May 10, 2021 • 25 mins
When they were getting fixed up by a friend, Ali was ho-hum about the prospect. Good thing she went anyway. This odd couple of proper-news-achor-meets-salty-adorable-comedienne is open to sharing how much they still enjoy sex — and why they believe it’s the root of their lasting bond.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
Pushkin. Hi, I'm Phil Donahue and I'm Marlowe Thomas, and
we're going on a series of double dates to find
out what makes a marriage last. On paper, the marriage
(00:40):
of George Stephanopoulos and Ali Wentworth would not have been
a sure thing. He's a serious, strait laced news anchor,
and here she is this lively and mischievous comedian and
author who will go to any length to get a
laugh out of you. But the secret is George is
the abbot to Alice's costello, and she's the Lucy to
(01:01):
his rickey. So when we got a chance to visit
with them in their stylish and homeye apartment on Manhattan's
East Side, we knew it was going to be fun
and revealing. We settled into their living room to chat
and marlow asked Ali to tell us how it all began.
Twenty years ago. I was talking to another single woman
(01:21):
and I had just had a torrid love affair with
this British actor and I was ready to be serious
and she said, oh, me too. And I said, I'm
going to introduce you to my brother, and she said,
I can introduce you to my old friend, George Stephanopolis
and I said, no, no, thank you very much. I'm
(01:42):
from Washington, d C. I grew up around journalists. That's
the last thing I want, you know, were your parents journalist? Yeah,
and in the White House, I just I wanted Matthew
Perry or Hugh Grant. You know. I just was like,
I don't want that. And so a few weeks later,
I was coming to New York and I thought, you
know what, I'm going to call him. It'll be a
great dinner party story. My date with George Stefanov. I mean,
(02:02):
it practically writes itself. So I thought, we'll have an
interesting conversation and that'll be that. And I couldn't believe
when I left lunch that day, on an April day,
April fourth, that I said, I'm attracted to him. I'm
attracted to that guy. It's not that, but I think
(02:24):
the differences, Honey, it wasn't a blind date. I knew
who you were. I knew exactly who you were. You
were not my type. I wasn't your type. That's so
interesting to me. Everybody always says, including us, I knew,
you know, we knew, I knew, we knew I was.
He interviewed me on his show, and we were lovers
the next day. So that's that. Yes, we were very
(02:44):
quickly into that, but we we knew and that was it.
And I'll tell you, you know how you know you
when you know, you know, every other man that I
had dated or had a relationship with, I was so
concerned with sort of performing who I was, you know,
and I just didn't feel I had to do it
with them, you know. So the first time we did,
(03:07):
I did go home with you. There wasn't a like
how's my breath or oh god, my cellul lead or
I just I didn't care at all. And that was
that's when I really knew that I wasn't pretending to
be this you were auditioning. No, I had gotten the part.
What about you? It wasn't even I mean, it was immediate,
you know, as close to immedia as can possibly be.
(03:30):
I mean, we went out two or three days in
a row. What what what can you? You had dated
the Isle of Manhattan? Well, I mean it, and it's
not and it's some based on some crazy idea of perfection,
because you're right, I was forty. I dated a fair amount,
(03:51):
but I knew this was someone who I could decide
to be with you know, forever and be happy. And
it's just like it's it's it's a it's a leap,
it's it is. It's it's partly faith, partly intuition, attraction,
and but it's nothing I've ever questioned from like, like
(04:14):
within hours. We were engaged two months later and I
was like, what is taking so long? And I had
been engaged before really yeah, boxer rings if you know
what I mean. Yeah, but it was never even close
to not happening. Never. I think age is also a
factor in marriage. I just do. I all my friends
(04:37):
that got married in their early twenties are not married now.
You're just not the same person, not all of them,
the majority. Immediately, one of the things we had to
learn was how to accommodate respect and change with each other.
I mean, we're similar in a lot of ways, but
there's the kind of I am definitely an introvert despite
(04:59):
my job and like being out socially and all that.
It's hard for not hard for me, but just its
like he drains me. She gets energy from being with
these people. Yea, And it took us we should have
gotten married. It's one of those things in life of
the party. You know, for me that's been great because
(05:20):
it's opened up a different side of myself. I think
you've probably also gotten more in touch with your introverted side. Yeah, definitely.
I mean our kids have mixes of both. I'll give
you an example. When we were first married, we would
argue because we would go to an event, a party
would take me an hour to get out the door
because I talk and talk and say goodbye, and George
(05:42):
would be sweating, you know, by the front door. He
had the God it goes. And now I not only
do I completely understand that, I even know when he
looks at me like we're out the door, no discussion,
I don't even say goodbye. And we've also learned you
don't have to do everything together, Like when if I
don't want to go to something, it's not a reflection
on you. No, Yeah, that's that's a big thing we've
(06:05):
We've had to come to that because Phil doesn't want
to go to every fundraiser for Saint Jude Children's Research,
which I drew nine thousand a year, and I at
first I said, you have to come, And then after
a while I thought, why does he have to? Really?
