Movers & Shakers: The Couples That Matter

Tom Hanks & Rita Wilson

One thing Hanks and Wilson had going for them was they knew each other before he became the biggest star this side of Tom Cruise. She acts selectively now, but success on-screen and with Playtone Productions, the production company he runs with Gary Goetzman, seems never to have cast the slightest shadow over her. Considered one of the very few actually great actor marriages in Hollywood, with both partners enjoying sky-high personal likability points, Hanks and Wilson only looked more preposterously well-matched when she turned Nia Vardalos' one-woman show into My Big Fat Greek Wedding, the biggest independent comedy in box office history. Word has it that one of her greatest talents--one that makes her Tom's secret weapon--is a memory for names, faces and personal information that endears the couple to everyone who gets remotely near them.

Will Smith & Jada Pinkett Smith

Long ago, she auditioned to play his girlfriend on The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and got turned down, but ended up with better roles, one as his wife and the mother of his children, and the other as an actress with comic, action and with the past summer's Collateral, mature dramatic successes to her name. Meanwhile, he's flying high off yet another summer box office hit, I, Robot. But the hits don't seem to keep him from supporting her, whether it's by accompanying her to Australia while she filmed The Matrix sequels or showing up when she sings with her band, Wicked Wisdom. They play up their couplehood and parenthood in public and seem to back it up in real life.

Keith Addis & Keri Selig

With producing partner Nick Wechsler, Addis runs Industry Entertainment, a company that manages clients from Ted Danson to Dakota Fanning to Sting, and produced the upcoming Robin Williams film The Final Cut and the Diane Lane picture Fierce People. Selig produces film and TV projects independently of Addis (she exec-produced last summer's The Stepford Wives). Together they have a third identity as gracious entertainers at their gorgeously landscaped Los Feliz estate, and as concerned environmentalists. Addis vice-chairs the board of the merged non-profits American Oceans Campaign (founded by Danson) and Oceana.

Barry Diller & Diane von Furstenberg

A most unusual dynamic between these two. Both independent success stories--she's a name brand in fashion and fragrance; he's a visionary entertainment titan (he's been the chairman and CEO of Paramount Pictures, Fox Inc. and now InterActiveCorp, the world's most astounding, multi-faceted giant in interactive commerce). They'd been friends since the '70s but married three years ago. Having made a dramatic fashion comeback in the '90s, she's now also on the board of his IAC, which is less surprising considering it was she who tuned him into QVC in '92, and that by the time she'd first appeared on that shopping network, he owned it, and that she followed him to Home Shopping Network when he sold QVC. Diller, meanwhile, is a partner in her DVF Studio. Both speak up at the respective board meetings, and often offer a fresh-eyed approach to each other's business. Couples don't get much more powerful. Various programs on public TV are among the recipients of their Diller-von Furstenberg Family Foundation's generosity.

Jerry & Linda Bruckheimer

Once half of a powerful partnership with the notorious, high-profile Don Simpson, now deceased, Bruckheimer has continued their signature action on the big screen and taken over network TV with the high-concept CSI and Without a Trace juggernauts. It's clear, therefore, that his way to achieve staggering success has always been to do it with product, not with hijinks visibility. It's also obvious that a 27-year marriage to a woman who at least tolerates extreme worka-holism does wonders for a guy who moves and shakes Hollywood non-stop. The elegant novelist/antiques dealer/preservationist Linda Bruckheimer looks more Manhattan than Hollywood (among her close friends: Blaine and Robert Trump), and writes about her Kentucky home rather than Malibu. As she herself has said, "Southern belles may appear sweet, but we've got the iron will of Special Ops guys." She looks Chanel chic when she chooses to be seen, but neither Bruckheimer seems to crave the limelight.

Kelly Lynch & Mitch Glazer

While both work steadily in Hollywood (she's doing character roles to transition out of a super-babedom she never wanted; he wrote The Recruit and associate-produced Lost in Translation), it's their private life that distinguishes them. They pioneered the currently fashionable interest in L.A.'s architectural treasures. They're known for their pure Mid-Century style, a passion they reinforce in each other. They restored a John Lautner house in the Los Feliz area that they outbid Leonardo DiCaprio to acquire, and now their elegant view of the city of L.A. is the backdrop for parties attended by fellow modernism junkie Sofia Coppola and other luminaries. And if that wasn't enough, they own a Neutra at the foot of Mt. Whitney in Lone Pine, CA.

