Anthony Michael Hall Waited 55 Years For This

The '80s icon spent decades building a career before he found what he now calls his greatest role: husband and father.

Anthony Michael Hall has been working in front of cameras for 50 years. He's been the face of some of the most iconic coming-of-age films ever made. And at 58, he says none of it compares to what happened when he became a father at 55.

"Fatherhood and being a husband that's absolutely the greatest role," Hall tells PEOPLE. Coming from an actor whose career has spanned five decades, that's a genuinely significant statement.

Finding His Person, Later Than Expected

Hall married his wife, Slovakian-born Licia Oskerova, in 2020. When PEOPLE asked him about her, his answer was immediate and unguarded: "I have found my soulmate. I have, and I love her."

There's something notable in how directly he says it: no hedging, no deflection into a joke, just a straightforward statement from a man who's clearly thought about whether he found the right person and has moved fully into just being grateful he did.

A Wedding The Pandemic Rewrote Twice

The couple's path to marriage wasn't simple. They'd originally planned to marry at the Cathedral of St. Mary in Miami on November 11, 2020. Then COVID hit, and like countless couples that year, they had to rework the plan.

Hall described what happened next in a social media post at the time: "Like many, when COVID arrived, we were forced to reschedule our plan: to be married at the Cathedral of St. Mary in Miami on 11.11.20. Being romantics, we decided we'd get married anyway, which we did, in a private civil ceremony on November 7th, 2020, on the beach in Miami."

But he didn't let the original plan go entirely. "Being a man of my word, I had promised Lucia that we would stick to our original plans. We would still be married at St. Mary's Cathedral, sometime in the near future."

That promise held. In 2023, the couple renewed their vows at St. Mary's Cathedral, the ceremony they'd always intended to have, finally happening on their own terms, three years later than planned.

Becoming A Dad On His Own Timeline

Hall and Oskerova welcomed their son, Anthony Michael II, in 2024, when Hall was 55. For most people, that would be considered a notably late start to fatherhood. Hall frames it as exactly the plan he'd always had in mind.

"I couldn't be happier because I always knew, even when I was a young man, that I wanted to get started later," he told PEOPLE in 2024, reflecting on the timing of his son's arrival.

That's a striking piece of self-awareness to carry for decades a young man in the middle of a rapidly rising Hollywood career, already certain that fatherhood was something he wanted to arrive at deliberately, later, rather than early. It suggests a level of intentionality about family that doesn't always get talked about amid the more chaotic public narrative often associated with young fame.

Life With A Toddler Who's "Like A Little Giant"

Now, with his son settled into preschool for about six months, Hall talks about parenthood with the specific, slightly amazed detail that new parents often reach for. "We started him in preschool about six months ago. He's doing great. He's eating so much. I mean, this kid is like a little giant. He looks like he's 5 years old already. But we're having a great time. It's incredible."

He's candid about the reality of it too, without losing the enthusiasm: "It's a full-time job... but we love it. We just embrace it, and our son [is] such a joy."

Introducing His Family To The World

When Michael was born, Hall shared the moment publicly with genuine emotion. "I am happy and so blessed to introduce... My Family," he wrote alongside photos of Lucia and the baby. "The Hall family. We shall live happily, ever after."

A Career That Made Room For This

Hall rose to fame in the 1980s, becoming one of the defining faces of that decade's teen and coming-of-age films, the kind of early, formative stardom that shapes an entire generation's understanding of an actor before they're even old enough to fully process what that fame means. Fifty years into a career that started that young and that publicly, he's now starring on FOX's competition series Nation's Dumbest, which airs Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET and streams the next day on Hulu.

But based on how he talks about his life now, the show, the decades of film work, none of it holds the same weight as what he's built at home. For an actor who spent most of his life in the public eye before he ever became a husband or a father, waiting until 55 to step into both roles deliberately, by his own account and calling them his greatest work yet, is its own kind of quietly remarkable story.