Latest news with #Slayers
Elle
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Elle
Malin Åkerman and Her Husband, Jack Donnelly, Knew Each Other 4 Years Before Dating
THE RUNDOWN In The Hunting Wives, Malin Åkerman leads an elite inner circle, but in real life, she's been building a quieter love story with her husband, Jack Donnelly. The actress, who stars as Margo Banks in the new series, has been married to the British actor and writer since December 2018. From starring in films together to supporting each other's creative work, the couple has built a life together in Los Angeles with Åkerman's son, Sebastian. Here, everything to know about Donnelly and his relationship with Åkerman. Åkerman first met Donnelly through one of her sister's boyfriends. '[Donnelly] is actually my youngest sister's boyfriend's friend from drama school in England,' Åkerman revealed during an appearance on Live with Kelly and Ryan in 2o18. 'I had known him for the past four years but didn't see all of a sudden he came back from England like a year-and-a-half ago, and I went, 'Wow, have you always been this cute?'' Donnelly's 2017 proposal to Åkerman was thoughtful and personal. 'Jack came to the door with a beautiful bouquet of flowers and proceeded to take me out for dinner at my favorite spot in Brooklyn,' Åkerman told Vogue in 2018. 'We sat in the garden and closed the place down. When we got home, he called me to our room, where he got down on one knee and asked the big question with a beautifully designed ring.' They married on Dec. 1, 2018, at the Papaya Playa Project in Tulum, Mexico. 'It was all about being adhering to somebody else's standard of what a wedding should be,' Åkerman told Brides. 'We wanted the wedding to feel real to us. It gave us a lot of freedom.' Donnelly and Åkerman have collaborated on multiple projects, including Friendsgiving, A Week in Paradise, and Slayers. In Friendsgiving, they starred as a couple and filmed a sex scene together. 'Any chance I get to have him do a scene like that, who better than to do it with than your husband?' Åkerman said during an appearance on The Talk in 2020. 'It's a really, kind of, intimate, crazy scene and thank God we know each other well enough instead of just meeting somebody on the first day and [doing] this crazy S&M scene. It was lovely to have him there.' Donnelly said that filming with Åkerman in Slayers, a vampire horror-comedy, was one of his favorite professional experiences. 'Malin and I are married, so any opportunity we get to work together, we always love it because it means we can keep the family together and travel together,' he told Bleeding Cool in 2022. Donnelly is well known for playing the lead in the BBC fantasy series Atlantis, and has appeared in United We Fall, Slayers, and the short comedy series The Players. In Slayers, Donnelly embraced a genre he hadn't tackled before. 'This is one of the only projects where I've not taken my top off at any point,' he joked to Bleeding Cool. 'This is the first time I've done an American accent on camera,' he added. 'I had such a good time doing it. Working with these guys and Asher, I would go back to this team and do more horror. Neither Malin nor I were huge horror fans in the past, but after doing this and exploring it, it was more like, 'There's stuff here that we'd like to get into again.'' In addition to acting, Donnelly writes and directs. He directed and starred in the short series The Players in 2023. Donnelly has a close relationship with Åkerman's son, Sebastian, from her previous marriage to musician Roberto Zincone. 'He was brilliant with my son, and that was it, and my heart melted,' Åkerman said on Live with Kelly and Ryan in 2018. When she told Sebastian about the engagement, she recalled, 'He jumped up on the couch and went, 'Yay, we're getting married!'' When Donnelly proposed in October 2017, Åkerman posted an Instagram, writing, 'This sweet and loving man has stepped into our lives and stole both our hearts! I think we're gonna keep him around for a while. ;)' Åkerman also told Us Weekly in 2018 that Donnelly and Sebastian were 'inseparable,' adding, 'It makes my heart warm. I'm very glad to be bringing Jack into our lives for good.' Åkerman credits Donnelly with helping her grow in their relationship. 'He's a master at [communication]. He's taught me a lot,' she told People in 2023. 'He's allowed me to be vulnerable and lean into him a bit, and it's been beautiful to be able to communicate with someone who's your partner.' The couple also prioritizes intentional time together. 'I love date nights. We both live for them,' she said. 'Sometimes, when we know we're not going to be able to do a date night one week, then we go out for breakfast together.' Donnelly does not have any social media accounts. 'I'm not really on social media with Twitter, Instagram, or anything,' he told Bleeding Cool in 2022. Åkerman often posts glimpses into their relationship instead, including a heartfelt post for their six-year wedding anniversary in December 2024: '6 years ago today…and still loving you more than ever ❤️ even if we both forgot that it was our anniversary. 😳 😂 ' She's also celebrated his birthday publicly. In October 2024, she wrote, 'It's his birthday!! #jackdonnelly I couldn't have asked for a better partner ❤️ you make me laugh like no one else! You are a shining bright light and I absolutely adore you for everything that you are.I cannot believe you're still in your 30's 👀 !!! #happybirthday my love.'
