Inside Anna Nicole Smith’s confusing marriage to 89-year-old J.Howard Marshall

One of the biggest question fans wonder about the gorgeous 90s model Anna Nicole Smith is whether she married her 89-year-old billionaire husband for money or love— a question presented with multiple answers in the new Anna Nicole Smith: You Don’t Know Me documentary on Netflix.

J. Howard Marshall was 63 years older than Anna when they finally married in 1994 at the White Dove Wedding Chapel in Texas after years of romantic phone calls, co-parenting her son, and many elaborate presents. So, in case you’re intrigued by the confusing age-gap relationship, here’s every other detail you need to know about Anna Nicole Smith and her second husband and oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall:

Signs Anna Nicole Smith married for money

Credit: Sipa/Shutterstock

When Anna and Howard met in the early 90s they had massively different backgrounds. Anna was a stripper in Gigi’s club in Houston and Howard was a Yale Law grad and oil mogul with a multi-million dollar fortune.

On the day they met in 1991, Anna agreed to go out for lunch with Howard the following day and they ordered lunch to his hotel room. During the meal, Anna complained about having to go back to work for her late shift and Howard gave her an envelop of $1,000, telling her: ‘“Don’t go to work, my Lady Love. You don’t have to ever go back to work,” Interview reports.

In the following months and years, Howard bought Anna a house, horses, diamonds, a Rolls Royce, and other humungous presents. When they married in 1994, speculation started that Anna had married him for money, which she denied.

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On the wedding day in June at Houston’s White Dove Wedding Chapel, New York Magazine reported immediately after Anna and Howard had sealed their marriage with a kiss, she told her husband she had to fly out of the state to a photoshoot immediately and Howard “sat crying in his wheelchair.”

Signs Anna Nicole Smith married for love

Credit: Sipa/Shutterstock

After meeting Anna in 1991, Howard asked Anna to marry him several times, which she refused to do until she’d made a name for herself independently through modelling and acting with campaigns for Playboy and Guess. She married Howard when her career was in full swing and he was 89 years old.

After gold-digging allegations had gone on for years, Anna attempted to set the story straight during a Larry King interview in 2002, claiming Howard had given her something that was worth more than money and she’d never had in life before.

“I loved him for so much for what he did for me and my son,” Anna said. “I’ve never had love like that before. No one has ever loved me, and done things for me, and respected me and didn’t care about what people said about me.”

Notably, although Howard allegedly promised Anna half of his £1.3billion fortune, the money he’d left her had only ever been spoken about between them— not put into his will or any other official legal documents. Many fans have pointed out that to not have her inheritance put down in writing, means either Anna wasn’t a gold digger at all, or a very bad one.

In Netflix’s new documentary, one of Howard’s attorneys, Kelly Moore, utterly denies Anna Nicole Smith married Howard for money: “They were both extraordinary people that other people were always trying to take pieces of,” she said. “Howard and Anna were protection for each other.”

Anna Nicole Smith: You Don’t Know Me is available on Netflix now. For all the latest Netflix news, drops, quizzes and memes like The Holy Church of Netflix on Facebook. 

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