Remember when Ashton Kutcher was a 26-year-old stepdad?
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Hello and welcome to Gossip Time, a weekly guide to the stars by Allie Jones. This week: an actress makes a statement about stepparents, a pop star makes a statement about his fashion line, and Michelle Obama breaks her silence on a surprising podcast.
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Think back to 2005: the Pope died, everyone was worried about bird flu, and Demi Moore married Ashton Kutcher in a Kabbalah ceremony in front of 100 guests at her Beverly Hills home. If you’ve read Moore’s 2019 memoir Inside Out (which I recommend btw; it was ghostwritten by Ariel Levy), you know that the wedding was the high point of the relationship.
Kutcher pretty much blew up Moore’s life when they got together when he was 25 and she was 40: According to Moore, he encouraged her start drinking again because he didn’t believe alcoholism was a “real thing,” he pressured her into threesomes, and he cheated on her before the couple ultimately split in 2011. The aftermath of the divorce was bad for Moore; she says she lost contact with her daughters Rumer, Scout, and Tallulah Willis before getting sober again.
As we saw during Moore’s Oscar campaign this year, she seems to have a good relationship with her kids now and seems happy and healthy overall.
Kutcher, meanwhile, is still smarting over how he was portrayed in Moore’s book. In 2023, he told Esquire he was “fucking pissed” about the characterization. He also commented on his role as stepdad during the marriage: “I was 26, bearing the responsibility of an eight-year-old, a 10-year-old, and a 12-year-old. That’s how some teen parents must experience their 20s.”
So I wonder what he makes of Talulah’s comments this week on Gwyneth Paltrow’s Instagram.
On Wednesday, Paltrow posted a teaser for her latest Goop podcast episode with her current husband, Brad Falchuk, about the challenges of step-parenting. (Paltrow and Falchuk each have two kids from previous marriages.)
Tallulah, now 31, jumped right into the comments with the following:
Well! I would personally love to hear her thoughts, but she didn’t provide further detail. She did, however, add that “no one needs to be bad guy for a situation to be healed. there’s room for everyone.” Okay.
Tallulah was only eight when Moore got together with Kutcher and 16 when they broke up, so it’s understandable that she’d have some feelings about it. What does Kutcher think?
He has not commented, but he did conveniently get papped with his current wife Mila Kunis on a walk in Beverly Hills this week, as if to signal that everything is fine.
Also fine: Justin Bieber and Hailey Bieber. They are currently in Palm Springs getting ready to attend Coachella. Look, they’re driving around peacefully on a golf cart!
The Biebers’ publicists would prefer that you ignore Justin’s more animated behavior on social media and in real life over the past few days, like yelling at the paparazzi (“all you want is money!”), joking (?) that Stevie Wonder “never sees” his Facetime calls, and severing ties with his own fashion line in a strangely edited Instagram story (“IF YOUR [sic] ROCKING WITH ME THE HUMAN JUSTIN BEIBER DON’T WASTE UR MONEY ON DREWHOUSE”).
I guess he is launching a new fashion line called Skylrk? He posted this computer-generated video of him lighting a house filled with DrewHouse merch on fire and then walking out to kiss Hailey, who is pushing an (empty?) baby stroller with the caption “@skylrk 👀” last week.
Just one of the many concerning uses of AI these days.
I am praying that the couple has a nice time at the music festival.
STUFF BY HILARY DUFF: Ten years ago this week, Hilary Duff released the first single off her last pop album Breathe In. Breathe Out. entitled “Sparks.”
It peaked at #93 on the Billboard Hot 100!
Finally, I’ll leave you with the news that Michelle Obama finally (somewhat) addressed the divorce rumors on … Sophia Bush’s podcast?
Good for you, Sophia Bush.
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How much "responsibility" was Ashton Kutcher really bearing, though??!? By all accounts Bruce was still very involved in their lives after he and Demi divorced- I mean it's not like Ashton was covering any of their bills because of their deadbeat dad. He milked that relationship for every bit of publicity he could get. Demi can say whatever she wants about it now.
Hmm time for me to read Demi's memoir.