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Samuel L. Jackson, famous for his role as Nick Fury in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), met his wife LaTanya Richardson, when he was just a college student. LaTanya was a former pupil at Spelman College, which is an all-female Black liberal arts college. During the same, Samuel had attended Morehouse College.
The couple got romantically involved in the 1970s, and also participated in the acting for Pearl Cleage’s The Sale as part of the Morehouse Spelman Players. Their relationship spanned a decade, which then led to Samuel L. Jackson and LaTanya, getting married after dating each other for 10 years.
LaTanya Richardson Jackson: The Acclaimed Actress and Wife of Samuel L. Jackson Who Shined on Broadway
LaTanya Richardson Jackson, like her better half, has also been part of the acting world. She was nominated for a Tony award, for her work in the play A Raisin in the Sun. Her performance in A Raisin in the Sun, marked her second appearance on Broadway after she debuted in 2009. According to the Internet Broadway Database, LaTanya was also a part of Aaron Sorkin’s Broadway adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird.
In a report shared by People on April 8, 2025, LaTanya shared that it wasn’t entirely a piece of cake, directing her Oscar nominee husband. In an interview with Sherri Shepherd on her show Sherri, LaTanya recalled working with her husband for the Broadway revival of the Piano Lesson.
When asked about the dynamic of directing her husband, LaTanya Richardson Jackson didn’t sugarcoat it. “No,” she said when questioned whether Jackson takes direction well. Later she replied with a joke “Because he’s so old” he “thinks he knows everything.”
As a Broadway director working with her husband in the cast, LaTanya Richardson Jackson understood the importance of leadership clarity. She was upfront with Samuel L. Jackson, saying, “In this room, it’s about what I say,” noting that her role required setting the creative direction and commanding attention from the full cast.
Speaking with People during a press event for the 2025 Tony Awards in New York City, LaTanya Richardson Jackson revealed that she and her husband, Samuel L. Jackson, are still driven by their passion for work. “We’ll know when it’s time,” she said, referring to the couple’s agreement to keep going until they both feel ready to retire.
“My husband and I — Sam and I — both have said we're going to do it till the wheels fall off. We both have ... this pact between us that if we see ourselves doing more [than] we [should] be doing, we'll pull each other in and say, ‘It's time. Come in the house,’ and do it that way,” she shared.
“We are just going to do this as long as life allows,” she added
Samuel L. Jackson and LaTanya are going strong, even after completing 40 years of marriage. In a 2022 conversation with PEOPLE, LaTanya shared that she and Samuel L. Jackson, had made an early vow: that they would stick together, no matter how tough things would get.
"In the beginning, we always said the most revolutionary thing that Black people could do was stay together, raise their children with the nucleus of having a father and a mother, since everybody likes to pretend that that's not the dynamic of the African American family,” she shared.
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“That it's just children out here being raised by women, which we know is false. In order to change that narrative, we made a decision to say, 'We are going to stay together no matter what. We'll figure it out.' " she added.
She also shared with People, that each year in July, the Jacksons temporarily set aside their careers to spend uninterrupted time together.
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