The Real Life Partners Of The Jersey Shore Cast

The cast of MTV's Jersey Shore has come a long way since dodging grenades at Karma and bringing randoms into the smush room. Eventually, one final cab arrives, and rather than driving you to the clubs where you fist-pumped away your wanton youth, it drives you straight into adulthood.

Since the groundbreaking reality TV series first aired in 2009, and subsequently enraged New Jersey's then-governor, the cast has undergone dramatic transformations — and we're not just talking about JWoww's alleged plastic surgery. Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino found sobriety and paid his debt to society with a brief prison stint. DJ Pauly D became one of the highest-paid DJs in the world. Some of the cast even — albeit temporarily — squashed their beef with Angelina Pivarnick. They're growing up, and if there's any proof, it's in the way nearly every person in the Jersey Shore family has settled down.

Sure, the meatballs may still spend an occasional moment spiraling like the old days at Jenkinson's Boardwalk, but most of the Jersey Shore cast are now married or, at the very least, doting parents. So, who managed to tame these wild, perfectly-tanned souls? Here are the real-life partners of the Jersey Shore cast.

Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi and Jionni LaValle have Jersey Shore's most enduring relationship. The pair famously started as what was supposed to be a one-night stand following a now-infamous night at Karma. As Snooks told Larry King, "I hated him at first. I was just like, 'Oh, he's cute. He'll do for tonight.'" At the time of this writing, LaValle has done for a decade, and the pair share three children. In fact, Polizzi was the first of the cast to settle down.

Per Insider, the pair split during the cast's trip to Italy in 2011. Their epic fight will forever remain in the MTV history books and delivered us our golden mantra: "I am heartbroken so let me dance." Shortly after, the couple reconciled, Polizzi fell pregnant, and the pair decided to tie the knot. The rest is history, but who actually is LaValle? 

We barely see Snooki's husband on the series, and it turns out that's intentional. The entrepreneur revealed on Instagram that being on television just isn't his thing. Instead, he's focused on his business. According to InTouch, LaValle previously ran an ATM business and a T-shirt company (Snooks probably recused herself after all that time spent reluctantly pressing t-shirts at the Shore Store). He also enjoys playing golf.

Like Snooki, Jenni "JWoww" Farley found love at the Jersey Shore, which lasted the better part of a decade. According to an MTV retrospective, the reality star met truck driver Roger Mathews while filming Season 1 of the show — but she had a boyfriend. Shortly after her split in 2010, the Daily Mail caught the castmate canoodling with her future husband. Unfortunately, the rest of their love story played out like a modern-day Shakespearean tragedy.

Mathews and Farley tied the knot in 2015, the year after the reality star gave birth to their first child. According to People, she announced baby No. 2 at the wedding reception. Things went strong for about three more years until 2018, when Farley filed for divorce amidst tensions regarding their son's developmental delays (and later autism diagnosis). The truck driver publicly vowed to keep "fighting" for his marriage, but months later, it became clear that reconciliation was off the table. 

In December, Farley shocked fans when she was granted a temporary order of protection against her husband. As E! put it, Mathews seemingly had "a meltdown" in the wake of the incident. The following month, JWoww posted a video with an open letter detailing Mathews' alleged abuse (via PageSix). People reports that the couple's divorce was finalized in 2019, and, at the time of this writing, they are currently working on co-parenting their two children. Mathews also eventually owned up to getting physical, according to The Hollywood Gossip.

At the time of this writing, Jenni Farley appears to be going strong with professional wrestler Zack Clayton Carpinello, who's almost nine years her junior. That's not to say it's been smooth sailing. The pair's relationship famously blew up faster than a so-called grenade when the reality star came out of MTV retirement for Jersey Shore: Family Vacation.

As fans know, there was a bizarre incident where Farley got trashed enough at a club to basically fall asleep on the dance floor, and 24 — as he was dubbed — got handsy with Angelina. It was enough to make Farley's castmates vocally uncomfortable, which takes a Herculean effort considering that in the early seasons, everyone pretty much watched everyone else get it in. Snooki drunkenly flashing her lady parts in 2011 is merely a blip on their hungover radar, for scale.

After the mother-of-two saw the episode, that hazy night became Claritin clear (being sober tends to do that). She took to Instagram expressing her hurt and promptly ended things, according to ET. The split was very short-lived, and per Us Weekly, Farley decided to "hit the reset button." Apparently, one of the athletes' main draws was his performance in bed. While we know little of his actual wrestling skills, Farley admitted (via Us Weekly), "He turns into this f**king monster in bed. I was like, 'Are you an escort? What's going on?' It wasn't normal. I had to look up positions and stuff." 

Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino has done a lot of work on himself over the years — from finding sobriety to serving his prison sentence gracefully. Overall, he seems to be one of the most transformed cast members, and it's a good thing. If he didn't do the work, he might have never ended up with his wife Lauren Pesce, who'd been waiting on the sidelines all these years.