Where was he go. I've started to realize that when
(06:26):
I married Marlow, I married a hospital Somewhere. During the
reception of our wedding, Danny stood up. My knew father
in law stood up on her wedding. You said, I
haven't lost a daughter, I've gained a fundraiser, and he did,
and he had been on the show a couple of times. Yeah,
we got along very well, and I got along very
(06:48):
well with her mother, an Italian who didn't like Irish people. Well, well,
that's another interesting thing about marriage too, is that you know,
if he had married a Greek Orthodox, that would have
been the jackpot. I just slid in. But I had
to charm them. But what are you do? You have
(07:10):
a faith of your own. I'm a pure wasp. Mother's
name is Muffie Mayflower wasp. But also we I mean
it's we're also lucky in that way. We've never had
in law issues, except for one fight over the wedding.
What was the fight. Well, his mother is a very
(07:31):
strong minded Greek woman. My mother was social secretary of
the Reagan White House six feet tall. So when we
decided to get married, it was very clear that these
two women were going to dominate the planning, and we
said have fun. Our feeling was we wanted to marry
each other. We're not going to get I was not
(07:54):
a girl who had a vision board about what my
wedding was going to look like. So I've said fine,
And it was a dog fight those two. So how
do you two fight? We fight, not but how constructively
we didn't use too I had a tendency to be
a meaner fighter, but you well, yeah, you're definitely a
meanor fighter. But that's you know, that's good to learn
(08:19):
how to navigate that as well. Right, she can be
a little more of a louder fighter. I'm a little
bit more persistent on making sure the conversation is truly resolved.
The thing that we've realized what the friends that we
know that don't make it is they don't know how
to come back. But to come back, you actually have
to go through why you have to finish it. You
(08:39):
have to just make sure you're actually communicating everything you
need to communicate. And that's the only way. You can't
just let it. You just can't push it down, right.
And also you hear from other couples that didn't make it.
They had fights and they would spend days not speaking
to each other and then soon that kind of cannot
(09:01):
imagine that. I can't either. We've had fights till the
sun came up, till we resolved. It wasn't good for
the guy who was interviewing that morning. And was that
when you first got married or you still could do that,
the timeline is definitely shorter. Yeah, but we always end
our fight by having sex generally. Yeah, I mean that's
how you that's perfect. You have to really end it. Yeah.
(09:24):
Well that's what a memo said about there's only one
way out of a bad fight, and that's makeup sex. Yeah,
it's essential. It does, it does make it go away.
It kind of think, oh, what was that, right? I
mean I kind of like, what's happening here? Yeah? Yeah, no,
I I think so too. And and and the premise
of each fight is I mean the premise, I mean
(09:46):
we we also both know we're not going anywhere. That's
a big one. Too many people go into marriage and
they think as kind of has an escape clause. Yeah,
it won't work. You have to believe and know that
this is and then and I know that, Yeah, I
(10:07):
guess for some people, so obviously people sometimes get divorced
for very very good reasons. We start from the premise
of it's not going to happen, but one of the
way when you talk about trust, when Phil was divorced.
When I met him, we were pretty hot and heavy
and flying to each other in the middle of the
night and all this crazy stuff. And at one point
I said to him, you know a sexual glow. Oh
(10:30):
my god, what would have happened if we'd met when
you were married? And he said, well, with all due respect,
nothing would have taken me from my wife and kids.
And I thought, I can love this man. I can
love this man who's not bullshitting me. You know he won't.
(10:52):
We'll have more after a quick break. We're back to
our conversation with George Stephanopolos and Ali Wentworth. By this
(11:14):
point we've covered most of the basics, so Marlowe steered
the conversation to Ali's favorite subject. All right, Well, the
fun thing about interviewing you two is that you talk
so much about sex and nobody does. That's great, thank you, No,
it is. No, it is great because we're well, it's
(11:37):
not naughty, especially when you're married. Yeah, well, it's never naughty.
It's it's rare. Yeah, exactly. So when you've written advice
books and so what is your advice about sex? My
advice to married couples about sex, Yeah, have it, Yes,
(11:57):
have it, and have it on a regular basis, because
I have found in talking to the great many women
who I have very honest, open relationships with, if you're
married and you're not having sex, something's wrong. I have
my girlfriends like, if George is unavailable to me for
(12:18):
whatever reason, he's working or he just doesn't want to
chew on the fact that so and so are getting
divorced and I need a four hour conversation, I go
to my girlfriends. But the one thing I have with
my husband is a physical relationship. And I know way
too many people who you started hearing, yeah, well we
never have sex, red flag, and then a few years
(12:40):
go by and then they get divorced or somebody has
an affair. And I say to my girlfriends, you know,
if you have the stomach flu, I get it. But
otherwise you've got to push it. We're all tired, we
all have kids and lives and careers, and you have
to push yourself. Alie always makes fun of me because
I always I am skeptical whenever she talks about all
(13:02):
these stories she hears about it married couples not having sex.
I sort of, I mean, obviously people go through periods,
but I don't sort of don't understand the point. There
are a sexless marriages more than you think, George maybe.
