As the host of Lifetime's new reality competition show Glam Masters, Laverne Cox has some exciting things going on in her career. And it turns out that her love life is equally as exciting right now. On Access Live, Laverne Cox said she's in a relationship with a man she met on Tinder. While she didn't reveal the name of her current boyfriend, the Orange Is The New Black star expressed how happy she is and confirmed that she's in love.
Even though she's famous, Cox uses dating apps like many mere mortals. "Honestly, I'm a Tinder girl," Cox told Natalie Morales and Kit Hoover on Access Live on March 7. "Cause I feel like if you want to date, you have to be on the apps. You have to be on the apps to be in the game." She said that people do recognize her on the app, but that "you have to take the risk." Plus, she said, "I'm really good at screening. I've been internet dating for a very long time."
With her current boyfriend, it seems the risk was worth it since they met through the app and have now been dating for "almost eight months." He has met her mom and she says she has met his parents. "Everybody gets along. His family's amazing. My mom likes him," Cox confirmed. "I'm in love. It's incredible, it really is. It's like love is so incredibly healing — it's weird talking about this on TV. But I'm just so happy," she said. "Love is lifesaving."
While makeup is something that Cox cares about, as demonstrated by her hosting gig on Kim Kardashian's makeup competition show, she said she doesn't do a full face when she goes on first dates with men she met online. "I'm not gonna put all this effort in," Cox said. "If I was coming from an event and I already had makeup on, great. But I'm not putting effort into a guy that I don't know yet. You might not look like your pictures, you might smell." As she told Access Live in August 2017, she does this to make sure the men she is dating are "into the real, authentic Laverne."
And that's how Cox handled it when she met her current boyfriend. "My current boyfriend, I showed up on the date with no makeup, had some jean shorts and it worked out," she said. Cox also confirmed in the March interview that her boyfriend is the man that she spoke about during that August 2017 Access Live appearance. At the time, they had only been on two dates and on the second one, he taught Cox how to drive. When Hoover asked then if Cox was ready for a relationship, she replied, "I'm recently single, so I'm not ready to jump into anything, but I'm open if the right person comes along." And apparently, he was the right person.
As for her previous relationship, Cox was most recently linked to Jono Freedrix, with Us Weekly reporting that Cox was dating the filmmaker in 2016. Newsweek reported that in a November 2017 interview with Attitude magazine, Cox didn't specifically name Freedrix, but noted how her ex "was really comfortable with himself" and how that's something that she looks for in a partner. "I think the thing about him, about any man who dates or decides to date a trans woman openly, is he cannot care if someone thinks he's gay or not," Cox said. "The problem is that people disavow the womanhood of trans women so they assume the male partners are gay because they don't accept us as women."
She added, "Men who are into trans women who want to keep us a secret and are afraid if someone thinks they are gay, they're insecure as f*ck. If someone thinks you're gay, gay is fabulous. Gay is amazing. There's nothing wrong with that. Toxic masculinity is bullsh*t."
Also in her Attitude interview, Cox discussed how she was in an emotionally abusive relationship when she was younger. But now the 45-year-old understands she deserves better. "I deserve someone who's going to treat me like a queen because I am one," Cox said.
Based on her Access Live interview, Cox has seemingly found someone who is secure in himself and treats her with love and respect. So while he'll remain a mystery for now, fans of Cox should be thrilled to know that she has a "lifesaving" love.
