John Schneider Marries Paul Sorvino’s Widow 17 Months After Wife’s Death

Two grieving souls have found love again. On Tuesday, July 23, Dukes of Hazzard star John Schneider married Dee Dee Sorvino, according to a press release. Dee Dee had been the widow of actor Paul Sorvino, and this union comes 17 months after Schneider’s wife Alicia Allain died.

Starting in 2015, Schneider began a relationship with Alicia, who was his producing partner and owner of Maven Entertainment. They tied the knot in 2019 and remained together until her death on February 21, 2023, from breast cancer. Crime drama icon Sorvino married Dee Dee Benkie in 2014, and the two were together until his own death in 2022 at the age of 83.

John Schneider has gotten married to Paul Sorvino’s widow, Dee Dee

Schneider and Dee Dee became husband and wife while together in Las Vegas. Aside from their formal wedding, they also plan on hosting a grand, larger-scale wedding ceremony. This is anticipated to take place on August 1.

The venue will be The Hollywood Museum, which is particularly important to these two, as it is where they first met.

After changing hands a few times, The Hollywood Museum opened to the public starting in 2003. It houses more than 11,000 items—including props costumes, scripts, photographs, stop motion figures, and more—related to Hollywood history.

Past and present honored, mourned, and celebrated

Schneider and Dee Dee find themselves in a unique position, both alone together and alone no more.

“God sent a widower to a widow and a widow to a widower who [gets] it, who understands,” Schneider mused, “Because I tell you what, I was ready to give it up, all of it — everything.” He went on, “Then just when I thought the very notion of dating or holding another hand was repulsive, I met this one, that crazy Dame over there.”

It was a bumpy road to get here, not even just getting into a new dating routine but also enduring the crushing loss and constant reminders of them.

“I have to get to the point where I look around and see where she is, not where she’s not,” admitted Schneider of his experience with the grieving process. “And I’m trying to do that, but that’s hard. Somehow I love her more every minute, but with that, somehow I miss her more every minute.”

“There will never be another Paul Sorvino,” Dee Dee said, following the death of the Goodfellas star on July 25, 2022, from natural causes. She also called him “the love of my life.” But perhaps these two have the right love that matches the other to create something not identical to what they had before but beautiful in its own way.