And then do they break up, Yes, they break up.
They have affairs, right, yeah, more mostly affairs because you know,
(13:26):
you sort of need a net to right to actually leave.
But it's it's amazing, and it's amazing how many couples
tolerate it and for how long they tolerate it for.
But guys don't talk about it, do they not? Really? Yeah? No,
I mean like women will say I'm not having or
I'm having or it's really great or whatever. I mean,
we we not only say are you having it or
(13:48):
you're not having it? What kind of problems are you having?
And right now everybody's in menopause, so everybody's coconut oil,
coconut oil, coconut oil. I mean people girlfriends help each other,
you know, or no, But I mean that this is
the stuff that people want to know about it. One
of the things marriage is about, obviously, is sex. One
of the things marriage is about is trust. No, but see,
(14:09):
I think all of it, it all sends from this
one place, which is people say to me all the time,
what is a secret to your marriage? You and George
are so different. I don't get it. People in the
back room of our wedding we're making bets on how
long it was going to last. And I don't know why.
But you know, eighteen years later, he walks in the
(14:30):
door from work and I'm just as attracted to him
as I was the first week we were dating. I
just I go, look at that sexy man. I'm so sweet.
All the time, I'm mad at you, and I'm not
going to let you know that. But no, but when
Phil goes away or I go away and we're going
to get back together, I'm excited. I'm fixing up. Yeah. Yeah,
(14:51):
I mean I think I hope you feel the same. Yes,
talk back, But I mean I think that it starts
with that, and then the sex is around that. And
I think the trust. Trust is a huge thing. Of course,
because it hasn't in a question is like I said,
it's just lucky. No. In fact, when people have affairs
or marriages break down or break up. I'll say to George,
(15:16):
you would never have an affair, and we both start laughing.
Like if somebody came to me and said, your husband's
cheating on you, I would laugh. That would be my
first reaction. Absolutely not, no way, it's not. It's just
not in his nature. But but how do you know that?
That's the thing. I feel the same way about Phil.
In fact, Phil's producers once said that when a woman
(15:37):
comes on to Phil, he's not doesn't really realize it.
That's just who he is. He's not there. George realizes it.
He just he just shuts it down. He just there's
no there's nothing back. But I'm an actress though, if
someone flirts back to me, I go, oh great, But
what do you do when somebody comes on to you?
I mean, do you say something or do you nobody's
(16:00):
that explicit? You have a wedding ring, right, because some
women don't wear wedding mans, which I think is really
like that's just yeah, like, look, I maybe I am available,
you know, but I mean I guess I'm just so
sometimes it makes them even more wanted when they stand on. Yeah,
women think it's a chance. I don't think. I don't
think there's any part of me that invites it. Marlo
bought a wedding band from me. It's six feet wide.
(16:25):
It's actually no mistake at all. And if a woman
gets too close to me, there's a When he was
on the year, I used to love that, he'd have
the microphone in his hand, this huge gold thing. Yeah hello, yeah, okay,
did you ever go to it? Never went to marriage counseling? Now, yeah,
(16:48):
I have nothing against it, but yeah, yeah, we Yeah,
we've been pretty I mean pretty good at figuring out
on our own. Actually, it's funny, that's what We've probably
ended three fights like that though. What put that card
on the table. Let's go to counseling, and that forces
us to do it ourselves. I do it, I say it.
But do you ever use the I'm leaving hardy people
(17:11):
do that? I know that's a scary car. And if
you have high abandonment like me, that could that has
significant repercussion. If you say, well, we're going to get divorced,
then I'll go have an affair because I think we're
getting divorced and I have to get my next because
I have abandonment. And then you say I'm just kidding,
and I go, oh, I already had an affair. Now
(17:31):
I am leaving you. It's a messy. See if there's anything,
oh stress, I mean with us, we used to if
one of us panicked, the other one would panic. Also
we had to learn not to go crazy at the
same time. Oh no, I think we if one of
us is panicking, the other one doesn't. Yeah, pretty much.
(17:53):
If he's panicking, let's say over a job thing, I know,
just a quiet down at home. Well, Phil does something
that just kills me. If he has a hurt look
on his face, I'm just absolutely mother Teresa, I just
will do anything. I'll go out and pick up lepers.
I'll do anything I can to get that look not
(18:15):
to be there. Yeah. And I do that with the
kids too. If I see, if I see he's going
through a hard time, I will say to them, put
all your bitchiness in a box. It'll be nice to dad.
