Christine Taylor thought she and Ben Stiller were having a rebound romance. They had both recently ended other relationships when they started dating in 1999, and neither expected to be making wedding plans quite so soon.
About six months later, Stiller proposed. Taylor recalled their quick engagement on the September 15 episode of We’re Still Here, Babe, telling host Natanya Ross they had taken “a big leap.”
“We just were having fun,” she said during the interview. She told her closest friends and family about Stiller, but kept the relationship from her wider circle for a while.
They married in May 2000 after meeting on the set of Heat Vision and Jack, a television pilot that never aired. Stiller directed it, and Taylor was cast after a callback she hadn’t expected.
She Had Already Thrown Away the Audition Pages
Taylor had read for Stiller and Jack Black, who was starring in the pilot, then heard nothing for about two weeks. When the call finally came, she was asked to return that day. She had already ripped up the pages she needed for the audition.
“Fax me the sides,” she remembered saying. She went back, read for Stiller and Black again, and got the job. Toward the end of the shoot, she and Stiller went on their first date.
The two later worked together in Zoolander and Dodgeball. Their family grew after the wedding, with daughter Ella born in 2002 and son Quinlin following in 2005.
Taylor Wanted to Be at Her Children’s Activities
After Ella arrived, Taylor initially intended to work as much as she could. She continued making television pilots while caring for her baby, but began asking herself whether she enjoyed keeping up that pace or simply felt she had to.
“Am I now just Ben’s wife or Ella’s mom?” she recalled wondering. With Stiller away working frequently, she didn’t want both parents filming while her mother, a babysitter or a nanny went to their children’s activities. Taking fewer jobs, she said, gave her more time with her daughter and left her feeling more peaceful.
“I never left the business,” Taylor said. By the time someone approached her about Search Party, the family had moved to New York. She remembered filming its low-budget pilot in a Brooklyn apartment for very little money, without expecting much to come of it. The show sold, and she ended up recurring on it for five years.
They Kept Doing Things as a Family During Their Separation
Taylor and Stiller announced their separation in 2017 after 17 years of marriage. They continued going to shows and celebrating birthdays together with their children, Taylor told Drew Barrymore in March 2023. She said the time apart had allowed each of them to get to know themselves better.
When the pandemic began, Stiller moved back into the family home so he could see Ella and Quinlin during lockdown. He confirmed their reconciliation in a February 2022 Esquire interview. “It’s been really wonderful for all of us. Unexpected, and one of the things that came out of the pandemic,” he said.
Taylor remembered being home with two teenagers and having time to talk to Stiller without the usual distractions. “We found this way back,” she told Barrymore, describing a reconciliation that happened naturally while the four of them were together.
This May, Taylor and Stiller attended the Met Gala together for the first time in a decade. They dressed in New York Knicks colors: Stiller wore a navy suit with an orange tie, and Taylor chose a cobalt blue gown.