Here is a list of celebrities who married their manager.
1. Neil Diamond
The “Sweet Caroline” singer married his manager Katie McNeil in 2012. This is Neil Diamond’s third marriage. She was 42 and he was 71. He was previously married to Jayne Posner from 1963 to 1969, and to Marcia Murphy from 1969 to 1995. His second wife Marcia Murphy, who was with him during the most profitable years of his career, walked away with a whopping $150 million as a divorce settlement.
2. Ronnie Spector
The “Be My Baby” singer married her manager Jonathan Greenfield in 1982. This was her second marriage, and the couple were parents to two sons. Her husband saw her first time when he was a teenager while she was performing at New York’s Madison Square Garden in 1974. He later told People magazine of his first encounter with his wife: “I was pretty convinced that when God created woman that it would look just like Ronnie did when I saw her that night at the Garden.”
She was previously married to her mentor turned abusive husband, Phil Spector, who had kept her as a virtual prisoner in his mansion, and she escaped the mansion barefoot and nearly broken in 1972, when he was away.
3. Charlotte Rampling
Charlotte Rampling was married to her manager Bryan Southcombe from 1972 to 1976. The couple had a son Barnaby Southcombe. While married to Bryan, the couple were in a ménage à trois with a male model, Randall Laurence. She did acknowledge the relationship in a interview with The Guardian in 2021, saying: “Well, I did have two boyfriends, which was racy at the time. We were all very young. It was all chop and change. Quite a lot of things were experimental, I suppose.”
4. Tonya Harding
Controversial figure skater Tonya Harding was married to Jeff Gillooly, who was her part-time manager from 1990 to 1993. They began their relationship in 1986, when he was 17 and she was 15. A sex tape featuring these two was released by Penthouse in 1994. Tonya was banned from figure skating after she and her husband were found responsible for the attack on fellow figure skater and competitor, Nancy Kerrigan.
5. Reese Witherspoon
Reese Witherspoon married Jim Toth in 2011. Jim Toth is the co-head of Creative Artists Agency, which is a Los Angeles-based talent and sports agency, where Reese was a client. The couple divorced in 2023. This was her second marriage. She was previously married to actor Ryan Phillippe from 1999 to 2008.
6. Suzanne Somers
Suzanne Somers married Alan Hamel in 1977, who she met in 1968 when she won a job as a prize model on the game show, Anniversary Game (1969–70), where he was the host. Alan along with being her husband, also became her manager.
7. Rita Hayworth
Rita Hayworth married Edward Judson in 1937 when she was 18 and he was twice her age. This was the first of her five marriages. Upon marriage, he became her manager who advised her to change her name from Margarita Carmen Cansino to Rita Hayworth. The couple divorced in 1942. When they separated she was left with no money. She later stated of the marriage: “I married him for love, but he married me for an investment.”
8. Ozzy Osbourne
The rock legend married his manager Sharon Arden on 4 July 1982. This was his second marriage. He later revealed that he married on 4 July so that he would never forget their anniversary. The couple had three children. The family appeared on a very famous MTV reality show, The Osbournes, in the early 2000s.
9. Judy Garland
Judy Garland married her tour manager and producer, Sidney Luft, on June 8, 1952. This was the third of her five marriage. She previously divorced her second husband, director Vincent Minnelli, the same year. Judy gave birth to a son and a daughter with Sidney. They separated in 1963 and divorced in 1965. Judy accused him of drunkenness and abuse.
10. Kelly Rowland
Kelly Rowland’s boyfriend Tim Weatherspoon became her manger in 2011. She announced her engagement to him in December 2013, during an appearance on The Queen Latifah Show. The couple married in Costa Rica on May 9, 2014. They have two sons together.
11. La Toya Jackson
Jack Gordon was hired by Joe Jackson to co-manage his daughter La Toya in 1987. Gordon took over her management completely, who sexualized La Toya’s public image. Around this time she was excommunicated by Jehovah’s Witnesses, and she distanced herself from the family. The couple married on September 5, 1989, in Reno, Nevada. He claimed it was for her protection from getting kidnapped by her family.
La Toya told Ebony magazine that the marriage took place against her wishes. She claims in her autobiography, La Toya: Growing Up in the Jackson Family, that he controlled her for the next decade using threats, lies, and domestic violence. In 1996 when she became aware that he planned to feature her in a adult film, she called her brother Randy Jackson who helped her escape him. She filed for divorce the next day.
12. Celine Dion
Celine Dion first met René Angélil in 1980 when she was 12 and he was 38 and married. He began managing her career and mortgaged his house to finance her first album, La voix du bon Dieu, in 1981. He divorced his second wife in 1985. They began a personal relationship on 30 April 1988, when she was twenty years old, the night she won the Eurovision Song Contest. They married on 17 December 1994, in a lavish wedding ceremony at Montreal, which was broadcast live on Canadian television. The couple had three children. He died in 2016 at age 73 of throat cancer.
13. Lynda Carter
Lynda Carter, who was famous for playing Wonder Woman, married her manager Ron Samuels in 1977, at Ron’s best man’s house. They divorced after five years in 1982. The actress publicly stated that those years were the most unhappy times of her life.
14. Alan Ladd
Alan Ladd married his agent and manager, former film actress Sue Carol in Mexico City, on March 15, 1942. She was seven years his senior. This was his second and her fourth marriage. They both had a children each from their previous relationship and in addition they had two kids of their own. They were married until his death from the swelling of brain in 1964.
15. Nancy Kerrigan
The Olympic silver medal winning figure skater and rival of Tonya Harding married her manager Jerry Solomon on September 9, 1995. This was her first and his third marriage. The couple had three children together.