That's nice to daddy. Make daddy a card, be nice
to daddy. Exactly what do you think is the biggest
challenge you've had to face. We've been so lucky. I
(18:37):
think there are many doors you have to go through,
and the you know, the first one is how do
we co exist together? But you never know when you
marry somebody what kind of parent they're going to be,
you know, So then you go through that door and
then then becomes just the life stuff. And we have
a teenage daughter who's about to have big surgery, and
(18:59):
so we're going to sort of be a solid couple
together to help her get through this period. So I
know our marriage well enough to know exactly what it's
going to look like. His strengths are to be the
problem solver to check him with the surgeon, and you know,
he'll be that guy and I'll be does she have
a blanket? And I'll do the nurturing stuff, and then
(19:21):
he'll know when I need a little comfort, and I'll
know when he's slightly freaked out by seeing his daughter
in this condition. And we know how to do all that. Now,
we know the kind of the dance and we know
the needs, and so you know, God forbid, bigger mountains
are ahead of us. I know what I can rely
on him for. I know, and he knows what he
can for me. That's great. I once took my son
(19:44):
to baseball practice, and then I went to pick him up.
He got in the car on the front seat, closed
the door and he said, I get cut. I'm telling you.
I mean it was like an arrow in my heart.
And I started talking, Oh, yeah, I got cut when
I was you. I don't worry about it. I don't
know what the hell I said. Now, obviously getting cut
(20:06):
from a baseball team is not the worst thing it
can happen. It is at the time, it is. Yeah,
we had something like that just before you guys came here,
our daughter. You know, this typical middle school, high school
stuff about who's having a party, who's got to invite,
who didn't get invited, And the truth is, when it's
your daughter, it's like, it is heartbreaking. And then our
conversation that we do, what do we do? What do
(20:29):
we say? You know yet? How do you keep your
distance from it? How do you have to let her
learn from it? And you have to sort of just
sit there while she cries? Oh, she cries. And all
I want to do is go find that girl that's
already inviting all her friends except her killer. And I
have to reminder she can't do that, all right. I
texted him, I said, do I call the mother? And
(20:50):
he said no, And I trust. I think he's right
and you know, but that's right. How we do it?
What would you pass on to, you know, to people
about to be married. There's a lot of hard stuff
that happens in life. We have to celebrate the good stuff.
You know, we have, you get you know, your contract
(21:13):
gets renewed. Let's celebrate it. We don't have to be
obnoxious about it. Could just be the four of us,
but like, let me make a cake and the kids
will stick some Eminem's on it and say good for you.
And I mean more than birthdays and stuff. I mean,
you know, special things, and you know, in our anniversary,
I don't like it to be taken lightly. I don't
(21:34):
want a diamond necklace or a you know, some expensive painting.
I want the two of us just to we write,
you know, letters to each other. But I want us
to say, like, hey, it's your eighteen, look at us.
I still love you. You know that those moments are
not to be sort of tossed aside. I think the
biggest thing, the thing I would think of, don't be afraid.
(21:55):
I mean, let it disrupt your life. By definition, that's
what you're doing, and it's that's going to happen all
the time. Be open to the changes that being married
or to bring you every single day gets. You're right.
I mean, I don't know sure this is all guys,
but I tend to be more creature of habit, and
(22:16):
he gets set in your ways and you have to
let kind of a lot of things just happen every day.
Let the chaos in. If you're about to get married,
if you have any pangs of hesitation, listen to them.
I have two friends who were about to get married
(22:36):
and had that feeling of dread. One of them cried
hysterically all the way to the church, and I was
in the car with her, and it wasn't crying like
I'm getting married. It was it was as if she
was going to be hunk in the village square, just
hysterically crying. And I kept saying to her, you know,
we can turn the car around. I agree with you.
(22:57):
If you if you have if there's anything holding you back,
listen to it. And then the flip side of that
is remember how you feel this day every single day.
Try to at some point remember that, because there are
going to be a lot of times when you remember
how you feel on the wedding day. Yeah, remember remember
how you feel this day, why you're doing it today,
(23:18):
who you're doing it with, what you love about that?
Did your friends? Mary? No? And in fact, three kids later,
she says I never should have married him. Oh God,
I said I could have told you that in the
car ride over there. Do you think that you've changed
a great deal since you're getting married. I think I've
(23:38):
a much richer, fuller person for marrying him. Oh, I
think you've definitely changed. I mean, it's hard to know
exactly how, because it just happens every single day. I'm
definitely better preparing him. Yeah, I got an anchor. He
doesn't question himself a lot. He's he's solid, has more
integrity than anybody I've ever met. And for me, that's
(24:02):
incredibly grounding. She brings all of life into the house, everything,
a whole world of beautiful stuff and friends and family,
and it's like it's opening up in Tira Vista for you.
For me, that's the very sexy George Stephanopolis and Ali Wentworth.
(24:24):
They are such an entertaining couple they should charge people
just to talk with them. Well, I'm glad we got
in for free. Until next time. I'm Phil Donahue and
I'm Marlo Thomas. Thank you, Thank you, guys. You guys
are great. Double Day is a production of Pushkin Industries.
The show was created by US and produced by Sarah Lilly.
(24:45):
Michael Bahari is associate producer. Musical adaptations of It Had
to Be You by Cellwagon, sim Finette, Marlo and I
are executive producers, along with Mia Lobell and Letal Molad
from Pushkin. Special thanks to Jacob Wiseberg, Malcolm Gladwell, Heather Faine,
(25:06):
John Snars, Carl Miglio, Eric Sandler, Emily Rostak, Jason Gambrel,
Paul Williams, and Bruce Kluker. If you like our show,
please remember to share, rate, and review. Thanks for listening.
