- 2 years ago
To call these celebrity relationships controversial would be an understatement. Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the most prominent adult celebrities who stirred up controversy by engaging in relationships with teenagers.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00 "You didn't fall in love then."
00:01 "Don't start a story, they're gonna write that."
00:04 Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the most
00:08 prominent adult celebrities who stirred up controversy by engaging in relationships with
00:13 teenagers.
00:14 "He would just be silly with me and then he started kissing me."
00:18 Number 20. Don Johnson and Melanie Griffith.
00:23 Born to acting legend Tippi Hedren, Melanie Griffith was determined to follow in her
00:28 mother's footsteps, initially taking on minor roles in films during her teenage years.
00:33 One of these parts had Griffith playing a student in The Herod Experiment,
00:37 where she crossed paths with the then 22-year-old Don Johnson.
00:42 "I don't think this is gonna work too well."
00:43 "Why not?"
00:44 Their relationship blossomed swiftly, despite Hedren's disapproval,
00:48 leading to their marriage in 1976, shortly after Griffith turned 18.
00:53 However, they divorced just six months later. Despite this,
00:58 fate brought them together again, and they remarried in 1989.
01:02 "What is it that you do that gives you access to unlisted phone numbers? Mine, for example."
01:08 This second attempt at marriage lasted seven years, and resulted in the birth of their
01:13 daughter Dakota Johnson, who also stepped into the acting world.
01:16 Number 19. Dane Cook and Kelsey Taylor.
01:20 In September of 2023, comedian Dane Cook raised eyebrows after it was announced that he had
01:27 gotten married to his partner of six years, 24-year-old Kelsey Taylor.
01:32 "My girlfriend and I, we get a lot of crap from people because we have an age difference.
01:35 I'm 46 and she's 20."
01:37 This indicates that their relationship began when Taylor was 18 and Cook was 45.
01:43 To make things even more uncomfortable, it appears the two had crossed paths long before,
01:48 meeting at a game night Cook hosted at his place.
01:51 They then became, quote, "friends for a while" before getting romantically involved.
01:57 While it's not clear how old exactly Taylor was when this friendship began,
02:01 the 26-year age gap between the couple understandably left a lot of people feeling unsettled.
02:07 "Sometimes I actually find myself saying, like, where has she been all my life? And then I
02:10 realize she wasn't alive for the first 26 years of it."
02:13 Number 18. Tyga and Kylie Jenner.
02:16 Rumors of a relationship between Tyga and Kylie Jenner began swirling in 2014,
02:22 when the reality star was still under the age of majority and the rapper was 24.
02:27 "This is the first time I'm bringing a guy on a family trip,
02:31 so I'm a little nervous about how it's gonna go."
02:34 At the time, Tyga was engaged to model Blac Chyna, with whom he shares a son.
02:40 Initially, Kris Jenner dismissed the speculation, claiming that the two were
02:44 merely friends who moved around in the same circles and enjoyed each other's company.
02:49 However, their relationship was confirmed in August 2015,
02:52 conveniently coinciding with Jenner's 18th birthday.
02:56 This confirmation came after Tyga gifted Jenner a Ferrari,
03:00 and the two were spotted cozying up in Mexico.
03:03 Theirs was an on-again, off-again affair before ultimately ending for good in April 2017.
03:09 "They say she young, I should've waited."
03:11 Number 17. Chuck Berry and Janis Escalante
03:15 Although many of the scandalous affairs on this list escaped legal consequences,
03:19 this one remains one of the only exceptions.
03:22 Rock and roll pioneer Chuck Berry was arrested in December 1959 on allegations that he had done the
03:35 deed with an underage waitress named Janis Escalante. He was also accused of transporting
03:41 Escalante across state lines for what was deemed, quote, "immoral purposes." Berry maintained that
03:47 Escalante had claimed to be 21 and that he had hired her as a hostess for his St. Louis nightclub.
03:53 Despite this defense, he was convicted in two separate trials,
03:57 and ended up spending nearly two years in prison for the crime.
04:01 "First of all, I didn't transport anyone, I didn't solicit anything."
04:04 Number 16. Ted Nugent and Pele Massa
04:08 In 1981, Ted Nugent released the single "Jailbait," which contained disturbing lyrics
04:14 about engaging in unlawful contact with an underage girl, with the consent of her mother.
04:19 It may have been interpreted as tongue-in-cheek if Nugent hadn't been in a very similar situation
04:29 just three years earlier. In 1978, the hard rock musician started dating Pele Massa. However,
04:36 as the two couldn't get married due to Massa being a minor, Nugent reportedly convinced
04:41 her parents to sign documents declaring him as her legal guardian. "And so the Ted-hating liberal
04:48 press started quoting the High Times magazine and quoting an ex-girlfriend who claimed that I
04:56 adopted her." It seems Massa wasn't the only youth with whom Nugent had been involved.
05:01 Musician Courtney Love also claims to have had a similar experience with him before she even
05:06 became a teenager. Number 15. Luc Besson and Maiwen
05:17 The 1994 film "Leon the Professional" revolves around the unconventional emotional bond that
05:23 develops between a hitman and a 12-year-old girl. "Leon, what exactly do you do for a living?"
