Theo James surprised fans at the 2023 Emmys when he announced that he welcomed his second baby with wife Ruth Kearney last year.
“We have a 4-month-old. We’re in the thick of it,” James, 39, announced during the KTLA5 Emmys red carpet show on Monday, January 15. “We have a daughter and then a 4-month-old son.”
James had his wife on hand for the awards show while celebrating his nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series for playing Cameron Sullivan in The White Lotus.
While James and Kearney have kept their son’s birth under wraps, Us Weekly broke the news in June 2023 that the duo were expecting another baby. “They are both wildly excited to be parents again,” a source exclusively told Us at the time, adding that their baby was “due late this summer.”
The report came after Kearney sparked pregnancy speculation in April 2023 when she shared photos of her Palm Springs, California, vacation with James. In one picture, she appeared to have her baby bump on display.
James and Kearney began dating in 2009 after meeting at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in England. They tied the knot in August 2018 and welcomed their first child, a daughter, in 2021.
The following year, James opened up about adapting to fatherhood. “It definitely changes you in an amazing way,” he told InStyle in May 2022. “It’s discombobulating at first. Especially with your first child because your whole life changes, but ultimately it makes you — definitely for me, at least — a much more solid person.”
While James acknowledged that “you still do all the same s—t that you did before,” he noted that his priorities became different as a parent. “For example, obsessiveness, worrying about X or Y — it does calm that kind of outlook on life because it makes you realize that certain things are a bit more important,” he explained.
Elsewhere in the interview, James revealed how his dynamic with Kearney has changed since the early days of their relationship. “I think my wife (we met in our mid-20s) if we went back there now, she wouldn’t want to hang out with that guy,” he said. “He did dumb stuff and was stupid and angry. It’s so true in a way; you evolve constantly.”
As James reflected on the pair’s past, he detailed how he had grown over the years. “When I look back on myself in my mid-20s, I was a very different person,” he shared. “I was trying to prove so much and worry too much about what other people thought. And, of course, you don’t lose all of that, but you evolve out of it a little bit. Well, hopefully.”
Prior to becoming a dad, James described Kearney as “very sanguine, thoughtful and funny” in a March 2020 interview with the Evening Standard, adding that their romance “made sense pretty early on.”
James divulged that it was “interesting being together this long because we have navigated through the very beginnings of our careers,” and while their parallel paths “can be hard at times,” the journey brings “certain strengths [to] a relationship.”
