I remember about eight or nine years ago, there were constant rumors about the state of Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick’s marriage. It’s weird to think back on that, because it did feel like the tabloids had the knives out for them to a crazy degree. To be fair, I think SJP and Matthew did go through a rough patch around that time, and they were barely together. But they eventually worked things out, and I think welcoming their twin girls probably did help their marriage in some ways. Anyway, SJP gave an interview to Girlboss Radio and she talked about her marriage philosophy, and how her marriage has “worked” for 20 years.
“I know this sounds nuts, but we have lives that allow us to be away and come back together,” Sarah Jessica Parker said. “His work life takes him here, and mine takes me there. In some ways, I think that that’s been enormously beneficial because we have so much to share in a way. Anytime that any relationship is hard, it’s the point in which you’re deciding, ‘Is this worth the investment getting through whatever that thing is?’”
She added: “I’ve been fortunate. Relationships are hard. I always felt that I wanted to invest more.” The Sex and the City alum said that making things work isn’t always easy, and the desire to be with someone through the good and bad is key. “I love him, and I think he’s brilliant. I’m sure I annoy him,” she said. “He annoys me sometimes. But also, I’m enormously proud of the person he is. I think the longer you can last, the more invested you just are and so their triumphs are yours, their disappointments are yours the more you feel those things and experience them, the more it’s hard to imagine not being part of their life.”
The longtime pair tied the knot in 1997 and share son James, 15, and 8-year-old twin daughters Tabitha and Marion. Parker also revealed during the podcast that motherhood changed the way she lives her life. “You’re in a constant state of worrying about your children,” she said. “It’s very painful and it’s exhilarating. It’s a really interesting way of living in the world.”
“It’s not for everybody, there’s a lot that’s really hard,” she continued. “All I do is organize people’s lives and get them here and there and all that. It’s what I wanted and with that, though, comes witnessing somebody hopefully develop into a really interesting, decent person who contributes something.”
I think this is probably true for her – her marriage works because they spend a lot of time apart, and they’re involved with very different things. They don’t have separate lives, really, they’re just doing wildly different things for a time and then they come back together. I also think this is telling: “I always felt that I wanted to invest more.” I think that’s probably true too – she would love to have a different kind of marriage where she could fully “invest” herself to the marriage and to Matthew, but he was always like “we should live more separate lives.” He’s always been the one who needed space from her, not vice versa.
SJP was also saying words about Kim Cattrall on Watch What Happens Live – if you can translate this sh-t for me, I would be grateful – go here to read.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
Oh my goodnesd she needs to stop talking about Kim already .
THIS. She displays the level of b#tthurtness that makes me think of Orangegutan in chief. Like, let it go already. Kim is just not that into you.
I think she fully sees the value that Kim brought to the franchise but is jealous at the same time and wants to control her. Personally her character was the most annoying neurotic of the bunch.
@Loopy. This! She knows that Samantha became the star which is why the latter seasons worked so hard to make Sam seem like a fool and Carrie and angel of sexual delight and it didn’t work. Kim Catrall still gave Sam dignity and it burns SJP to the ground.
Yes I think you’re right. I’ve been so impressed by Kim Cattrall’s handling of this mess … all the manipulations of SJP cut down flat but without meanness. I’m happy for Kim, she’s in a good place with her life and she deserves it.
My thoughts exactly.
OK. I like SJP, genuinely, but I’ve never been a fan of the obvious “Carrie is the star” thing she and Michael Patrick King had going on about SATC. If that show had been just Carrie, it wouldn’t have been half as successful or reached as many women as it did. It also felt very disrespectful to the other women. Especially since Kim actually won an award for the show.
The first movie was ok but the second was an embarrassing racist mess.
Dear Sarah, regarding Kim Cattrall and another SATC movie…
“LET IT GO!!!”
Sincerely,
Elsa and the cast of Frozen
Yeah, I don’t like her “who, me?!” act with Kim. All Kim said was that they were colleagues and it was probably a healthier relationship that way. Big deal! And she was on WWHL acting like the SATC III script was Oscar-worthy. Girl, stop.
Cue Phil Collins and Marilyn Martin’s “Separate Lives.” Also stop talking about Kim, please.
I’d STILL be married if I never saw my husband. Ever. We’d be together until we died
LOL!!
SJP is embarrassingly fixated on SATC. Team Kim 4 evah.
