Zach McGowan and his wife, Emily McGowan (née Johnson), met in college. They met at Carleton College. It was not love at first sight for them. It actually took her almost a year to warm up to him. For the longest time, his dedication to football kept her from going out with him. But as soon as he left it for the stage, their love affair began.
Zach McGowan’s wife hated football players.
Zach and Emily are both members of Carleton’s class of 2002, meaning they joined the institution just before the turn of the century. Zach chose Carleton because he wanted “an academically difficult institution in an unusual part of the nation.” Emily happened to be there. In 1998, the two met for the first time in the university’s Goodhue Dining Hall. He’d entered the hallway with his football buddies and she was ‘swiping meal cards’. In turn, he grinned and handed her his card, but she didn’t. “She didn’t want to talk to me,” the actor recalled in an interview in 2019.
“Emily will acknowledge that she had prejudices about footballers,” he continued. Even at a subsequent meeting, hosted by mutual friends, he could tell she “liked him a little bit,” but thought, “Ew, that football guy.” All this happened during their freshman year in college. Zach had to choose between football and theater for his sophomore year. He went with the latter. The choice may or may not have been inspired by his feelings for her, but it certainly helped his love life.
She changed her mind about him after seeing him perform on stage. To get closer to her, he even persuaded a professor to associate them with an educational science project project they were both taking. Zach’s efforts were successful and they began dating towards the end of his sophomore year. They have been married for almost ten years and together for over two decades.
The Family Life of Four Children by Zach McGowan
Zach married Emily on September 27, 2008 and they have a wonderful family. They are currently the parents of four children. They had doubts about starting a family, but finally decided to go for it. Elsie, the couple’s first child, was born on March 24, 2011. She is 11 years old at the time of writing and loves soccer. Nelly, their second child, was born on April 9, 2014. Finally, on October 20, 2019, their third and fourth children, twins Vinnie and Josie, were born.
The family of six exceptionally handsome people now regularly attend movie premieres and red carpet events. When Zach is not a celebrity, he generally enjoys having fun at home with his kids and uploading images to Instagram. His Instagram is chock full of photos of his family over the years.
