Tyra Banks & Seal, 1996
Agyness Deyn & Giovanni Ribisi, shortly after announcing their engagement, 2012.
The couple were married for three years, divorcing in 2015.
Giovanni Ribisi & Chan Marshall (AKA Cat Power)
The actor and the musician were in a relationship for six years and lived together with Ribisi’s daughter from his first marriage. Their breakup was almost immediately followed by Ribisi announcing his engagement to model Agyness Deyn. Marshall has confirmed that the split was abrupt and coincided with her completing her 2012 album Sun, commenting: “I cut my hair off three days [after the breakup], got on a plane to France, and finished the shit.”
On August 22, 1972, John Wojtowicz, along with two accomplices, attempted to rob a branch of the Chase Manhattan bank at 450 Avenue P in Gravesend, Brooklyn. A major motivation for the robbery was to gather funds for his girlfriend, Elizabeth Eden’s, sex reassignment surgery.
The couple had met the previous year at Manhattan’s Feast of San Genarro and quickly fell in love. Although Wojtiwicz was technically still married to his first wife, he married Eden in a public ceremony a few months later.
Eden, a trans woman, struggled with severe depression. After several suicide attempts she was admitted to a psychiatric institution. Wojtiwicz attributed these struggles to not being able to afford the sex reassignment surgery that Eden badly wanted.
Unbeknownst to Eden, Wojtowicz began planning the bank heist. On the day in question he held bank employees hostage for 14 hours. He reportedly based his plan on the movie The Godfather. He spent the next 15 years in and out of prison and has stated that Eden visited him every month.
A movie based on the robbery, Dog Day Afternoon, starring Al Pacino and Chris Sarandon was relased in 1975. Wojtowicz used the money he made from selling the movie rights to his story to pay for Eden’s surgery.
Eden eventually remarried and passed away from AIDS related pneumonia in 1987. Wojtwowicz, freshly released from prison, attended her funeral and delivered the eulogy.
Brandy & Kobe Bryant met at the 1996 Essence Awards. Brandy had just won a Grammy and was starring on Moesha, Bryant was about to become the first basketball guard drafted directly out of high school. They were both 17 years old.
Shortly after meeting Bryant asked Brandy to be his prom date. Bryant’s mother said he made up his mind after the awards show. “He came home from the Essence Awards and said, `I met such a nice, beautiful, intelligent, sweet person.’ Then when [Brandy] called, she said, `My mom might let me go.’ I thought it was so sweet.”
Brandy has since said that she never would have gone to prom if Bryant hadn’t asked her and that she still has her corsage.