For most of Jean Smart’s adult life, there was Richard Gilliland.
He was there before Frasier, before 24, before Fargo, before Watchmen and long before Hacks transformed Smart into one of television’s most celebrated stars.
They met when Gilliland walked onto the set of Designing Women in 1986. They married the following year, raised two sons and remained together until his sudden death in March 2021.
Smart later described losing the person with whom she had shared roughly half her life as almost impossible to comprehend. Gilliland’s death from an unexpected heart condition left her raising their younger son without him and entering one of the greatest professional periods of her career while grieving privately. (People.com)
For years, it seemed difficult to imagine another romance becoming part of that story.
Then came actor Joe Pacheco.
And at 75, Smart is no longer walking Hollywood’s red carpets alone.
Before Joe, There Was Richard
Smart was just beginning Designing Women when Richard Gilliland arrived to guest-star during the show’s first season.
He wasn’t even playing her character’s boyfriend.
Gilliland portrayed J.D. Shackelford, the love interest of Annie Potts’ Mary Jo Shively.
But Smart noticed him immediately.
Speaking on Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ Wiser Than Me podcast in 2026, Smart remembered being particularly taken with Gilliland’s smile. Their romance developed rapidly after his appearance on the show. (People.com)
Smart even devised a wonderfully old-fashioned excuse to get him alone.
She asked him to help her with crossword puzzles in her trailer.
It worked.
Their Romance Was ‘Fast and Furious’
Smart and Gilliland’s relationship didn’t involve years of wondering where things were headed.
They knew.
They married in June 1987, roughly a year after meeting.
Their first son, Connor, was born in October 1989. Smart has revealed that she discovered she was pregnant the same night her Designing Women character got married on television. (People.com)
Two decades later, the couple expanded their family again.
They adopted their younger son, Forrest, from China. Forrest joined the family in 2010 when he was 18 months old. (People.com)
For Smart, Richard wasn’t simply the man waiting at home while she built a career.
He was an actor too.
They Even Continued Working Together
Gilliland built a long television career of his own, appearing in series including The Waltons, Thirtysomething, Party of Five and Desperate Housewives.
The couple occasionally found themselves working on the same projects.
Years after Designing Women, they both appeared on 24. Smart portrayed First Lady Martha Logan, while Gilliland appeared as Captain Stan Cotter. (People.com)
Behind the scenes, however, their careers weren’t always perfectly balanced.
Smart has acknowledged that Gilliland made sacrifices for her career and their family.
After his death, that realization became especially painful.
There were things she wished they still had time to change.
They Expected to Have Many More Years Together
By early 2021, Smart and Gilliland had been together for roughly 35 years.
Nothing suggested to Smart that their life together was about to end.
Gilliland began experiencing pain when taking deep breaths. Smart initially wondered whether he might have COVID-19, which was a natural concern during that stage of the pandemic.
What followed was far more serious.
Gilliland had an unexpected heart condition and died on March 18, 2021, at 71. (People.com)
Smart was stunned.
She later said she had expected him to be around for at least another 20 years.
Instead, the future they had assumed they would share simply disappeared.
‘This Doesn’t Make Any Sense’
Three years after his death, Smart was still able to describe precisely how surreal the loss had felt.
She told Chris Wallace that losing a partner of 35 years was “indescribable.”
For roughly half of her life, Gilliland had been there.
Then suddenly he wasn’t.
Smart recalled the strange disbelief that accompanies such an unexpected death — the feeling that what has happened cannot possibly be real. (People.com)
And she didn’t have the luxury of retreating entirely into grief.
She was a mother.
Forrest was only 12 when his father died. (People.com)
Connor Came Home to Help His Mom and Brother
Smart and Gilliland’s sons are almost two decades apart in age.
Connor was already an adult when his father died.
Forrest was still a child.
After the loss, Connor stepped up dramatically for his family, at one point moving back home to support his mother and younger brother. (People.com)
Smart suddenly understood single parenthood in an entirely new way.
She later called raising a child alone after Richard’s death “unimaginable.” (People.com)
At precisely the same time, something extraordinary was happening professionally.
‘Hacks’ Arrived Just as Her Personal Life Fell Apart
Smart was working on Hacks when Gilliland died.
Her performance as legendary comedian Deborah Vance would become perhaps the defining role of her later career.
The show premiered in 2021 and transformed Smart into an awards-season powerhouse.
By September 2026, she had won an Emmy for every one of Hacks’ five seasons — five consecutive lead-comedy-actress victories — and reached eight career Emmys overall. (Variety Australia)
It’s an extraordinary contradiction in Smart’s story.
One of her greatest periods of professional recognition arrived during the years immediately following the worst loss of her personal life.
Romance Wasn’t Exactly Something She Expected to Revisit
Imagine going on a first date after spending more than three decades with one person.
That’s eventually what Smart did.
And the man sitting across from her was Joe Pacheco.
Pacheco is also an actor, with a career largely made up of television and character roles.
Their relationship developed quietly enough that, initially, many people didn’t realize Smart had begun seeing someone.
By June 2025, however, Smart acknowledged that she was dating a “wonderful actor.” (People.com)
The mystery didn’t last forever.
The actor was Pacheco.
Her New Partner Had Already Started Appearing Beside Her
Pacheco began accompanying Smart to major industry events.
He joined her at the 2025 Emmys.
By 2026, there was little attempt to hide that they were a couple.
