Danny DeVito, Rhea Perlman separate after 30 years of marriage
Actors Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman attend the opening night of the 23rd Annual Israel Film Festival at the Ziegfeld Theatre in Manhattan in 2008. A spokesman for DeVito says the couple is separating after 30 years of marriage. (Oct. 29, 2008) Credit: AP
Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman, one of Hollywood's most enduring couples, are separating after 30 years of marriage.
Stan Rosenfield, the longtime representative for actor-producer-director DeVito, 67, and four-time "Cheers" Emmy winner Perlman, 64, confirmed the news Monday to "Entertainment Tonight."
The couple have three children: daughters Lucy, 29, and Grace, 27, and son Jacob, 24.
They met in January 1971, when DeVito was performing as a demented stable hand in the play "The Shrinking Bride," which ran one night at Manhattan's Mercury Theatre.
"Rhea was in the audience," DeVito told an interviewer in 1992. He asked her out and, "We had coffee at a place called The Cookery and listened to records," he said. "Two weeks later she moved in with me" at the West 89th Street Manhattan apartment DeVito shared with friend and fellow actor Michael Douglas.
DeVito had a breakthrough, Emmy-winning role as despotic dispatcher Louie De Palma on the classic sitcom "Taxi" (ABC/NBC 1978-1983), in which Perlman appeared in several episodes as Louie's love interest. The two actors, who married in January 1982 during a "Taxi" lunch break, went on to appear together in the 1996 children's film, "Matilda."
DeVito directed that film in addition to "Throw Momma from the Train" (1987), "The War of the Roses" (1989), "Hoffa" (1992) and others. The couple also co-founded the production company Jersey Films, which counts "Pulp Fiction" (1994) among its movies.
DeVito currently stars as Frank Reynolds on the FX sitcom "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia," which his company produces.
Perlman performs regularly in TV and film, including in this year's independent drama "The Sessions," starring John Hawkes and Helen Hunt.
