Forgotten Hollywood First Wives: Recognize These A-List Exes?

Fans were left aghast after remembering actress Talia Balsam was the first wife of legendary Hollywood star George Clooney when she stepped out last week.

Many A-lists wed so-called ‘ordinary’ people before launching into stardom and later went on to getting a divorce in their heyday.

While the current wives of stars including George, Idris Elba, Robert Downey Jr. and Tom Hanks spring to mind easily – many have forgotten the women they first married.

Take Billy Bob Thornton, despite marrying six times, the Landman actor is renowned for his brief marriage to Angelina Jolie, not his forgotten first wife Melissa Lee Gatlin.

Similarly to Billy, Nicolas Cage has been at the alta five times – most famously with the late Lisa Marie Presley.

And Harrison Ford, 83 – now happily married to Calista Flockhart – said ‘I Do’ for the first time to his college girlfriend Mary Marquardt back in the 1960s.

Here is a list of legendary A-lists and their forgotten first wives. 

George Clooney

Decades after her brief marriage to George, Talia built a thriving acting career and a high-profile life of her own. 

Before human-rights barrister Amal entered the picture, he’d been romantically linked to a string of notable women, including Lisa Snowdon, Krista Allen, Sarah Larson, Elisabetta Canalis, and Stacy Keibler. 

He then eventually found his match in Amal Alamuddin. 

It wasn’t until marrying Amal that he found stability, with the couple welcoming twins Ella and Alexander in June 2017.  

Before settling down with the British beauty, George first dipped his toes into married life with Talia. 

George wed Talia in a spontaneous Las Vegas ceremony in December 1989 after five years of dating.

By 1993, they had divorced, and George famously vowed he would never marry again.

Reflecting on the union years later, he told Vanity Fair: ‘I probably — definitely — wasn’t someone who should have been married at that point. 

‘I just don’t feel like I gave Talia a fair shot. I was responsible for the failure of that marriage.’

Talia comes from a storied Hollywood lineage.  She is the daughter of Academy Award-winning actor Martin Balsam and actress Joyce Van Patten, who herself hailed from a showbiz family. 

Talia went on to build a steady television resume, appearing as Mona Sterling on Mad Men from 2007 to 2014, and playing Cynthia Walden on Homeland in 2012.

She has been married to husband John Slattery since 1998, and the couple share one son. 

Tom Cruise

While fans of Tom Cruise will be well aware of his marriages to Katie Holmes and Nicole Kidman, some could be forgiven for forgetting his first wife – whose life has gone in rather a different direction. 

Tom started dating his first wife Mimi, now 69, in 1986 and then a year later they got married, but divorced three years later.

He quietly married Florida-born actress Mimi, during his rise to fame as a leading man in Top Gun with only two people in attendance as they said their vows. 

‘I’d never been in love before. Since I’ve been with her, it’s opened me up a lot. I think it’s helped me be a better actor,’ he told Rolling Stone ahead of their split. 

‘We live a lot of life together. We share everything. … She’s my best friend.’ 

Mimi, who is also a professional poker player, is believed to be the person who first introduced Tom to Scientology, a religion that has dominated conversations around the Mission Impossible star throughout his career. 

While she has starred in the Prime Video series Bosch, a glimpse at Mimi’s social media reveals that her life couldn’t be further from the glitz and glamour of her marriage to Tom.

Alongside her TV work, Mimi has pursued a more unlikely venture, competing at county fairs with her homegrown hay, and she tops up her salary by recording personalised video messages on Cameo.

Tom and Mimi first met back in 1985 while he was developing Top Gun, though the pair’s recollections of their first encounters are conflicting, to say the least.

The actor, who was 23 at the time, told Rolling Stone in 1986 that he met Mimi, then 29, ‘at a dinner party about a year ago,’ however he revealed that she was ‘dating a friend’ at the time.

‘I thought she was extremely bright,’ Tom said.

Mimi’s version of events appears different, as she previously told Sun Sentinel that she and Tom had been introduced by mutual friends.

