The Truth About John Mulaney's Marriage To Annamarie Tendler
Anyone who watched any of John Mulaney's Netflix comedy specials over the last decade knows of his wife, artist Annamarie Tendler. Mulaney has often joked about his relationship with Tendler onstage, poking fun at her brutal honesty and her misunderstanding of Leonardo Da Vinci's "The Last Supper," as well as raving about the wonders of marriage and "buying the cow."
"She and I have totally different styles," Mulaney said of Tendler in his 2018 special "Kid Gorgeous at Radio City." "When my wife walks down the street, she does not give a s**t what anyone thinks of her in any situation. She's my hero. When I walk down the street, I need everybody, all day long, to like me so much. It's exhausting."
Since their first meeting in the late 2000s, Mulaney and Tendler have frequently collaborated on projects, including the Broadway show "Oh, Hello!" and fundraising for various causes. To many fans, the West Village-based couple appeared to have a creative, collaborative, and strong relationship. They shared their successes, their friends, and their French bulldog, Petunia. But nearly seven years after their picturesque 2014 wedding, Mulaney and Tendler confirmed their divorce to Page Six in May 2021. Here's a look back at the time Mulaney and Tendler spent together.
Annamarie Tendler predicted her relationship with and marriage to John Mulaney
Annamarie Tendler — who, incidentally, once hosted a paranormal-themed YouTube makeup series — had a psychic sense about her relationship with and marriage to John Mulaney.
As reported by Us Weekly, the couple's now-defunct wedding website explained that they met through mutual friends while vacationing in Massachusetts. "After a group vacation to Martha's Vineyard, John rode shotgun while Anna drove a carload of people home," the site read. "He did bits the whole ride and killed. They were not dating at the time, but Anna knew they would be soon after."
On the couple's four-year anniversary in July 2018, Mulaney posted a photo from their wedding to Instagram, along with a note written and signed by Tendler and dated February 16, 2010. "John is the man I'm going to marry," the note read.
"Happy 4th anniversary," Mulaney wrote in the caption. "And happy 8 year and 5 month anniversary to when you predicted it."
John Mulaney's proposal to Annamarie Tendler went awry
John Mulaney's proposal to Annamarie Tendler did not go according to plan. During his appearance on The Pete Holmes Show in December 2013, Mulaney blamed Holmes for spoiling the surprise. "You're directly involved with ruining my engagement," he told Holmes. "You're directly involved with ruining the surprise of my engagement."
Mulaney went on to explain that shopping for an engagement ring took "multiple days," which required him to conjure up multiple alibis accounting for where he was, including one day when he told Tendler that he was having lunch with Holmes. Mulaney recalled Tendler saying, "That day you said you were with Pete Holmes, you weren't. ... He Instagrammed a photo of himself recording a podcast."
Later in the episode, Mulaney recalled the proposal itself, which involved a beach off the Pacific Coast Highway in California. "On the day that I took her, the beach was — I don't know how to phrase this — crawling with homeless people," he said. "And Anna said, 'There are a lot of other beaches in Malibu,' and I said, 'That's right.'" The pair managed a silent drive down to a more proposal-friendly Malibu beach. "It was really funny, it was so tense," Mulaney recalled, "and then when I proposed, it was really worth it, so all of it was great."
Love John Mulaney's look? It's Annamarie Tendler's handiwork
Annamarie Tendler went to Vidal Sassoon Academy and New York City's Makeup Designory "pretty much out of high school," and went on to work as a hairstylist and makeup artist for several years, according to Architectural Digest. John Mulaney has been her biggest client.
In a 2012 interview with New York Magazine's Intelligencer, Mulaney (kind of) shouted out his then-girlfriend's beautifying skills. "My girlfriend is a makeup artist and hairstylist, and cuts my hair for free," he said. "I would promote her here but I totally forgot her name."
In 2015 and 2016, Tendler provided the senior-citizen makeovers of Mulaney's and co-star Nick Kroll for their hit Broadway show "Oh, Hello!". "We had a great little family," Kroll said of the experience (via Yahoo! Sports). "When you do a show like this, you have this little family of people who make it." Mulaney chimed in: "And at the core was Nick and I and Anna in the makeup chairs for two hours every night."
