It’s onerous to think about a time when Broadway star Sutton Foster would confide in now-disgraced influencer Hilaria Baldwin about her efforts to maintain her marriage going earlier than revealing that her subsequent huge venture was to co-star with Hugh Jackman in a Broadway revival of “The Music Man.”
However that’s what occurred in 2019. Foster went on Baldwin’s since-shuttered Mother Mind podcast. For the star of the 2024-2025 Broadway revival of “Once Upon a Mattress,” Foster was, as soon as upon a time, fortunately married — or appeared to be happly married — to screenwriter Ted Griffin. And Foster and Griffin had an lovable adopted daughter, two cute little canine, Mabel and Brody, and a picturesque residence within the nation the place she and her little woman would plant flowers.
As Foster chronicled her completely happy household life on Instagram by 2023, the two-time Tony Award winner and star of the TV Land comedy “Younger” additionally opened as much as Hilaria Baldwin and her co-host Daphne Ozabout how she tried to get pregnant through IVF in her early 40s. When that didn’t work, she and Griffin labored with a lawyer to rearrange an open adoption, which she stated went fairly easily. However as new dad and mom, Foster admitted that her marriage virtually broke aside. Close to the top of the interview, although, Foster definitely brightened up when mentioning that her subsequent huge venture was to work with Jackman.
The point out of the good-looking Australian film star prompted sighs of approval and “oh, him!” from Baldwin and Oz. Celeb world now is aware of that the household life that Foster, 56, celebrated on this podcast and on Instagram would quickly come to an finish. She and Griffin filed for divorce in October 2024 after she grew to become romantically concerned with Jackman, both throughout or after the 2022-2023 run of “The Music Man.”
Foster and Jackman have tried to maintain a low profile since information of their romance burst onto the scene “with white-hot intensity” within the fall of 2024, as The Minimize stated. Each are going by respective divorces — he from his spouse of 27 years, Deborra-lee Furness. However Foster and Jackman emerged in public collectively this previous week. Folks journal photographed them on the streets of New York Metropolis, holding fingers whereas taking a stroll, to point out that they’re nonetheless a pair and nonetheless appear completely happy.
Sadly for Foster, her “perky,” upbeat popularity has taken successful, judging by the adverse feedback that pop on her previous Instagram posts that characteristic photographs of her with Griffin, or of them with their daughter, now 7. For instance, for a January 2023 carousel of household photographs of Foster, Griffin and their daughter visiting Disneyland, somebody wrote, “He must’ve been shocked when you dumped him for Hugh I hope he finds a nice and honest lady.”
In different posts, folks name her a “cheater” or categorical sympathy for his or her daughter. There’s additionally a Reddit thread asking, “Can someone explain the Sutton Foster hate,” which really focuses on her skilled talents. Some folks on-line speculate that the seven-time Tony nominee was among the many listing of latest notable “snubs” for the 2025 Tony nominations, for her efficiency in “Once Upon a Mattress,” due to the “scandal” surrounding her romance with Jackman.
If there’s any comfort for Foster, it’s that her popularity hasn’t suffered the identical collapse as Hilaria Baldwin, the spouse of acclaimed however long-polarizing movie and TV actor Alec Baldwin. A 12 months after Foster, Baldwin and Ozrecorded this podcast episode, Hilaria Baldwin grew to become engulfed in her personal scandal when folks on-line alleged that she had faked being a Spanish immigrant for greater than a decade to seem extra glamorous and attention-grabbing. Curiously, Hilaria Baldwin didn’t communicate with a Spanish accent in her “Mom Brain” chat with Foster, as she’s been recognized to do in different podcast or TV interviews.
However Hilaria Baldwin’s Spanish id scandal led to the top of her Mother Mind podcast with Oz, the daughter of former TV physician Mehmet Ozturned Trump-supporting administrator of the federal Facilities for Medicare & Medicaid Providers. Hilaria and Alec Baldwin have launched maligned new careers in actuality TV after he grew to become mired in authorized drama over his unintentional 2021 killing of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the western movie “Rust.”
For some time, Hilaria Baldwin’s Mother Mind podcast appeared fairly in style and booked different well-known moms as visitors, together with Jennifer Garner, or main specialists to debate parenting subjects. Foster got here on the present in November 2019 to speak about her effort to change into pregnant in her early 40s, whereas additionally juggling a busy profession, appearing, singing and dancing on Broadway.
Foster instructed Baldwin and Ozthat she had a “total breakdown” after her second spherical of IVF didn’t result in a being pregnant, so she instructed Griffin additionally they needed to pursue adoption as a result of it “can’t all fall on her shoulders.” She stated it was “amazing” when their daughter was born however there was a “big learning curve” in being a brand new dad or mum and in attempting to determine how she and Griffin had been going to navigate this new stage of their relationship.
“No one really prepared me that it breaks your marriage apart,” she stated.
When requested how she and Griffin labored to maintain their relationship “open and vulnerable with each other,” Foster stated, “With us, it’s like you’re choosing your battles, not picking on every (issue) because I can be such a control freak, and I try to control every little thing, and I want to over-talk and over-analyze stuff. It was like letting things go.”
“That’s what I realized sometimes, that it’s OK letting (the marriage) be, like, a 10 today, or a zero,” she stated. “Or, if it’s a good solid six, that’s OK too.”
Manufacturing on “The Music Man” with Jackman was delayed till the spring of 2021 as a result of COVID-19 pandemic. Over the subsequent 12 months, Foster posted a number of photographs of her and Jackman in rehearsals or selling the present. However she additionally shared photographs of her with Griffin, writing in Might 2020, “I’m stuck on you” and in December 2021, “Love this man.” She furthermore posted photographs of her, Griffin and their daughter, together with the three of them carrying humorous selfmade hats to have a good time New 12 months’s Eve in 2021.
“The Music Man” opened in February 2022, with Foster and Jackman gushing about one another on social media, in line with Vulture. “You’re an exceptional talent and friend,” Jackman wrote about Foster. “Your joy brings the company of @MusicManBway to life.” In the meantime, Foster stated it was “a dream to be dancing with Hugh every night.”
Foster additionally famously revealed in a 2022 look on “Live with Kelly and Ryan” that she and Jackman had developed an in depth bond in the course of the manufacturing, which she stated included a pre-performance ritual that passed off after they had been alone in her dressing room.
“We call it carpet chat,” Foster revealed. “We hang out in my dressing room before every show and just catch up.”
“It’s such a wonderful thing,” Foster continued. “We’ve become really good friends and we just talk and catch up on our day. That’s been one of the best parts of the whole thing, that I’ve made this wonderful new friend.”
The world now is aware of that Foster and Jackman grew to become greater than buddies. On Instagram, she stopped posting photographs of her husband in January 2023, and he or she started posting far fewer photographs of her daughter and of their two small canine. She posed with a distinct small canine on a seaside in a September 2023 picture.
Jackman’s estranged spouse, Deborra-Lee Furness, developed “suspicions” about them working collectively. The longtime Hollywood energy couple introduced their separation in October 2023, 9 months after “The Music Man” closed.
