Is it because they’re in love that Trump

can’t stand them?

In September, the president famously

let loose on John Legend and Chrissy

Teigen in one of his bizarre drive-by

tweetings, huffing and puffing about the

“boring” singer and his “filthy mouthed

wife.” Teigen responded with a tweet so

sublime that it became canon: “lol what a

pussy ass bitch. tagged everyone but me.

an honor, mister president.” The whole

exchange was suitable for framing—and

one of Teigen’s friends actually did frame

it and present it to her as a gift.

The shadowbox with Trump’s broad-

side and Teigen’s burn now sits in the

grand entryway to the family’s home in

Beverly Hills, on a table crowded with

otherwise joyful photos of the couple’s

beautiful children and their grand wed-

ding at Lake Como. In person, Teigen

herself is unguarded and endearing.

When she gives this reporter a tour of

the house, she doesn’t just point out the

fitness room (“Here’s the gym I never

go into”), the master bathroom (“Here’s

my tub where I take baths with Luna and

we watch the movie Coco”), and the

screening room (“Look at all my candy

jars. Literally all I wanted as a child

was a room with this much candy”),

but also the milky tablet in the ceramic

bowl next to the Nintendo Switch on

her nightstand: “Here’s my Lexapro.”

Teigen has become a social media icon

precisely because she can be frank about

her struggle with anxiety and her need

for approval, while also dunking on

the president and MAGA nation. As she

puts it, “I don’t care about pissing off

a bunch of bigots.”

It’s a Sunday afternoon, three weeks

to the day since the tweet battle. Three-

year-old Luna is running away from her

baby brother, Miles, who desperately

wants to hug her. She’s wearing a bright

orange one-shoulder bathing suit and

urging her daddy to put on the swim

trunks she picked out for him, which

are blue and covered with orange crabs.

Legend promised her they’d go swim-

ming in the backyard pool when she

woke up from her nap.

Sunlight fills the house. There’s foot-

ball on the TV, clattering in the kitchen,

and the heavy breathing of the family’s

bulldogs puttering around everyone’s

feet. Awards line the shelves on one

wall, most of them the fruits of Leg-

end’s recent EGOT distinction. (At 40,

he is one of the youngest of the 15 people

to have earned the honor, as well as the

first black man.) But there’s also Teigen’s

Glamour Women of the Year award, the

presentation of which brought Legend

to tears as he described how intimidated

his wife of six years used to feel in rooms

of influential people. In front of all that

hardware rests a little plastic trophy for

Teigen’s mother, Pepper, who lives with

them, for surviving the Hot Cheetos and

Takis Fuego Challenge.

It is a rare thing to meet people who

care about serious things but still manage

not to take themselves too seriously, who

accept the well-intentioned and messy

totality of themselves enough to live a

transparent life. Beneath the awards

awaits Legend’s Yamaha piano. Just yes-

terday, Teigen posted an Instagram video

of Legend sitting at it with Miles, big and

little brown fingers both doing their thing

on the keys, her husband serenading their

son with a few bars from “My Favorite

Things.” It worked like a balm for her mil-

lions of followers—the pleasure of song

and the power of parent-child connec-

tion—on that first chaotic weekend after

news of the impeachment inquiry broke.

Legend brings a decency and gravitas

to every room he enters, be it onstage at

the Academy Awards or in prisons across

the country in conversation with inmates

as part of his criminal-justice reform

activism. Teigen, 33, is the electricity,

the laugh that breaks the tension. She’s

a famous person who can’t bring herself

to respond to texts from famous people

who follow her on Twitter because, as

she explains, “I’m terrified they’re going

to think I’m a thirsty fame whore.”

Legend calls himself a nerd. Teigen

admits she’s kind of a basket case. They

adore each other.

“I’ve been nourished by watching

them,” says Ava DuVernay, who directed

the movie Selma, for which Legend won a

best original song Oscar. “It’s just beauti-

ful to see a real melding of their family

life—their home life, those moments they

curate with their children—side by side

with real activist commentary about the

way that they feel in the world.”

E

arlier in the afternoon, while

the children nap, Legend pours

everyone glasses of LVE label,

his collaboration with Napa

Valley winemaker Jean-Charles Boisset.

He’s wearing a navy Gucci V-neck sweat-

er with matching blue pants. Even at

home, he is all about the classics. Teigen,

on the other hand, is dressed for loung-

ing, in a pale pink silk romper and no bra.

She chases her wine with an Activia

because her stomach is messed up. “I

think my next cookbook has to evolve a

bit from cheese on top of cheese on top

of a different kind of cheese,” she says.

When LVE launched, the Ne w York

Times announced Legend’s entry into the

celebrity-vintner world by asking, “Would

you expect anything less from Chrissy Tei-

gen’s husband?” Legend’s male ego seems

to have joyfully survived being eclipsed. At

an Obama Foundation event in Oakland

earlier this year, Legend bonded with the

former president about their magnetic

partners: “We joked about how much our

wives are loved more than we are now.”

Glass in hand, he sits next to Teigen on

the sectional sofa and puts an arm around

her shoulders.

“I’m her biggest cheerleader,” he says.

“I always think she should do more.”

Legend sometimes pretends that he’s

going to retire soon on her money.

How could Trump’s ego withstand the

couple’s goodness and glamour? Legend

and Teigen are a reminder of what it was

like to have #RelationshipGoals in the

White House. Their easy riding of each

other, the way they lean in with affection

when listening to each other, particular-

ly Legend, who looks eager and excited

every time his wife speaks.... Wouldn’t

they be—with their happy children, the

live-in mother-in-law, the dogs!—a first

family we could believe in?

I

66 VANITY FAIR DECEMBER 2019