‘I wasn’t seeing anybody, he wasn’t seeing anybody, and they thought, “These people should be going out with somebody — let’s see if they want to go out with each other,”‘ she recalled. ‘And we said, “Aw, what the heck. OK”.’ 

Idris Elba 

Before marrying love of his life, third wife Sabrina Elba, 36, the Luther star, 53, lived two very different lives with two of his ex wives.

First was make-up artist Hanne Norgaard, with whom he moved to New York with in a bid to launch his career. 

However, he struggled to master an American accent and was reduced to working as a labourer and nightclub bouncer.

When Hanne became pregnant with daughter Isan, 23, in 2001, the marriage collapsed after four years.

As it turned out, Isan would be born on the very day he secured his role on The Wire, the launch pad for his later success.

A ten-year affair with pole dancer Desiree Newberry followed, and it was during a lengthy break from this that he met his second wife, Sonya Hamlin, who lived in Maryland on the eastern seaboard, where The Wire was filmed. 

Idris is also father to a 32-year-old son Riaze as well as 10-year-old boy, Winston, with whom he shares with different women.

His first wife Hanne, 48, is a talented makeup artist and successful businesswoman alongside advocating for mental health.

Over the years she worked with celebs including Robin Williams and Shaquille O’Neal.

Robert Downey Jr.

The American actor, 60, shares 26-year-old Indio with his forgotten first ex-wife Deborah Falconer.

Deborah, now 60, who is an American singer, model and actress, wed Robert in 1992 before splitting over a decade later in 2004. 

Nowadays, Robert’s first wife lives largely out of the spotlight. 

The former couple’s marriage hit the rocks when the Hollywood star battled a drug addiction alongside repeated trips to prison and rehab.

It ultimately took a toll on their marriage and separated in 2001, before divorcing three years later.

Now, Robert is happily married to his wife of 20-years Susan Downey. 

Robert met producer Susan Levin on a film set. She told him she would marry him only if he promised to quit drugs for good.

On Aug 27, 2005, nearly two years after getting engaged, Susan and Robert tied the knot.

They welcomed son Exton Elias Downey on February 7, 2012 and daughter Avri Roel Downey on November 4, 2014.

Billy Bob Thornton

Billy has been married six times and he has four children by three women. From 1978 to 1980, he was married to his first wife Melissa Lee Gatlin and had a daughter Amanda. 

The Landman actor wasn’t present in his eldest daughter Amanda’s life.

In 2005, Billy told the Mail on Sunday: ‘She didn’t grow up with me, and so we were pretty much strangers for years.’

Years later, in 2011, Amanda was convicted of aggravated manslaughter of a child after her goddaughter, one-year-old Olivia Madison Garcia, died in her care, reportedly by falling from her playpen. She was released in 2020.

As per Style magazine, Amanda was dealt a 20-year prison sentence but was commuted after the Innocence Project of Florida (IPF) and the Center for Integrity in Forensic Sciences (CIFS) advocated for her release, citing wrongful conviction.

He married actress Toni Lawrence in 1986; they separated the following year and divorced in 1988.

From 1990 to 1992, he was married to actress Cynda Williams.

In 1993, Billy married Playboy model Pietra Dawn Cherniak, with whom he had two sons. The marriage ended in 1997.

He then dated Laura Dern from 1997 to 1999, but in 2000 he married Jolie. They separated in June 2002 and divorced the following year.

In 2003, he met his current wife Connie Angland.

Billy is renowned for his marriage to Angelina in the noughties, famously seen packing on the PDA during red carpet appearances. 

Billy explained in a November 2016 interview with GQ that he ‘never felt good enough for Angelina,’ saying that her humanitarian efforts did not align with his easygoing lifestyle.

Of the vials of blood the pair wore on chains around their necks, the Fargo alum told The Hollywood Reporter in October 2014, ‘It was a crazy time. I’ve never been fond of it.’

He continued: ‘We were apart a lot because she’s off making Tomb Raider and I’m making Monster’s Ball.

