls, and they’ve been inseparable ever since.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Deputy attorney general's second day of meeting with Ghislaine Maxwell has concluded
Controversial March in Switzerland Features Men Dressed in Nazi Uniforms
Politics is a good business: Barack Obama’s Reported Net Worth Growth, 1990–2025
Thai Civilian Death Toll Rises to 12 in Cambodian Cross-Border Attacks
TSUNAMI: Trump Just Crossed the Rubicon—And There’s No Turning Back
Over 120 Criminal Cases Dismissed in Boston Amid Public Defender Shortage
UN's Top Court Declares Environmental Protection a Legal Obligation Under International Law
"Crazy Thing": OpenAI's Sam Altman Warns Of AI Voice Fraud Crisis In Banking
The Podcaster Who Accidentally Revealed He Earns Over $10 Million a Year
Trump Announces $550 Billion Japanese Investment and New Trade Agreements with Indonesia and the Philippines
US Treasury Secretary Calls for Institutional Review of Federal Reserve Amid AI‑Driven Growth Expectations
UK Government Considers Dropping Demand for Apple Encryption Backdoor
Severe Flooding in South Korea Claims Lives Amid Ongoing Rescue Operations
Japanese Man Discovers Family Connection Through DNA Testing After Decades of Separation
Russia Signals Openness to Ukraine Peace Talks Amid Escalating Drone Warfare
Switzerland Implements Ban on Mammography Screening
Japanese Prime Minister Vows to Stay After Coalition Loses Upper House Majority
Pogacar Extends Dominance with Stage Fifteen Triumph at Tour de France
CEO Resigns Amid Controversy Over Relationship with HR Executive
Man Dies After Being Pulled Into MRI Machine Due to Metal Chain in New York Clinic
NVIDIA Achieves $4 Trillion Valuation Amid AI Demand
US Revokes Visas of Brazilian Corrupted Judges Amid Fake Bolsonaro Investigation
U.S. Congress Approves Rescissions Act Cutting Federal Funding for NPR and PBS
North Korea Restricts Foreign Tourist Access to New Seaside Resort
Brazil's Supreme Court Imposes Radical Restrictions on Former President Bolsonaro
Centrist Criticism of von der Leyen Resurfaces as she Survives EU Confidence Vote
Judge Criticizes DOJ Over Secrecy in Dropping Charges Against Gang Leader
Apple Closes $16.5 Billion Tax Dispute With Ireland
Von der Leyen Faces Setback Over €2 Trillion EU Budget Proposal
UK and Germany Collaborate on Global Military Equipment Sales
Trump Plans Over 10% Tariffs on African and Caribbean Nations
Flying Taxi CEO Reclaims Billionaire Status After Stock Surge
Epstein Files Deepen Republican Party Divide
Zuckerberg Faces $8 Billion Privacy Lawsuit From Meta Shareholders
FIFA Pressured to Rethink World Cup Calendar Due to Climate Change
SpaceX Nears $400 Billion Valuation With New Share Sale
Microsoft, US Lab to Use AI for Faster Nuclear Plant Licensing
Trump Walks Back Talk of Firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell
Zelensky Reshuffles Cabinet to Win Support at Home and in Washington
"Can You Hit Moscow?" Trump Asked Zelensky To Make Putin "Feel The Pain"
Irish Tech Worker Detained 100 days by US Authorities for Overstaying Visa
Dimon Warns on Fed Independence as Trump Administration Eyes Powell’s Succession
Church of England Removes 1991 Sexuality Guidelines from Clergy Selection
Superman Franchise Achieves Success with Latest Release
Hungary's Viktor Orban Rejects Agreements on Illegal Migration
Jeff Bezos Considers Purchasing Condé Nast as a Wedding Gift
Ghislaine Maxwell Says She’s Ready to Testify Before Congress on Epstein’s Criminal Empire
Bal des Pompiers: A Celebration of Community and Firefighter Culture in France
FBI Chief Kash Patel Denies Resignation Speculations Amid Epstein List Controversy
Air India Pilot’s Mental Health Records Under Scrutiny
×