Tony Shalhoub has been married to Brooke Adams for decades, and their partnership is still going strong.
Speaking withCloser Weeklyin 2024, Shalhoub revealed the secret to his long, happy marriage: mutual respect.
I’m so fortunate, she’s the right life partner for me."
But … who is Brooke Adams?
When they first met, however, she was the bigger star.
Read on to learn more about Brooke Adams, Tony Shalhoub’s wife.
“My sister and I were in love with theater,” she explained.
“It was just, we were going to be actresses, my sister and I.
We never even heard about taking an SAT or applying to college,” she said.
“We didn’t go to college, and we just started acting.”
“I just thought, ‘Well, this is easy,'” she said.
“My father got the call that I’d gotten the series and [he] accepted the role.
Brooke added, “It was just, that’s what we did.”
“I studied at New York City Ballet I loved the discipline.
I even loved the Russian teachers who would yell at you,” she told Mubi.
“I guess I’m kind of a masochist.
I loved that kind of order in my life, which was not my family life.”
She had to leave, however, after she landed that aforementioned TV role.
Still, Adams had received hints that maybe dance was not for her.
“He said to me, ‘You’re a good actress,'” Adams recalled.
First came Terrence Malick’s “Days of Heaven.”
Adams was glad she got the part, sensing that the movie would end up a classic.
“I was just over-the-moon thrilled,” she toldThe Film Stage.
“I was just so excited.
Her instinct was correct.
Behind the scenes, Malick kept cutting their dialogue, so the film is mostly quiet.
“I just think that the silence is what makes it sort of special.”
The film is incredibly creepy, and it seems to have even creeped out its star.
So he said, ‘You use it, Phil.'”
“I don’t think I was impatient,” she said.
Her own mother, Rosalind Adams, was also an actor.
“She had no confidence, she had no self-esteem.
She was very beautiful.
And she was a terrible drunk,” Brooke recalled to Mubi.
“That was hard.
And I think that’s definitely imprinted me in a lot of ways, of course.”
In 1989, Brooke adopted her first daughter, Josie Adams.
“I decided to adopt and was really happy that I did.”
Since becoming a mother, Brooke had to reconsider her career as an actor.
“It’s such a weird thing to be a mother.
Being a mother is more like being wallpaper.
It’s not being the center of attention,” she reflected.
In fact, it was through a theatrical performance that she met Tony Shalhoub.
“I was so completely enamored of her that I just could not leave.”
Lynne Adams, Brooke’s sister, supported their relationship.
“Then living with them, I thought: This is good,I like this.
They were so compatible, they seemed to like each other so much, they had fun together.”
They still get along great after all these years.
Brooke is particularly proud of how much her husband pulls his weight around the house.
“Everybody tells me, ‘You’re so lucky to have married this guy.'”
“Josie picked Tony,” she said, “and he fell for her bigtime.”
I needed to be more well-rounded.”
At the time, Brooke was touring with a play.
And then we got married in April."
Despite her impressive resume, Adams felt that the industry moved on.
My ego couldn’t take it; it was too depressing," she told The New York Times.
“I think it’s especially hard for someone who was really considered a beauty.
“That was kind of my college years, ages 20 to 24,” she toldAmerican Theatre.
I lived with a Spaniard, and was kind of a housewife for four years … For a while, painting occupied her time.
“Four years later I came back to the States and never even thought about painting again.”
Until, that is, she took up the craft once more.
“Painting people is very much like acting,” she said.
The film drew inspiration from Brooke’s real life.
Thankfully, though, Brooke is not competitive about their respective careers.
“So now I’m not competing with him in that way.
I’m now a painter.
I love to paint, and I sell my paintings, so it’s all good.”
That was a mindset that took work, however.
To that end, she also dabbles in playwriting.
“I’d like him to just make it all happen for me.
I’ve written a play.
So my tongue is in his cheek.”