In a 2019 Nylon profile, Tendler described her "Oh, Hello!" experience as "hands down the most rewarding thing that I did in makeup in my entire makeup career," adding, "It prolonged my career in makeup for an extra year and a half. We did 140 shows just on Broadway, that doesn't include the tour and off-Broadway. I went from writing books, which was very solitary, to working on Broadway on something really collaborative, and that was so fun."
Annamarie Tendler and John Mulaney's 'perfect' wedding
John Mulaney and Annamarie Tendler got married on July 5, 2014. "On a beautiful and perfect day, I married a beautiful and perfect woman," Mulaney wrote in an Instagram caption the following day, adding, "I wish I could live it over and over again."
According to Us Weekly, Mulaney and Tendler got married at the Onteora Mountain House in Boiceville, New York, in the Catskill Mountains. The guest list included the couple's famous funny friends Nick Kroll, Seth Meyers, Nasim Pedrad, and Amy Poehler. Instead of asking for wedding gifts, the couple requested guests donate to the Innocence Project, which helps clear the names of those who are wrongfully convicted of crimes.
"First and foremost John and I wanted to get married in nature," Tendler recalled in an article about the ceremony for the blog Green Wedding Shoes. "We knew rain or shine [this venue] would be the perfect setting for the 1920's inspired, woodland-deco bash we'd envisioned." Tendler carried a rose-and-fern bouquet and wore a Jenny Packham dress and a flower crown she made herself. "In the end, it was the most perfectly clear, not too hot, zero humidity day we east coasters only dream of in the summer," she recalled. "Everyone danced all night long thanks to our amazing DJ. John and I had the wedding of our dreams surrounded by all the people we love most. It was truly the best day of our lives."
John Mulaney has publicly supported Annamarie Tendler
"I have always lived my life waking up each morning and asking myself, 'Aesthetically, who do I want to be today?'" Annamarie Tendler said in a 2019 interview with Nylon. Tendler is an artist who works with pretty much any medium available to her, from faces and heads (as a makeup artist) to artful photography and costumes.
"I like doing a lot of different things, and I know that I would be happy just doing lampshades or just doing weavings or just doing embroidery, but I like to try my hand at a lot of different things," Tendler continued. "I love working with my hands. I think that just based on that, doing something that's artistic with my hands is really fun for me and something that I really enjoy."
Tendler owns a company called Silk Parlor, through which she sells handmade, Victorian-inspired lampshades for over $1,000 a pop. In the fall of 2018, she began pursuing a Master of Arts degree in costume studies from New York University, per Architectural Digest.
In 2020, Tendler and John Mulaney worked to raise funds for a project called The Fashion and Race Database, which aims to "decolonize and decentralize the study of fashion." Sharing a fund drive for the foundation on Instagram, Mulaney wrote, "Academic fashion scholarship is close to my wife, Anna's, heart. She is close to my heart and so we are helping to raise donations for The Fashion and Race Database."
John Mulaney raved about his marriage to Annamarie Tendler onstage
John Mulaney has raved about his relationship with Annamarie Tendler in several of his comedy specials. "I love saying 'my wife,'" the comedian said in his 2015 special "The Comeback Kid" (via Scraps from the Loft). "It sounds so adult. 'That's my wife.' It's great, you sound like a person. I said it even before we were married." Mulaney continued, "Being married is so nice. I never knew relationships were supposed to make you feel better about yourself. That's not really a joke, that's just a little sweet thing I like to say."
Mulaney referenced Tendler again in his Emmy-winning 2018 Netflix special "Kid Gorgeous at Radio City," recalling how when he asked her if he could mention her onstage, she said, "'Just don't say that I'm a b**ch and that you don't like me.'"
"I would never say that, not even as a joke, that my wife is a b**ch and I don't like her. That is not true," Mulaney said. "My wife is a b**ch and I like her so much. She is a dynamite, 5-foot, Jewish b**ch and she's the best."