Pushkin. Hi, I'm Phil Donahue and I'm Marlowe Thomas, and
we're going on a series of double dates to find
out what makes a marriage last. On paper, the marriage
(00:40):
of George Stephanopoulos and Ali Wentworth would not have been
a sure thing. He's a serious, strait laced news anchor,
and here she is this lively and mischievous comedian and
author who will go to any length to get a
laugh out of you. But the secret is George is
the abbot to Alice's costello, and she's the Lucy to
(01:01):
his rickey. So when we got a chance to visit
with them in their stylish and homeye apartment on Manhattan's
East Side, we knew it was going to be fun
and revealing. We settled into their living room to chat
and marlow asked Ali to tell us how it all began.
Twenty years ago. I was talking to another single woman
(01:21):
and I had just had a torrid love affair with
this British actor and I was ready to be serious
and she said, oh, me too. And I said, I'm
going to introduce you to my brother, and she said,
I can introduce you to my old friend, George Stephanopolis
and I said, no, no, thank you very much. I'm
(01:42):
from Washington, d C. I grew up around journalists. That's
the last thing I want, you know, were your parents journalist? Yeah,
and in the White House, I just I wanted Matthew
Perry or Hugh Grant. You know. I just was like,
I don't want that. And so a few weeks later,
I was coming to New York and I thought, you
know what, I'm going to call him. It'll be a
great dinner party story. My date with George Stefanov. I mean,
(02:02):
it practically writes itself. So I thought, we'll have an
interesting conversation and that'll be that. And I couldn't believe
when I left lunch that day, on an April day,
April fourth, that I said, I'm attracted to him. I'm
attracted to that guy. It's not that, but I think
(02:24):
the differences, Honey, it wasn't a blind date. I knew
who you were. I knew exactly who you were. You
were not my type. I wasn't your type. That's so
interesting to me. Everybody always says, including us, I knew,
you know, we knew, I knew, we knew I was.
He interviewed me on his show, and we were lovers
the next day. So that's that. Yes, we were very
(02:44):
quickly into that, but we we knew and that was it.
And I'll tell you, you know how you know you
when you know, you know, every other man that I
had dated or had a relationship with, I was so
concerned with sort of performing who I was, you know,
and I just didn't feel I had to do it
with them, you know. So the first time we did,
(03:07):
I did go home with you. There wasn't a like
how's my breath or oh god, my cellul lead or
I just I didn't care at all. And that was
that's when I really knew that I wasn't pretending to
be this you were auditioning. No, I had gotten the part.
What about you? It wasn't even I mean, it was immediate,
you know, as close to immedia as can possibly be.
(03:30):
I mean, we went out two or three days in
a row. What what what can you? You had dated
the Isle of Manhattan? Well, I mean it, and it's
not and it's some based on some crazy idea of perfection,
because you're right, I was forty. I dated a fair amount,
(03:51):
but I knew this was someone who I could decide
to be with you know, forever and be happy. And
it's just like it's it's it's a it's a leap,
it's it is. It's it's partly faith, partly intuition, attraction,
and but it's nothing I've ever questioned from like, like
(04:14):
within hours. We were engaged two months later and I
was like, what is taking so long? And I had
been engaged before really yeah, boxer rings if you know
what I mean. Yeah, but it was never even close
to not happening. Never. I think age is also a
factor in marriage. I just do. I all my friends
(04:37):
that got married in their early twenties are not married now.
You're just not the same person, not all of them,
the majority. Immediately, one of the things we had to
learn was how to accommodate respect and change with each other.
I mean, we're similar in a lot of ways, but
there's the kind of I am definitely an introvert despite
(04:59):
my job and like being out socially and all that.
It's hard for not hard for me, but just its
like he drains me. She gets energy from being with
these people. Yea, And it took us we should have
gotten married. It's one of those things in life of
the party. You know, for me that's been great because
(05:20):
it's opened up a different side of myself. I think
you've probably also gotten more in touch with your introverted side. Yeah, definitely.
I mean our kids have mixes of both. I'll give
you an example. When we were first married, we would
argue because we would go to an event, a party
would take me an hour to get out the door
because I talk and talk and say goodbye, and George
(05:42):
would be sweating, you know, by the front door. He
had the God it goes. And now I not only
do I completely understand that, I even know when he
looks at me like we're out the door, no discussion,
I don't even say goodbye. And we've also learned you
don't have to do everything together, Like when if I
don't want to go to something, it's not a reflection
on you. No, Yeah, that's that's a big thing we've
(06:05):
We've had to come to that because Phil doesn't want
to go to every fundraiser for Saint Jude Children's Research,
which I drew nine thousand a year, and I at
first I said, you have to come, And then after
a while I thought, why does he have to? Really?
