Update: Baby on the way for Drea de Matteo and Shooter Jennings

Update: Mark at the Boston Globe tells us that baby to be is a girl — grandma spilled the beans! Donna de Matteo, a playwright with a show currently running in Gloucester, MA, told the paper,

Drea’s job now is to withstand these nine months, and have a beautiful baby girl.

Source: Boston Globe

Update 2:49 pm: Drea confirms the news to Us Weekly — and she’s mad. The press statement reads:

Drea de Matteo and her long time boyfriend Shooter Jennings are having a baby and they are so excited. Please beware the onlyreason we’re announcing the news is because the very rude andcondescending salespeople at Veronique Maternity on Madison Avenuedecided to leak this to the press, so please beware if you’re trying tokeep your happy secret under wraps. Shop at Pea in the Pod. The salespeople are lovely and helpful and know how to keep exciting news to themselves.

Update 2:20 pm: We’ve just gotten word that this is true. Expect rep confirmation very soon.

Originally posted May 14th, 7:54 am: Page Six reports that former Sopranos and Joey star Drea de Matteo, 35, was overheard saying that she and her boyfriend of 5 years, country star Shooter Jennings, 27, are expecting a baby. The conversation occurred while Drea was shopping for maternity clothes at Veronique Maternity in New York.

Reps for the Drea did not confirm the pregnancy. Spies at the store say Drea is pregnant, but is ‘not showing much of a baby bump yet.’

Source: Page Six

Thanks to CBB reader Lisa.

Comments

Well, for some reason this news made me very happy. I liked Drea on Joey (never saw The Sopranos, I only have basic cable, lol) and I’m a HUGE fan of Shooter’s dad, plus, I think he has just about the coolest name ever given to a child in the history of mankind, lol! Shooter Jennings…. they just don’t make cooler names than that!

Congratulations Drea, Shooter… and Waylon in heaven!

- Diva on May 14th, 2007

Speaking of rude, that press statement is really quite unprofessional. She’s a well known actress shopping in a maternity boutique talking about being pregnant – what the heck does she expect?? Shop online if you don’t want the news to get out….or retire and get out of the spotlight. Of course actors don’t deserve it when people invade their privacy (i.e. the Jolie-Pitt kid bathtub shots) but in my opinion this little rant is just silly.

- madison on May 14th, 2007

agreed Madison. she should know people are gonna snitch. what, she thought she’d go the whole nine months without people noticing? GIVE ME A BREAK!

- MuffThumb on May 14th, 2007

So he was 17 and she was 25 when they started dating? Did I read that right?

- beccalovesbabies on May 14th, 2007

HAHA! Ouch !
Congratulations on the pregnancy though!

- Lola on May 14th, 2007

I think it’s rude for stores to break someone’s news for them. I do agree that if someone wants to keep something under wraps they should be more private but shops shouldn’t do these things, it’s unfair to the customers.
They haven’t been together for 10 years i think whomever wrote that had the date wrong. She was with her ex i think for ten years whom she owned a store with. She’s been with Shooter off and on for maybe 5-6 years.

- Jessica on May 14th, 2007

Are you sure they’ve been dating for 10 years? I would have guessed 2 maybe 3 tops. Plus he would have been a minor at the time they started dating!!! Anyway, congrats to the couple and it’s unfortunate that their good news got leaked before they wanted it to.

Sarah’s note: It’s 5 years, that’s what I get when I try to put up too many stories in a row. Sorry about that! It’s been corrected.

- Kimber Christian on May 14th, 2007

I actually think that Drea’s statement is completely within her rights. Most boutiques and upscale retail stores choose to protect the privacy of their celeb-clients as opposed to outing their private matters. If a photog snapped her at the baby boutique (obviously in public) and a rumor began (i.e. Nicole Kidman, Halle Berry-multiple times) then that is a little different and more anticipated, but it’s not unreasonable to expect that a boutique should keep quiet-especially if they initiated the call to US Weekly!

- Melissa on May 14th, 2007

Ditto Mellisa and Jessica! It is not the store’s place to break her news for her.It is unprofessional and a really good way to lose business. As far as shopping online goes, it is a bit of a pain in some cases. Unless I have tried something on in the store, I will very rarely order most clothing online because I don’t want to have to send it back when it doesn’t fit.

- Jaime R Dodds on May 14th, 2007

Ok, I can see the point about the stores respecting their celeb clients privacy. So then if she really didn’t want any publicity, why come out with such a statement today? She knew it would create a stir and be picked up everywhere. And the Page Six item was JUST printed today. It’s not like days/weeks have gone by, the press isn’t leaving her alone so she makes a statement just to try to get the whole thing to die down. She responded on the same day – please, she totally wants the publicity.

- madison on May 14th, 2007

Ooooh. Snap!

I think it’s extremely rude for salespeople to gossip to the media about their clients. Pregnancy is a very personal thing. I’m currently 8 weeks along with my second and I sure wouldn’t want to be outed like that.

- Lorus on May 14th, 2007

I think the point is that the shop owners should respect people’s privacy if they want to keep their business running. Celeb or no, I would be pretty pissed if I went into a store and later found out that the shop owners were telling my tales to Page Six. We don’t know how many calls Drea’s PR people got from news organizations TODAY about this. It could have been zero and it could have been 100. Either way, she was well within her rights to respond to it as she sees fit since she was outed through no fault of her own. What if she was waiting to announce this info for personal reasons? It’s a shame that people can’t even relish in their personal joys in private for a minute before folks start running to the tabloids.

- lizzielui on May 14th, 2007

Oh yeah,. She really wants the publicy. She’s only comfirming what is already known. and Making it clear she won’t shop at that other place again.

- Aura on May 14th, 2007

Madison: I am sure she didn’t make the annoucement because she wanted the publictiy. She obviously made it because she wanted the press to leave her alone. She has a right to want to enjoy her pregnancy in peace!

- Annoynous on May 14th, 2007

Maybe she is upset because they hadn’t told their families yet? In my opinion, if she wanted to get some publicity she wouldn’t have sent out such a scathing statement – she could have easily done a Britney and played to the press until well into her pregnancy then announced it, or not even announced it at all. Obviously there is more at play than just people running their traps to a newspaper.

- Erin on May 14th, 2007

I’m not going to harp on her. I think she felt like sharing to one person thinking the people at the store wouldn’t be so quick to say anything about it. It was wrong of her to think that obviously, but it was also wrong of the store snoops to personally make a call and leak that information.

Drea could be mad for a number of reasons. Maybe she hadn’t told her/his family yet, maybe she wanted to keep it a surprise a little while longer but still wanted to see what was out there for baby clothes. There are a number of reasons. And another one could be that she felt like sharing with someone just to get it off her chest. And yes, she could’ve said she was shopping for someone else but then like it’s happened so many other times, it could’ve been cause for speculation, and that would’ve started a buzz going.

I think it was wrong, but you could go either way. It’s luck of the draw when it comes to things like this, and she talked to the wrong person.

Still, good luck to her and Shooter on the pregnancy!

- FC on May 14th, 2007

I’m wery happy for the family! A baby is so much fun! Good luck with the pregnancy!!

- Marie on May 15th, 2007

I think good for her for saying what she really thinks in her release – right or wrong (and I think she’s right).

If you’re pregnant and something doesn’t go the way you wanted it, you get to be upset.

Besides, I get so tired of the “sanitized” press releases.

- lisen on May 15th, 2007