America Ferrera and Her Husband Ryan Piers Williams Were *So* Cute at the 2024 Oscars

National Treasure Barbie™️ aka America Ferrera and her husband Ryan Piers Williams have been together for almost 20 years—a literal lifetime by Hollywood standards. The longtime couple met during a fated casting call for one of Ryan's first short films (America was auditioning 🥺), and the rest is history! Since then, the celebs have gotten married, welcomed two kids, and have collabed a ton. Like, Ryan legit made a cameo in America's record-breaking 2023 blockbuster film, Barbie (casual!).

Though Disney kids grew up with America throughout the early aughts thanks to projects like the Oscar-robbed film Gotta Kick It Up!, a bit less is known about her husband. Enter: us, whose literal job it is to be nosy AF. Below, everything you need to know about Ryan, starting with the fact that...

He met America during a casting for his short film

The year? 2005. The setting? A casting for Ryan's first film after graduate school titled Muertas. Yep, turns out these lovebirds met while America was an undergraduate student at the University of Southern California auditioning to be in the eight-minute short film whose premise focused on an American journalist investigating the murders of young girls and women in Juarez, Mexico.

While discussing his film in 2011, Ryan said the following to El Paso Inc.: “I want to bring awareness to the issue. I'm trying to put a face to one of the girls who's been murdered, to give people a better idea of what's going on in Juarez. You can't predict how people are going to respond, you can only hope that you're going to inspire somebody to want to learn more about the issue.”

They got married in 2011

After dating for five years, the longtime couple got engaged in 2010 and officially tied the knot on June 27, 2011 in Chappaqua, New York. Oh, and if these two couldn't get any cooler, they held their ceremony at the home of America's Ugly Betty costar Vanessa Williams *and* had it officiated by Judith Light!!

In a subsequent interview with SiriusXM in 2021, America recalled how she wound up saying her "I do's" in Vanessa's home, and the story is truly equal levels of 🥺 and 😂 to say the least. "She is a mother to me, I love her so dearly, and if you would have told my little self that freaking Angela from Who's the Boss was gonna officiate my wedding...," the actor began.

"But then here's the kicker, we got married at Vanessa Williams's house in New York. This was right after Ugly Betty, and our Ugly Betty cast is such a family. When I told Vanessa that I was engaged, she just started sending me pictures of her backyard, she's like, 'This is where you'll get married.' I didn't think she was serious, but she was," America added.

Oh, and despite being an intimate ceremony, there was no shortage of major star power on the actor's special day. Just a few of the celebs in attendance? Mark Indelicato, Rebecca Romijn, and America's Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants costars Blake Lively, Alexis Bledel, and Amber Tamblyn.

They have a nonprofit together

America, Ryan, and *checks notes* Wilmer Valderrama founded the company Harness shortly after the 2016 presidential election. The purpose of the nonprofit is to create opportunities for artists, influencers, and organizers to make a political impact.

"Nothing changes in just one election," the actor told Vogue in a February 2019 interview with the outlet about the project. "We won some important races, but there’s a deeper issue here, which amounts to a crisis of civics in this country: how politicians on both sides are all too ready to have people not be engaged until it serves them."

Shortly after launching Harness, America teamed up with Cosmo to have a conversation with a panel of activists about the culture of modern-day activism and said, "It’s one thing to sit on a computer and read about issues, or watch someone's story. But what changes us is being in a relationship to other people face-to-face. So whether that’s having a conversation in your community, attending a conversation, attending a town hall, attending a local organization's teach-in, or leading or holding your own, building community is transformative."

Literally didn't think we could love her more if we tried, but here we are!

They share two children

America and Ryan currently share two children: a son named Sebastian, 5, and a daughter named Lucia Marisol, 3. Though the bb's have understandably been kept fairly out of the spotlight, America has opened up about parenthood a ton during interviews. Case in point? During an appearance on Live with Kelly and Ryan in 2019 when she gushed about raising their first child with Ryan and said, "It's amazing, he has so much personality. Yesterday, I caught him for the first time standing up in his crib. I was like, 'Oh, pray for me, he's about to get very mobile.' But it's just so much fun, we're having a blast. Now, he wants daddy and you know he's bonding more with other people."

The Ugly Betty actor also dished the iconic fact to Entertainment Tonight that both of her kids visited her on the set of the Barbie movie.

"My kids got to visit me one day on the Barbie set. They didn't know what to make of it. They think that when I'm not with them, I live and work in Barbie land," she dished. Tbh, we're not not jealous lol.

...And seem to have hilariously different parenting styles

During an appearance on Conan O'Brian's talkshow, the actor opened up about how her parenting style is different from her husband's. "We differ, yeah, a lot. I do things for the child, that the child wants and needs," America began before revealing, "Like, you know, I'll listen to 'Wheels on the Bus' and read him One Fish Two Fish, and Ryan will listen to Cardi B, like whatever he wants to, and then he reads him, like, A Brief History of Time."

America and Ryan 🤝🏻 iconic parenting dualities.

He's an artist

'Kay, so not only does Ryan work in the film industry *and* have a nonprofit, but he's also an artist! And according to his website, his "artistic endeavors delve into the complex facets of human nature."

A buncha cool works by him for your viewing pleasure below:

He was in the Barbie movie

Nope, turns out you totally weren't dreaming when you thought you may have spotted Ryan in Barbie. The 42-year-old really is in the project and was even hilariously cast as America's character's Spanish-learning husband.

And to make matters more ~meta~, the film's script even snuck in an Easter egg when Ryan tells Barbie "Si se puede" (aka "Yes, you can" in Spanish)—a nostalgic phrase that calls back to America's 2002 Disney Channel movie Gotta Kick It Up!

While speaking with People about how Ryan nabbed the role, the actor revealed, "It came about because on my first Zoom with [director Greta Gerwig]. I was telling her all my favorite parts of the script and all the parts that made me laugh out loud." "And I said, 'Oh, my god, I laughed so hard when you cut to the dad doing his Spanish lessons, because my husband was literally in the other room doing his Spanish lessons,'" she added.

"Right away she was like, 'Oh, my God, does he want to play your husband?' And I was like, 'I don't know, you'll have to ask him.' When it came time, she was like, 'Remember when I asked you if your husband would play your husband?' And he said yes. So, it was really fun."

And he went to the Oscars (and after-party!) with America

The Barbie co-stars and power couple hit up the Oscars together, where they shared *many* sweet moments. First things first, their red carpet look:

While America didn't snag the award for Best Supporting Actress, she still seemed in good spirits with Ryan at the Vanity Fair Oscars after-party:

TL;DR: These two are the literal definition of a power couple!

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