Ryan Gosling and Eva Mendes seem like one of Hollywood’s most solid couples, even though they keep most of their romantic life pretty private. They first sparked dating rumors in 2011 while filming The Place Beyond the Pines, and have been going strong ever since. Here, we look back at their connection over the last decade and beyond.
August 2011
The couple were friends for many years before they started dating, according to Oprah Mag.
“We had known each other for a while already, so to work together was really exciting,” Mendes said of filming The Place Beyond the Pines in New York together. But soon, they seemed to be spending a lot of time together for just friends.
“There’s always been this strong chemistry between them…this was just a matter of time!” said a source on set.
September 2011
In September of that year, the pair were seen smooching at Disneyland. An observer told Us Magazine how flirty they were.
“They were very playful,” they said. “Eva was skipping around like a little girl…She would lean into him and she held his arm the entire time.”
October 2011
Like Zendaya and Tom Holland, Gosling and Mendes got busted while making out at a stoplight in Hollywood. Soon after, they flew out to Paris together.
June 2012
The next summer, the couple visited Gosling’s native country, Canada, and spent time with his mother, Donna. Donna was apparently a big fan of Mendes.
“Donna and Eva get along really, really well,” said a source. “Donna wants Ryan to settle down and Eva is all about getting him on that train too, so they’re both on the same page.”
Another source claimed that Mendes’ family also gave the relationship the all-clear. “Eva says that’s what sealed the deal with Ryan” the insider said. ‘They’re going to make it.”
September 2012
The Place Beyond the Pines premiered at the Toronto Film Festival, and the couple posed on the red carpet together.
They were also each other’s date when the movie premiered in NYC at the Landmark Sunshine Cinema.
September 2014
Mendes gave birth to the couple’s first child, their daughter Esmeralda Amada. Mendes had apparently not planned to be a mom, but that changed when she and Gosling got together.
“Then it made sense for me to have… not kids, but his kids,” she told Women’s Health. “It was very specific to him.”
April 2015
Gosling’s directorial debut Lost River is released, co-starring Mendes.
December 2015
Gosling made some rare comments about his relationship, saying in an interview with Hello! magazine, “I know that I’m with the person I’m supposed to be with.”
When pressed about what qualities he looks for in a woman he said the only only quality he looks for is “that she’s Eva Mendes…There’s nothing else I’m looking for.”
May 2016
The pair welcome their second daughter, Amada Lee.
September 2016
Marriage rumors swirl around the couple, and Us Weekly reported that they’d had a ceremony with “a small group of family and friends.”
Soon after, TMZ refuted the story.
In 2011, Mendes had told Chelsea Handler, “I’m not like anti-marriage or the institution, like for other people. And I love the idea of a union—that’s all very beautiful. But I think, you know, it’s a very old fashioned, archaic kind of thing. We did it for land originally. How unromantic is that?”
She added that it would be fun “to be with someone in your fifties and sixties and be like, ‘That’s my boyfriend.’”
January 2017
Gosling received a Golden Globe award for La La Land, and thanked “his lady” for her support.
“While I was singing and dancing and playing piano, and having one of the best experiences I’ve ever had on a film, my lady was raising our daughter, pregnant with our second, and trying to help her brother fight his battle with cancer,” Gosling said. “If she hadn’t taken all of that on, so that I could have this experience, there would surely be someone up here today, so, sweetheart, thank you.”
September 2019
Mendes told Access Hollywood a little about parenting her with Gosling.
“It’s so fun and beautiful and maddening,” she said. “It’s so hard, of course, but it’s that that feeling of ending your day and putting them to bed and Ryan and I look at each other like, ‘We did it, we came out relatively unscathed.’”
October 2021
Much like their relationship, the couple try to keep their kids out of the spotlight. Gosling is not active on social media, and Mendes has responded to people accusing him of not being an active parent because doesn’t appear much in her feed.
“I don’t talk about Ryan and all the wonderful things he does as a father because I keep that part private,” she wrote. “I feel it’s best that I continue to disclose what I’m comfortable with but not involve him or my kids too much. It’s not about being cagey or weird, it’s just about staying private in a public space. Does that make sense? Hope so. Because this is my honest answer.”
But Gosling did share a little bit about what it was like parenting under lockdown conditions from the pandemic.
“Our kids are young, so it was a tough time for them to be separated from other kids and not being able to see family and whatnot,” Gosling told GQ. “So, we did our best to entertain them.”
