LGBTQ Celebrities Who Got Engaged or Married This Year
- Former “Biggest Loser” trainer Jillian Michaels recently got engaged to DeShanna Marie Minuto.
- Kristen Stewart announced her engagement to Dylan Meyer in an interview with Howard Stern.
- “Top Chef” winner Kristen Kish married her partner in their backyard over the summer.
Even as the coronavirus pandemic continues to complicate wedding planning, famous members of the LGBTQ community have forged ahead with their proposals and marriages.
Here are 10 celebrity couples who’ve taken their relationship to the next level in 2021.
Singer-songwriter Tayla Parx and dancer Shirlene Quigley announced their engagement in January
Quigley, who has danced on tour with Lizzo, Rihanna, and Beyoncé, shared the news in a heartfelt post that is no longer available on Instagram.
“From the first week we met, I knew you would be in my life forever,” Quigley wrote. “Safe to say, I said ‘YES’ and I am no longer single lol. @taylaparx you’re my forever. I love you and I’m thankful for our friendship, love, and future.”
Quigley also wrote about struggling with her sexuality as a Christian, and how Parx, the Grammy-nominated songwriter behind Ariana Grande’s “Thank U, Next,” was the kind of partner she had “prayed for daily.”
“To be transparent, as a believer, I struggled for years being attracted to both men and women,” Quigley wrote. “I told myself, for years it was something I wouldn’t do again (date a woman). Being judged doesn’t feel good, & that scared me. Until I met someone who showed me what love looked and felt like.”
Former Olympic figure skater Adam Rippon announced his engagement to longtime boyfriend Jussi-Pekka Kajaala in February
The couple actually got engaged in December 2020, but Rippon shared the news in an Instagram post in February.
“JP and I didn’t get to see each other for almost all of 2020 because of the pandemic. When there was finally a chance for me to go and see him in Finland, I jumped at it,” he wrote.
Rippon, who first connected with Kajaala on a dating app in 2017, stayed in Finland for two months, where he helped Kajaala build a cottage and workshopped jokes for an upcoming NBC comedy about figure skating that is currently in development.
His post continued: “In between all that and binging the entire 4 seasons of The Crown, we bought ourselves some rings and said that magic word.. ‘duh!’ We got ~*engaged*~.”
In August, Rippon told People magazine they are planning a city-hall wedding in Pasadena, California.
“Do I need a wedding if I make every day about me? Probably not. I probably need a day off,” he joked.
Ross Mathews announced his engagement to Dr. Wellington García on ‘The Drew Barrymore Show’ in February
Mathews, a judge on “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” told Barrymore that García works as an educator.
Mathews also shared an engagement announcement to Instagram.
“Fiancé, you stay!” he wrote. “I am so proud to announce that after over a year together — navigating a pandemic, quarantine and opposite coasts — the smartest, funniest and kindest man I’ve ever met said, ‘Yes!’ Dr. García, I love you. A lifetime of adventure awaits.”
Bella Thorne, who came out as pansexual in 2019, got engaged to Italian singer Benjamin Mascolo in March
Thorne and Mascolo began dating in April 2019, and they became Instagram official that June.
Mascolo announced their engagement in an Instagram post captioned “She said YES” featuring the happy couple kissing as Thorne showed off her ring.
They star together in the indie film “Time Is Up,” which will be released in September.
‘Top Chef’ winner Kristen Kish and fiancée Bianca Dusic got married in their backyard in April
“Threw on some nice clothes (my favorite blazer), headed to our backyard with our own written vows in hand, had our family with us (virtually), got all sappy, and WE DID THE DAMN THING,” Kish wrote in a since-deleted Instagram post.
Kish was the first woman of color to win “Top Chef.” The couple, who got engaged in 2019, had originally planned a larger wedding celebration. They decided to get married anyway with a virtual ceremony because Dusic’s family is located in Australia, where the country’s borders remain closed due to the pandemic, Kish told Today.
WNBA star Breanna Stewart proposed to Spanish basketball player Marta Xargay Casademont in May and they married in July
“Did a thing. Another ring. She said YES. #wifey,” Stewart captioned a photo of their engagement, alluding to her two championship rings with the Seattle Storm.
Casademont, a former WNBA player herself, shared an engagement announcement of her own, writing: “Life isn’t just about the moments, it’s about who we share them with! I said YES.”
It wasn’t a long engagement: They married on July 6 before Stewart flew to Tokyo for the Olympics, where she won gold. After she returned home, they welcomed a daughter, Ruby. They hope to have a bigger wedding celebration with family and friends — and a lot of food — in the future, they told Brides.com in August.
Jacqueline Toboni of ‘The L Word: Generation Q’ got engaged to her girlfriend, actress Kassandra Clementi, in August
Toboni proposed at a romantic spot overlooking the ocean while the two were on vacation.
“@kassandraclementi I feel so incredibly lucky to have found such a goofy, smart, funny, kind soul in you,” Toboni wrote on Instagram. “Thank you for making me laugh everyday. I can’t wait to do this forever. Love you x.”
The couple first began posting about each other in 2019, according to People magazine.
Kal Penn came out as gay and announced he is engaged in a new memoir in October
REUTERS/Danny Moloshok
Penn, who is known for his roles in “Harold and Kumar” and “Designated Survivor,” as well as his time as a White House staff member during the Barack Obama administration, announced he has a new memoir titled “You Can’t Be Serious” coming out in November. In the book, he reveals he is gay, has been dating a man for 11 years, and that the two are engaged, though he didn’t specify when the engagement took place.
“I discovered my own sexuality relatively late in life compared to many other people,” Penn told People. “There’s no timeline on this stuff. People figure their s— out at different times in their lives, so I’m glad I did when I did.”
Kristen Stewart announced her engagement to screenwriter Dylan Meyer in a November interview with SiriusXM’s The Howard Stern Show
LRNYC/MEGA/GC Images
Stewart and Meyer have been dating for two years. Meyer first confirmed their relationship in an Instagram post in October 2019.
“We’re marrying, we’re totally gonna do it,” Stewart told Stern. “I wanted to be proposed to, so I think I very distinctly carved out what I wanted and she nailed it. We’re marrying, it’s happening.”
Also in November, Jillian Michaels proposed to her girlfriend of 3 years, DeShanna Marie Minuto
The former “Biggest Loser” trainer shared an Instagram photo of Minuto wearing a diamond engagement ring with the caption, “1153 days… here’s to thousands more. She said ‘yes.'”
“DeShanna is ‘all the things’ — beautiful, smart, funny, creative, quirky, passionate … I could run down the list of adjectives,” Michaels told People magazine. “Those characteristics obviously attract you to someone. But it’s the quality of their character that makes you think ‘Thank God for this person laying next to me’ every night when you fall asleep.”
