11 Long-term Celebrity Couples with Large Age Gaps Whose Relationships Have Stood the Test of Time
Love conquers all — even significant age gaps.
While the age difference between a couple can present some challenges, these couples have managed to make their relationships work. From Beyoncé and Jay-Z who are 12 years apart to Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi who are 16 years apart to Holland Taylor who is 30 years older than her love, Sarah Paulson, these celebrity pairings have proven that age can sometimes just be a number.
Below, see some of the celebrity couples who have large age gaps but are completely compatible nonetheless.
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Jay-Z and Beyoncé
Age Difference: 12 years
Married: 16 years
Jay-Z and Beyoncé have been together since the early aughts and though they have a 12-year age difference between them, the power couple have managed to make their long relationship work.
The pair, who began dating sometime between 2000 and 2001, got married in a super secret ceremony in 2008.
Asked whether or not she felt pressure to get married, Bey told Ellen DeGeneres, “I mean it’s different for everyone, I was really young [when we first began dating] I’m only 27. So I was really young and I feel like it’s important for women and men to have their own goals and their own life before they can complete someone else.”
They share three kids — daughter Blue Ivy, 12, plus twins Rumi and Sir, 7.
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Viola Davis and Julius Tennon
Age difference: 12 years
Married: 21 years
Viola Davis has has never been shy about letting the world know that her husband Julius Tennon is an answered prayer.
“I said I want a big Black man from the South who’s probably been married before. Has kids, because I don’t want any pressure in that department,” she told Oprah of her prayer back in 2022.
“Someone who’s maybe been an actor who understands the artistic community,” she continued. “Someone who goes to church and loves God. I said, ‘If you give me that, I’ll start going to church, God. I really will. I’m committed to it.’ And then I signed off, just like writing a letter.”
Shortly thereafter, Davis met her husband on the set of the CBS series City of Angels in 1999. They wed in 2003.
Davis and Tennon share daughter Genesis, 14, whom they adopted in 2011.
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Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi
Age Difference: 15 years
Married: 16 years
Though Ellen DeGeneres and her wife Portia de Rossi first laid eyes on each other in 2001, it wasn’t until 2004 that they got together romantically. At the time of their first meeting, de Rossi hadn’t publicly come out as a lesbian, but she told PEOPLE it was love at first sight. “I remember thinking that she was the coolest, most fascinating, beautiful, funniest person I’d ever met,” she said.
The couple dated for four years before getting engaged in May 2008. They tied the knot in August of the same year.
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Camila Alves McConaughey and Matthew McConaughey
Age Difference: 13 years
Married: 12 years
Former PEOPLE’s Sexiest Man Alive Matthew McConaughey got his heart stolen by his now wife of 12 years, Camila. The pair met at a West Hollywood nightclub called Hyde in 2006 — and the connection was instant.
“She showed up, and she moved right to left in front of my eyes across that club,” the actor told PEOPLE of their first meeting. “It was as if she was floating. And I did not say, ‘Who is that?’ I said, ‘What is that?’ And then introduced myself. Since that evening, I have not wanted to spend time with any other woman.”
The pair welcomed their son Levi Alves on July 7, 2008 and then added to their family with Vida Alves born on Jan. 3, 2010. They would go on to get married in June 2012 before welcoming their third child Livingston Alves on Dec. 28, 2012.
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Sam Taylor-Johnson and Aaron Taylor-Johnson
Age Difference: 23 years
Married: 12 years
Aaron Taylor-Johnson and his wife Sam first met when he was auditioning to play a young John Lennon in Sam’s directorial debut about the musician’s early life, Nowhere Boy back in 2008.
Sparks immediately flew and the pair began dating and were engaged by 2009. And while the pair fell in love effortlessly, they have had to navigate the chatter around their age difference.
“I guess that interest was more when we got together, which was now 14 years — at the beginning, was quite intense,” the Back to Black director admitted on BBC Radio 4’s This Cultural Life.
“And that sort of fascination, because he’s younger than me, which you know, we couldn’t really fathom the fascination … it’s sort of gone away a little bit.”
Aaron and Sam welcomed their first child together, a daughter named Wylda Rae, in 2010 and followed up with another baby girl named Romy Hero in 2012 before they got married that same year.
Aaron is also stepdad to Angelica and Jessie Phoenix, Sam’s older daughters, whom she shares with her ex-husband Jay Jopling.