May 2022
Mendes promoted Gosling’s new movie, The Gray Man, sharing a poster for the film in which Gosling looks like an undeniable dreamboat.
“My man making all my 1980’s action star dreams come true,” she captioned it.
June 2022
She also got excited about Gosling’s role as the iconic Ken in the Margot Robbie-led Barbie film.
“So. F. Funny. So. F. Good. So F excited for you to see this… she joked, hashtagging it #Thatsmyken.
November 2022
On November 15, Mendes shared her new inner-wrist tattoo on Instagram, a design that spells “de Gosling.”
Mendes, who was raised by her Cuban parents in Miami, may be referring to the tradition of adding a husband’s last name onto the woman’s original name after their marriage, using “de” or “of.” If Mendes and Gosling were married, her name could be Eva Mendes de Gosling. Fans took the tattoo as a sign that Mendes and Gosling are secretly hitched.
Mendes then made an appearance on Australia’s Kyle and Jackie O Show, where they naturally asked about the tattoo. Co-host Brittany Hockley asked directly, “There’s a rumor that you guys might have secretly tied the knot. Is that true?”
Mendes replied, “But who says we weren’t already? I like to keep it all mysterious. I’m a very mysterious woman.”
About the the tattoo, she said, “I do have a tattoo. It’s just a press on…no, it’s not a press on. But I got it years ago. I posted a picture and I’ve gotten a lot of funny questions.”
April 2023
Mendes explained why she and Gosling don’t do red carpets together to a user on Instagram expressing hope that they would appear together on the Barbie press tour.
“What a cool comment, thank you,” Mendes replied, via Entertainment Tonight. “But we don’t do those things together. Like these photos I’ve been posting, Im only comfortable posting because it’s already out there. ♥️.”
May 2023
Ahead of the release of the Barbie movie, Mendes made a rare public support of Gosling and his role as Ken in the movie. She posted a photo of herself on Instagram, wearing a shirt with him in character on it. “Got that real big Kenergy. Coz girls is players too,” she captioned it.
Gosling later spoke about Mendes in his interview with GQ. He revealed that he never imagined himself being a parent until “Eva said she was pregnant. I would never want to go back, you know? I’m glad I didn’t have control over my destiny in that way, because it was so much better than I ever had dreamed for myself.”
Meeting Mendes genuinely changed the course of his life. “I was looking for her, you know?” Gosling said, adding he wasn’t even fully aware at the time. “But it all makes sense now.”
When parenting their two daughters, “I just lean on Eva [when I’m not sure what to do]. She knows what’s important, always. She just somehow knows. So if ever I’m in my head about it, I just ask her.”
June 2023
During his press tour in Canada for his new movie Barbie, Ryan Gosling shared what it’s like to be the “Barbie dad” to his two daughters who apparently have “complicated backstories” for their dolls. On Thursday, June 29, he shared that Esmeralda and Amada like to make up their own universe while talking to ET Canada.
“Well, you have to know, my kids, their Barbies aren’t even named Barbie,” he explained. “They all have their own names, very complicated lives, backstories, interrelationships, history, you gotta know it all.”
He joked that when he jumped into play he was informed the dolls were “estranged now” and that “it’s like, ‘Get out of here.’”
“They don’t even talk!” he added, explaining that in his daughter’s Barbie world, Ken has been demoted.
“He works at a grocery store, he’s not a fireman,” Gosling said.
July 2023
Gosling wore a tribute to Mendes at the Barbie Los Angeles premiere: an “E” necklace in the Barbie font.He spoke to Entertainment Tonight about how the couple’s daughters influenced the way he played Ken. “They’ve seen a lot pieces of [the film], and helped me a lot with it,” Gosling said. “They were huge inspiration for me.” He also added that he may wait to take them to see the movie: “Well, it was, I think, weird enough for them that I played Ken anyway. I might like, you know, just hold off on them seeing the full Ken energy.”
On Friday, July 14, Gosling shared more about his family in an interview with People.
“I think they’re confused as to why I would want to play Ken,” he said. “They have no use for Ken.”
Gosling went on, “My kids were my introduction to [Barbie]…My kids were around for the months at home, as I was prepping for it. So they, inadvertently, were prepping for it too. And they came to set that day and were a huge sense of support and doing it with me off-camera.”
Aimée Lutkin is the weekend editor at ELLE.com. Her writing has appeared in Jezebel, Glamour, Marie Claire and more. Her first book, The Lonely Hunter, will be released by Dial Press in February 2022.