Actor Omar Epps and R&B Wife Keisha’s Marriage Strong After Nearly 20 Years
Nearly 20 years after their 2006 wedding, actor Omar Epps and Keisha Spivey are still as in love as they were when they said “I do.” The couple have three children and sing each other’s praises on social media. Here are the swoon-worthy things Epps has said about Spivey over the years.
Omar Epps and his wife Keisha Spivey married almost 20 years ago
When Epps first saw Spivey, a member of the R&B group Total, at a party, he said the world stopped.
“When I first laid eyes on her I was like, what is that? Not who. She just looked like this beautiful painting,” he said on Live With Kelly and Ryan. “The room disappeared and here we are.”
They welcomed their first child in 2004 before tying the knot in 2006. Epps has said their connection is unlike anything he experienced before.
“She’s amazing. There’s no question that that’s my soulmate,” he told The Hollywood Reporter in 2018. “She anchors me in a way that I can only relate emotionally is like how I feel anchored by my mom. That’s the weight of what I feel; this connection to another person.”
He admitted he’s constantly learning from her.
“I’m constantly in my head and she’s helped me be more present,” he said. “She loves hard … and she’s taught me a lot, about everything.”
Epps said their secret to a long-lasting marriage was simply making the decision to never break up. This allowed them to approach conflict in a more level-headed manner.
“Our little secret sauce is we took breaking up off the table,” he told The New York Post in 2022. “And what that did for me personally, I can’t speak for her, but what that did for me was it changed the way that we had conflict … We still bump heads from time to time. We do it in such a respectful way.”
Even after years of marriage, the couple still makes time for romance.
“My wife and I were at an event, and she was looking great, so I had to take her hand and cut a rug,” he told People. “I’m more of a two-step vibe guy.”
Omar Epps and his wife Keisha Spivey share three children
Epps has one child, daughter Aiyanna, from a previous relationship. He and Spivey welcomed their first child together, K’mari, in 2004, followed by their first son, Amir, in 2007. He spoke about raising his three children.
“I got three different kids, so that’s three different personalities,” he said. “There is something with girls — at least in my experience — where there’s this innate connection of the father to have with them.”
He admitted the teenage years have been a bit more of a challenge, but he still loves being a father.
“They’re calmer when they’re babies, and then now that they’re teenagers and you got a whole different slate of emotions. For years, some of my friends who are older told me just to wait for their teenage years, and I was like, ‘No, my babies, they’re cool.’ And woo! What they said was right. With my son, with boys in general, they just have so much energy.”
Epps wrote the book From Fatherless to Fatherhood in 2018.
Who did he date before meeting his wife?
Before he met Spivey, Epps dated his Love and Basketball co-star Sanaa Lathan. They began dating while filming The Woods and decided not to disclose their relationship to director Gina Prince-Bythewood.
“When Sanaa did a chemistry read with Omar [before casting], she was great and their chemistry was off the hook. Didn’t know they were dating, though,” Prince-Bythewood told ESPN. “I’m glad I didn’t because it would’ve affected the casting.”
Lanthan said she had no intention of letting her relationship impact the film.
“Everybody has a different philosophy about chemistry, and I also knew that’s bulls***,” she said. “People are like, ‘If they’re together, that means they won’t have a chemistry.’ You either have chemistry with somebody or you don’t. It has nothing to do with if you’re dating or not. I instinctively knew, ‘This is not something that needs to get in the way.’”
Epps believed their real-life relationship made their onscreen chemistry more electric.