05:29 "Cleaner." "You mean you're a hitman?" "Yeah." "Cool."
05:40 The film, which was written and directed by Luc Besson, was reportedly inspired by Besson's
05:45 relationship with his ex-wife, Maiwen. The couple first met when Maiwen was also 12,
05:51 and Besson was 29. However, they only officially began dating when she turned
05:56 the age of consent in their native France. They tied the knot the following year,
06:01 after Maiwen became pregnant with their daughter. Although they parted ways a few years later,
06:06 their controversial relationship re-entered the news in the late 2010s amid allegations of sexual
06:11 misconduct against Besson. A 49-year-old casting director has claimed she was assaulted by Besson.
06:17 Number 14. Bill Wyman and Mandy Smith
06:20 In 1989, Bill Wyman, the then bassist for the Rolling Stones, married his second wife,
06:26 Mandy Smith, who was 18 at the time. "Things work out in the end if they're right,
06:31 and we always thought it was right at the beginning, and here we are."
06:34 While that is legally permissible, the circumstances surrounding their relationship
06:39 raised a lot of questions. According to Wyman, he first met Smith after she'd just become a teen,
06:45 and he later fell in love with her. They reportedly became involved shortly after.
06:50 However, their marriage lasted only two years before they separated and eventually divorced.
06:55 "Their marriage lasted only two years, and much of that was a sham,
07:00 followed by a bitter divorce last May because of his adultery."
07:04 Adding to the complexity of the situation, in the same year of the divorce,
07:08 Wyman's son from his first marriage tied the knot with Smith's mother. This not only made him his
07:14 son's former son-in-law, but also his ex-wife's step-grandfather.
07:19 Number 13. Charlie Chaplin and Lita Gray
07:23 By 1924, Charlie Chaplin was one of the most popular figures in the world,
07:28 having achieved great success with several box office hits.
07:39 While making his third film, The Gold Rush, Chaplin got married to his second wife,
07:44 the teenaged Lita Gray. Their marriage was sudden, as Gray had unexpectedly become pregnant
07:50 through the then 35-year-old Chaplin. Fearing potential legal repercussions in California due
07:56 to the age difference, Chaplin opted to elope with Gray to Mexico for a clandestine wedding.
08:02 Despite producing two children, their marriage ultimately soured, culminating in a bitter
08:07 divorce. Gray walked away from the union with a staggering $600,000 settlement,
08:12 a record sum for an American case at the time.
08:15 Number 12. Jimmy Page and Lori Maddox
08:29 Although Jimmy Page had a well-known adult partner throughout the 1970s,
08:35 he also reportedly engaged in a secret relationship with a teenager between 1972 and 1975.
08:42 "He kept his favorite, Lori Maddox, under lock and key."
08:45 The teenager in question was Lori Maddox, a former child model and groupie who began
08:50 seeing Page in her early teens. According to Maddox, she initially had little interest
08:55 in the musician, but was taken to his room by the band's tour manager against her will.
09:00 "He told me he was going to be with me and I said, 'No, he wasn't.' And he said, 'Yes, I am.'"
09:04 Despite lasting over two years, Page made extensive efforts to conceal the relationship,
09:09 for fear of the legal consequences. It wasn't until 2015 that it drew widespread attention
09:16 after Maddox divulged her alleged encounters with several 70s rock icons in a revelatory interview.
09:22 Number 11. Woody Allen and Bobby Christina Englehart
09:26 In his 1979 film Manhattan, Woody Allen plays a divorced writer entangled in a secret romance
09:33 with a teenager named Tracy. "Yes, excuse me." "She's gorgeous."
09:40 Well, according to actress Bobby Christina Englehart, that plotline may not be entirely
09:47 fictional. In a 2018 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Englehart claimed that she and Allen
09:53 were involved in an eight-year relationship, starting before she officially became an adult
09:58 in 1976. "He was 41 and their 25-year age gap didn't seem to be a problem for the famed movie
10:06 director." This period coincided in part with Allen's public involvement with actress Mia
10:11 Farrow. Although Allen has refused to confirm the existence of this relationship, Englehart
10:16 believes that she very likely served as an inspiration for the character Tracy in Manhattan.
10:21 "How did you react when you first saw the film?" "I cried because I thought, 'Wow, you know,
10:27 he won't help me in my acting career. He doesn't do anything for me, but boy, I'm great subject
10:32 matter.'" Number 10. Doug Hutchison and Courtney Stodden Hutchison is an actor perhaps best known
10:39 for 1999's The Green Mile, but he re-entered the spotlight in a big way when he married the
10:45 teenaged Courtney Stodden in 2011. "I got down on my knees and I said, 'Send me an angel, please.'"
10:52 The two met online through an acting workshop Hutchison was teaching, with the then 50-year-old
10:58 apparently unaware that his love interest was not even one-third his age. Stodden's mother approved,
11:04 at least at the time, while Hutchison lost his agent and was alienated from much of his family.