Ellen DeGeneres & Alexandra Hedison

After her closely watched and discussed coming out tended to overshadow her life as an uncommonly talented comedienne, DeGeneres found an equilibrium with actress-turned-photographer Alexandra Hedison, her partner for four years. Helping to keep an aura of tastefulness around their public appearances, Hedison has made it possible for DeGeneres to avoid being defined by her sexuality; DeGeneres' more secure celebrity status helps Hedison in turn. She just had her first solo photography exhibition and directed her first film, an untitled romantic comedy.

Chris Rock & Malaak Compton-Rock

Rock's star has only risen higher since he married Howard University grad Malaak Compton. "She's really calmed me down and centered my life," he said not long after they were married. She was then a PR exec who did work for UNICEF, but has since developed a non-profit called Styleworks that makes over women trying to go from welfare to the work force. She's stylish herself and able to deal with his world, but until recently they lived with their daughter in Rock's hometown of Brooklyn rather than Hollywood, which might have something to do with him retaining the common-man edge in his comedy. When the family did move, it was to the suburbs of New Jersey.

DIRECTOR JULIE TAYMOR & COMPOSER ELLIOT GOLDENTHAL

"We worked together for five years before we even looked at each other," says Julie Taymor, the Tony-winning director and costume designer of Broadway's The Lion King, referring to her 20-year relationship with composer Elliot Goldenthal. The two have done the films Frida and Titus together, as well as stage plays and musicals, and they're working on his opera creation Grendel, which will bow at the Los Angeles Opera in 2006. "A big part of our love for each other is our work together," she says. "Everybody knows that working situations can be prime territory for falling in love." Goldenthal says he has long admired his partner's clarity of vision and gentle way of conveying it. "Composing is a solitary pursuit, but the touching part is when you present it to someone," he says. "You can feel like you're asking a director, 'Don't you think my child is pretty?' and they might say, 'No, you've got an ugly baby there who's quite stupid.'" With opera, though, they're deliberately shifting the dynamic between them. "The opera is a composer's medium," says Taymor. "If I didn't like a cue he wrote for Frida, I'd tell him and we'd either argue or he changed it. It has to be that way in movies, and I'm glad for the opportunity to support him on his opera." Taymor and Goldenthal have a novel strategy for being together without being too together. "I work 9 to 5, and so does he, but he starts in the evening and goes till morning because he responds to working in the city when it is so quiet," she explains. "It's very peaceful in the daytime for me, and then we share some late afternoon hours. We like to say that we are very happily unmarried and have been for 20 years."

PRODUCER ALEXANDRA MILCHAN & AGENT SCOTT LAMBERT

When William Morris agent Scott Lambert first met Alexandra Milchan at the Sundance Film Festival a decade ago, he was smitten by her French accent, sophistication and beauty. The admiration wasn't mutual. "She said there were two people she'd been warned to stay away from, and I was one of them," says Lambert. "It took a year to get her to go out with me. I wasn't allowed to come to the house for another." The daughter of industrialist-turned-Hollywood mogul Arnon Milchan explains how romance blossomed: "Scott was funny and good-looking, but he was pretty lazy, a waste of talent. I came from a family where generosity only came if you worked hard. Scott realized that and turned himself around." Indeed. He now makes deals for the likes of Scarlett Johansson and Sharon Stone. "I created a monster," she laughs. "My father said never marry an agent, but Scott became his beloved son, and I am a bit jealous of their relationship." When Alexandra was an exec at her father's production company, New Regency, the mix of business and personal life hit rough spots. It got easier when she became a producer. "I thought it would be horrible to be married to someone in the business, but it's great," she says. Now they go everywhere together while applying lessons learned. She bites her tongue during his dinners with clients who'd be perfect in one of her movies. He does the same for her and benefits from added opportunities for humility: "We were out with friends and we told them our son's name was Jagger Dov Milchan Lambert. One said that the 'Lambert' was silent. That put me in my place."

AGENT RICK NICITA & PRODUCER PAULA WAGNER

He makes Tom Cruise's movie deals and she, having been Cruise's agent herself for years, now partners with the star in his production company. It might seem convenient that Rick Nicita and Paula Wagner are married to each other. Or not. Nicita is the co-chairman of Creative Artists Agency and also reps Nicole Kidman, Kate Hudson, Bruce Willis and Al Pacino, and Wagner's work led her to spend much of the last decade on other continents overseeing mega-budget movies. The sheer intensity of either one of their careers makes the fact that they just celebrated their 20th anniversary amazing. "We delayed our wedding three times because of client-oriented matters, and took our honeymoon before we got married, because we had made the reservation," says Nicita. "But we've been doing this so long that we don't know any other way. We laugh, we shake our heads and we accept it." The marriage is so apparently compatible it seems like the Hollywood business-side answer to Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson. "If a woman is determined to have a high-powered career and a marriage to someone with the same, she'd better find someone who will respect and enjoy her success," says Wagner. Nicita does. "We're each other's best friend and advisor," he says. "There are many times I go into a restaurant and they say, 'Mr. Wagner, come this way.' And if I've been steered to a wonderful table, I'm fine being Mr. Wagner." Neither marriage partner takes it personally when the other holds back business information, and each has learned to forget confidential things gleaned from the other. "Nothing in business," says Nicita, "is worth jeopardizing our relationship." Nicita has a policy on the personal side of marriage, too: "To me, there are two keys to a relationship like ours succeeding. One is to talk everything out, immediately. The second thing is: separate bathrooms." " Nicita sums up what makes it all worthwhile: "In my darkest moments, I think, 'How bad can it be, I'm married to her.'"