Daniel Craig

Before marrying his current wife Rachel Weisz, Daniel married his first wife Fiona Loudon and welcomed a daughter Ella, now 32.

Daniel and Fiona tied the knot in 1992 but divorced only two years later in 1994. 

Fiona, now 57, is greatly recognised in the arts for her contributions to productions. She has also dedicated her life to be a mother to daughter Ella.

Daniel and wife Rachel have known each other as far back as 1994, when they first played lovers in a steamy theatre production together.

But after years of friendship, the couple fell in love while filming a movie together in 2010 – and were married in a ‘secret’ ceremony within a year.

In 2018, the couple – both of whom have children from previous relationships – also welcomed a daughter. 

Tom Hanks

When Tom Hanks, 69, met his now-wife Rita Wilson in the eighties, he was navigating a bitter divorce from Samantha Lewes after she cruelly separated him from their two children without warning. 

New details of those tumultuous years have been revealed by their daughter E.A. Hanks in her memoir, in which the 42-year-old writer opened up about living with her abusive mother – who went by the stage name Samantha – after her parents’ split. 

In The 10: A Memoir of Family And The Open Road, E.A. said her life between the ages of five and 14 were ‘filled with confusion, violence, deprivation, and love’ as she endured increasingly frequent bouts of neglect and mistreatment at the hands of her mother.

E.A. believes that, although she was never diagnosed, Samantha struggled with bipolar disorder with episodes of ‘extreme paranoia and delusion’.

The troubled actress died from bone cancer at the age of 49 and, in the wake of her mother’s passing, E.A. set out on a six-month road trip to try and piece together a portrait of the woman she called ‘mum’.

The Forrest Gump actor met his first wife – who was four years his senior – when they were both studying theatre at California State University in Sacramento.

They formed a friendship that quickly turned into more, as Tom and Samantha embarked on a whirlwind romance that led to the birth of their first child together – son Colin Hanks – out of wedlock in 1977.

Tom, 22 at the time, was struggling to get his acting career off the ground when he, Samantha, and Colin moved into a cockroach-infested apartment in Manhattan in 1978.

Samantha and Tom finally tied the knot the following year and Elizabeth was born in 1982.

By then, their marriage had already begun crumbling as Tom’s career was taking off and he began booking acting jobs that kept him away from his wife and children for longer and longer periods of time.

He was still married to Samantha when Rita guest-starred in one episode of Tom’s cross-dressing ABC sitcom Bosom Buddies back in 1981.

When they reconnected while filming the 1985 film Volunteers, neither Tom nor Rita could deny their feelings for each other.

‘Rita and I just looked at each other and – kaboing – that was that,’ the 68-year-old actor said during an appearance on the BBC’s Desert Island Discs in 2016. ‘I asked Rita if it was the real thing for her, and it just couldn’t be denied.’

Tom legally separated from his first wife in 1985 before their seven-year marriage ended in divorce two years later.

Tom and his current wife Rita have endured a near four-decade marriage and have raised two sons, Chet Hanks, 35, and Truman Hanks, 29.

Nicolas Cage

Fans may have forgotten Nicolas Cage’s first marriage to American actress Patricia Arquette, 57.

The City of Angels star, 60, has been married five times, with the last three of his wives being over 20 years younger than him.

While it may not be his most famous marriage, he wed Patricia in 1995 until 2001.

The pair reportedly split due to ‘irreconcilable differences’ after a tumultuous, on-again, off-again relationship where they spent significant periods living apart.

Patricia revealed that she is looking for love online earlier this year after quietly ending her longtime relationship with Eric White.

Over the years, Arquette has not been shy about talking about both her good and bad dating experiences.

In 2021, she joined in on a popular Twitter prompt about bad dates to reveal that her date became an infamous murderer years later.

The star initially shared what sounded like a run-of-the-mill bad date with a ‘pro skateboarder’ who turned out to be a bad kisser.

