## Facts

- A wife, an internationally known actress and fashion model, and a husband, a successful New York attorney, married in 1976 and had children.
- During the marriage, the wife’s fame and earning capacity increased, with substantial travel and work in the entertainment and fashion industries.
- The husband assumed significant domestic responsibilities, supervised household staff and childcare, and managed the parties’ income-producing real-estate investments.
- The parties acquired multiple tangible marital assets, including residential rental properties.
- In the divorce action, economic relief (equitable distribution and maintenance) was contested after grounds for divorce were established.
- The husband claimed the wife’s enhanced “celebrity status” and related future earning potential, developed during the marriage, should be treated as a distributable marital asset, analogizing to cases treating professional degrees/licenses as marital property.

## Issues

1. Whether enhanced celebrity status, reputation, and related future earning potential developed during the marriage constitute marital property subject to equitable distribution under DRL § 236(B).
2. If not distributable as property, whether and how the non-celebrity spouse’s contributions should be recognized through equitable distribution and/or maintenance.

## Decision

- The court held that the wife’s celebrity status, and any increase in its value during the marriage, is not marital property subject to equitable distribution.
- The court rejected the husband’s attempt to equate celebrity status with a professional degree or license for valuation and distribution purposes.
- The court recognized the husband’s marital and career-related contributions, but addressed them through distribution of tangible marital assets and consideration of maintenance factors, rather than by valuing “fame” as a separate asset.

## Legal Principles

- Marital property under DRL § 236(B), though broadly construed, has limits; not all personal attributes or expectancies constitute distributable property.
- Enhanced earning capacity associated with a discrete, identifiable credential (e.g., a degree or professional license) may be treated as marital property; celebrity status is materially different because it is personal, nontransferable, and highly contingent on public perception and market conditions.
- Courts may decline to recognize an asserted asset as marital property where valuation would be speculative or imprecise and would depend on conjecture about future income opportunities.
- Spousal contributions facilitating the other spouse’s career may be compensated through equitable distribution of tangible marital assets and through maintenance determinations, rather than by creating an additional intangible “career value” asset.
- Avoiding double counting is a relevant concern where future earnings are already considered through support and maintenance and through the valuation/distribution of existing marital property.

## Conclusion

The court refused to classify enhanced celebrity status as marital property, treating it as an imprecise and speculative personal attribute, while still accounting for the husband’s contributions through equitable distribution of tangible assets and the maintenance analysis under New York’s statutory factors.


Golub v. Golub, 527 N.Y.S.2d 946 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 1988)