7 Hollywood Celebrities Who Found Love and Have Been Together Forever

Relationships can endure even under the bright lights of fame

Katherine Gustafson,

AARP Experience Counts

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En español

Published September 05, 2024

a collage of notable celebrity marriages

Clockwise from top left: Rita Wilson and Tom Hanks; Christopher Walken and his wife Georgianne; Denzel and Pauletta Washington; Oprah Winfrey and Stedman Graham; Elton John and David Furnish; Jack Fisk and Sissy Spacek.

Credits (clockwise from top left): Ron Galella/Getty Images; Daily Mirror/Mirrorpix/Newscom; Ron Galella/Getty Images (2); Rick Diamond/Getty Images; Ron Galella/Getty Images

Hollywood relationships often come and go as quickly as the latest blockbusters. But some celebrities have made it work over the long haul despite the bright lights of fame.

Here are some stars who have been together forever — well, by “forever” we mean at least 30 years, which is a pretty long time for love in La La Land.

Sissy Spacek

Sissy Spacek, 74, has been married to production designer Jack Fisk, 78, since 1974, the year after they met while filming the movie Badlands. Fisk has worked on many high-profile films and was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Art Direction for There Will Be Blood in 2008 and The Revenant in 2016. The couple have two children: Schuyler, 41, an actress and singer-songwriter, and Madison, 35, a production designer and art director.

Samuel L. Jackson

Samuel Jackson, 75, met LaTanya Richardson, 74, when they were both college students in Atlanta and were acting together with the Morehouse Spelman Players. The pair began dating in 1970 and married in 1980. An actress and director, LaTanya appeared in Fried Green Tomatoes and Sleepless in Seattle, was nominated for a Tony, and was the first woman to direct an August Wilson play on Broadway. The pair have one child, Zoe, 42, a producer for reality TV.

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Christopher Walken

Christopher Walken, 81, and his wife Georgianne (née Thon), 80, have been married since 1969. They met in 1963 while starring together in a tour of West Side Story. Along with acting, Georgianne worked as a casting director for film and TV, including for shows such as The Sopranos and Entourage.

Tom Hanks

Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, both 67, met in 1981 while filming the ABC sitcom Bosom Buddies and have been married since 1988 and have been described as a Hollywood “power couple.” They have starred in multiple films together, including portraying siblings in Sleepless in Seattle and have also produced movies together.

Hanks and Wilson have two children: Chet, 33, an actor and rapper, and Truman, 28, an actor and cinematographer. Hanks has two other children, Colin, 46, and Elizabeth, 42, with his late ex-wife Samantha Lewes.

Denzel Washington

Denzel Washington, 69, married Pauletta Pearson, 73, in 1983, a while after meeting her on the set of the television film Wilma, which was Denzel’s first on-screen gig. Pauletta is also an actor, with many credits on Broadway, and is also a classically trained pianist and vocalist. The pair have four children: actor and former pro football player John David, film producer Katia, and twins Olivia, an actress, and Malcolm, a film producer.

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Oprah

Although they have never been married, Oprah, 70, and her longtime partner Stedman Graham, 73, qualify for having been together “forever.” They met at a charity event in 1986, the same year that The Oprah Winfrey Show debuted. They were engaged at one point, but Oprah called it off, realizing she wanted to be proposed to more than she wanted to be married. She later told Vogue that she believed getting married would have doomed their relationship, which has lasted almost 40 years.

Elton John

Sir Elton John, 77, got together with David Furnish, 61, a Canadian-British advertising executive, in 1993, and the pair entered into a civil partnership in 2005 on the first day it was legal to do so in the United Kingdom. They converted their civil partnership into a marriage in 2014. Furnish became a filmmaker in 1995 by directing a documentary about John. The couple has two children by surrogacy: Zachary, 13, and Elijah, 11.

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Katherine Gustafson is a freelance writer specializing in creating content related to technology, business, finance, the environment and other topics for companies and nonprofits such as Visa, Adobe, Lumeon, Skift and the World Wildlife Fund. Her writing has appeared in a variety of publications including Slate, TechCrunch, YES! Magazine and Forbes.