If I recall well he was busted flirting (kissing?) with a redhead, it’s not quite the same as “tabloids were against them a lot”. She forgave and moved on, I guess.
Well, can you really blame Matthew? Anyone having to deal with SJP on the daily basis would go mad.
She seems very high maintenance.
Oh I don’t know. I tend to think they’re cut from very much the same cloth. He just doesn’t speak to the media as much.
I joke that my husband and I are doing the world an enormous public service by sparing any number of innocent people the reality of being romantically involved with/married to one of us! I feel the same sense of gratitude toward Kim & Kanye, and imagine that SJP and MB are also in that bucket.
I totally get what she’s saying. My husband traveled a lot for work for a couple of years and honestly it was great. Right around the point where I was sick of his sh*t (and he was sick of mine, I’m sure), he’d go away. And then I’d miss him and he’s come back and we’d have all sorts of interesting things to talk about. But we don’t have kids, I think that would have been very different. Single mom to a cat for a week or two is nowhere near as hard as single mom to humans.
Apparently part of her time away from Matthew is spent obsessing over Kim Cattrell. Seriously, she has to let it go. The first movie was barely okayish and the second was beyond garbage. Kim didn’t want to participate in another train wreck and SJP just can’t accept it. It says a lot about why Matthew needs so much time apart. She can play innocent all she wants, but I get a raging mean girl vibe from her.
SATC was a huge show for many years. There were two movies that followed. As long as fans (even people that hate the show) keep talking about the alleged feud, SJP will keep talking about it as well. That’s just life, ladies. Get used to it. 🤫
This is all bullshit. These two are very busy being in the middle of the NY theater community together. You can tell by how much work she throws theater actors on her shows. Not to mention the political fundraising they are always doing. She makes out like they live separate lives when they are very involved as a social couple. They both have careers, big deal. They are still both NY actors. She is hiding that she lives with his affairs. That is fine. They have a strong social contract regarding lifestyle, friends and kids. Nothing wrong with it.
I was going to say it was always my impression that their work rarely takes them out of New York. They don’t live separate lives the way most actors or celebrities would.
I thought they bought side-by-side brownstones in Brooklyn (and maybe connected them) and that he was gay and that was the deal. If that’s what you mean by a “social contract.”
more tea please
SJP: thirsty and annoying as all hell
MB: oddly puffy/old-looking for his years, seems like a bore, got off easy ($175 fine) for causing a car crash that killed two people back in 1987
No use for either of them.
all of this
I would like to give SJP a makeover….get rid of that eye makeup that makes her eyes so tiny. Ditch the long center parted hair, go shoulder length and go all one color, not the darker roots.
Yes, please. She looks great when her hair is shorter, blond and curly. Center parts are the work of the devil. And those tiny eyes… WHHHHYYYYY???
Yaaas! That eye makeup is not doing her any favors.
Me too! She is not the prettiest woman alive, but that’s just genetics. She would look so much nicer if, like you said, she ditched the heavy eyeliner and changed the hair. I’m proud to say I never watched one single minute of SATC. Lastly, if she stopped her one sided argument with her former costar and lose the snarkiness, I bet she’d look a lot prettier with the weight of all that negativity off her shoulders. When she was younger, guys called her a butter face, but that really is mean.
If I was Matthew, I would happily take EVERY job that got me some time away from that woman. I can’t imagine what a nagging, harpie of a woman she must be to live with. I’d stay for financial reasons, but have my own life and friends far away from her.
As I remember, he cheated on her with some commoner. It seemed like he was hoping it would bounce him out of the marriage, but she stuck in and used it as leverage to negotiate for the twins.
The thing with all the Kim Cattrall talk is that SJP took over producer responsibilities for the show and drove it into the ground with Michael Patrick King by turning her character into a moron flibbertigibbet and the show into a cotton candy consumerist fantasy, instead of the credibly slightly gritty New York show about sex and relationships it had started out as. A process that culminated with the clueless wedding / real estate / marriage obsessed movies. SJP lived out her Upper East Side rich lady wish fulfilment fantasies with a studio budget and drove the franchise into the ground.
That’s a good observation and it explains why SJP is having trouble moving on–the show lets her play out her fantasies. Carrie is an awful character but she was slightly better in the first season or two. Then she became completely unrelatable.
I love all four of the SATC actresses equally, so I stay out of it.
I think she and Matthew have a solid marriage.
