Old time actors and directors that you were surprised to find out were married to each other once upon a time

I wouldn't count Martin Scorsese and Isabella Rossellini since I believe this is relatively well-known but I certainly would count:
Jeanne Moreau and William Friedkin

As well as Wim Wenders and Ronee Blakley.

And today's big find, Beth Howland and Michael J. Pollard.

I'll have to wrack my brain a bit--I come across these all the time in various books and documentaries.

Paulette Goddard and--wait for it--Burgess Meredith.

Oh, and PJ Soles & Dennis Quaid.

Great one! I'd sell my soul for a couple of years with late-'70s P.J.

Paulette Goddard and--wait for it--Burgess Meredith.

I just recalled walking by the Bobby Van Steakhouse the other day. I almost tried to figure out how to add him and his widow to this thread or spin off a new one but then I remembered and checked that she remarried, so
Elaine Joyce and Neil Simon

(Screenwriters welcome)

The new thread would be called something like Celebrity Couples of the 70s Known Mainly For Appearing on Game Shows

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/dnA74lpIOtE/hqdefault.jpg

Now seen 12 times a day on Buzzr.

Paulette Goddard had the Tramp, the Penguin, and the Pacifist

Ha. Just watched an entire episode of Tattletales with Bobby and Elaine along with Orson Bean and Alejandro Rey and their wives, neither of which I was familiar with.

A lot of the '70s Match Game regulars had surprising spouses at one time or another:

Brett Somers => Jack Klugman
Joyce Bulifant => James McArthur ("Dano" of Hawaii Five-O)
Richard Dawson => Diana Dors

Oh yeah, Dawson & Dors is a great one.

I've known for a long time but initially was surprised that Burt Reynolds was married to Judy Carne of Laugh-In

These are all great, thanks!

Knew Klugman/Somers, had forgotten Reynolds/Carne, rest all new to me. Had being trying hard to remember Joyce Bulifant at all, but kept getting interference from Joyce Van Patten. Who, it turns out, was married to Martin Balsam for five years. As a bonus for this thread, this union produced a daughter, Talia Balsam, who was married to George Clooney for four years.

...and who is currently married to John Slattery, whom also played her ex-husband on Mad Men.

More Match Game:
Mary Ann Mobley => Gary Collins

God is she annoying on Match Game or any other game show

Haven't watch one with her in ages. Does she make goo-goo eyes at Gene or something?

It's the combination of her dumb, ill-considered answers with the fact that she's clearly so full of herself. Dim and haughty and yeah, goo-goo eyes at everybody.

Caught her on Tattletales the other day and she bitched about not hearing a question because her rooting section was too noisy. Missing the question allowed another celeb to win the game, and at the end of the show she announced that she was going to "file a protest." So a sore loser as well

B-b-but... oh wait

Lol at description of Mobley/Collins as the "Brangelina of the '70s"

Henry Fonda and Margaret Sullavan.

Don't think I knew that either. Believe they were neighbors later when she was married to Leland Hayward.

RIP Tattletales regular Dick Gautier.

Not both actors - you could argue neither were - but the one that always surprises me is George Lazenby and Pam Shriver.

Nicky Henson and Una Stubbs

http://img5.bdbphotos.com/images/orig/8/c/8c4gfbdxfrfrfrd.jpg?djet1p5k

Jack Klugman and Brett Somers had that thing some couples have where they kinda look like they could be brother and sister.

Indeed.

Tbh, trying to remember who Dick Gautier's actress wife was at the time of Tattletales and what I would have seen her on.

Barbara Stuart. You probably knew her from her role as "Bunny" in Gomer Pyle: USMC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JmEvGYhfek

Because Beth Howland. And Valerie Harper + Richard Schaal, which I didn't know about until after posting.

I don't know how old-time this is, but Alan Pakula and Hope Lange.

http://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/a0/c4/3e/a0c43ef2906994d6fa594413a620fb8c.jpg

^a perfect addition

RIP Jeanne Moreau

had a romance w/ Lee Marvin!

And Peter Handke, apparently.

https://handkeonline.onb.ac.at/sites/handkeonline.at/files/styles/fullscreen/public/images/pool/sph-lw-s69-1.jpg?itok=18mynEyj

Not a director but a writer: Hugu Claus and Sylvia Kristel
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/64/5e/d7/645ed73c422c4575c0b263f2aa6e2d70.jpg

HugO, sorry

Cliff Robertson & Dina Merrill

Dave Vanian and Patricia Morrisson!

Bricolage
Decoupage

Ha! Meant to post ^^ in the “I always get those two mixed up” thread.

Lol

Not that obscure, but Rip Torn and Geraldine Page

Albert Finney & Anouk Aimee

Talk about punching above your weight.

Mel Tormé & Janette Scott... the surprising part of that union being that Thora Hird was therefore Mel Tormé's mother-in-law!

Not married just dating but Jay Sebring and Barbara Luna.

i was distressed enough to know about ava gardner but ok

now i find out martha vickers and all?

this is approaching michael sheen levels of fuck off

Paula Prentiss and Richard Benjamin.

^ not just were, but still are married

^

Two English actors: Edward Fox and Tracy Reed, the only female cast member of Dr. Strangelove and stepdaughter of Sir Carol Reed.

Barrie Chase and Gene Shacove

I only just found out about Viggo Mortensen and Exene Cervenka.

Carolyn Jones and Aaron Spelling

Roy Boulting and Hayley Mills.

I only just found out about Viggo Mortensen and Exene Cervenka.

flashback to the advanced bar trivia game question I won: "what is the only movie to feature two exes of Exene?"