11:10 Since tying the knot, the pair have split, reunited, been expecting, renewed vows,
11:15 and split again. In 2021, Stodden claimed that Hutchison had initiated contact with them over
11:21 email and groomed them. However, Hutchison denies this, asserting that they contacted him first.
11:28 "I'm learning how to be a normal person." Number 9. Henry Cavill and Tara King
11:34 The handsome, well-spoken Superman actor tends to keep a pretty low profile,
11:39 which made the gossip-worthy 13-year age gap with girlfriend Tara King all the more surprising.
11:44 "In a new interview with Elle magazine, he got candid about their 13-year age gap,
11:49 telling the mag quote, 'People say age is just a number. It's actually real and a true sign of
11:55 maturity.'" After meeting Cavill at a London nightclub in 2015, King later accompanied him
12:00 to the Batman v Superman premiere, as well as a Vanity Fair Oscar party. The actor spoke glowingly
12:06 about his lady love in interviews throughout 2016. "When asked what he and his lady love talk about,
12:11 he responded with, 'Everything.'" But by the year's end, they had parted ways,
12:16 with King reportedly wanting something more serious than Cavill. It wasn't the first age-gapped
12:21 relationship for Cavill either, as oddly enough, he himself dated a 32-year-old when he was 19.
12:28 Number 8. Paul Walker and Jasmine Pilshard Gosnell
12:32 Paul Walker's accidental death was a shocker, but amid the tragedy came to light a previously
12:37 unnoticed detail about his life - his girlfriend's age. Jasmine Pilshard Gosnell was 23 when Walker
12:44 died, and having dated him for roughly seven years, that would make her underage when her
12:50 relationship began with the then 33-year-old actor. The two were even rumored to have gotten
12:55 engaged back in 2009 when she was 19 and he was 35, according to Perez Hilton. Although just
13:02 eight years her senior, Jasmine took on a stepmotherly role to Walker's daughter, Meadow.
13:07 A bit of math and a few details involving ex-girlfriend Aubriana Atwell suggest that
13:13 Pilshard Gosnell was not the first teenager that an adult Walker had been involved with.
13:18 According to a 2013 interview, when she was 28, the pair had known each other for a dozen years.
13:25 Number 7. R. Kelly and Aaliyah
13:27 "Age ain't nothing but a number" takes on an entirely different meaning,
13:31 considering the relationship between the song's adult producer and underage singer.
13:36 "Once I got up to Detroit, I didn't have to hear her sing because she was glowing.
13:41 I knew she had it. As soon as she started singing, that verified it."
13:44 R. Kelly, credited as the sole writer, first met Aaliyah when she was a preteen and assumed a
13:50 mentor role in her life. The controversial lyrics of the song sparked rumors that the
13:55 two were romantically involved. "Age ain't nothing but a number,
13:59 going down ain't nothing but a thing." Soon after, a marriage certificate emerged,
14:05 showing that they had secretly tied the knot in 1994. As Aaliyah was only in her mid-teens at
14:10 the time, rather than the listed age of 18, the marriage was rendered unlawful and was promptly
14:16 annulled by her parents. Both parties initially denied the wedding ever happened, but Aaliyah
14:22 later admitted to falsifying her age. "Why didn't the culture say something is wrong?"
14:29 Number 6. Jerry Seinfeld and Shoshana Lonstein
14:33 The fictional Jerry Seinfeld has had many notable romantic interests. A deaf woman,
14:38 a phone sex operator, a supermodel, a woman who always wore the same outfit, a woman with man
14:44 hands, and many more. The actual Jerry Seinfeld dated a high school student.
14:49 Within weeks after their first date, friends and neighbors grew accustomed to seeing Jerry
14:54 pull up in a limousine outside of their apartment building, where Shoshana lived with her parents
15:00 and her brother. Meeting her before she turned 18, and rollerblading, Seinfeld and Shoshana Lonstein
15:07 became tabloid regulars and Howard Stern fodder. The two were an item throughout her university
15:13 days, and Jerry also allegedly made two attempts at engagement, including a proposal on her 21st
15:20 birthday. However, they also broke up at least once during their couplehood, before splitting
15:25 for good in 1997 after roughly four years together. "I do think he really cared about her,
15:31 but it doesn't change the fact that it's creepy that he tried to get with her when she was so
15:36 young." Number 5. Sonny Bono and Cher. "They say we're young and we don't know." It's doubly
15:44 impossible to believe that Cher was ever a teenager, and that Sonny Bono was capable of
15:49 dating her. But it's true. All of it. "Babe, I got you, babe." By then a high school dropout,
15:59 a teenage Cher was a dancer keen on cracking into showbiz when she met Sonny in November of 1962.
16:05 He instead hired her as a housekeeper, but eventually found her work as a backup singer.
16:10 "I just was this kind of wild child. And he had been married once and he was 28 and had been in
16:16 the music business and had been trying to be a singer forever." After about a month of living
16:22 together, the two became involved, culminating in an unofficial and non-binding wedding in Tijuana
16:28 in October 1964 when she was 18. A real wedding followed in 1969 after the birth of their child,
16:36 Chaz Bono. Number 4. