Roseanne Barr dumped her lawyer, her manager, her publicist, and her sister, then handed her whole life over to Tom Arnold—the detoxed stand-up comic who became her second husband in 1990. But was theirs a marriage of true minds—or a disaster waiting to happen?
September 1990: It is 2:30 on a Wednesday afternoon and Tom Arnold is pushing his wife, Roseanne Barr, up against the wall of their office on the CBS/MTM lot, where Roseanne is taped. He is large—well over six feet and two hundred pounds—and Barr, who is small and round, hits him on the chest. “Owwww,” she says, punching him with tiny fists. “You’re hurting me.” Arnold throws his arms around her, bumping her against the wall again. “You’re back,” he says. “You’re always back for more.”
Barr beams at her husband. They have been married for almost a year, have known each other for seven. “Our engagement rings have six diamonds around the outside,” Arnold explains. “For each year of our friendship. The yellow diamond in the middle is for when we had sex.” Barr grabs his arm. “The center diamond is for when we fucked,” she says gleefully. Barr loves the word; she says it the way a child would—to be daring, to shock. “It’s my favorite word,” she has written. “It’s beautiful and coarse and ugly all at the same time.”
“Stop swearing,” Arnold says. “You sound like a truck-driver.” Barr looks wounded for a moment and fidgets with a scarf that is knotted on top of her head. She is wearing loose-fitting pants, a matching blouse, and brand-new black cowboy boots. She is surprisingly compact, wears no makeup, and seems vain only about her hands, which are beautiful and carefully manicured; her long tapered nails are painted wine red. Sensing her brief upset, Arnold rubs her forearm. “Isn’t he cute?” she says, putting her hand to his face. “You’re so damn cute. You look like Mickey Rourke. You look at a picture of Mickey Rourke upside down and he looks just like you.” Arnold looks embarrassed. “All women look the same upside down,” he says. “Ooooh,” says Barr, “you are so damn cute.”
Since Arnold and Barr’s affair went public two years ago in a blaze of tabloid press, they have been virtually inseparable. He manages her, he produces and guest-stars on Roseanne, and he co-writes her stand-up material. Arnold orchestrates every aspect of his wife’s life, from cover stories to investments to what she eats for lunch. These responsibilities used to fall to managers, lawyers, Barr’s former husband, Bill Pentland (with whom she has three children), and her sister Geraldine. Arnold fired or separated all of these people from Barr, except for her agents at William Morris, who recently negotiated a large, all-encompassing deal for Barnold Productions, Roseanne and Tom’s newly formed partnership. As a result of the firings, there are two pending lawsuits. Arlyne Rothberg, Barr’s former manager, is suing for $15 million, her alleged share of future earnings on deals she negotiated, and Bill Pentland is seeking at least $15 million from Barr and $3 million from Arnold. Pentland is claiming that Arnold undermined his marriage by telling Barr that her husband was “unreliable, non-supportive, and a detriment.”
This is pretty much the claim that a large part of Hollywood makes against Arnold himself. These people feel he turned their Rosie against them, but no one’s interest in Roseanne Barr is without complication. There is simply too much money at stake. Barr is one of the highest-paid performers on television, earning roughly $100,000 per episode, and she’ll make as much as $30 million more when her show goes into syndication in 1992. That makes her a valuable and vulnerable target. And since Arnold was until very recently a struggling stand-up comedian with a serious cocaine problem, he would seem to be a dubious choice for the role of savior. Yet that is exactly how Barr views him: the couple are a cult of two.
“We can’t be apart,” she says, looking at Arnold, who is still jamming her against the wall. “We’re mentally ill. We never get sick of each other. That’s how sick we are.” Arnold stares at her for a second. “Rosie,” he says, “you need to wax your face again. The hair’s coming out.”
“Don’t say that,” Barr yelps, genuinely hurt. Arnold is still inspecting her face. “I didn’t tell about the hair on your back,” he says, joking. She cracks up and stands on her toes, reaching up to Arnold’s collar. “Show the necklace I gave you.” She pulls a pendant out from under Arnold’s shirt. “It’s two dolphins,” Barr says. “Dolphins mate for life. I bought it for him in Hawaii. It’s real gold, too.” Arnold looks at the pendant. “I’m always going to wear this,” he says. “Always?” says Barr.
