It is not often that celebrity couples stay firmly together and one of the most enduring in Hollywood have decided to split up and take a break from living together. Catherine Zeta Jones and Michael Douglas were married in the year 2000 and if you look at a composite of their birth charts then you can track from the time that they got married all the way through to now when they are splitting up.
Here is a composite Davison chart of Catherine and Michael who incidentally share a birthday of 25th September; Michael was born in 1944 at 10.30am in New Brunswick, New Jersey and Catherine in 1969 at 14.40 in Swansea in Wales. They met in 1999 and got married on 18th November 2000 when transiting Saturn was at 27 degrees Taurus, making a lovely double trine aspect up to their joint Jupiter Midheaven conjunction at 25/26 degrees Virgo and a square to their composite Pluto at 28 Leo. Saturn was bringing transformation of their relationship, changing the nature of it and empowering both Catherine and Michael through the square to Pluto and solidifying a very powerful union. With Jupiter sitting right on the composite Midheaven and ruling the chart as they have Sagittarius on the Ascendant (Jupiter’s sign) this was always going to be a well known and powerful couple with fortune and international notoriety. They had already had their first child Dylan on 8th August that year, with Jupiter still sitting conjunct to natal Mars ruling their joint 5th house of children (via Aries). When he was born, transiting Uranus was sitting bang on their composite Moon (ruling the 8th house of change and sharing via Cancer) showing that the nature of their relationship was changing. Mars and Mercury had also been in that 8th house sitting in conjunction with composite Uranus making two lovely joyous trines to their composite Sun Venus conjunction indicating news of a happy event.
Lets move forward to more recent times. We know in the past few years that ill health has hit both Catherine and Michael. The 6th house of health is empty apart from the South Node. More importantly, this house is ruled by Venus with Taurus on the cusp. Now it just so happened that in 2010 when Michael Douglas was diagnosed in August of that year with throat cancer that transiting Pluto was making a square aspect from 2/3 degrees Capricorn and had been for the previous few months to composite Venus and transiting Uranus was just into Aries approaching a conjunction with Venus as well sitting at 1:25 Aries. Just think about this. The sign Taurus (Venus) traditionally rules the throat, the 6th house rules health issues and any focus on the 6th house ruler from Uranus and Pluto square on this planet in their composite chart would have affected them both.
Moving on to April 2011 when Catherine was diagnosed with bipolar depression, transiting Uranus was sitting at 1 degree Aries bang on composite Venus again. This time, transiting Neptune had just entered Pisces and in the process was opposing their composite Pluto and was beginning to make a trine to composite Neptune. An opposition between these two outermost planets will naturally hit the subconscious areas of our lives. On this chart, Pluto receiving the Neptune opposition rules (via Scorpio) the 12th house of things hidden beneath the surface, of suffering and psychological issues in our lives hiding beneath the surface; it also is connected to hospitals and institutions. Neptune through Pisces rules the 4th house of the foundation of our lives, our home and domestic matters. Put it all together and you can see how Catherine’s depression would have disrupted their union, their marriage and their home life which was already rocked by Michael’s illness. This would have been difficult in the extreme to deal with.
Right now as they split, focus in on Mercury in their composite chart which sits at 12 degrees Aries. Mercury on this composite chart rules two houses, their 7th house of marriage and their 10th house of their joint public image. Uranus is a planet of independence and so it is no surprise with Uranus having been at 12 degrees Aries last month and today at 11:46 Aries that they have decided to move apart. The Ascendant on this chart is at 4 Sagittarius and transiting Neptune now at 3:51 Pisces is making a close square to it and to composite Mars in the 7th (ruling the 5th house of love given and children) dissolving their union, affecting their love and the future of their children too. Transiting Pluto later next year is going to be making a square to that composite Mercury from around February 2014 and this the transformation of their marriage and a possible divorce may be in the pipeline as I see it, or they may make the split completely permanent.
I think this is a powerful look at the affect of the transiting planets on a celebrity couple who looked for all the world at one point as if they would spend the rest of their lives together. It just shows that you cannot stand in the way of those outer planets when they start to hit the angles of a composite chart or the chart rulers of those angles. It also shows the power to the time/space composite chart which if you are interested you should read just as if it were a natal one.