Francesca Sarah Toich and Paul Bertrand Spera were married Oct. 27 at the Supreme Court in Washington. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the groom’s grandmother, officiated.
The bride, 37, and the groom, 32, are Paris-based actors who met in Venice in summer 2016 while performing in Compagnia de’ Colombari’s production of Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice,” an ongoing production in which they are still a part. The production premiered in the Venice Ghetto in July 2016 and has since had two runs in the United States, in 2017 and 2018.
The bride, who specializes in commedia dell’arte and in classical Italian poetry, also performed in Goldoni’s “L’uomo di mondo” at the Pushkin Museum in Moscow in October 2016. She graduated with a degree in art history from Ca’ Foscari University in Venice, from which she also holds a master’s degree in performance and multimedia studies.
She is the daughter of Grazia Parlato and Nevio Toich of Vicenza, Italy. The bride’s father retired as a civilian in charge of tactical maintenance supervision and logistics for the United States Army in Vicenza. Her mother, also retired, was a marketing professional for Edipra Srl, a contracting consultant agency for construction corporations, also in Vicenza.
The groom, 32, also appeared in the French cinema feature “Mes Provinciales.” Directed by Jean-Paul Civeyrac and produced by Moby Dick Films, it was released in April 2018 in France, and in August 2018 in the United States. The groom graduated from Yale and received a certificate in acting from the French National Drama Conservatory in Paris.
He is the son of Jane C. Ginsburg and George T. Spera of New York. The groom’s mother is the Morton L. Janklow professor of literary and artistic property law at Columbia Law School. His father is a lawyer at Shearman & Sterling, a law firm in New York.
The bride’s first marriage ended in divorce.
At the wedding, Justice Ginsburg met Lucrezia Mary Spera, her first great-grandchild, who was born to the couple on New Year’s Day.
