Photo: Instagram
The pair married in England.
By Rebekah Kuschmider — Written on Aug 17, 2019
Outlander's Caitroina Balfe has tied the knot. She and long-time boyfriend Tony McGill got married in a small Catholic ceremony in England, according to reports. The pair have been dating since at least 2015, but they keep their relationship very private. Balfe showed up with an engagement ring on in 2018 and confirmed that they would be getting married. The wedding happened in the past week and Balfe's co-star Sam Heughan was there to celebrate.
Who Is Catriona Balfe's husband? Keep reading for more.
1. Music producer and actress
There isn't a lot of info available about Tony McGill, though reports about the wedding indicate that he is a music producer. He doesn't appear to have any social media accounts that give us a peep into his life. For her part, Balfe is from Ireland and started her career as a model, though IMDB quotes her as saying: "Modelling wasn't a passion of mine so that made it get old kind of quickly. I was getting very frustrated." She started acting in 2011, with appearances in Super 8 and a short called Lust Life. After years of movies and TV work, she landed the role in Outlander, which catapulted her to fame. In it, she brings to life novelist Diana Gabaldon's time-traveling heroine who passionately loves a man from a different century.
2. Dating since 2015
The couple keeps their relationship well below the paparazzi radar. There aren't even a lot of photos of them together at Hollywood events, though they were photographed together at the 2017 Oscar Wilde Awards. He also accompanied her at the 2016 ceremony for Jodie Foster’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. The earliest photo of them together is from a friend's Instagram account, which shows Balfe sitting on McGill's lap in a pub.
3. Diamonds at the Globes
They didn't even make a big deal of their engagement, with no formal announcement or cutesy social media posts about it. Balfe was at the Golden Globes —though McGill wasn't with her — when reporters first noticed the diamond on her left hand. When People asked her about it on the red carpet, she commented: “It happened over the break. I’m very happy.” She wasn't just there to announce her upcoming nuptials, however. Balfe was also nominated for a Golden Globe for best performance by an actress in a television series, drama, for her starring role in the Starz series. She didn't win the award, which went to Elisabeth Moss for A Handmaid's Tale. She was nominated again in 2019, but lost to Sandra Oh for Killing Eve.
4. Keeping it low key
The couple seems to enjoy keeping their lives simple. In an interview with Parade, Balfe described her perfect Sunday as a day spent mainly at home, relaxing. She told the magazine: "I love to get the newspaper and sit around and read. If I can get a walk-in, that’s always really nice. Sundays are supposed to be a guilt-free day where you can just relax, but usually, there’s a little bit of homework to be done, especially if we’re filming Monday. If it’s wintertime, you turn the fire on and put on a good movie before bed or cook a nice meal. Sometimes I’ll spend a few hours prepping some food for the next few days as well. It’s nice to put on some music and spend some time just puttering around the house." She didn't explicitly mention McGill in that description of weekend relaxation, but it's easy to imagine a happy couple partaking of all those activities.
5. An intimate wedding
In keeping with their usual habit of simplicity and privacy, People reports that the wedding wasn't an over-the-top celebration by any stretch. Instead, it was an intimate affair officiated by Rev. Louis Beasley-Suffolk, who performed a Roman Catholic service. Attendees were mainly close family, though Balfe's co-star was likely present. Heughan posted a photo of himself on Instagram wearing what appeared to be wedding attire and included the caption: "Remarkable weekend" along with a string of emojis that seemed to indicate he'd been at the celebration.
Her co-star attended her wedding.
6. Disappointment to fans
McGill is most likely a wonderful person but that didn't stop fans of the show from wishing that Balfe had found love with her on-camera leading man instead. Fans, who have avidly followed the otherworldly romance of Claire and Jamie and wish it would spill over into real life with a romance between Balfe and co-star Sam Heughan. However, after she got engaged to McGill, Balfe tried to gently put that notion to rest, telling Parade magazine: "There’s a small vocal group that really wanted it, which is just a testament to the characters that we portray, that the love story is so inspiring and so aspirational that people just really wanted to believe in it,” she said. “And that’s a nice thing. But I think things are pretty clear now that I’m engaged to someone else. Everyone gets it now.”
Best wishes to the happy couple.
Rebekah Kuschmider has been writing about celebrities, pop culture, entertainment, and politics since 2010. Her work has been seen at Ravishly, Babble, Scary Mommy, The Mid, Redbook online, and The Broad Side. She is the creator of the blog Stay at Home Pundit and she is a cohost of the weekly podcast The More Perfect Union.