Where was he go. I've started to realize that when
(06:26):
I married Marlow, I married a hospital Somewhere. During the
reception of our wedding, Danny stood up. My knew father
in law stood up on her wedding. You said, I
haven't lost a daughter, I've gained a fundraiser, and he did,
and he had been on the show a couple of times. Yeah,
we got along very well, and I got along very
(06:48):
well with her mother, an Italian who didn't like Irish people. Well, well,
that's another interesting thing about marriage too, is that you know,
if he had married a Greek Orthodox, that would have
been the jackpot. I just slid in. But I had
to charm them. But what are you do? You have
(07:10):
a faith of your own. I'm a pure wasp. Mother's
name is Muffie Mayflower wasp. But also we I mean
it's we're also lucky in that way. We've never had
in law issues, except for one fight over the wedding.
What was the fight. Well, his mother is a very
(07:31):
strong minded Greek woman. My mother was social secretary of
the Reagan White House six feet tall. So when we
decided to get married, it was very clear that these
two women were going to dominate the planning, and we
said have fun. Our feeling was we wanted to marry
each other. We're not going to get I was not
(07:54):
a girl who had a vision board about what my
wedding was going to look like. So I've said fine,
And it was a dog fight those two. So how
do you two fight? We fight, not but how constructively
we didn't use too I had a tendency to be
a meaner fighter, but you well, yeah, you're definitely a
meanor fighter. But that's you know, that's good to learn
(08:19):
how to navigate that as well. Right, she can be
a little more of a louder fighter. I'm a little
bit more persistent on making sure the conversation is truly resolved.
The thing that we've realized what the friends that we
know that don't make it is they don't know how
to come back. But to come back, you actually have
to go through why you have to finish it. You
(08:39):
have to just make sure you're actually communicating everything you
need to communicate. And that's the only way. You can't
just let it. You just can't push it down, right.
And also you hear from other couples that didn't make it.
They had fights and they would spend days not speaking
to each other and then soon that kind of cannot
(09:01):
imagine that. I can't either. We've had fights till the
sun came up, till we resolved. It wasn't good for
the guy who was interviewing that morning. And was that
when you first got married or you still could do that,
the timeline is definitely shorter. Yeah, but we always end
our fight by having sex generally. Yeah, I mean that's
how you that's perfect. You have to really end it. Yeah.
(09:24):
Well that's what a memo said about there's only one
way out of a bad fight, and that's makeup sex. Yeah,
it's essential. It does, it does make it go away.
It kind of think, oh, what was that, right? I
mean I kind of like, what's happening here? Yeah? Yeah, no,
I I think so too. And and and the premise
of each fight is I mean the premise, I mean
(09:46):
we we also both know we're not going anywhere. That's
a big one. Too many people go into marriage and
they think as kind of has an escape clause. Yeah,
it won't work. You have to believe and know that
this is and then and I know that, Yeah, I
(10:07):
guess for some people, so obviously people sometimes get divorced
for very very good reasons. We start from the premise
of it's not going to happen, but one of the
way when you talk about trust, when Phil was divorced.
When I met him, we were pretty hot and heavy
and flying to each other in the middle of the
night and all this crazy stuff. And at one point
I said to him, you know a sexual glow. Oh
(10:30):
my god, what would have happened if we'd met when
you were married? And he said, well, with all due respect,
nothing would have taken me from my wife and kids.
And I thought, I can love this man. I can
love this man who's not bullshitting me. You know he won't.
(10:52):
We'll have more after a quick break. We're back to
our conversation with George Stephanopolos and Ali Wentworth. By this
(11:14):
point we've covered most of the basics, so Marlowe steered
the conversation to Ali's favorite subject. All right, Well, the
fun thing about interviewing you two is that you talk
so much about sex and nobody does. That's great, thank you, No,
it is. No, it is great because we're well, it's
(11:37):
not naughty, especially when you're married. Yeah, well, it's never naughty.
It's it's rare. Yeah, exactly. So when you've written advice
books and so what is your advice about sex? My
advice to married couples about sex, Yeah, have it, Yes,
(11:57):
have it, and have it on a regular basis, because
I have found in talking to the great many women
who I have very honest, open relationships with, if you're
married and you're not having sex, something's wrong. I have
my girlfriends like, if George is unavailable to me for
(12:18):
whatever reason, he's working or he just doesn't want to
chew on the fact that so and so are getting
divorced and I need a four hour conversation, I go
to my girlfriends. But the one thing I have with
my husband is a physical relationship. And I know way
too many people who you started hearing, yeah, well we
never have sex, red flag, and then a few years
(12:40):
go by and then they get divorced or somebody has
an affair. And I say to my girlfriends, you know,
if you have the stomach flu, I get it. But
otherwise you've got to push it. We're all tired, we
all have kids and lives and careers, and you have
to push yourself. Alie always makes fun of me because
I always I am skeptical whenever she talks about all
(13:02):
these stories she hears about it married couples not having sex.
I sort of, I mean, obviously people go through periods,
but I don't sort of don't understand the point. There
are a sexless marriages more than you think, George maybe.
And then do they break up, Yes, they break up.
They have affairs, right, yeah, more mostly affairs because you know,
(13:26):
you sort of need a net to right to actually leave.
