Ryan Gosling's Wife Eva Mendes Actually Was At The 2024 Oscars

It's okay, Oscar viewers! Ryan Gosling's wife Eva Mendes was there to support him at this evening's telecast.

Gosling, as many probably know, earned a nomination for supporting actor at this year's Academy Awards for his stunning, scene-stealing comedic turn as Ken in Greta Gerwig's box-office smash "Barbie." Whenever actors attend the Oscars, their partners are typically on hand to support them, but Gosling walked the red carpet with his sister Mandi Gosling — and everyone noticed when the ceremony's host, Jimmy Kimmel, joked that Gosling is so gorgeous that the two men should go camping without their wives. So, why wasn't Mendes in the audience alongside her husband?

In an Instagram post, Mendes posed in front of Gosling's dressing room, celebrating her partner's success this awards season. The two are very rarely seen in public together, so it's not entirely surprising that she didn't appear at the ceremony on Gosling's arm. Still, it's good to know that the actress is there to support him for his latest nomination — even though, as of this writing, he lost the award to Robert Downey Jr. (who took home the statue for his supporting turn in "Oppenheimer"). 

So how did this elusive Hollywood couple link up in the first place? Ryan Gosling and Eva Mendes worked on the 2012 family drama "The Place Beyond the Pines" together, where Mendes plays the ex-girlfriend of Gosling's character (and the mother of their child) — but in April of 2023, Mendes clarified that they didn't get together romantically while working on the movie. "Magic is Real," Mendes wrote in an Instagram post. "We did not meet on set. The magic started way before but here's a little magic captured on camera. Gracias to the increíble director Derek Cianfrance."

The couple now have two children together and are incredibly sweet about each other whenever the topic comes up. In 2023, Gosling even said that he wasn't even sure he wanted children, but that changed when he met Mendes. "I wasn't thinking about kids before I met her," he told GQ. "But after I met Eva, I realized that I just didn't want to have kids without her."

This all comes full circle when it comes to "Barbie," because when one of Mendes and Gosling's kids left their Ken doll facedown in a mud puddle, Gosling felt inspired to play Ken and told director Greta Gerwig he was all in on the project. Ultimately, we have Mendes to thank, in a roundabout way, for Gosling's star turn in "Barbie."

Ryan Gosling is very likely happy that Eva Mendes was at the Oscars to support him for his most high-profile nomination to date — and it was well-earned. As the narrator Helen Mirren puts it at the beginning of the film, "Barbie [played by Margot Robbie] has a good day every day. Ken [Gosling] only has a good day when Barbie looks at him." At first, that's true; Ken's very existence depends on whether or not Barbie pays him any mind. When they journey to the real world, though, Ken has a startling discovery — outside of the matriarchal Barbie Land, men are the ones with power, and Ken loves that possibility. When he returns to Barbie Land before Barbie gets there, he installs a hastily made patriarchy, overtaking Barbie's dream house and renaming it as Ken's "Mojo Dojo Casa House." 

Between Ken's descent into half-baked sexism and his show-stopping dream ballet "I'm Just Ken" — where he and the rest of the Kens since and dance their feelings and wonder if they're "enough" — Gosling is a tour de force in "Barbie," and he certainly deserved his award. It's not surprising that Mendes was present to support him, but it's definitely a sweet gesture from Gosling's longtime partner.

For fans who adored Gosling's stellar 2023 performance, be sure to read about how he hilariously compared Ken to men on "The Bachelorette" and how he pushed for a wild Ken fight involving his iconic mink coat.