But, she later revealed that her disastrous second date was with former professional skateboarder Mark ‘Gator’ Rogowski, who would later confess to brutally raping and murdering his acquaintance Jessica Bergsten in 1991 when she was only 22 years old.

Nicolas, a nephew of acclaimed Godfather director Francis Ford Coppola, also has a history of high-profile relationships with several prominent Hollywood stars.

The father-of-three is currently enjoying wedded bliss with his fifth wife, Riko Shibata, 29, whom he married in 2021.

His second marriage was to Elvis’ only daughter Lisa Marie.

The two tied the knot during a secret ceremony in Hawaii in August 2002 on the 25th anniversary of Elvis’s death. They were married for just over a 100 days.   

He married third wife Alice Kim, now 40, in July 2004 after meeting her while she worked as a waitress in a Los Angeles restaurant.

They got married two months later and went on to have a son named Kal-El, now 19, (named after Superman). After 11 years of marriage, they separated in 2016.

Nicolas married make up artist Erika Koike, who was 34 at the time, on March 23, 2019 in an infamous Vegas ceremony.

The actor argued that he was too intoxicated to understand what he was doing and filed for annulment four days later.

Robert De Niro

The Meet The Parents actor had previously been married to actress Diahnne Abbott, 80, from 1976 to 1988.

The pair had a son, Raphael, in 1976 while the Oscar-winning actor adopted Diahnne’s daughter Drena from a previous relationship.

The Mean Streets star also has two children with ex Toukie Smith, twin boys Aaron and Julian.

The Hollywood legend split from his wife Grace Hightower after 21 years of marriage in 2018. The former couple share two children, son Elliot and daughter Helen. 

De Niro spoke about his feelings on marriage in a 2013 interview with Katie Couric.

The star of The Godfather Part II said that the secret to a happy union involved ‘a lot of give and take, standing your ground, because then you keep the respect you started out with.’

However, he shared some rather more cautious advice with The Independent in 2014, saying: ‘The only thing I would say is that if you get married, it’s easier probably not to have children if you’re going to split up – it makes life simpler.’

In May 2023, Robert announced he has recently welcomed a baby with his girlfriend Tiffany Chen. 

Johnny Depp

Johnny married his first wife Lori Allison in 1983, when he was just 20 and she 25, with the pair divorcing just two years later, citing ‘irreconcilable differences’. 

The pair have remained close, with Lori revealing that seeing him in court ‘broke her heart’ and she was ‘terrified’ that he would lose in his defamation trial with ex-wife Amber Heard.

Lori was the sister of the bassist in a band Depp played in back in the eighties.

She began her career as a makeup artist while Depp worked odd jobs before rising to stardom. 

While she has remained out of the spotlight in her career, Lori has nothing but nice things to say about her ex-husband Johnny.

Speaking to the Miami Herald in 2015, she said: ‘Well, we all know he’s a talented actor and can pull off the pirate thing like nobody’s business.

‘But he’s also an extremely talented guitar player and started out in South Florida playing the local Hollywood/Fort Lauderdale club circuit.’

Harrison Ford

During his college years and before skyrocketing to fame, Harrison, now 83, married his high school sweetheart, Mary Marquardt.

The pair went onto have a blossoming marriage in 1964 and welcomed two children Benjamin, 59, and Willard, 56.

But the childhood couple soon grew out of their romance when Harrison hit big time and they split in 1979.

Mary worked as an illustrator before pursuing a career in cooking, her life long passion.

During their relationship Harrison took on carpentry jobs to support his young family before reaching Hollywood. 

While Harrison was rising to fame and received increased attention, the Star Wars actor’s ex-wife Mary remained out of the spotlight. 

In her later years, Mary was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS). 

And then Ford was married to Melissa Mathison from 1983 until 2004.

He has insisted he’ll always regret walking down the aisle when he was in his early 20s.

When asked how long he has been married to his third wife, he joked: ‘If you ask me, I would say all my life. I was married for the first time at 23 years of age, which should be illegal.’

The Indiana Jones star has been married to 60-year-old actress Calista Flockhart since 2010.