Annamarie Tendler and John Mulaney share a French bulldog named Petunia
"Anna wants you to know that someone online asked if she was pregnant after seeing her in "Pay Attention" and that's why she left social media," John Mulaney wrote on Twitter in April 2020 of Annamarie Tendler. "She has not looked back once." While Mulaney and Tendler did not have children, they do share a French bulldog named Petunia, who has her own Instagram profile.
Mulaney discussed their family dynamic on a 2014 episode of The Ellen Show. "That's my wife and my daughter," he said, referring to a photo of Tendler and Petunia "doing yoga together." He continued, "It's fun to have a French bulldog puppy. It's like having a baby that's also a grandma."
According to a 2020 profile in The New York Times, Petunia had her own bedroom in the couple's apartment in the West Village. "I throw treats into the guest room to lure Petunia in there, then close the door," Mulaney said of their nightly routine. "She always gives me a look like, 'You bastard.'"
Annamarie Tendler and John Mulaney's religious differences were a topic of his stand-up
John Mulaney has often discussed the differences in his and Annamarie Tendler's religious backgrounds onstage. "I really like dating Jewish women," he said during his 2012 Netflix comedy special "New in Town," adding, "They're great. Because I think a lot of problems that people have in relationships are with communication 'cause guys don't know what women are thinking. And with Jewish women, you do not have to guess what they are thinking. They will tell you."
Mulaney, on the other hand, was raised as an altar boy in the Catholic church, which he mentioned during his 2015 special "The Comeback Kid" (via Scraps from the Loft). "I don't know if you can tell that from the — everything about me. My wife is Jewish, I grew up Catholic, so we got married by a friend. Being married by a friend is a beautiful ceremony that alienates both families' religions, while confusing the elderly people at the wedding."
In his 2018 special "Kid Gorgeous at Radio City," Mulaney joked about Tendler in a politically charged bit. "These new Nazis, [they're like] 'Jews are the worst, and Jews ruin everything, and Jews try to take over your life,'" he said. "It's like, you know what, motherf**ker? My wife is Jewish. I know all that, how do you know all that?"
John Mulaney has referenced Annamarie Tendler's crushes on Leonardo DiCaprio and Timothée Chalamet
Annamarie Tendler has two major celebrity crushes: Leonardo DiCaprio and Timothée Chalamet. "My wife is in love with this Timothée Chalamet son of a b**ch," John Mulaney said onstage during Seth Rogen's "Hilarity for Charity" event. "We were coming back from dinner the other night, my wife walks past me, she goes, 'You know Timothée Chalamet's 6'1."' I just internalized it. ... The next day, I looked it up online and it said he was 5'11." ... I go into her office and I go, 'You know, he's 5'11."' She goes, 'What?' I go, 'The boy! He's not 6'1", he's 5'11!' She goes, 'I was f***ing kidding!'"
On episodes of her 2015 YouTube series for "Amy Poehler's Smart Girls," Tendler often asked her guests Leonardo DiCaprio-themed questions, such as "Would you date Leonardo DiCaprio's ghost?" She even introduces herself this way: "Hi, I am Annamarie Tendler. There are three things that I love in this world: makeup, the paranormal, and Leonardo DiCaprio. Four, if you count my husband."
For Halloween in 2018, Mulaney and Tendler dressed up as Claire Danes and Leonardo DiCaprio from the 1996 movie adaptation of "Romeo & Juliet" (shown above). Earlier that year, Mulaney had posted a photo to Instagram honoring the couple's four-year anniversary, and addressed Tendler in the caption: "Every time I see you it feels like when Leo saw Claire Danes through the aquarium."
Pete Davidson is buds with both John Mulaney and Annamarie Tendler
Comedian Pete Davidson has been John Mulaney and Annamarie Tendler's third wheel on multiple occasions.
During an interview on "The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon" in 2018, Mulaney told a story of the three of them bonding over jazz-fusion dad music. "When I met my now-wife, I played her some of my favorite music, which was Steely Dan. And she said, 'What is this? I hate this,'" he recalled, launching into a story about convincing Tendler and Davidson to join him at a Steely Dan concert. "I said, 'Pete, there is no way I can prepare you for what's about to happen.' And my wife took Pete by the shoulders and said, 'Pete, it's gonna be awful.'"
