So Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher have called it quits. I’m inexplicably upset about this turn of events. I liked Demi and Ashton together. They seemed to be the real deal but after the latest cheating scandal broke, I suppose it was only really a matter of time. I don’t know Ashton. I don’t know Demi. There are plenty of couples within my real life circle of friends that are having problems yet for some reason, I’m completely bummed out over this celebrity couple splitting up. Perhaps this means I’m far too interested in the lives of celebrities. Perhaps there’s no perhaps about it.
Let’s be fair to Demi and Ashton for a moment though, shall we? With six years of marriage under their belt, they had a pretty successful union by Hollywood standards. When they first got together, no one thought they’d last a year but last they did, until now of course. Even so, people love to say “I told you so”. They love even more to tear celebrities down but I like to think of myself as a fair person. Sure Ashton and Demi didn’t make it to the ten year mark but they lasted longer than the ten celebrity unions on this list. I give you, ten of the shortest marriages in Hollywood history.
10: Drew Barrymore and Tom Green
Married: July 7, 2001
Separated: December 2001
Duration of Marriage: 5 months
Drew Barrymore and Tom Green were a weird couple. To some, Tom and Drew made perfect sense. To others, they made no sense at all. Perhaps the truth is somewhere in between. Their five month marriage wasn’t the shortest Hollywood has ever seen (it’s not even the shortest marriage for Drew whose first marriage, to bar owner Jeremy Thomas lasted only a month), but it was marred with bad omens including Tom’s cancer diagnosis and Drew’s house burning to the ground.
09: Colin Farrell and Amelia Warner
Married: July 2001
Separated: November 2001
Duration of Marriage: 4 months
Perhaps I should use quotations around the word marriage for this one as technically, the Bora Bora wedding ceremony between Colin and Amelia wasn’t legally binding so they weren’t legally married. Like Eddie Murphy and Tracey Edmonds (who made it all of two weeks), Colin and Amelia were able to avoid all the stress of a divorce but Colin was left with a lasting reminder of this brief union, a tattoo of the name ‘Millie’ on his ring finger.
08: Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Esposito
Married: Late 2006
Separated: Early 2007
Duration of Marriage: 4 months
Before Bradley was named the Sexiest Man Alive by People magazine, he was also known as one half of one of Hollywood’s shortest marriages. While both insist the separation was amicable, one has to wonder what could have gone so wrong in such a short amount of time. They’re both incredibly beautiful people after all. If they can’t make it work, who can? Certainly not…
07: Renee Zellweger and Kenny Chesney
Married: May 9, 2005
Separated: September 15, 2005
Duration of Marriage: 4 months
This marriage is a strange story from top to bottom. When the annulment papers were filed, the reason for ending the marriage was listed as ‘fraud’. Rumors swirled that Renee found out that Kenny is in fact gay and was using her as a beard to hide the truth. Rumors also swirled that it was Kenny who learned Renee is a lesbian and that it was Renee who was using Kenny as whatever the lesbian version of a beard is. The truth? No one knows. Probably none of the above. Renee later went on to date Bradley Cooper, perhaps bonding with him over their mutually short experiences with wedded bliss.
06: Nicolas Cage and Lisa Marie Presley
Married: August 10, 2002
Separated: November 5, 2002
Duration of Marriage: 3 months
Nicolas Cage has admitted to being a little obsessed with Elvis. Surely that isn’t why he married the King’s daughter, Lisa Marie. Couldn’t be. That could, of course, explain the quick end of the marriage. It is also entirely possible, however, that Lisa Marie discovered Nicolas Cage is a vampire and just couldn’t get behind that. The divorce wasn’t finalized until May 16, 2004 which means the divorce proceeding lasted longer than their marriage.
05: Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries
Married: August 20, 2011
Separated: October 31, 2011
Duration of Marriage: 10 weeks
I tried really hard to avoid writing about this wedding because there is not even the smallest part of me that didn’t see this split coming a mile away. I don’t necessarily think the wedding was fake but it certainly seems that way. There were a lot of jokes made about this split – a whole hash tag on Twitter, #thingslongerthankimkardashianswedding, was born of it – but the truth of the matter is, Kim and Kris barely cracked the top five on the all time shortest marriages in Hollywood list and probably wouldn’t have if I’d been able to find out exactly how long Dennis Rodman and Carmen Electra were married or had Eddie Murphy legally married Tracey Edmonds.
04: Chris Kattan and Sunshine Tutt
Married: June 28, 2008
Separated: August 10, 2008
Duration of Marriage: 8 weeks
When former Saturday Night Livestar Chris Kattan married model Sunshine Tutt, a lot of people were thrilled the dorky, funny looking comedian scored such a hot girl. Sadly, only eight weeks later, this unusual union came to a shockingly swift end. Kim K and her hubby made it nearly two whole weeks longer than these two.
03: Mario Lopez and Ali Landry
Married: April 24, 2004
Separated: May 2004
Duration of Marriage: 2 weeks
Mario and Ali make Demi and Ashton’s marriage look like a roaring success. A mere two weeks after tying the knot in a small, intimate ceremony in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, this marriage was annulled. Ali has said she found pretty strong evidence Mario had been unfaithful during their relationship and decided to pull the plug.
02: Britney Spears and Jason Alexander
Married: January 3, 2004
Separated: January 5, 2004
Duration of Marriage: 55 hours
The joke that went to far and the first sign that all was not well in the land of Spears, Britney and Jason were childhood sweethearts who reunited in Vegas, got married and then had the marriage annulled a little more than two days later. Britney has said she proposed as a joke and things just sort of got out of hand from there. And people say allowing two men in love to get married is an affront to the sanctity of marriage.
01: Rudolph Valentino and Jean Acker
Married: November 6, 1919
Separated: November 6, 1919
Duration of Marriage: 2 hours
Who says quickie marriages and even quicker separations are a new thing? Way back in 1919, Rudolph Valentino and Jean Acker showed us all how it’s done, getting married after two months of dating but not even making it through the wedding night. Valentino, a legendary ladies man, found himself locked out of his hotel room by his new bride only two hours after the ceremony. They later mended their broken friendship with Acker penning, We Will Meet at the End of the Trailfor her ex-husband shortly after his death.
Of course, these ten couples are just examples of the fickleness of love in Hollywood. Demi and Ashton also outlasted:
- Kid Rock and Pamela Anderson whom were engaged back in 2002 only to call off that engagement, get married in a surprise ceremony in 2006 and then separate five months later.
- Sophia Bush and Chad Michael Murray fell in love on the set of their then hit television show One Tree Hill. They married and separated five months later.
- Shannen Doherty and Ashley Hamilton are also members of the five month marriage club, separating after Ashley claimed his blushing bride threatened him with a gun.
- Cris Judd and Jennifer Lopez lasted nine months but separated shortly before she began dating Marc Anthony. Rumors that Jennifer cheated on Cris with Marc were never proven but persist all the same. It’s worth noting, Jennifer’s marriage to Marc lasted much longer although it also ended in divorce.
- Hank Azaria and Helen Hunt made it eleven months before separating.
- Michael C. Hall and Jennifer Carpenter are another example of why co-stars should avoid romantic entanglements with the end of their one year marriage apparently causing friction behind the scenes of their hit cable series, Dexter.
- Angelina Jolie and Billy Bob Thornton are nearly the picture of wedded bliss compared to many of the couples on this list but Demi and Ashton still outlasted Billy Bob and Angelina’s two year marriage by a whole four years.
