The Curse of the Married Stage Name

Cafe Society
1

Over the years, quite a few well-known female celebrities have gotten married and changed their “professional” name. Then they got divorced.

Pamela Anderson Lee
Roseanne Barr Arnold
Farrah Fawcett Majors
Chris Evert Lloyd
Phylicia Ayers-Allen Rahshad
Patty Duke Astin

Granted, celebrity marriages do tend to be short-lived anyway. But, have any that changed their stage names managed to stay married? (Jada Pinkett Smith and Courteney Cox Arquette come to mind, but it has only been a few years for them.) What is the reason for this phenomenon?

2

Well, there’s Mrs. Patrick Campbell, but she was rather before even my time.

3

Who’s that?

4

Dont forget one of my favorite from my teen years, Merideth Baxter-Birney.

5

Susan Tomalin didn’t stay married to Chris Sarandon, but she’s still kept her married name 20 years after they divorced.

6

Yeah, but she became famous with the name “Susan Sarandon.” In the OP I was referring to celebrities who changed their name after they had already become famous.

7

Ooo. I thought of a counter-example: Babe Didrikson Zaharias. She married in 1938 and stayed married until she died in 1956.

8

You’re missing the best one:

Barbara Hershey who for a brief shining moment (when she was either married to or with one of the Carradine bros, David If memory serves), changed her name professionally to :

Barbara Seagull. I seem to recall her ‘demand’ that the credits in her prior work be re-done to reflect this.

The fanfare was distinctly less when she changed it back.