Anya Taylor-Joy on Her Secret Wedding to Husband Malcolm McRae: ‘We Were Pretty Spy-Orientated’

The actress revealed she secretly wed McRae in April 2022 on Instagram earlier this month

Keeping their first wedding a secret required some effort for Anya Taylor-Joy and Malcolm McRae.

At CinemaCon on April 9, the actress told Entertainment Tonight that she and McRae, 29, “did our research” before successfully marrying each other in private — and keeping it a secret for two years.

The couple wed in New Orleans on April 1, 2022, which Taylor-Joy, 27, revealed in an Instagram post earlier this month, and she told the outlet of the private ceremony, “We were pretty spy-orientated.”

"At the end of the day, it was about the two of us and so we ran away with our two best friends and had the most magical day possible," she continued. “It kind of made it all the more special, ‘cause it just felt like a secret that we got to keep to ourselves.”

In October 2023, she and McRae got married again, this time with more of an audience, in Italy, though at the time, no one was the wiser that they had already said “I do.”

She told ET she was “very grateful” to “celebrate” her marriage with family the second time around, as only Cara Delevingne and Sebastián Faena were in attendance at the couple's New Orleans nuptials.

Related: Celebrities Who Had Secret Weddings

In the Queen’s Gambit star’s Instagram post revealing her April Fools' Day nuptials, she wrote, "Two years ago, on April Fools, I secretly married my best friend in New Orleans. The magic of that day is ingrained in every cell of my being, forever.”

The post included photos of her Dior wedding dress, which she said was “beautifully embroidered with our love story,” a video of Taylor-Joy in the empty chapel, a shot of her, McRae, Delevingne, 31, and Faena, and a photo of the “anatomically correct heart cakes” she and her husband enjoyed. “Happy second ( first ) anniversary my love…you’re the coolest 🫀,” she captioned her post.

McRae shared a post on Instagram marking the anniversary, too, which included the same video of Taylor-Joy and photo of the couple with their friends, but also a solo shot of the actress in her wedding dress with a long white veil.

"I love you now and somehow I always have and somehow it will never end. Happy two year anniversary (yesterday), beautiful," the musician wrote in the post's caption.

Related: Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth Unveil Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga Details at CinemaCon

The couple’s second wedding took place in Venice, and a host of A-list stars were in attendance, including Miles Teller, Julia Garner, Nicholas Hoult and Evan Ross. A source told PEOPLE at the time that they enjoyed a terrace brunch at the St. Regis the day after their wedding, and Taylor-Joy was “a vision.”

In photos obtained by the Daily Mail, the Mad Max: Furiosa star wore the same Dior wedding dress for the Italy ceremony as she did in New Orleans.

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Taylor-Joy met McRae at the premiere of The Queen's Gambit in 2021, and two days later, McRae wrote a song about her, which he revealed on Instagram a year later.

"I wrote this song for Anya two days after meeting her. It’s called ‘Really Want to See You Again,' " he wrote in the caption.

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