Tatum O’Neil Has First High-Profile Same-Sex Relationship, And It’s With Rosie O’Donnell

Tatum O’Neil and Rosie O’Donnell are reportedly dating in what is the first high-profile same-sex relationship for the actress.

The pair were connected this week, in what appears to be a rebound relationship for The View host. Rosie just filed for divorce of her wife of three years, and has reportedly sparked a long-distance romance with O’Neil.

“They are romantically involved,” a source told Radar Online.

Another source added to People magazine that the two were in a long-distance relationship.

“They are confidantes,” the insider said. “They are hanging out. They have seen each other on both coasts, in Nyack and in Los Angeles.”

The relationship comes after a messy split for Rosie O’Donnell. Her divorce turned ugly when ex Michelle Rounds accused her of being an unfit parent, and not long afterward, Rosie’s 17-year-old daughter, Chelsea, went missing.

Tatum O’Neil has had her share of troubled relationships, as well. She had a famously volatile relationship with father Ryan, and in an interview with the New York Times detailed their troubled past.

“I did have one psychiatrist, Dr. Beatriz Foster. She’s the only one who told me, when I was about 14, ‘I don’t think your father is a good influence on you.’ I’d never heard that before, even though he’d been hitting me and beating me and head-butting me for years. By the time I hit puberty, Ryan didn’t like me. Period. But he wouldn’t let me go. So he left me at the beach house [in Malibu] and went off with Farrah [Fawcett]. But I had this funny survival instinct.”

In the interview, Tatum also admitted that she was attracted to ex John McEnroe in part due to his fiery temper.

“He was powerful. He could take care of me and let me hide. Because I had no inner core back then. I was so beaten down. Everybody says, ‘Oh, you married your father.’ I’ve heard that a million times. But John is a much better man than my father. A decent man. Is he bitter at me? Yes. Is that O.K.? No. But that’s his problem.

Same-sex relationships are relatively new for Tatum O’Neil, however. In May, she told People magazine that she was “mostly dating women.”

“I think women are the most amazing creatures on earth. They’re gentle, and also more intelligent than the men that I’ve met recently,” said O’Neil, who said she didn’t identify as either lesbian or bisexual.

Rosie O’Donnell denies having a relationship with Tatum O’Neil, but said the pair “have been friends for several years.”

[Picture by Kevin Winter / Getty Images]