Joaquin Phoenix sparks marriage rumor with long-time partner Rooney Mara as he calls her 'wife' on podcast

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Joaquin Phoenix sparked marriage rumors with his long-time partner Rooney Mara after addressing the actress as his “wife” on s podcast.

The 49-year-old Oscar-winning actor appeared on Sunday, September 30, episode of ‘Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso’ podcast, where he passingly mentioned his partner as his “wife.”

The ‘Joker: Folie à Deux’ star, however, did not give further detail on his relationship with Mara, 39. 

Joaquin Phoenix calls Rooney Mara his ‘wife’ 

During his conversation with Sam Fragoso, Phoenix shared the process of how he came up with his stirring 2020 Oscars speech after winning the Best Actor Award for ‘Joker’. 

Phoenix shared that the idea of the speech came up while he “was talking with my mom and my wife," per Page Six.

Later in the episode, he referenced his partner again while saying that she validated his speech, thus confirming it was Mara who was initially addressed as his wife. 

Phoenix recalled, “Rooney was like, ‘That’s what you should say!'” 

Nevertheless, throughout the conversation, he refrained from confirming his marital status with Mara, whom he met on the sets of their 2012 film ‘Her’. 

According to Page Six, the two stars did not start dating until they met again on the sets of ‘Mary Magdalene’ a few years later. 

The couple got engaged in 2019. In 2020, they welcomed their first child together - River Mara Phoenix (named after the ‘Napoleon’ star’s late brother River Phoenix who died of a drug overdose aged 23 in 1993). 

Earlier this year, the couple were expecting their second child together as in February, the ‘Carol’ actress showed off her baby bump at the 74th Berlin Film Festival.

Joaquin Phoenix gushed about Rooney Mara in rare revelation

The fiercely private couple seldom talk about each other to the press. 

The couple first went public with their romance at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2017. Per People, a source shared at that time that the actors “seem totally natural and easy.”

Later in the same year, Phoenix also shared in an interview with T Magazine that he had moved in with his actress partner. 

The ‘Walk The Line’ actor, however, gushed about Mara during a rare interview with Vanity Fair in 2019, when he shared, “She’s the only girl I ever looked up on the internet.”

He added, “We were just friends, email friends. I’d never done that. Never looked up a girl online.”