Kerry Washington’s Husband Went From Football Pro to Fellow Actor (2024)

  • Little Fires Everywhere, starring and executive-produced by Kerry Washington and Reese Witherspoon, is available to stream on Hulu come March 18.
  • Washington, who plays Mia Warren, married Nnamdi Asomugha in 2013; they share two children together.
  • Asomugha is a former pro football player who pivoted to acting and producing for his second career. Films like Beasts of No Nation and Crown Heights top his resume.

Little Fires Everywhere, on Hulu March 18, stars Kerry Washington and Reese Witherspoon (both executive producers) as opposing forces Mia Warren and Elena Richardson, respectively. Provocative and engaging, it’s Desperate Housewives for a modern audience, its narrative grappling with themes of race, class, and sexism.

Adapted from the same-name novel by Celeste Ng, the eight-episode miniseries poses the following question: Who started the fires in the Richardsons’ home? Of course, you'll have to watch the show and get to know the characters better for the full story. But if you're anything like us, you'll also want to learn more about the leading ladies in real life.

Notoriously private about her personal life, Washington is married to a former NFL player and shares two biological children and one stepchild with the famed cornerback. His name is Nnamdi Asomugha, and you may want to remember it: Though football fans aren’t cheering him on anymore, he's forged a second career as a producer and actor.

Below, everything we know about the Nigerian-American who Washington calls her husband.

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Nnamdi Asomugha met Kerry Washington in the theater.

The couple met after Asomugha went with a mutual friend to see Washington perform in Race on Broadway. “The last time I did theater, it completely transformed my life. That’s where I met my husband,” Washington told Marie Claire in October 2018. Though Asomugha was in the audience that night, he’s no stranger to center stage. Most recently, he played Private First Class Melvin Peterson in the Pulitzer Prize-winning A Soldier’s Play, a murder mystery co-starring seasoned veterans David Alan Grier and Blair Underwood on Broadway.

They married in 2013 and have two children together.

In a super-secret wedding, Washington and Asomugha said “I do,” with People confirming the nuptials and citing their marriage certificate in June 2013. The union came after the couple had been dating for a year. According to E! News, the bride’s parents, Earl and Valerie Washington, were witnesses, and the groom’s sister, Chisaraokwu Asomugha, officiated.

A year later, Washington gave birth to their first child, a daughter, Isabelle Amarachi Asomugha, with their son, Caleb Kalechi Asomugha, following in 2016. But in October of 2018 during an interview on the Today show, Washington revealed that she’s actually “a mother of three," most likely referring to Asomugha's teenage daughter from a previous relationship.

Nnamdi Asomugha has had an impressive pro football career.

Asomugha played college football for the University of California, Berkeley, and was drafted in the first round of the 2003 NFL Draft by the Oakland Raiders, where he spent the first eight seasons of his career. A three-time Pro Bowler, he also spent time in Philadelphia Eagles and San Francisco 49ers jerseys.

He eventually retired in 2013, though the sports honors didn’t stop when he hung up his pads. In 2016, the cornerback was voted the Best Raider of the Past Decade by Pro Football Focus, per Vanity Fair.

After retiring from the NFL, he pivoted to acting.

His first major role came in 2009 on the Southern small-town sports drama Friday Night Lights, which starred Kyle Chandler as the head football coach of a Texas high school football team who take the game very seriously. But it wasn’t until rather recently, in 2015, when Asomugha began to really get noticed.

He was a producer for Beasts of No Nation, a 2015 wartime drama told from the point of view of a child soldier, which earned a Golden Globe nomination. Two years later, he starred in and produced the biopic Crown Heights. The film won an Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival and he received a nomination for Best Supporting Male at the 2018 Independent Spirit Awards. His latest film, Sylvie’s Love, just premiered at Sundance this year, so keep an eye out for the forthcoming theater release.

Crown Heights

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Coming to America made him want to get into movies.

It’s not possible for any of the above to have happened had Asomugha not seen Eddie Murphy’s seminal classic comedy, Coming to America. “I just watched how my dad and my uncle, my mom … everyone was just cracking up. They could relate because of the story line, and so that film just made a big impression. And I was like, ‘If I can do work that can bring some of these emotions out of people, then that’s when I know it’s good work,’” he told Vanity Fair. Fingers crossed that he eventually works on a project, either in front of or behind the camera, with his wife.

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He founded the Asomugha Foundation.

Formally founded in 2010, the Asomugha Foundation says its mission is “to ensure that those with fewer means are given the opportunity to obtain a quality education, and thereby transform themselves, their families, and communities.”

The foundation offers programs and partnerships with Los Angeles high schools that encourage students with disadvantaged backgrounds to seek the resources and encouragement they need for higher education. “I believe that success is like a roll of film; in order to develop you need exposure,” Asomugha said in a statement on the foundation's website.

He was a speaker at USC’s 2019 graduation.

For the USC School of Dramatic Arts graduation, the athlete-turned-thespian delighted students with an inspiring, charming, and self-deprecating speech. Beginning by revealing his favorite films—they’re Goodfellas, Coming to America, La Bella Vita, and It’s a Wonderful Life—he went on to encourage others to follow their dreams and allow themselves to grow in the face of scrutiny, no matter how much rejection they may face. “I never really knew what rejection felt like until I started acting,” he said.

Though private, he’s no stranger to public events.

While he and Washington are a very private pair, they've made appearances at high-profile events such as the 2019 Met Gala, where Washington arrived in sorbet ruffles embroidered with the words negativity and noise next to her date in navy blue. They also attended the SAG Awards in 2017, Tonys in 2018, and the Independent Spirit Awards in 2019.

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Sabrina Dhowre, Idris Elba, Gabrielle Union, Dwyane Wade, Karry Washington and Nnamdi Asomugha

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DeAnna Janes

DeAnna Janes is a freelance writer and editor for a number of sites, including Harper’s BAZAAR, Tasting Table, Fast Company and Brit + Co, and is a passionate supporter of animal causes, copy savant, movie dork and reckless connoisseur of all holidays. A native Texan living in NYC since 2005, Janes has a degree in journalism from Texas A&M and got her start in media at US Weekly before moving on to O Magazine, and eventually becoming the entertainment editor of the once-loved, now-shuttered DailyCandy. She’s based on the Upper West Side.

Kerry Washington’s Husband Went From Football Pro to Fellow Actor (2024)
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