Bryan Randall, photographer and Sandra Bullock's longtime partner, dies at 57 from ALS
Sandra Bullock's longtime partner Bryan Randall, a photographer and former model, died Saturday at age 57 after a private battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
"It is with great sadness that we share that on Aug. 5, Bryan Randall passed away peacefully after a three-year battle with ALS," his family said in a statement to The Times. "Bryan chose early to keep his journey with ALS private and those of us who cared for him did our best to honor his request."
"We are immensely grateful to the tireless doctors who navigated the landscape of this illness with us and to the astounding nurses who became our roommates, often sacrificing their own families to be with ours," the statement continued, also asking for privacy as family members grieve and "come to terms with the impossibility of saying goodbye to Bryan."
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His family requested donations be sent to a research fund at the ALS Assn. and Massachusetts General Hospital.
Randall and Bullock, 59, started dating in 2015 after they reportedly met when he photographed her son Louis' fifth birthday party. The two were private about their relationship, but were spotted around town together, including at Jennifer Aniston and Justin Theroux’s surprise Bel-Air wedding. Later that year, they started to make public appearances together, including at the Hollywood premiere of Bullock's political comedy “Our Brand Is Crisis."
Though public interest in Randall grew suddenly when he started dating Bullock, the Portland, Ore.-born photographer had been featured previously as a fashion model in major publications, including a 2011 Harper's Bazaar Singapore full-page spread as the muse of fashion icon Cindy Crawford.
Before dating Randall, the Oscar-winning "The Blind Side" and "Bird Box" actor was married to TV personality Jesse James for five years. Their relationship imploded in 2010 when several women came forward alleging they'd had extramarital affairs with James. Bullock filed for divorce later that year.
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Randall and Bullock were raising her two adopted children, Louis and Laila, along with Randall's daughter, Skylar. In 2021, Bullock spoke of her relationship with Randall while a guest on "Red Table Talk" alongside co-hosts Jada Pinkett Smith, Willow Smith and Adrienne Banfield-Norris. In explaining her decision not to marry Randall, she said she didn't "need a paper to be a devoted partner and devoted mother," and called her relationship with Randall and their family dynamic with their children "the best thing ever."
Bullock went on to describe Randall as "the example that I would want my children to have."
"I have a partner who's very Christian and there are two different ways of looking at things," she shared. "I don't always agree with him, and he doesn't always agree with me. But he is an example even when I don't agree with him."
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
