Denise Fennell and Rick Pasqualone were married an estimated 5,000 times between them as stars in “Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding,” the Off Broadway hit.
Among the first words that Denise Fennell and Rick Pasqualone ever said to each other were, “I do.”
That was in 2006, when Ms. Fennell and Mr. Pasqualone were married at a casino in Temecula, Calif., — that is, in a production of “Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding,” the Off Broadway hit where she played the part of Tina and he Tony.
“When I married Ricky that day, I just couldn’t stop staring at him, he looked so handsome,” said Ms. Fennell, her words emanating not from a shallow rehearsal script but the deep recesses of her heart. “I couldn’t wait to meet him later at the bar and really get to know him.”
She did just that moments after the curtain closed on a rather zany reception where audience members are treated as wedding guests. “But he told me he was married, and that he had two children,” Ms. Fennel said with a sigh, “and then we didn’t see each other again for a good number of years.”
In the meantime, they had their memories. “Just before we were to be married at the casino that day, I made a pretend grab for the blackjack chips and security arrested me,” Mr. Pasqualone said, laughing. “I was escorted to my own wedding in handcuffs.”
Ms. Fennell, 47, and Mr. Pasqualone, 55, have spent sizable portions of their acting careers playing the lead roles in “Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding,” which enjoyed a 22-year run, from 1988-2010, in six countries. (She appeared more than 4,000 times in 150 cities, and he an estimated 1,000 times.)
Mr. Pasqualone, who grew up on Long Island, graduated from Boston College with intentions of moving on to medical school. “But my passion for acting kept getting in the way,” he said. Ms. Fennell, raised in Boston, said “college wasn’t for me.”
While the two were pretend married to other actors an estimated 5,000 times in total that quarter of a century, they enjoyed just that one night in Temecula of theatrically wedded bliss.
“Denise is younger than I am,” Mr. Pasqualone said, “so by the time she started playing the role of Tina, I had pretty much moved on with my career.”
Ms. Fennell, describing herself as “the longest-running Tina in the history of the show,” said that “while I may have dated a Tony or two in my time, Ricky is the only Tony I could ever see myself making a real life with.”
She got that opportunity in 2014, when she and Mr. Pasqualone were reunited in a “Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding” relaunch in Times Square celebrating the show’s 25th anniversary. The “dynamic duo,” as Ms. Fennell refers to her and Mr. Pasqualone, were asked to play the bride and groom’s parents in the anniversary production.
Despite the fact that she hadn’t married him in almost a decade, those unscripted feelings began rushing through Ms. Fennell at the mere sight of Mr. Pasqualone, whom she described as being, “hard to forget.”
This time around, Mr. Pasqualone was divorced, and they hit it off immediately.
Both were living on opposite coasts — she in New York and he in Los Angeles — but they embarked on a long-distance friendship that turned into a long-distance writing partnership, and then a long-distance romantic story suited for the heart of Broadway.
That story culminated in a very real wedding on June 26 at the home of the bride’s family in York Beach, Maine.
The couple stood before 120 guests, including their officiant, Thomas Dicker, a cousin of the bride who became a Universal Life minister for the occasion.
They had planned their wedding while together during the pandemic, a time “when the world stopped moving, and we fell in love,” Mr. Pasqualone said.
In the lead-up to their wedding, the bride, who has since relocated to Los Angeles, practically turned her parents’ home into a giant stage for their nuptials with a complete overhaul of the property.
Ms. Fennell said that she had their lawn entirely replaced with a new one, erected a tent, brought in trailer bathrooms, built a flower wall, and among many other modifications ordered every guests’ place setting.
“I wanted it to feel very intimate and elegant,” she said. “From my experience with “Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding,” I knew that there was a very specific way to set up a room to have a very successful party.”
To that end, Ms. Fennell personally measured space to put in a new bar and buffet area, and also had a stage and dance floor built on the property, “so that I could do the tarantella,” she said.
Among the guests were a handful of other Tony and Tina’s past, and while a legion of actors have portrayed those two characters throughout the years, Ms. Fennell and Mr. Pasqualone are the only Tony and Tina in the history of the show to have married for real.
“I’ve never had anyone look at me and believe in me the way that Ricky looked at me and believed in me,” said Ms. Fennell, who had not previously been married. “He made me a better person, and he made me a wife and a mother of two beautiful children.
“Actors can have a very selfish lifestyle, but watching Ricky be a father showed me how he always put his family first,” she said. “In those moments when I saw how wonderfully he treated his children, I just knew that he had changed my life in a way that is indescribable.”
Ms. Fennell added that her life with Mr. Pasqualone, “has been everything you never knew you wanted but you got — it’s just been perfect.”
Mr. Pasqualone agreed. “The biggest thing that has brought us together has been the concept of family,” he said, choking back tears. “That was so important to me, because when I saw her with my children, and how she interacts with them, and how she interacts with my parents, it’s just something I love seeing.”
Among the many things the couple have in common is that both of their families are from Abruzzo, an Italian region, east of Rome, with an Adriatic coastline.
Three years ago, they visited Abruzzo, and learned minutes after arriving that they were to attend a funeral there. “Here we are, jet-lagged, tired, and hungry, and about 45 of my relatives are speaking Italian at the same time to Denise, and she’s like, ‘What’s going on here?’” Mr. Pasqualone said.
“She was under the impression that we were going to Italy for a romantic getaway,” he continued, “and here we are driving up the Apennine Mountains all dressed in black and heading to a wake, yet Denise took it all in stride, and I look back at that moment in time as a seminal moment in our relationship.”
They continued to support each other, and each other’s projects.
“I stage managed Denise’s online ‘Late Night Catechism’ show, and she road managed my touring solo show, ‘Channeling the King,” Mr. Pasqualone said. “All I can say is, if you can marry your best friend, I highly recommend it.”
On This Day
When June 26, 2021
Where The home of the bride’s family in York, Maine.
Introducing … The D.J. at the couple’s wedding reception introduced them to their guests by saying “For the 4,766th time as a husband and a wife, but for the first-time ever as a married couple.”
Leader of the Band The groom said that for many years, his father, Fernando Pasqualone, a musician, was a conductor at Radio City Music Hall. “I’m so proud of him,” the groom said of his father, who was at the wedding, What a thrilling position.”
Experience Needed Both the bride and groom were originally turned away when first auditioning for roles in “Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding.” He was told to take a few improv classes and she was asked to work on erasing her Boston accent.
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