4 minute readEmmy Award-winning actress Julia Garner is a rising star best known for her role as Ruth Langmore on Ozark. In 2023, she was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for her lead role in The Invention of Anna. Her estranged husband, Mark Foster, is also a highly successful musician, leading the Grammy-nominated band Foster the People.
The couple lived a mutually supportive marriage for over six years and supported each other in all artistic endeavors. However, in July 2026, People magazine reported that the two had separated. Here’s everything you need to know about Mark Foster’s past with Julia Garner.
Who is Mark Foster?
According to NPR, Foster is from Cleveland, Ohio. He attended Nordonia High School and then moved to Los Angeles. Foster became involved in the music business at various levels early on, joining the music production company Mophonics, where he composed commercial jingles. He also worked on his personal music and band, Foster the People. He attributed his success to his early commercial work, telling Bloomberg in 2012, “If it wasn’t for Mophonics, there would be no Foster the People. Mophonics is kind of like a creative home for me.”
He said in a 2011 interview with American Songwriter that he worked on his Torches album in the studio and even wrote his 2010 smash hit “Pumped Up Kicks” in “a little writers’ room at Mophonics.”
Foster also told Interview magazine, “When I wasn’t writing for commercials, I was writing songs. Four months later I started a band, and eight months later I was signed. I went from the lowest point of my life to the highest point I’ve ever been in less than a year.”
Foster the People have been nominated for two Grammy Awards, first in 2012 for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance and Best Alternative Music Album, and in 2013 for Best Short Music Video for “Houdini.”
Foster has worked extensively in music production, collaborating with Taylor Swift on “Forever Winter” in 2012, which was re-recorded for her 2021 album Red (Taylor’s Version).
“It’s a great song, you know?” he told Hughes when it was first released. “We kind of went into it casually, like, ‘Yeah, let’s just jam and have fun,’ and something really great came out of it.”
On October 8, 2024, he shared photos from the Austin City Limits Music Festival on the merry-go-round, including a photo of Garner hanging out backstage.
“A snapshot from the weekend at @aclfestival // Thank you to everyone who welcomed us back after 7 years,” he wrote in the caption.
How did Foster and Garner meet?
The two had known each other for years before they started dating. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the pair met outside the Eccles Theater at Sundance in 2013. She told Vogue in 2020 that they realized they had a connection from their first conversation.
“I realized that my grandmother lived in the same small town as my father, outside of Cleveland,” she said. Garner lived in New York, but visited the city frequently, and “we met in Cleveland every Christmas,” she said.
Garner added, “It’s kind of become a tradition.”
Foster then started following her on Instagram. she told THR in 2020. I clicked on him and thought, “Oh, Mark.” Oh, that’s cute. I’ll follow him back too. ‘ Then he sent me a DM. ”
how long have they been together?
A few years after they met, the two started dating and got engaged in 2019. Garner said Foster was traveling to Montana when he asked the question.
“He read me a poem he had written. When he finished reading it, he knelt down and asked me to marry him,” she said.
They married a year later. “We went back and forth from having a big wedding to eloping in Las Vegas,” Garner told Vogue. “In the end, we decided to do what my parents did 40 years ago and get married at City Hall in New York City.”
Foster wrote her a song called “Lovers in a Stream” for their first dance.
“It was a surprise,” Garner explained. “Mark wrote, produced and sang this song. It was so surreal and the most beautiful gift I’ve ever received. It felt like I was floating in the air. It was the most magical moment I’ve ever experienced.”
What else did Garner say about Foster?
Garner won her first Emmy Award in 2019 for “Ozark.” In her acceptance speech, she called Foster “the love of my life.”
With her second Emmy win, Garner once again thanked her husband and family, and in 2022 as well. In January 2023, Garner won a Golden Globe Award and said in her acceptance speech, “My husband, Mark, I love you.”
In December 2024, the couple appeared in a Gucci campaign, where they were pictured sharing a magical winter kiss. The fashion brand’s caption read: “This is a story of a family, a story of a kiss, and a story of many kisses. Gucci gift campaign starring Julia Garner and Mark Foster.”
In January 2025, Garner shared photos from a trip to Switzerland’s Matterhorn on a merry-go-round, starting with an adorable photo of her and Foster in ski gear. This post has since been deleted.
When did Garner and Foster break up?
The exact date of the two’s separation has not been made public. However, officials confirmed in July 2026 that the two had broken up. Fans also noticed that Garner deleted a post on Instagram that included Foster.