New York Times
08-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Buffy Slayed. Their Marriage Didn't Survive.
'The story you most often hear about divorce, about heartbreak, is the story of an ending. A light switch flicked into the Off position,' writes Jenny Owen Youngs in 'Slayers, Every One of Us,' a memoir written with her ex-wife, Kristin Russo. 'But what if you clicked the bulb back on?' Restoring the power is the dominant theme in their book, with that light source being the creative partnership the two achieved through their podcast about 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer,' even as their romantic partnership went dark five years after their 2013 marriage. The book is narrated by both women, with each providing her perspective on their shared history in alternating sections. Russo (a speaker, a consultant and an 'Italian-born, Long Island-raised triple fire sign') comes off as the more ebullient and emotional partner. Youngs (a musician and songwriter who has 'always been a bit more grounded in reality') is more sardonic and taciturn. Boom-and-bust romance memoirs are common, but mix in fervent fandom and original music and we've got ourselves a different approach to the well-trod ground here — all spurred on by a 1990s television show about a girl with superhuman strength fighting evil with help from her pals. (The book's title comes from an inspirational speech, given by Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers, to a room full of young women in the final episode of the series: 'I say my power should be our power. … Slayers, every one of us.') The pair's mutual love of 'Buffy' led them to create a podcast in 2016 called 'Buffering the Vampire Slayer.' Their show stood out among the usual nattering nerd productions, thanks to the intelligent, queer-centric commentary and a handcrafted soundtrack; each episode included at least one original song about the series. The podcast became popular enough to be a 'Jeopardy!' question. Huge numbers of listeners turned out for live recording sessions and 'Buffy'-themed proms. And it is the women's devotion to producing this labor of love — even while in the throes of the breakup — that drives the narrative. The book's seven numbered chapters retrace the authors' lives together and are roughly mapped to the trajectory of the seven 'Buffy' seasons. It's a convenient structure, but just like a long-running genre TV show, there's some obvious filler and bits of melodramatic foreshadowing sprinkled here and there: 'If only we'd consulted the 'Buffy' mirror in which we increasingly saw our lives reflected, we could have glimpsed our futures.' (With a revival of the television series reportedly in development, Russo and Youngs may have to write a sequel.) Devotees of 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' and the podcast are most likely the target audience for this book, but it can also be viewed as a joyful ode to the awesome ability of pop-culture arcana to create a solid community — especially in the modern era where the internet and digital tools give fans more options for connecting and creating new content from their own interpretations of the material. Fan culture has come a long way from those mimeographed Kirk-Spock love stories that used to circulate at 'Star Trek' conventions in the 1970s. William Shatner, Kirk himself, once joked that ardent 'Star Trek' fans should 'get a life,' and some people may dismiss taking direction from a TV show. But humans have been using myth and legend as motivation for centuries, and Buffy's challenges are just a modern variation of the trials faced by Odysseus, Beowulf and other warriors. And as 'Slayers, Every One of Us' illustrates, the hero's journey is easier with friends.