At the end of Mulaney's second "Saturday Night Live" hosting gig on March 2, 2019, he wore a t-shirt bearing a photo of Tendler smoking a cigarette. "The greatest woman in the world made me a t-shirt for SNL GOODNIGHTS featuring the only good photo I have ever taken," Mulaney captioned an Instagram photo of himself in the t-shirt alongside Tendler. "Luckily it's of her. Oh and after he saw it she made one for Pete [Davidson] too." Davidson proceeded to wear the T-shirt on a date with Kate Beckinsale.
Annamarie Tendler made memorable cameos in some of John Mulaney's work
John Mulaney appeared in an episode of Jerry Seinfeld's Netflix show "Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee" which premiered in July 2018. But the real standout star of the episode — which was titled "A Hooker in the Rain" — was Annamarie Tendler. Mulaney and Seinfeld spent much of the episode shopping at ABC Carpet & Home, with Seinfeld ultimately buying a rug for Mulaney and Tendler. At the end of the episode, when Mulaney presents the rug to Tendler, she reacts with a simple "no," followed by, "I don't think it's going to work." She then affirms to Seinfeld that she "[doesn't] want it at all."
The saga led to headlines including Vulture's "How Annamarie Tendler Won The John Mulaney episode of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee" and Decider's "Annamarie Tendler, John Mulaney's Wife, Usurped 'Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee' Without Even Trying."
Tendler also appeared, albeit briefly, in Mulaney's musical comedy special "John Mulaney & The Sack Lunch Bunch." In fact, the couple's last public appearance together was at the New York City screening of the special in December 2019.
There were signs of trouble in paradise when John Mulaney left for rehab in 2020
In December 2020, John Mulaney checked into a rehab facility in Pennsylvania. "John's friends and family are happy that he's finally getting some help and focusing on his health," a source told Page Six at the time. "His fans know he's struggled in the past with sobriety, he has talked about it openly. Unfortunately he has struggled again during the pandemic. He's on board with his recovery, he's not fighting against rehab."
The comedian had long discussed his struggles with alcohol and cocaine, but to the public eye, he appeared to have been sober since he quit cold turkey at the age of 23.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Mulaney struggled with the lack of structure in his life. "During quarantine, I was like, 'Why am I going totally crazy and why am I ... suddenly telling my own wife my accomplishments?'" he said on a December 2020 episode of "Jimmy Kimmel Live!," adding, "I really needed a job ... When I'm in charge of something, not so much the best thing."
According to The Sun, fans noticed that, shortly after the news of Mulaney's relapse went public, the comedian and Annamarie Tendler had unfollowed each other on Instagram, and Tendler had dropped the "Mulaney" from her handle before deleting her account altogether.
According to Page Six, Mulaney left the rehab facility and moved into outpatient sober care in February 2021 and, according to a source, was "doing well."
If you or anyone you know is struggling with addiction issues, help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).
John Mulaney and Annamarie Tendler confirmed their divorce in May 2021
On May 10, 2021, Page Six reported that John Mulaney and Annamarie Tendler were getting a divorce. According to the site's sources, Mulaney is the one who initiated the split in February 2021, around the time he left a rehab facility in Pennsylvania. Mulaney's representative confirmed the report, adding, "John will not have any further comment as he continues to focus on his recovery and getting back to work."
Tendler released her own statement on the divorce through her spokesperson: "I am heartbroken that John has decided to end our marriage. I wish him support and success as he continues his recovery."
The news came the same day Mulaney performed the first of his sold-out, post-rehab shows at Manhattan's City Winery. "Just left John Mulaney's first post-rehab show at City Winery," Julia Glum of Money magazine wrote on Twitter that night, adding, "I don't know much about comedy, but imho he did a great job ... an excellent mix of humor and honesty. I'm rooting for u, dude."
Rolling Stone Senior Editor David Fear also took to Twitter, calling Mulaney's comeback show "intense," adding, "90 mins that was mostly processing his intervention and rehab experience. Remarkably raw, vulnerable, personal ... Hilarious, harrowing, brave, historic."