Inside Melissa McCarthy’s Playful Marriage with Husband Ben Falcone

When Melissa McCarthy stepped out with Ben Falcone for the premiere of her new Netflix movie Unfrosted April 30, it wasn’t a typical date night for the pair, who often simply stay in at home.

“A lot of the times I’ll cook something,” writer and actor Falcone, 50, told PEOPLE earlier this year. “I’ll make us a special dinner — a steak of some sort.”

McCarthy, 53, endorses her husband’s culinary skills with two enthusiastic thumbs up. “He makes a crazy delicious steak. It really is. [It’s] difficult now to order out ’cause it’s so good. And he makes really, really delicious smash burgers.”

Married for nearly two decades, the parents of Vivian, 16, and Georgette, 14, are each other’s biggest cheerleaders whether it’s anything from cooking to acting.

But the latter is something they prefer to do together. Over the years, the two, who wed in 2005, have collaborated on a number of projects, including Bridesmaids, Tammy, Thunder Force and the Happytime Murders to name a few.

“We’re like carnies. We make a lot of decisions that are just simply based on, ‘Can we go together?’ It’s family first,” McCarthy told PEOPLE in 2020.

It’s a sweet sentiment that endures decades after they first crossed paths in comedy school in the 1990s. McCarthy knew he was a keeper from the get-go.

“It’s [about] finding someone who you just absolutely are better with. He’s nothing but supportive, and he’s super smart,” McCarthy previously said. “He makes me gut-laugh, like crazy gut-laugh, four or five times a day. I hit the jackpot!”

Their house, McCarthy has said, is a light-hearted environment: “It’s not the most serious household. There’s a lot of serious stuff happening in the world, and we don’t have to have it in the house.”

Indeed, the pair like to entertain and host parties that require a costume or something along those lines. “There’s often a theme that Melissa will very lovingly and forcefully suggest,” Falcone quipped earlier this year. 

“If not everybody knows each other, but everybody looks equal parts ridiculous, you can talk to anybody,” added McCarthy.

Though throwing parties is fun, McCarthy is a fan of just hanging out with Falcone and their kids. “I work so much, and I’m gone a lot, that sometimes just being home and if everybody’s home, I’m in heaven,” she told PEOPLE in 2023.

Unfrosted is now streaming on Netflix.