STUDIO EXECUTIVE KEVIN McCORMICK & BIOGRAPHER A. SCOTT BERG

Warner Bros, executive Kevin McCormick and acclaimed biographer A. Scott Berg met back in the days of disco, when McCormick had just exec-produced Saturday Night Fever and Berg was just finishing the biography that would win him the National Book Award, Max Perkins: Editor of Genius. Since then, the couple's careers have flourished in their different tracks and proved uncannily compatible. "I'd be hard-pressed to name two people whose lives and careers are as complementary as Kevin's and mine," says Berg, who has written celebrated biographies of Samuel Goldwyn, Charles Lindberg and Katharine Hepburn. "We work on completely different calendars. Kevin's job as a studio executive is to anticipate what might be successful in three years. I spend my life looking at the past. I give him the historical context; he helps keep my work contemporary and relevant so that I am not writing some big, dry history book." McCormick notes, "We live in Los Angeles, but he helps me to exist not just in the movie business, but in the world of letters as well. He works a decade on one book, and it is soothing to live with someone who looks at people in decades." Berg, who grew up the son of a TV producer and is brother to Jeff Berg, head of ICM, understands McCormick's world and gives the same credit to McCormick. "He is the single best reader I know, of both people and unpublished material. He's got a gift that allows him to read something or meet someone and come away with a first impression that is penetrating and accurate. Nobody sees what I write before my editor, with one exception." Adds McCormick, "We live in a house with lots of books, separate studies. We have separate as well as common friends, and we have a mutual respect."

DIRECTOR/PRODUCER RICHARD DONNER & PRODUCER LAUREN SHULER DONNER

Partners in The Donner Company, husband Richard Donner and wife Lauren Shuler Donner have a relatively new pact: "We've made 22 movies, only three together, and never again," says Shuler Donner. "My marriage is far more important to me than my career, and I don't want to bring in needless acrimony." Donner, best known for directing films like Lethal Weapon and Superman, met his future wife when they worked together on Ladyhawke almost 20 years ago. She was headed into divorce. "He was there to console me," she says, "and we fell in love." They married three years later and proceeded to work together--most effectively, they eventually discovered, when they didn't work too closely together. They made the decision to work side by side on projects they are producing (but not projects he directs) after his last film, Timeline. "It's better if we keep a distance," she says. "Otherwise, it can become personal where it should just be business. We also find we are better when we don't mix work with home. We don't talk about work for a few hours before we go to bed, mostly so we can sleep stress-free."

PRODUCERS DOUG WICK & LUCY FISHER

Producer Doug Wick, whose heavy resume includes Gladiator, married his current production partner, Lucy Fisher, 18 years ago and then spent most of the years afterward trying not to do business with her. She was an executive at Warner Bros. "It is harder to have a relationship than a career in Hollywood," says Wick, "and if I had a project at her studio, we wouldn't even discuss it." Fisher was of the same mind: "I'd actually leave the room when his stuff came up." That changed when Fisher left Warner Bros, to become vice chairman at Sony Pictures, where Wick had so many films that contact was unavoidable. But they mixed so well together that when she was offered the chairman post at Sony, she passed it up and left to partner with her husband. "The idea of being partners with your wife had a small-time ma-and-pa stench to it," says Wick. "But as executive, she was a voice of intelligence, and had a way of communicating with a filmmaker that would get through. We'd done enough test-driving and were married long enough that we'd worked through identity issues." For her part, says Fisher, "I'd never produced and didn't want to start from scratch. Inheriting Doug's amazing slate was the perfect situation for me." The current lineup (which includes Bewitched with Nicole Kidman and Memoirs of a Geisha with Chicago director Rob Marshall) speaks well of their strategy for merging professional and personal lives; they have offices on separate floors and strict rules related to their children. "Our biggest fear was the business would pollute our home life," says Fisher, "so there's no business after 10 p.m. and none before breakfast."

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