But it's it's amazing, and it's amazing how many couples
tolerate it and for how long they tolerate it for.
But guys don't talk about it, do they not? Really? Yeah? No,
I mean like women will say I'm not having or
I'm having or it's really great or whatever. I mean,
we we not only say are you having it or
(13:48):
you're not having it? What kind of problems are you having?
And right now everybody's in menopause, so everybody's coconut oil,
coconut oil, coconut oil. I mean people girlfriends help each other,
you know, or no, But I mean that this is
the stuff that people want to know about it. One
of the things marriage is about, obviously, is sex. One
of the things marriage is about is trust. No, but see,
(14:09):
I think all of it, it all sends from this
one place, which is people say to me all the time,
what is a secret to your marriage? You and George
are so different. I don't get it. People in the
back room of our wedding we're making bets on how
long it was going to last. And I don't know why.
But you know, eighteen years later, he walks in the
(14:30):
door from work and I'm just as attracted to him
as I was the first week we were dating. I
just I go, look at that sexy man. I'm so sweet.
All the time, I'm mad at you, and I'm not
going to let you know that. But no, but when
Phil goes away or I go away and we're going
to get back together, I'm excited. I'm fixing up. Yeah. Yeah,
(14:51):
I mean I think I hope you feel the same. Yes,
talk back, But I mean I think that it starts
with that, and then the sex is around that. And
I think the trust. Trust is a huge thing. Of course,
because it hasn't in a question is like I said,
it's just lucky. No. In fact, when people have affairs
or marriages break down or break up. I'll say to George,
(15:16):
you would never have an affair, and we both start laughing.
Like if somebody came to me and said, your husband's
cheating on you, I would laugh. That would be my
first reaction. Absolutely not, no way, it's not. It's just
not in his nature. But but how do you know that?
That's the thing. I feel the same way about Phil.
In fact, Phil's producers once said that when a woman
(15:37):
comes on to Phil, he's not doesn't really realize it.
That's just who he is. He's not there. George realizes it.
He just he just shuts it down. He just there's
no there's nothing back. But I'm an actress though, if
someone flirts back to me, I go, oh great, But
what do you do when somebody comes on to you?
I mean, do you say something or do you nobody's
(16:00):
that explicit? You have a wedding ring, right, because some
women don't wear wedding mans, which I think is really
like that's just yeah, like, look, I maybe I am available,
you know, but I mean I guess I'm just so
sometimes it makes them even more wanted when they stand on. Yeah,
women think it's a chance. I don't think. I don't
think there's any part of me that invites it. Marlo
bought a wedding band from me. It's six feet wide.
(16:25):
It's actually no mistake at all. And if a woman
gets too close to me, there's a When he was
on the year, I used to love that, he'd have
the microphone in his hand, this huge gold thing. Yeah hello, yeah, okay,
did you ever go to it? Never went to marriage counseling? Now, yeah,
(16:48):
I have nothing against it, but yeah, yeah, we Yeah,
we've been pretty I mean pretty good at figuring out
on our own. Actually, it's funny, that's what We've probably
ended three fights like that though. What put that card
on the table. Let's go to counseling, and that forces
us to do it ourselves. I do it, I say it.
But do you ever use the I'm leaving hardy people
(17:11):
do that? I know that's a scary car. And if
you have high abandonment like me, that could that has
significant repercussion. If you say, well, we're going to get divorced,
then I'll go have an affair because I think we're
getting divorced and I have to get my next because
I have abandonment. And then you say I'm just kidding,
and I go, oh, I already had an affair. Now
(17:31):
I am leaving you. It's a messy. See if there's anything,
oh stress, I mean with us, we used to if
one of us panicked, the other one would panic. Also
we had to learn not to go crazy at the
same time. Oh no, I think we if one of
us is panicking, the other one doesn't. Yeah, pretty much.
(17:53):
If he's panicking, let's say over a job thing, I know,
just a quiet down at home. Well, Phil does something
that just kills me. If he has a hurt look
on his face, I'm just absolutely mother Teresa, I just
will do anything. I'll go out and pick up lepers.
I'll do anything I can to get that look not
(18:15):
to be there. Yeah. And I do that with the
kids too. If I see, if I see he's going
through a hard time, I will say to them, put
all your bitchiness in a box. It'll be nice to dad.
That's nice to daddy. Make daddy a card, be nice
to daddy. Exactly what do you think is the biggest
challenge you've had to face. We've been so lucky. I
(18:37):
think there are many doors you have to go through,
and the you know, the first one is how do
we co exist together? But you never know when you
marry somebody what kind of parent they're going to be,
you know, So then you go through that door and
then then becomes just the life stuff. And we have
a teenage daughter who's about to have big surgery, and
(18:59):
so we're going to sort of be a solid couple
together to help her get through this period. So I
know our marriage well enough to know exactly what it's
going to look like. His strengths are to be the
problem solver to check him with the surgeon, and you know,
he'll be that guy and I'll be does she have
a blanket? And I'll do the nurturing stuff, and then
(19:21):
he'll know when I need a little comfort, and I'll
know when he's slightly freaked out by seeing his daughter
in this condition. And we know how to do all that. Now,
we know the kind of the dance and we know
the needs, and so you know, God forbid, bigger mountains
are ahead of us. I know what I can rely
on him for. I know, and he knows what he
can for me. That's great. I once took my son
(19:44):
to baseball practice, and then I went to pick him up.
