Celebs Who Have Married Again and Again (and Again)

Marriage is tough enough sometimes without being in the glare of the spotlight. Maybe it's the pressure of success or maybe some people just aren’t cut out for long-term relationships. But it hasn’t kept a lot of big name people from trying over and over again. It’s also surprising to see how many celebs marry the same person twice, maybe going back just to confirm they hadn’t made a mistake. Take a look at our list of notable people who love to be in love. Did we miss one of your favorites? Let us know in the comments.

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Holly Michelle Gilliam found fame as a member of the ’60s folk group The Mamas and the Papas and later turned to acting in films and television. Her marriage to bandmate John Phillips in 1962 was a rocky one with both pursuing other relationships until they divorced in 1970. After relationships with Jack Nicholson and Warren Beatty, she married Dennis Hopper in 1970, but that marriage only lasted for eight days. She also had failed marriages with radio executive Robert Burch and actor Grainger Hines before she married again in 2000 to plastic surgeon Steven Zax who died in 2017.

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The alluring movie “love goddess” of the 1940s married Eddie Judson, “a shady former car salesman who was twice her age,” in 1937, says Vanity Fair. They divorced in 1942 and she married actor Orson Welles in 1943 “during her lunch break from shooting the film ‘Cover Girl,’” but the marriage fell apart in 1948. She also married Prince Aly Khan (1949-53), singer Dick Haymes (1953-55), and producer James Hill (1958-61). But Vanity Fair said “she found little solace in her relationships: ‘Men go to bed with Gilda, but awaken with me,’ Hayworth famously said once,” referring to her biggest role.

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Many of the Oscar-winning director’s films involve strong, independent women, which might explain his choice in mates. His first wife, Sharon Williams (1978-84), was said to be the inspiration for the character of Sarah Connor in the Terminator films. They divorced in 1984, the same year the first Terminator movie was released. His second wife, Gale Anne Hurd (1985-89) produced and co-wrote “The Terminator” with him and produced two more films with him before they split. He then married director Kathryn Bigelow (1989-91), who later beat him out for two Oscars. Then he and Sarah Connor – er, Linda Hamilton – began a relationship, eventually marrying in 1997 and divorcing in 1998. He’s been married to Suzy Amis (who appeared as Rose’s granddaughter in “Titanic”) since 2000.

The actress forever tied to the role of Alexis Carrington on the primetime drama “Dynasty” married Irish actor Maxwell Reed (1952-56), whom she said tried to sell her to an Arab sheik for an evening. After a string of relationships including Harry Belafonte and Warren Beatty she married singer-songwriter Anthony Newley (1963-70), record executive Ron Kass (1972-83), Swedish pop singer Peter Holm (1985-87), and then film and television producer Percy Gibson in 2002.

“The Gambler” singer took more than a few chances on love during his lifetime. His marriages to Janice Gordon (1958-60), Jean Massey (1960-63), Margo Anderson (1964-76), and Marianne Gordon (1977-93) all ended in divorce – largely because of his obsession with his music career. He married Wanda Miller in 1997 and was with her until his death in 2020.

The celebrated director’s films have had much more success than most of his marriages. He married his first wife, actress Laraine Marie Brennan, in 1965 and they divorced in 1971. That was followed by marriages to journalist Julia Cameron (1975-76), actor and model Isabella Rossellini (1979-83), and producer Barbara De Fina (1985-91). He’s been married to former Random House editor Helen Morris since 1999 for more than 20 years.

Little did Oldman and his first wife actress Lesley Manville know that long after their marriage (1987-90) ended they’d both be nominated for Oscars in 2018. Oldman won best actor for “Darkest Hour” but Manville lost out on her supporting actress role in “Phantom Thread.” Oldman also was briefly married to actress Uma Thurman (1990-92), photographer Donya Fiorentino (1997-2001), and then to singer-songwriter Alexandra Edenborough (2008-15), before marrying writer Gisele Schmidt in 2017. “You know, sometimes you have to go through the others,” he philosophically told the New York Daily News.

