Christine Marinoni, an education activist and LGBTQ+ advocate, is widely recognized as the wife of Sex and the City star Cynthia Nixon. The couple met in 2001, began dating in 2004, and married in May 2012 after New York passed the Marriage Equality Act. Their relationship came after Nixon's 15-year partnership with a man, Danny Mozes, with whom she had two children.
Who Is Christine Marinoni?
Marinoni was born in 1969 in Washington State and grew up on Bainbridge Island, across from Seattle. She moved to New York in the early 1990s and earned a degree in economic development from Columbia University. In 1995, the year she came out as a lesbian, she opened an LGBTQ-friendly coffee shop in Park Slope, Brooklyn.
Her professional focus has been education reform. As an education organizer, Marinoni founded the Alliance for Quality Education, a non-profit pushing for high-quality public schooling for all students across New York. She later served as senior adviser for community partnerships, reporting to New York City Deputy Mayor Richard Buery. In the administration of Mayor Bill de Blasio, she took a prominent role as senior adviser but stepped down in 2018 to support her wife's gubernatorial campaign.
How Did Cynthia Nixon and Christine Marinoni Meet?
Nixon and Marinoni met in 2001 while working on a campaign to reduce New York public school class sizes. At the time, Nixon was a spokesperson for Marinoni's Alliance for Quality Education. They were close friends before their relationship turned romantic, which happened sometime before the summer of 2004.
Nixon, who identifies as queer, had previously only dated men. In a 2010 interview with The Advocate, she explained her attraction: "I love her sexuality — it's a big part of what I love about her — but I feel like it was her. It wasn't something in me that was waiting to come out. It was like… How can I let this person walk by?"
Nixon also shared with Radio Times how Marinoni initially worried about the relationship: "When we started seeing each other, Christine kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, for me to panic about what this would mean — to my career or to myself — as if somehow I just hadn't noticed that she was a woman. And then she met my mother and that was when she stopped worrying about it."
Engagement and Wedding in 2012
The couple got engaged at a rally supporting same-sex marriage in New York in 2009, when it was not yet legal. They legally married in May 2012 after the city passed the Marriage Equality Act. For the wedding, Nixon wore a custom pale green Carolina Herrera gown, while Marinoni wore a dark suit with a matching green tie.
Reflecting on the marriage, Nixon told Radio Times: "Marriage was never a goal of mine. I was with my boyfriend for 15 years and we never got married. But it seemed like Christine and I did fight really hard for it and we had a lovely wedding. Why wouldn't I have done it?"
Cynthia Nixon's Children and Family
Nixon has three children in total. With Danny Mozes, her college sweetheart and partner from 1988 to 2003, she has two children: Samuel Joseph Mozes (Seph), born in November 1996, and Charles Ezekiel Mozes, born on 16 December 2002. Nixon was pregnant with Charles during the fourth season of Sex and the City, which coincided with her character's pregnancy.
In 2018, Nixon publicly expressed pride when Seph came out as transgender. She posted on Instagram: "I'm so proud of my son Samuel Joseph Mozes (called Seph), who graduated college this month."
Marinoni gave birth to Max Ellington Nixon-Marinoni in February 2011, with the assistance of a male friend. Before that, Marinoni endured five miscarriages, and her sixth pregnancy was successful. She told The New York Times: "I always just pictured myself like a little worker bee my entire life. But it's like this amazing gift." After Max's arrival, Marinoni took time off work to be a stay-at-home mum, also raising her stepchildren.
Cynthia Nixon's Career and Activism
Cynthia Nixon is an American actress, activist, and theatre director. She has won two Primetime Emmy Awards, two Tony Awards, and a Grammy Award, making her one of the few actresses to achieve three of the four major American entertainment awards. She is best known for playing Miranda Hobbes in HBO's Sex and the City, a role that earned her the first Emmy. She also starred in, directed, and executive produced the sequel And Just Like That…
Nixon has been politically active on abortion access, cancer awareness, public school funding, and LGBTQ equality. In 2018, she ran for Governor of New York State. In May 2026, Cynthia and Christine celebrated their 14th wedding anniversary.
