Desperate Housewives star Marcia Cross announces
engagement

Actress Marcia Cross, a star of the ABC hit show Desperate Housewives, is headed for real-life matrimony with her stockbroker boyfriend, Tom Mahoney, Us Weekly magazine reported on Friday. The performer's publicist, Heidi Slan, was quoted on the magazine's Web site as saying Cross, 43, and Mahoney, 47, became engaged during the past weekend, but she added, "The happy couple have not set a date for the wedding yet."

The red-haired actress, who earned an Emmy nomination for her role as the perfectionist homemaker Bree Van de Kamp on Desperate Housewives, began dating Mahoney about six months ago. They recently vacationed together in Europe and Aspen, Colo., the magazine said. Neither has been married before. Darkly comic Desperate Housewives, from gay creator Marc Cherry, ranked as the most watched new series on U.S. television last season, helping lead a ratings turnaround at ABC. The show garnered 15 Emmy nominations in all, including a bid for Best Comedy.

Cross made headlines (and the cover of The Advocate) in early 2005 when an Internet rumor suggesting that the actress was planning to come out of the closet got picked up by the mainstream media, prompting Slan to issue a denial. (Reuters, with additional reporting by Advocate.com)