The famed “Easy Rider” actor, director, and screenwriter (with Peter Fonda and Terry Southern) became the poster boy for the excesses of 1970s Hollywood, which likely also took a toll on his relationships. He married actress Brooke Hayward (1961-69), singer Michelle Phillips for eight days in 1970, therapist and former actress Daria Halprin (1972-76), actress and ballet dancer Katherine LaNasa (1989-92), and actress Victoria Duffy (1996). Hopper and Duffy were separated at the time of his death in 2010.

An unauthorized biography of the Queen of Romance suggests that some of her story ideas “stem from the turbulent events of her own life.” While she admits to a few “youthful mistakes,”she’s been married and divorced five times. Her husbands include French banker Claude-Eric Lazard; Danny Zugelder, who she met and married while he was serving a prison sentence; William George Toth, who also had a record; socialite John Traina, father of five of her children; and venture capitalist Thomas Perkins – who wrote his own romance novel “Sex and the Single Zillionaire” in 2006. This may be taking “write what you know” too much to heart.

The iconic “Gone With the Wind” actor was reported to be involved with many of his on-screen leading ladies including Joan Crawford and Loretta Young as well as his third wife Carole Lombard, according to TCM.com. He married “the considerably older stage manager-acting coach Josephine Dillon” — who also became his manager — in 1924 and they divorced in 1930. He married Los Angeles socialite Maria Langham in 1931 but left her in 1939 to marry Lombard, who he shared the screen with in several films before she died in a plane crash in 1942. After serving in World War II, he was married to actress-model-socialite Lady Sylvia Ashley from 1949-52 and Kay Williams from 1955 until his death in 1960.

Even one of America’s most beloved actors wasn’t immune from what The New York Times called “turmoil” in his personal life. Fonda married actress Margaret Sullavan in 1931; they divorced in 1933. He married Frances Seymour Brokaw – the mother of Jane and Peter Fonda – in 1936, but she “took her life in a sanitarium in 1950,” his Times obituary notes. “His third marriage, to Susan Blanchard (1950-56) … ended in divorce, as did his fourth marriage, to Contessa Afdera Franchetti (1957-61).” He married model Shirlee Adams in 1965 and they were together until his death in 1982.

The actress was best known for the string of 10 musicals she starred in with Fred Astaire before winning an Oscar in 1940 for “Kitty Foyle.” She married Vaudeville actor Edward Culpepper in 1928, but they separated the following year and divorced in 1931. She briefly dated Astaire in 1930 and married actor Lew Ayres in 1934. She was involved with Howard Huges and director George Stevens when she was separated from Ayers in the late ’30s; they divorced in 1941. She then married Jack Briggs (1943-49) who she met while touring with the USO in World War II, was linked to Cary Grant, and married actor Jacques Bergerac (1953-58). She married for the fifth time in 1961 to actor, director, and producer William Marshall. They started a production company together before divorcing in 1971.

Burton and Elizabeth Taylor met years before their on-screen romance in “Cleopatra” brought the two to the alter, according to Biography.com, but his “reputation as a womanizer” had Taylor on her guard. Still, when sparks flew on the movie set, they both divorced their mates and married – twice (1964-74; 1975-76). Burton’s other spouses include Sybil Williams (1949-63), Susan Hunt (1976-82), and Sally Hay (1983 to his death in 1984).

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The Oscar winner and “Goliath” star has taken multiple trips down the aisle, though none were more famous than his short-lived 2000 marriage to Angelina Jolie. He married Melissa Lee Gatlin (1978-980), actress Toni Lawrence (1986-88), actress Cynda Williams (1990-92), who he starred with in “One False Move,” and Pietra Dawn Cherniak (1993-1997) before eloping with Jolie, who he starred with in “Pushing Tin,” for a Las Vegas wedding (after earlier announcing plans to marry actress Laura Dern). He married long-time girlfriend Connie Angland in 2014 following the birth of their daughter in 2004.

