Celebrities do everything bigger than we do. They have bigger birthday parties, bigger weddings, bigger houses…it’s just part of their lifestyle. They also have big and elaborate relationships with other high profile people in the industry. And we’re always paying attention to them: while these relationships are going on, paparazzi line the streets and hide behind children to try to get snapshots of the couple, which are then cited by media sources as proof of the couple’s happiness or unhappiness. And when these relationships end, articles upon articles are printed that speculate why the couple called it quits. This summer, there were TONS of articles about celebrity couples, and most of them were about the ones that split up. So in case you were following the stock market this summer (I don’t know why you would!), here’s a list of the celebrities who had far more unpleasant summers than anyone’s portfolio.
Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver
The biggest celebrity catastrophe of the summer was truly epic and it was the split that took place between Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver, who’d been together for 25 years and had four children together. Their marriage crumbled with the news that Arnold had fathered a child with his housekeeper, Mildred Patricia Baena, fourteen years ago. When the world learned of Schwarzenegger’s transgressions in May, he claimed that he told Maria about Baena and his child with her after he left the governor’s office in January. After immediately separating from Schwarzenegger and taking some time to think about her next move, Maria then swiftly filed divorce on July 1st, citing “irreconcilable differences” and petitioned for Schwarzenegger to pay spousal support and her attorney fees.
Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony
Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony
Most splits between celebrity couples are easy to predict, but one that caught us completely off-guard was between Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony. On July 15th, People reported that Jennifer and Marc had released a statement announcing their separation, which said, “We have decided to end our marriage. This was a very difficult decision. We have come to an amicable conclusion on all matters. It is a painful time for all involved and we appreciate the respect of our privacy at this time.” No particular reason was given as to what led them to part ways, but a few days later, quotes from her first post-divorce announcement interview with Vanity Fair hit the internet, and of the separation, she said “Sometimes we don’t realize when we’re compromising ourselves. To understand that a person is not good for you, or that that person is not treating you in the right way, or that he is not doing the right thing for himself – if I stay, then I am not doing the right thing for me. I love myself enough to walk away from that now.”
George Clooney and Elisabetta Canalis
George Clooney and Italian actress Elisabetta Canalis started dating in September of 2009. For two years they led a very glamorous life of travel, fine dining, and walking red carpets and bonding over the fact that marriage and children were not for them. But then one day in early June, Elisabetta told Italian magazine, Chi, that she wanted to get married one day. She said, “I am a firm believer in marriage, in the future I will be married, but for the time being I am happy as I am.” That very same month, the news broke that Clooney and Canalis had decided to end their relationship and Canalis did not launch a campaign claiming that the magazine misquoted her.
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Hugh Hefner and Crystal Harris
After Holly Madison, Kendra Wilkinson and Bridget Marquardt moved out of the Playboy Mansion in October of 2008, Crystal Harris, 24, promptly moved into both the public and Hugh Hefner’s spotlights. In September of 2010, Hugh proposed to Crystal despite their 60 year age difference…which he addressed and defended when he told E! News, “I do believe that you are healthy, age is just a number. It depends on your DNA and it also depends very much on how you are as a person, your mental attitude, et cetera.” However on June 13th, Crystal surprisingly broke up with Hugh and posted on her website, “After much deep reflection and thought I have decided to end my engagement with Hef. I have the utmost respect for Hef and wish him the best going forward. I hope the media will give each of us the privacy we deserve during this time.” Then there were rumors that even though the couple were going to profit from a television special they were going to film during their wedding, Crystal was secretly planning to leave Hef at the altar (so as to boost ratings and start her own career). Seeking to tell her side of the story, Crystal sat down with Howard Stern and explained the reason why she broke up with Hugh, which was apparently because he lasted “like two seconds” in bed. After Hugh promptly responded to Crystal’s statements and insisted they weren’t true, Crystal apologized to Hef and he accepted. They’re still not together, though.
Emily Maynard and Brad Womack
After Emily Maynard happily accepted Brad Womack’s proposal on the finale of The Bachelor last March, things drastically took a turn for the worst. Tabloids reported that since Emily had a very hard time watching Brad get physical with the other women on the show, she stopped trusting him and began to doubt how much he wanted her in his life. To complicate things further, Brad continued to live in Austin, Texas while Emily and her 6 year-old daughter Ricki lived in Charlotte, and Emily told The Bachelor host Chris Harrison that she didn’t want to uproot Ricki’s life since she wasn’t sure if Brad was really ready to be a father. However, the couple appeared to be trying to work things out…until another hurdle presented itself. This time, a woman named Laurel Kagay told Us Magazine that Brad wasn’t the man he said he was, and that he had proposed to her hundreds of times, and that Emily shouldn’t believe a word her fiancé says. The next thing we knew, Emily was sitting down with Chris Harrison again on July 11th and confirming that she and Brad were no longer together. The reason for the split? Emily saw too many “red flags,” and did not elaborate ay further. She is rumored to be in talks to be the next Bachelorette.
Jesse James and Kat Von D
People started despising Jesse James the moment they learned he was hiding Nazi apparel in Sandra Bullock’s basement. But we really started to hate him when almost immediately after he and Bullock separated, he ran right into the arms of Kat Von D in September of 2010 and insisted to us that he loved Kat so much more than he ever loved Bullock (a woman who, might I add, would go on to donate $1 million to the American Red Cross to help the victims of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan). He even told Howard Stern that sex with Kat was “100% better than sex with Sandy”! Jesse and Kat continued unapologetically advertising their love of one another to every public medium that would listen, and after getting engaged in January of this year, Kat thought it would be a good idea to get a tattoo of her future husband before they actually tied the knot for real. Obviously it wasn’t such a swell decision to make, and like all relationships that are immortalized in ink, Jesse and Kat ended up calling off their engagement in July. After the announcement was made, Jesse explained to People that the geographical distance (Kat lived in LA and Jesse lived in Austin, Texas) between them made the relationship impossible. But then they got back together! So good for them, but they still make this list.
Leonardo DiCaprio and Bar Refaeli
There’s not much information on Leonardo DiCaprio’s five-year relationship with Sports Illustrated model Bar Refaeli because they pretty much kept to themselves. Leo is famous for not saying anything about his personal life, and so the only proof we had that these two were even together was when they were photographed courtside at a Lakers game or on a yacht drifting into the sunset somewhere. In any case, we learned the actor and model decided to split up in May, and sources claimed neither one of them were ready to settle down, and that the relationship ultimately ended because their careers were heading in different directions. You would think that would’ve occurred to them earlier!
Kate Bosworth, Alexander Skarsgard
It was announced in July that Kate and Alex broke up after two years of dating. They apparently met in October of 2009 at the Chateau Marmont in West Hollywood, and spent the majority of their relationship drinking beers out of plastic cups and sitting on the grass at music festivals. There’s really not much to say about them…so good riddance! They weren’t very entertaining, anyway.
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