Vanessa Hudgens said yes! On Friday (Feb. 3), news broke that the actress is officially engaged to boyfriend Cole Tucker.
TMZ was first to report the engagement, which was later confirmed by People. The High School Musical alum has been dating the Reno Aces player since late 2020 after meeting in, of all places, a Zoom meditation class.
“If I want something or someone, I’m going after them,” Hudgens shared on a May 2021 episode of The Drew Barrymore Show after confirming her new relationship. “I fully just slid into his DMs and was like, ‘Hey, it was nice to meet you.’ So I think there is no shame in making the first move.”
Six months later, the couple made their official red carpet debut at the premiere for the big-screen musical adaptation of Jonathan Larson’s Tick, Tick… Boom!, in which Hudgens starred opposite Andrew Garfield, Alexandra Shipp, Robin de Jesus and Joshua Henry.
Hudgens may be focused on wedding planning in the weeks and months ahead, but at least one of her exes still has her to thank for major developments in his life as of late. In a recent interview with the Los Angeles Times, Austin Butler, who dated the star for nearly a decade from 2011 to 2020, credited her for pushing him to audition for the lead role in Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis. “We’d been together for so long and she had this sort of clairvoyant moment and so I really, I owe her a lot for believing in me,” the Golden Globe winner and current Oscar nominee said.