The “Golden Girls” star was married so many times that she wrote a tell-all book called “My First Five Husbands … and the Ones Who Got Away,” assigning letter grades to her beaus and sometimes nicknames. She was married to and divorced from Tom Bish; Norman Hartweg, a college friend; actor Peter D’Maio (the Italian); real estate agent Gus Fisher (the Greek); and high-school sweetheart Tom Keel. She married husband No. 6, actor-producer Morrow Wilson, in 1997. “This is my last marriage,” she told the Cape Cod Times in 2007. “This man is a keeper.” They were still married, though legally separated, when she died in 2010.

The young actor’s marriage to Janet Leigh in 1951 propelled his career in the 1950s and ’60s including films like “Houdini” (with his wife), “Some Like it Hot,” and “Spartacus.” His career hit a wall when he divorced Leigh in 1962 and married young German actress Christine Kaufmann in 1963. They divorced in 1967 and Curtis married model Leslie Allen the following year; they stayed together until 1982. Marriages to Andrea Savio (1984-92), Lisa Deutsch (1993-94), and Jill Vandenberg (1998 until his death in 2010) followed.

The controversial two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning writer (“The Armies of the Night” and “The Executioner’s Song”) of whom the Washington Post said “the tempests of his personal life complemented the turbulence of his prose,” had six wives and nine children. He married Bea Silverman in 1944 and they divorced in 1952. He married artist Adele Morales in 1954 and they divorced in 1962 – but not before he stabbed her with a penknife during a party (and spent two weeks in a psychiatric unit). He married Lady Jeanne Campbell the same year and divorced in 1963, marrying actress Beverly Bentley that same year. They separated in 1970 when Mailer began living with nightclub singer Carol Stevens and divorced in 1980. He briefly married Stevens in 1980, divorced quickly, and then married artist Norris Church the same year.

The skinny half of the classic comedy team Laurel and Hardy (born Arthur Stanley Jefferson) wasn’t officially married to his first wife, Australian singer and dancer Mae Charlotte Dahlberg, but they lived together long enough to be considered a common law marriage. He married Lois Neilsen in 1926 and had two children with her before they split in 1935. But before that divorce was finalized, he married Ruth Rogers in 1934; they made it legal in 1935 and divorced in 1937. He was briefly married to singer and dancer Ivanova Shuvalova from 1938 to 1941. And then he remarried Rogers in 1941 and divorced again in 1946. He married once more, to Russian singer Ida Kitaeva, in 1946 and stayed with her until his death in 1965.

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The groundbreaking comedian and actor’s life was complicated and his relationships were no exception, to the point where he shot his fourth wife’s car when she tried to leave him. Pryor had a series of marriages — most of them brief — to Patricia Price (1960-67), Shelley Bonus (1967-69), Deborah McGuire (1977-79), Jennifer Lee (1981-82), and Flynn Belaine (1986-87). He remarried Belaine in 1990 and they divorced again in 1991. He then remarried Lee in 2001 and they remained together until his death in 2005 at age 65.

None of the many marriages of the co-founder of the Allman Brothers Band was most celebrated than the one to Cher in 1975 – three days after her divorce from Sonny Bono became final. Nine days after tying the knot with Allman, Cher filed to dissolve the wedding after finding Allman’s problems with alcohol and drugs overwhelming. Allman dried out and they stayed together until 1978. Marriages to Shelley Kay Winters, Janice Blair, Julie Bindas, Danielle Galliano, and Stacey Fountain also ended in divorce. At 64, he became engaged to 24-year-old Shannon Williams in 2012 but seemed a little gunshy about another wedding. “With my earlier marriages, everything was fine until we tied the knot, and it seems like it went downhill from there,” he said in a 2013 interview with the Savannah Morning News. But as his health declined, they married a few months before his death in 2017, his long-time manager told Variety.