At the January 2026 Golden Globes, Smart and Pacheco arrived holding hands.
The photographs were striking partly because audiences had spent decades seeing another man beside her.
Richard had been her red-carpet partner for years.
Now Smart was allowing herself to create new memories with somebody else.
And Yes — His Bright Blue Eyes Are Pretty Hard to Miss
Recent photographs of Pacheco show the silver-haired actor with striking light-colored eyes, one of the physical details that has attracted attention as pictures of the couple have circulated.
But Smart’s public comments suggest that what matters to her goes considerably deeper than appearance.
She has described the actor she was dating as “wonderful,” while their increasingly comfortable public appearances suggest the relationship has become an established part of her life. (People.com)
They don’t appear to be chasing attention.
They simply look increasingly comfortable standing beside each other.
They Held Hands at the ‘Hacks’ Premiere
Another unmistakable moment arrived at the premiere of Hacks’ fifth and final season.
Smart and Pacheco walked the carpet together, hand in hand.
PEOPLE now identifies Pacheco directly as Smart’s boyfriend. (People.com)
It represented a very different Jean Smart from the woman who, five years earlier, was attempting to comprehend the sudden death of the person she expected to grow old with.
Not someone who had “moved on” from Richard.
Someone whose life had continued.
There’s an important difference.
Finding Joe Has Never Meant Forgetting Richard
Smart continues to speak about Gilliland with enormous affection.
Her descriptions of him haven’t disappeared simply because another relationship entered her life.
In May 2026 — while already involved with Pacheco — she happily told Julia Louis-Dreyfus the story of falling for Richard on Designing Women. (People.com)
She remembered his smile.
His personality.
Their courtship.
The silly crossword-puzzle excuse she used to get him into her trailer.
She sounded like someone remembering an enormous love, because that’s exactly what it was.
Joe occupies a different chapter.
Richard Was There Before Most of Her Greatest Roles
Look at Smart’s career chronologically and Gilliland’s presence becomes even more remarkable.
He met her at the beginning of Designing Women.
Their marriage came before her memorable appearances on Frasier.
Before 24.
Before Samantha Who?
Before Fargo.
Before Watchmen.
Before Mare of Easttown.
And almost all the way to Hacks.
He knew the young actress building her career and the veteran performer who had become one of television’s most respected talents.
Their relationship wasn’t a footnote to Smart’s life.
It occupied almost 35 years of it.
Their Two Sons Remain at the Center of Her Life
Connor and Forrest have also become the bridge between the life Smart built with Richard and the one she lives now.
At the 2026 Emmys, 17-year-old Forrest accompanied his mother.
Smart made history that night with another Hacks victory, becoming the first performer to win an Emmy for every season of the show. (People.com)
But one of the most personal moments came during her acceptance speech.
Smart thanked Connor and Forrest.
She called her sons her “anchor.” (People.com)
It was a simple word carrying an enormous amount of history.
They are the family she and Richard created together.
Forrest Is Now Almost Grown
Forrest’s appearance beside his mother also offered a startling reminder of how much time has passed since Gilliland died.
He was 12 when he lost his father.
He is now 17.
Recent reporting says Forrest has even begun showing an interest in acting, participating in theater at school. (People.com)
Smart has maintained boundaries around his exposure to Hollywood, but he has occasionally accompanied her to awards ceremonies.
At the 2026 Emmys, he stood beside a mother experiencing yet another career high.
Five years earlier, they had been learning how to exist as a family without Richard.
Smart Herself Is 75 Now
Jean Smart turned 75 on September 13, 2026.
Two days later, she was celebrating another historic Emmy win.
Her career is arguably more acclaimed now than at any earlier point in her life.
She has eight Emmys.
She has completed five seasons of Hacks.
She has watched her younger son grow into a teenager.
And, unexpectedly, she has a partner beside her again. (Variety Australia)
That last part might be the transformation she least expected.
Her Story Isn’t Really About ‘Replacing’ Her Husband
Celebrity stories about widows finding romance often get compressed into a neat formula:
She lost the love of her life.
She grieved.
Then somebody new appeared and gave her a second happily-ever-after.
Real life is messier.
Pacheco doesn’t erase Gilliland.
And Smart’s willingness to date again doesn’t reduce what her marriage meant.
She spent almost 35 years with Richard.
They became parents together.
They built careers together.
She expected to grow old beside him.
His death changed that future without her consent.
Finding companionship again years later simply means another future became possible.
The Two Photographs Tell the Story Beautifully
Look at an older photograph of Smart and Gilliland walking hand in hand and there is something especially poignant about it now.
They were younger.
Smart was still decades away from becoming Deborah Vance.
Gilliland was still decades away from the illness neither of them could have anticipated.
They had no idea how much life remained ahead.
Now look at Smart beside Pacheco.
Different man.
Different era.
Different Jean.
The first photograph doesn’t become less meaningful because the second exists.
If anything, together they tell a fuller story.
One is about the person with whom Smart built nearly 35 years of her life.
The other is about discovering, after devastating loss, that life can still contain something unexpected.
And five years after Richard Gilliland’s death, Jean Smart has found someone whose hand she is willing to hold again. (People.com)
For more inspiring stories, read about how ‘My Girl’ Star Anna Chlumsky Walked Away From Hollywood at the Height of Her Fame or dive deeper into Jean Smart’s journey to finding love again.