According to Us Weekly, Sorrentino and Pesce were college sweethearts who dated for three years before the reality star found MTV fame. They parted on good terms and stayed in touch, but nonetheless, the lifestyle blogger didn't keep up with her ex's antics on the show. Considering that'd require her to watch her former lover lure countless women into hot tubs night after night, can you really blame her? "I didn't like a lot of the things he did [on the show], but we weren't together! I was just glad he had found success," she told Us Weekly. 

Sitch ended up reconnecting with Pesce when his series ended, and she stuck by his side through his numerous legal issues. The pair tied the knot shortly before he began his eight-month prison sentence for tax evasion. Most recently, he's found himself in a brand new situation — fatherhood. At the time of this writing, the pair are expecting their first child in May 2021.

Pauly D actually made a career out of beating up the beat and is one of the few cast members to find more success outside of the Jersey Shore than within it. You know what they say: you can take the dude outside of Jersey, but you can't take his hair gel. Though the hard-partying DJ seemed like the least likely to settle down, he did unexpectedly transform into a doting father, thanks to a one-night stand named Amanda Markert.

There's not a whole lot we know about Markert, as she wasn't famous when she did the deed. According to TMZ, she's a former Hooters waitress who met Pauly D in Las Vegas at a Hard Rock Hotel pool party. The pair reportedly "got wasted" (enough that she sprayed the crowd watching his DJ set with a bottle of champagne) and jumped into bed without taking any precautions. Nine months later, out came a baby, and Pauly D was fully willing to embrace his new role, at least once he finally discovered the news. According to R Online, another man named Donn Barbitta believed the five-month-old kid was his.

Per TMZ, Markert and Pauly D battled for custody, but anyone who's watched Family Vacation knows that the pair are working on co-parenting. Markert also has another child with a baby daddy she allegedly "bloodied" in a "brutal fist fight," according to TMZ.

It seems like a reality dating show is the absolute last place you'd actually find love, but Pauly D seems to have achieved the impossible. This time, it took a double-take rather than a double shot. According to Hollywood Life, Pauly D met his girlfriend Nikki Hall on Season 1 of his MTV spinoff series, Double Shot At Love. In case you're unfamiliar, it was essentially The Bachelor with a bigger hairspray budget — if that's even possible. Men's Health reports that Hall made it all the way to the finale, but he dumped her because he wasn't ready to give up the single life. They dated off-screen for a bit, but by the time the reunion special aired, they had called it quits for real. 

Nevertheless, Hall persisted. She was welcomed back for Season 2, where the pair decided to give it another go. Now, it's apparently serious enough that, as People reports, the couple started quarantining together once the pandemic hit. Pauly D even brought her home to meet the Jersey Shore family during Season 4. As Vinny Guadagnino put it, "2020 is officially the craziest year ever — Pauly has an actual boo." 

While it's not exactly clear what Hall does in her time off the show, she appears to be either a model or an Instagram influencer and has managed to rack up more than 260,000 followers on the platform. She also likes to cook.

Since rising to fame on Jersey Shore, Vinny Guadagnino has been famously single — and we're guessing it has nothing to do with spending a large chunk of his adulthood living with his mother in Staten Island. Though his noble efforts on Double Shot at Love failed, it's looking like that may change, all thanks to Snooki.

According to InTouch, the Keto Guido has been linked to Too Hot Too Handle's Francesca Farago since the summer of 2020 when the pair were caught flirting on Twitter and on a date in New York City. For the latter, the Canada-bred beauty opted for a seasonably appropriate outfit revealing full-on underboob. That's one way to avoid boob sweat during the city's historically humid summers. 

For those who forget, Farago became the arguable villain of Netflix's hit series after falling for Aussie Harry Jowsey, flagrantly ignoring all the rules, and costing the crew $29,000. Vinny, on the other hand, could have very well slept with more than 1,000 different women — or at least that's what he said during an interview on WFAN Sports Radio – and Farago is poised to be lucky 1,001. Per an interview with the Not Skinny But Not Fat podcast, the pair were set up by Snooki and are "casually talking" (i.e., totally about to get married). Who makes a better match than two people who both abysmally failed at finding love on a reality dating show?

As much as we love to fantasize about a world without the infamous note, a world where Sammi Sweetheart's cup of RonRon Juice runneth over, that's just not the world we live in. Alas, Ronnie Ortiz-Magro had to motorboat a waitress at B.E.D, and his love life seemed to spiral downhill from there.

If you've been anywhere near TMZ during the last three years, you've probably seen Ortiz-Magro and Jen Harley's torrid relationship play out in real-time. According to InTouch, the pair started dating sometime after Ron split from his Famously Single co-star Malika Haqq in February 2017. By the summer, the influencer was pregnant, and the New York native was packing his bags for Vegas.