The high-powered Hollywood producer made headlines as much for the women he married as for his celebrated films including “Rosemary’s Baby,” “Love Story,” “The Godfather,” and “Chinatown.” He was married twice (to actresses Sharon Hugueny and Camilla Sparv) before marrying “Love Story” lead Ali MacGraw in 1969. That marriage ended in 1973 when MacGraw left him for Steve McQueen. Nuptials with sports commentator and former Miss America Phyllis George and actress Catherine Oxenberg followed: one ended in divorce and the other annulment after 12 days. He also was married to Leslie Ann Woodward and Victoria White.

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Screen goddess Taylor found herself in so many romantic entanglements that the Vatican once accused her of committing “erotic vagrancy,” People.com says. She was engaged twice before tying the knot at 18 with Hilton heir Conrad Hilton Jr. in 1950 – just as her film “Father of the Bride” was released. They divorced in 1951 and Taylor wed British actor Michael Wilding (1952-57), producer Mike Todd (1957-58), who died in a plane crash, and singer Eddie Fisher (1959-64), who had been married to Debbie Reynolds. That relationship “dissolved when she fell in love with her ‘Cleopatra’ costar, Welsh actor Richard Burton,” People says. They married in 1964 – nine days after her divorce from Fisher was final – and lasted nearly a decade together before splitting in 1974. And then came the sequel as they remarried in 1975 and divorced again a year later. She then married former Secretary of the Navy John Warner in 1976 and helped him get elected to the U.S. Senate before they split in 1982. She met her last husband, construction worker Larry Fortensky, at the Betty Ford Clinic. They were married in 1991 and divorced in 1996.

Tayor’s baby-faced “National Velvet” costar also had his share of relationship issues, says Yahoo! News. At 22, the five-foot-two star of the Andy Hardy movies married 20-yeard-old Ava Gardener in January 1942 – a union that ended in May 1943. He followed with Miss America contestant Betty Jane Phillips (1944-49), model Martha Vickers (1949-51), and model Elaine Devry (1952-58), who starred with her husband in “The Atomic Kid.” He married actress Barbara Ann Thomason in 1958, but they separated in 1965 after she discovered Rooney was having an affair. She then moved into the home of actor Milos Milosevic – who killed her and himself in 1966 amid talk that Rooney and Thomason might reconcile. Rooney married one of Thomason’s friends, Marge Lane, later that year, but the marriage ended in 1967. He married Carolyn Hockett in 1969 and they divorced in 1975. He married musician Jan Chambers in 1978 and remained with her — despite reports of elder abuse by her and her son — until his death in 2014.

The television talk-show host “had a relationship history almost as interesting as his interviews,” says People.com, marrying eight times including one woman twice. King eloped with high-school sweetheart Freda Miller in 1952 at the age of 18 but the marriage was annulled a year later. He wed Annette Kaye in 1961; a union that didn’t last a year. Then he married former Playboy bunny Alene Akins from 1961 to 1963 – and then again from 1968 to 1971. In between, he married environmental biologist Mickey Sutphin (1964-67). A few years after his fifth marriage ended, he wed production assistant and former math teacher Sharon Lepore (1976-83), followed by businesswoman Julie Alexander (1989-92). His longest marriage was to former singer and television host Shawn Southwick (1997 until his death in 2021), though People notes reports of multiple affairs and says King filed for divorce in 2019.

Long before the Kardashians, this Hungarian model, actress, and sex symbol was largely famous for being famous. The author of “Zsa Zsa’s Complete Guide to Men” and “How to Get a Man, How to Keep a Man and How to Get Rid of a Man” was well-known for her many marriages as well as whispered romances with famous men including Frank Sinatra and Henry Kissinger. She wed Turkish government official Burhan Asaf Belge (1937-41), hotel magnate Conrad Hilton (1942-48), actor George Sanders (1949-54) (who she later appeared with in “Death of a Scoundrel” in 1956 before he married her sister, Magda), financier Herbert Hutmer (1964-66), oil executive Joseph Cosden (1966-67), Barbie doll creator Jack Ryan (1975-76), attorney Michael O’Hara (1977-82), actor Felipe de Alba (1982), and Prince Frederick von Anhalt (1986 until her death in 2016). “I am a marvelous housekeeper,” she once said. “Every time I leave a man, I keep his house.”