He got in the car on the front seat, closed
the door and he said, I get cut. I'm telling you.
I mean it was like an arrow in my heart.
And I started talking, Oh, yeah, I got cut when
I was you. I don't worry about it. I don't
know what the hell I said. Now, obviously getting cut
(20:06):
from a baseball team is not the worst thing it
can happen. It is at the time, it is. Yeah,
we had something like that just before you guys came here,
our daughter. You know, this typical middle school, high school
stuff about who's having a party, who's got to invite,
who didn't get invited, And the truth is, when it's
your daughter, it's like, it is heartbreaking. And then our
conversation that we do, what do we do? What do
(20:29):
we say? You know yet? How do you keep your
distance from it? How do you have to let her
learn from it? And you have to sort of just
sit there while she cries? Oh, she cries. And all
I want to do is go find that girl that's
already inviting all her friends except her killer. And I
have to reminder she can't do that, all right. I
texted him, I said, do I call the mother? And
(20:50):
he said no, And I trust. I think he's right
and you know, but that's right. How we do it?
What would you pass on to, you know, to people
about to be married. There's a lot of hard stuff
that happens in life. We have to celebrate the good stuff.
You know, we have, you get you know, your contract
(21:13):
gets renewed. Let's celebrate it. We don't have to be
obnoxious about it. Could just be the four of us,
but like, let me make a cake and the kids
will stick some Eminem's on it and say good for you.
And I mean more than birthdays and stuff. I mean,
you know, special things, and you know, in our anniversary,
I don't like it to be taken lightly. I don't
(21:34):
want a diamond necklace or a you know, some expensive painting.
I want the two of us just to we write,
you know, letters to each other. But I want us
to say, like, hey, it's your eighteen, look at us.
I still love you. You know that those moments are
not to be sort of tossed aside. I think the
biggest thing, the thing I would think of, don't be afraid.
(21:55):
I mean, let it disrupt your life. By definition, that's
what you're doing, and it's that's going to happen all
the time. Be open to the changes that being married
or to bring you every single day gets. You're right.
I mean, I don't know sure this is all guys,
but I tend to be more creature of habit, and
(22:16):
he gets set in your ways and you have to
let kind of a lot of things just happen every day.
Let the chaos in. If you're about to get married,
if you have any pangs of hesitation, listen to them.
I have two friends who were about to get married
(22:36):
and had that feeling of dread. One of them cried
hysterically all the way to the church, and I was
in the car with her, and it wasn't crying like
I'm getting married. It was it was as if she
was going to be hunk in the village square, just
hysterically crying. And I kept saying to her, you know,
we can turn the car around. I agree with you.
(22:57):
If you if you have if there's anything holding you back,
listen to it. And then the flip side of that
is remember how you feel this day every single day.
Try to at some point remember that, because there are
going to be a lot of times when you remember
how you feel on the wedding day. Yeah, remember remember
how you feel this day, why you're doing it today,
(23:18):
who you're doing it with, what you love about that?
Did your friends? Mary? No? And in fact, three kids later,
she says I never should have married him. Oh God,
I said I could have told you that in the
car ride over there. Do you think that you've changed
a great deal since you're getting married. I think I've
(23:38):
a much richer, fuller person for marrying him. Oh, I
think you've definitely changed. I mean, it's hard to know
exactly how, because it just happens every single day. I'm
definitely better preparing him. Yeah, I got an anchor. He
doesn't question himself a lot. He's he's solid, has more
integrity than anybody I've ever met. And for me, that's
(24:02):
incredibly grounding. She brings all of life into the house, everything,
a whole world of beautiful stuff and friends and family,
and it's like it's opening up in Tira Vista for you.
For me, that's the very sexy George Stephanopolis and Ali Wentworth.
(24:24):
They are such an entertaining couple they should charge people
just to talk with them. Well, I'm glad we got
in for free. Until next time. I'm Phil Donahue and
I'm Marlo Thomas. Thank you, Thank you, guys. You guys
are great. Double Day is a production of Pushkin Industries.
The show was created by US and produced by Sarah Lilly.
(24:45):
Michael Bahari is associate producer. Musical adaptations of It Had
to Be You by Cellwagon, sim Finette, Marlo and I
are executive producers, along with Mia Lobell and Letal Molad
from Pushkin. Special thanks to Jacob Wiseberg, Malcolm Gladwell, Heather Faine,
(25:06):
John Snars, Carl Miglio, Eric Sandler, Emily Rostak, Jason Gambrel,
Paul Williams, and Bruce Kluker. If you like our show,
please remember to share, rate, and review. Thanks for listening.
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