This woman is so TIRESOME, please let it go, you had a good run on tv with SATC.
The films were just awful, especially the second one, that one was outright embarrassing.
She has a new show, she should focus on that and STOP trying to guilt people into making another SATC movie. The world will go happily on without it, we will survive!
LET IT GO, ALREADY! She goes on and on like a broken record.
Please also stop with with that terrible eye make-up, she looks like she is constantly squinting.
Nobody looks good with raccoon eyes.
Just apply medium brown eye pencil near the upper lashes, gently smudge with a Q-tip to get a light smoky look, apply mascara and call it a day with your eye make-up.
She would look younger with hair to the collarbone without the multi-color hair color and the middle part gone.
I didn’t follow them closely but it seemed like the tabloids just went after them. They always say a couple is breaking up. Also kids don’t save a marriage. If there are major problems they’re only going to make them bigger.
I like her new show DIVORCE on HBO, but she looks rough, too much something. Her face has been pulled too tight and the smokey tiny eyes looks terrifying.
I think those are some pretty honest words about what it’s like to be married for 20 years and have three kids, especially ““It’s not for everybody, there’s a lot that’s really hard,” she continued. “All I do is organize people’s lives and get them here and there and all that. ”
I never got a super loved up vibe from them as a couple, I think they just make it work for the sake of the kids, which is noble.
Were the twins conceived via IVF? I can’t remember. I’ve always felt they’ve had a rather sexless marriage.
Yes, they had a surrogate.
She didn’t give birth to them, so I hope so!
She also hinted that SATC 3 may still happen if MPK reworks the script. Ugh. Who even wants this?? And why do they insist that we need this?? What else is there to say?? I don’t want another movie – especially if Kim isn’t in it! That would ruin the whole premise of the show!
Good God, girl. Stop flogging that dead horse.
S&TC was a glorious TV series. A landmark, for which all concerned should be proud.
The movies were nothing but overblown product placement, shopping porn & empty characters that had nothing whatsoever to do with the characters from the series.
Cattrall did the classy thing. Since the show ended she’s done many fascinating projects including the wonderful CBC series, SENSITIVE SKIN.
She has been a total pro and has moved on.
Cynthia Nixon has had a magnificent career since S&TC – justifiably so.
The show ended. Deal with it.
Once you graduate, no matter how much you loved High School, it gets a little creepy if you keep trying to sneak back into algebra.
You said it
I’m not married to her, but she annoys me.
Lol
When she wished she was more invested in her marriage to Matthew, Sarah became invested in her unrequited relationship with Kim. At least she is giving back with her stocking and bonding.
IMO, SJP has residual bitterness at not being born classically “beautiful”. Surely a great career and not resembling the elephant man would be enough for most? Anyway, I believe this is were her constant mean girl regarding Kim Cattral stems from. Kim is more beautiful and a better actress any day of the week and has shown way more class with this tired scenario of SATC 3.
Years ago, my husband and I went to see an off off broadway Kenneth Lonergan play. Right before the show started, both Matthew and SJP walked in. It was a tiny theater, everyone could see them, He waved to fans and she covered her face with her hand and purse. The ended up sitting diagonally innfrontonofnus and she kept trying to make sure no one looked at her. It was ridiculous. Plus her skin looked horrible and she was dressed in a brightly printed, very noticeable summer dress that made her look even more skeltetor. During the intermission, again she held her hands over her face and booked out of the theater, meanwhile, Matthew was all smiles and kind to audience members who waved to him. It was so weird their dynamic. Jessica takes herself way too seriously in person, but doing interviews she acts like she’s America’s darling. Her latest woe is me SATC3 isn’t happening and Kim hurt me PR stunt on WWHL this week was gross and transparent as Andy Cohen was her pot stirrer since they are BFF’s. SJP has never been a nice person. Onlybto thebpeople who kiss her ass! Meanwhile, she didn’t know all this week that Kim’s only sibling, her 55 year old brother was missing and today we all found out he sadly died outside his home in Alberta, CA. I hope this teaches SJP finally what is really important in life. Kim wanted to move on and explore different paths in her life/career and SJP wouldn’t let this stupidity go. Shame on her! I did see ion Kim’s IG that SJP sent her condolences. Find it gross that only a few days ago she wouldn’t stop it with Kim on tv! My heart breaks for Kim and her family’s loss!
You said it!