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Actress Aubrey Plaza and late filmmaker Jeff Baena were partners both on and off the big screen. According to Collider, the Life After Beth writer/director died by suicide at the age of 47, according to the County of Los Angeles Medical Examiner.

“This is an unimaginable tragedy,” Plaza and Baena’s family said in a statement posted by E! “We are deeply grateful to everyone who has offered support. Please respect our privacy during this time.” The married couple had stayed private throughout most of their relationship, although a 2022 GQ profile hints that they started dating in 2011 and wed in 2021.

Inside Audrey Plaza And Jeff Baena’s Relationship

Aubrey Plaza and Jeff Baena kept their relationship low-key over the 15 years they were together. In 2022, she opened up to GQ a little about their love story and how they met. The Agatha All Along actress revealed that she met writer-director Jeff Baena over a game of Balderdash.

The couple stayed mostly private throughout their relationship, usually only making appearances together to promote their movies and appear at film festivals. On her now-deleted social media, Aubrey acknowledged his birthday and Valentine’s Day, although the posts weren’t the usual gushy celebrations of love usually associated with celeb couples online.

In an August 2022 interview with Reel Talker, he spoke about how grateful he was to have met Aubrey. “I’d be working with her if she wasn’t my wife, but luckily she’s my wife. We were together for three years before we made Life After Beth together. I think having that sort of shorthand and that sort of connection, it’s amazing.”

The I Heart Huckabees writer added, “The opportunities to create together and do something creative where we’re both fulfilled, it’s like, how rare is that? She’s down and she’s so talented, so I’m really lucky.”

Speaking with PEOPLE in 2019, Aubrey opened up about their romance and how, because they both worked in the same industry, they were working on a “deeper level.”

“I think that one of the great things about our careers is that we are forced to be independent, take little breaks, go off and do our things and come back,” she explained. “So it’s kind of fun. Nothing is ever the same. You don’t want to spend too much time apart. But I think that there’s a way that it can work and there’s a balance in that.”

Inside Aubrey Plaza And Jeff Baena’s Unusual Wedding

Followers of the couple were shocked when Aubrey Plaza referred to Jeff Baena as her “darling husband,” in a May 2021 Instagram post about the movie Spin Me Round. “So proud of my darling husband @jeffbaena for dreaming up another film that takes us to Italia to cause some more trouble.”

In December 2021, she confirmed to Ellen DeGeneres that she was a married woman. “We got a little bored one night,” the Parks and Recreation star explained on the former talk show. “We got married, and I’ll tell you how: 1HourMarriage.com. It’s real — look it up.”

The pair’s wedding took place on the couple’s 10-year anniversary. “We should do something—get an ice cream cone and do something special,'” she joked.

“And then I joked about getting married. And he’s like, ‘Well, we probably couldn’t get married that fast.’ And I said, ‘Well wouldn’t it be nice to get married on our actual anniversary?” Aubrey continued.

And then I Googled it, and I found 1HourMarriage.com. And then I called around 5 p.m., and I said, ‘Can you come in an hour and marry me in our yard?’ And he said, ‘How about tomorrow?’ And I said, ‘Well, that’s not what you’re advertising.’

The Emily The Criminal star added that the officiant agreed to perform the ceremony, they were two hours later. “My now-husband went and picked up food from some restaurant because we had already ordered food,” she added. “He almost missed the wedding ‘cause he had to wait so long for the order.”

She also opened up about the details of the ceremony and how she created the perfect space for them. “I created a very quick love altar in my yard: facts of our love, little stones, smoke, fire, things of that nature,” she explained. “And then the man from Alhambra showed up in a Hawaiian shirt with a briefcase and I can’t remember a lot of it. It was fuzzy. But I’m pretty sure it’s legal.”

On a December 2021 episode of The Drew Barrymore Show, Aubrey explained how they mix the complications of romance and work. “It’s extreme highs and extreme complications. It’s a really hard thing to navigate. But man, we’ve been together for 11 years. We just muscle our way through it.”

But the Ingrid Goes North actress acknowledged that married life isn’t always easy, and related to her character in White Lotus. “I’ve been with my husband for 12 years. I relate to being in a relationship that has peaks and valleys, and going through a rough patch and comparing yourself to another couple that seems perfect.”

Inside Aubrey Plaza And Jeff Baena’s Working Relationship

Aubrey Plaza and Jeff Baena were more than husband and wife, they were well-known collaborators in the world of indie cinema. Jeff wrote and directed 2016’s Joshy and 2017’s The Little Hours, in which Aubrey appeared.

“I have worked with Jeff on all of his movies,” she told SIFFcast in 2017. “I love his movies, and I love the way his mind works.”

“My partner’s a filmmaker, and we’ve made movies together,” she opened up on a 2020 episode of HFPA In Conversation but explained how their relationship meant more to them than their working partnership.

We’ve had really good experiences and really bad experiences, and I think I learned going through those things that ultimately movies come and go.

“Movies — it’s what are our lives are built off of. But when you’re about to die, you don’t think about the movies. You think about the people in our life and your relationships. I think that’s what most people think about before they die.”

In a conversation with Vulture in 2014, Aubrey admitted she was “nervous” to make Life After Berh with her real life partner, but it ultimately went “great.”

“I was like, we’re either going to break up or stay together forever,” she joked to the outlet. “It was great, he’s a great director and that didn’t surprise me either because his brain is operating on another level — he’s too smart and he’s got so many opinions and he’s a very confident person that always knows what he wants.”

On Jan. 3, 2025, Jeff Baena was reportedly found dead in his home by his assistant by apparent suicide, as reported by BBC. Aubrey and her team released a statement to PEOPLE following his tragic death. “This is an unimaginable tragedy. We are deeply grateful to everyone who has offered support. Please respect our privacy during this time.”

Jeff Baena’s Colleagues Paid Tribute

• “I love you Jeff. Hate your last move. But still love you,” Jake Johnson (New Girl) wrote in his Instagram caption.
• Alex Ross Perry, who also appeared in Joshy, wrote on Instagram, “If you’ve seen me in LA in the last 10 years, it is probably because Jeff gave me a place to stay.”
• Adam Pally called Jeff, “a connector of people, a fosterer of possibility.”