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Laura Savoie is a 26-year-old PhD student at the University of Texas and fiancée of famous actor Dennis Quaid. The two got engaged last week in Honolulu, Hawaii, while Dennis was shooting his upcoming movie Midway.
“It happened on the very northernmost point of Oahu, at Turtle Bay. It was kind of spontaneous. It was very much a surprise,” Quaid told Extra on Monday, hours after proposing.
“I had the ring in my pocket. … It has been kind of a month-and-a-half plan. … I wanted it to be private,” said Quaid.
Quaid added that the proposal caught Savoie by surprise. “She was actually taking a selfie of us, and I put the ring in front and said, ‘Will you marry me?’ — and then she fell down,” he revealed.
There is a 39-year age gap between Savoie (26) and Quaid (65), and the Parent Trap actor has tied the knot three times before.
Quaid was previously married to actress P. J. Soles from 1978 to 1983, actress Meg Ryan from 1991 to 2001, and Kimberly Buffington from 2004 to 2018. He has a 27-year-old son with Meg Ryan, Jack Quaid, who had a small part in The Hunger Games movie and now stars as Hugh “Hughie” Campbell in the Prime Video superhero series The Boys.
Quaid and Buffington finalized their divorce in April 2018 citing “irreconcilable differences.” They share joint physical custody of their fraternal twins, Thomas Boone and Zoe Grace, both 11, though Buffington was awarded 75% of their time.
Quaid started dating model Santa Auzina immediately after his divorce. The couple was together for three years before splitting in December 2018.
Savoie was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. She moved to California to earn her bachelor’s degree in accounting at Pepperdine University. She is currently in the process of earning her PhD in philosophy at the University of Texas.
Here’s what you need to know:
1. She Previously Dated Actor Jeremy Piven
Presley Ann/Getty ImagesJeremy Piven attends Annapurna Pictures, Gary Sanchez Productions, and Plan B Entertainment’s World Premiere Of “Vice.”
A source told People that Savoie previously dated Entourage actor Jeremy Piven while she was at Pepperdine University.
Piven, 54, is 28 years older than Savoie.
2. She Graduated Valedictorian at Pepperdine University
According to her most recent resume, she graduated valedictorian of her class at Pepperdine with a 4.0 GPA and finished her degree in three years. In addition, she was named the Regent Scholar, the top scholar award.
She was also named “Outstanding Graduate in Accounting” from Pepperdine in 2014. She earned several scholarships during her time at the school, including the Beta Gamma Sigma Scholarship, the Faculty-Staff Scholarship, the Maxy Pope Alles Merit Scholarship, and the Ernst & Young Outstanding Student Scholarship.
After leaving Pepperdine to pursue her master’s degree at Notre Dame, she spent some time in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and Santiago, Chile, as part of the University of Notre Dame’s MBA Interterm Immersion program.
According to her LinkedIn profile, after earning her M.S. in Accounting from Notre Dame, she was hired by Ernst & Young full time as part of their assurance team from 2015 to 2017, where she worked with “real estate, biopharmaceutical, retail consumer products, and media and entertainment” clients. She left in 2017 in order to pursue her PhD in philosophy at the University of Texas and is slated to graduate in 2021.
3. She’s a Certified Public Accountant, Certified Real Estate Agent, and Certified Yoga Instructor
LinkedIn
Savoie has a long list of certifications despite only being 26 years old. In addition to being a certified public accountant, she holds her real estate license in the state of California and a 200-hour registered yoga teacher certification.
According to her LinkedIn profile, she worked as a “Consultant – Real Estate Operations” for Pepperdine University in 2016 while she was also working in assurance at Ernst & Young.
She’s currently working as a teaching and research assistant while earning her PhD from the University of Texas.
4. Savoie and Quaid Were Only Dating For a Few Months Before They Got Engaged
Quaid quietly broke up with his girlfriend of three years, 32-year-old model Santa Auzina, in December and started dating Laura Savoie only a few months afterward.
US Weekly reported that Savoie’s private Instagram account “features several pictures of her with the 65-year-old Parent Trap actor, whom she claimed to ‘love’ in one post of the couple kissing.” There is also a photo that “showed the duo embracing each other, which she captioned: ‘Never been happier.'”
Savoie posted a photo in May and said she “loved this man”. The couple met and began dating less than six months after Quaid’s previous relationship.
Quaid popped the question after dating Savoie for five to six months and told Extra TV about his engagement on October 21.
5. Savoie Was Called out by Quaid’s Former ‘Parent Trap’ Co-Star on Twitter
Quaid’s Parent Trap co-star, Elaine Hendrix, took the couple’s engagement announcement as an opportunity to draw some parallels between The Parent Trap and his relationship with Savoie.
In The Parent Trap, Hendrix played Nick’s (Quaid) 26-year-old fiancée, Meredith Blake. Her character hated children and was portrayed as a gold digger in the film. Lindsay Lohan plays twin sisters Hallie Parker and Annie James, who endeavor to get Nick back together with ex-wife Elizabeth by chasing Meredith away with a series of pranks.
At one point in the film, Lohan says, “You’re going to adopt Meredith,” and, “How can you marry a woman young enough to be my big sister?” Savoie is currently younger than Quaid’s son Jack, who is 27.
The 48-year-old Hendrix quote-tweeted an article about Quaid’s engagement and said, “Watch out for those twins,” referring to the twins that tormented her character in the movie. Quaid also has twins with his ex-wife Buffington.
The tweet has over 330,000 favorites and 55,000 retweets on Twitter.
Quaid’s former fiancée Lea Thompson also took the opportunity to clap back at the actor. She one-upped a tweet from Diedrich Baker, who said, “She was 3 when I got married!” by saying “she was -10 when I was engaged to him.” Thompson and Quaid met on the set of 1983’s Jaws 3D and were engaged for three years before calling it quits.
@bader_diedrich She was -10 when I was engaged to him.
The rest of Twitter also had a field day with the couple’s age gap.
The couple has not announced a wedding date yet.
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