BY JOHN HINTON
HOLLYWOOD star Mark Wahlberg has married his long-term girlfriend Rhea Durham in a small ceremony in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles.
They wed on Saturday in a 45-minute Catholic ceremony at Good Shepherd Catholic church in front of 20 close friends and family.
Their daughter Ella Rae, six, was a flower girl and held her father’s hand as they left the church.
The couple have three children together: Brendan Joseph, who turns one next month, Michael, aged three, and six-year-old Ella.
Their relationship began in 2001 but they split up two years later after the birth of their first child.
Mr Wahlberg said they had been through “a lot of hard work and counselling”.
He said: “We always wanted to make it work, we wanted to be together, we wanted to raise our family together.
“And it’s been a lot of hard work and counselling, and I think that’s the only way to make it work, to put in the time and effort.” Mr Wahlberg first became famous as a younger member of the boy band New Kids on the Block and later as rapper Marky Mark. He moved into acting in the early 1990s and has since starred in I Heart Huckabees and Martin Scorsese’s The Departed.
Mr Wahlberg said last year that he wanted to bring up his children to realise their Catholic faith “is the most important thing”. He also said he was much more concerned about being a good father than a good actor.
The couple announced their engagement in February this year.