According to TMZ, Harley and Ortiz-Magro eventually ended things for good and remain dedicated co-parents to the daughter they welcomed in April 2018 — but it's taken a long road (and a couple of restraining orders) to get there. In January 2020, Ortiz-Magro claimed Harley attacked him with eyeliner, while the most horrific publicized incident that occurred in 2018 had the aftermath play out on Family Vacation. Per TMZ, Harley reportedly "hit Ronnie in the face," then "dragged him" with a car as he "tried to get out," leaving blood all over the interior console. Despite Harley's nefarious fame, the inadvertent tabloid villain didn't chase reality TV dreams. Instead, she got her real estate license. Maybe she can repurpose her mugshot for her LinkedIn.

Though Ronnie Ortiz-Magro has had a tough time in recent years, the star did manage to find a new flame, and it sounds like the real deal. The New York native told Us Weekly that he met his girlfriend, Saffire Matos, in Miami in February 2020. They initially talked for "four or five months" before the coronavirus pandemic caused some major roadblocks and sent them apart. Ultimately, they rekindled their romance right before Ortiz-Magro left to film Family Vacation.

"She supports me. She loves me, you know, and that's something that I've always looked for," he gushed to Us Weekly. "And I feel like that's [some]thing that I have not gotten in return and it's [some]thing that I've always given to other people."

So, who really is Ortiz-Magro's new boo? According to HollywoodLife, she's an eyelash technician who works in Staten Island and Manhattan. She lives somewhere in New York City, and (per her Instagram stories) she's already calling him her "future hubby."

Deena Nicole Cortese has been with her husband Chris Buckner for a while, and according to E!, the pair revealed in October 2020 that they're expecting their second child in May 2021 — just like the Situation. As such, at the time of this writing, we're anticipating a Jersey Shore revival with both of the babies in about two decades when they're old enough to legally binge drink.

Though Buckner is not a main fixture on Family Vacation, we do know a little bit about the meatball's longtime lover. According to the father's Facebook account, he's from Edison, N.J. That's not far from where Cortese grew up in New Egypt. He also works in the world of publishing at Professional Sports Publications, a company that prints gameday programs, magazines, and sports-related yearbooks.

Furthermore, the couple's wedding website sheds some light on their love story, which largely remained out of the public eye. The pair reportedly met at a local pub through mutual friends in 2011 after Cortese filmed Season 4 of Jersey Shore. She proceeded to "creep and stalk" him online, sent a Facebook friend request, met up once again, and the rest is history. The pair tied the knot in 2017, welcomed their first baby in 2019, and are patiently awaiting their next little meatball.

At the time of this writing, it's been nearly a decade since the original Jersey Shore aired its final season. Nonetheless, Sammi "Sweetheart" Giancola's angry cries of "Rahnnnnn!" will probably echo across the shore house forevermore — even though she's totally moved on. Let's face it: Sam's relationship with Ronnie was cursed, and Giancola famously removed herself from the Jersey Shore narrative when she declined to appear on Family Vacation because she wanted to "avoid potentially toxic situations" (via app). Instead, this former reality star is focusing on her life with her fiancé Christian Biscardi.

In an interview with E!, Giancola revealed that Biscardi wasn't in the public eye, a trait she found "refreshing." Honestly, who wouldn't, after watching the toxicity of her last relationship play out in a series of drunken arguments on MTV. Though we don't know a ton about her future husband, we do know that he enjoys luxury cars and put his passion towards launching a new YouTube channel called The Stables. He's an aspiring YouTube star of sorts. He also adores Giancola and, according to InTouch, admitted he's "very lucky" to have his future wife and that she's got "great eyebrows." Indeed, she does.

Sadly, Us Weekly reported that the couple's nuptials were postponed because of the coronavirus pandemic. They reportedly plan to tie the knot in September 2021.

Angelina Pivarnick is a taken woman — and we're guessing no one is sadder than Vinny. According to MTV, the castmates knew each other in high school before they drunkenly hooked up in Season 2. To this day, Pauly D still claims that the pair needs "to pound it out." Alas, that will never happen because, as we saw during the epic wedding blowout in Family Vacation, Pivarnick tied the knot.

Pivarnick's love story with Chris Larangeira is full-on adorable. After all, he's a sanitation worker, and Pivarnick was once dubbed the Staten Island dump. It's a match made in heaven and trash, and one that's been a long time coming. In an interview with People, Pivarnick revealed, "I had known Chris for 14 years, and he says the reason he never hit on me was because I always had a boyfriend. We both worked in the mall when we were younger, and he says he used to see me walk past with a different boyfriend every week."

The pair ended up reconnecting at a pool party and got engaged in January 2018. "It's hysterical that I'm going to marry a garbage man," she told People. "And he's so cute. He's like 6'3", he's jacked, he's tan, and he's Portuguese and Italian." Larangeira marked Pivarnick's third engagement, so apparently, the third time really is a charm.