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Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones
Age Difference: 25 years
Married: 24 years
It seems the key to Catherine Zeta-Jones and Michael Douglas’ long-lasting relationship is open admiration. The couple, who share the same birthday — September 25 — posted sweet tributes to each other this year, with Zeta-Jones writing, “Happy Birthday to Michael and to me!! This was us on our birthday 25 years ago!” alongside a black-and-white throwback pic of her husband planting a kiss on her cheek.
Douglas then responded, “To my birthday sister, I love you with all my heart! May your new year be the best! @catherinezetajones ❤️,” in his own birthday post.
The couple first met back in 1998 at the Deauville Film Festival. They were engaged in 1999 and got married the following November. They share two children — son Dylan, 24, and daughter Carys, 21. Douglas also has on older son, Cameron, 45, whom he shares with his ex-wife Diandra Luker.
Through their two decades together, Zeta-Jones and Douglas have never made their age difference an issue.
“My husband is 25 years older than me; that’s not a secret,” she told the Wall Street Journal in 2021.
“With any relationship, it wouldn’t be normal if there weren’t any ups and downs. The constant is love is respect. We’ve never, ever lost our sense of humor, and we enjoy each other’s company.”
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Harrison Ford and Calista Flockhart
Age Difference: 20 years
Married: 14 years
Though they have been married for 14 years, Harrison Ford and his wife Calista Flockhart have been together for 22 years, as the pair started dating in 2002.
The Indiana Jones actor met the Ally McBeal alum at 59th Golden Globe Awards in 2002 and though Ford was still married to his second wife Melissa Mathison at the time, she had filed for legal separation in 2001. Their divorce was later finalized in 2004.
Ford and Flockhart would go on to create a quiet life together. He adopted Flockhart’s son Liam, 22, who she had welcomed via adoption in 2001, prior to having met Ford.
The actor is also father to four other children — Malcolm, 38 and Georgia, 34, who he shares with Mathison, as well as Benjamin, 58, and Willard, 55, whom he shares with his first wife, Mary Marquardt.
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Rosie Huntington-Whiteley and Jason Statham
Age Difference: 20 years
Together: 14 years
Rosie Huntington-Whiteley and Jason Statham have been together since 2009. The British couple crossed paths at a party in London and “it was instant chemistry,” she said in a Q&A session on her Instagram Story, per The Daily Mail.
The pair have been going strong since then. They got engaged in January 2016, and welcomed their first child together, son Jack Oscar, on June 24, 2017. They then expanded their family five years later with the birth of daughter Isabella James on Feb. 2, 2022.
Asked what the best part of being with an older man is, Huntington-Whitely told Glamour, “His knowledge and strength are really inspiring and attractive, and that can come with a man who’s had a bit of time.”
She continued, “We have a connection that has nothing to do with age. Work comes and goes, but if you have someone at home who thinks you’re the greatest person in the world, that keeps you going.”
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Jeff Goldblum and Emilie Livingston
Age Difference: 30 years
Together: Nine years
Proving that sliding into someone’s DMs totally works, Holland Taylor caught the attention of Sarah Paulson after hitting her up on X, formerly Twitter, in 2015. Though the actresses had crossed paths years prior, it wasn’t until they started talking on the social media platform that fireworks sparked.
They have been together since and are publicly crazy about each other, though Taylor did recently say she occasionally does worry about their age difference.
“We have a big generational difference between us, which worries me for her sake. But, you know… what can I do?,” she said. “We do have a wonderful resonance. We are very interested in the same kinds of things, and yet we share big differences.”
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Dick Van Dyke and Arlene Silver
Age Difference: 46 years
Married: 12 years
Dick Van Dyke met his now-wife Arlene Silver = SAG Awards in 2006. After chatting at the show, the actor and makeup artist forged a friendship that eventually turned into a relationship after the death of his wife in 2009.
They tied the knot in 2012.
“We were friends for so long that when I told people that I know, they were happy about [our relationship], and I was scared,” Silver told Entertainment Tonight earlier this year.
“I mean, the facts, our age difference. But it’s so irrelevant. I think when you see us together, it’s like you don’t even think about it,” she added.
“We don’t think about it, we just meet in the middle,” Silver told the outlet, while Van Dyke added, “I was fortunate that I didn’t grow up … It was meant to be.”
And around his 97th birthday, he credited his marriage for keeping him young: “Having a beautiful young wife half my age to take care of me — that works! My positive attitude, I get that from my wife.”
Source: People
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