A. the Vanishing Point remake from 1997

Weird one: Film producer Sidney Luft (once married to Judy Garland; father of Lorna Luft) in the last 12 years of his life was married to Camille Keaton, the lead actress in I Spit on Your Grave who also was in Italian giallos.

Not that old school but: Jenny Seagrove and Michael Winner

Texas oilman W. Howard Lee was married to Hedy Lamarr and then, shortly after their divorce, Gene Tierney.

Forgot that Gene Tierney had earlier been married to Oleg Cassini, as mentioned upthread. In between she dated Charles K. Feldman, but who didn't.

W. Howard Lee deserves a Gene Markey Marital Achievement Award

again- mickey rooney

Yeah, Rooney, Markey and Lee are definitely in the elite of 20th Century show biz marriers

Along with Artie Shaw.

Thought about all those guys.

Betsy Blair was married Gene Kelly for almost two decades and then later more than twice as long to Karel Reisz until he died.

Virginia Cherrill and Cary Grant

Joan Fontaine and producer William Dozier, who created– and narrated! –both Batman and The Green Hornet.

i came across marty and isabella recently and didn't know that one, but that was just because i had never actually read the first post on this thread.

Binnie Barnes and actor-turned-producer Mike Frankovich.

Janusz Kamiński, Spielberg’s cinematographer, was married to Holly Hunter for five years in the 1990s.

Everyone knows that George Brent was married to Ruth Chatterton, but did you also know that afterwards he was married to Ann Sheridan for exactly a year and in between, in 1937, he was married to another actress, the Australian Constance Worth, for less than a year.

#onethread

Figuring now that his gift of gab must have been on the order of Gene Markey malarkey.

They never got married, although in the first case there was actually an announcement in the press about such a union being imminent, but David Niven was seriously involved with both Merle Oberon and Rita Hayworth.

Evelyn Keyes was married to someone I never heard of, then Charles Vidor, then John Huston, then later Artie Shaw, although being married to Artie Shaw, similar to being married Mickey Rooney, should probably not count.

― Vini C. Riley (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, June 30, 2019 8:46 PM (four years ago) bookmarkflaglink

i was coming here with this one (just watched here comes mr. jordan the other night). to be fair, she was married to artie shaw for almost 30 years, his longest marriage by a significant amount

https://hjordisniven.com/david-niven-1947/

Was rewatching Harry and Tonto last night and had to look up Harry's aging anti-capitalist friend who turned out to have been played by Herbert Berghof - who was married to Uta Hagen.

Miriam Hopkins and Anatole Litvak

An actor called Drewe Henley, who I've never heard of and don't recognize, was married to both Jacqueline Pearce and Felicity Kendall - which I'm pretty impressed by.

Always watchable British (comic) actress, Adrienne Posta, and former Rainbow lead singer, Graham Bonnet.

After Richard Avedon, Doe Avedon married Don Siegel (and some unknown actor in-between)

Henry de la Falaise was married to Gloria Swanson and Constance Bennett.

Nancy Olson, the 97-year-old surviving actress from Sunset Boulevard, and Alan Jay Lerner, in the 1950s. One of his eight wives.

Jack Fisk and Sissy Spacek

Still together after 52 years

The 1940s Hollywood starlet Marie McDonald had an interesting marital history. Married seven times in just 23 years. Got her sixth divorce at the age of 39. Died of a drug overdose at age 42 after which her three children were raised by Debbie Reynolds.

Her most show biz-connected husband was Victor Orsatti, a talent agent-producer and possibly gangster who is credited with convincing ice skater Sonja Henie to work in Hollywood films.

So that's how it happened---a unique career arc? Any of you seen her movies? (Was wondering about her while watching Winter Olympics---wonder what Alyssa Liu will do, too---)

I watched Iceland (1942) in preparation for a trip to Iceland. It really gave me some valuable insights into the country and its culture. The film also featured Jack Oakie, "America's Joy Boy".

Just saw the new 4K restoration of Bitter Rice at the Film Forum. The female lead who is not Silvana Mangano is Doris Dowling, who later moved back to the US where she married, and had a son with, Artie Shaw, but as far as I can tell she has yet to be mentioned on this thread.

Dowling and Shaw's son is Jonathan Shaw who was a tattoo artist and opened NYC's oldest tattoo parlor, Fun City Tattoo, back in 1976. Now is a novelist and lives in Rio de Janeiro, according to Wikipedia.

Simone!

Simon never married. She was at one time in a relationship with World War II double agent Duško Popov, codenamed "Tricycle", a notorious womaniser.[16] This relationship led to her being placed under covert surveillance by the FBI during the filming of Cat People. Simon had loaned Popov £10,000 in 1942 shortly before he left the country, likely her payment for the film (value circa £600,000 in 2025). They broke up in 1943 with him not repaying the money. [17]

It was alleged by Simon's secretary that she gave a gold key to her boudoir to any man she was interested in, including George Gershwin. The film historian, Greg Mank, reports in his audio commentary for the DVD of Cat People, that the secretary was then on trial for extorting money from her employer, and her word on this matter cannot be taken at face value (the secretary was later convicted, and the terms of her probation required that she never speak of the "gold key" scandal again). In the 1950s, Simon was romantically involved with the French banker and racehorse owner–breeder Alec Weisweiller whose wife Francine was one of Jean Cocteau's patrons.

Gershwin was a real Tom Cat People.

Erica Wexler, occasional actress and daughter of screenwriter Norman Wexler, went from being Roy Liechtenstein's girlfriend to Andy Partridge's wife.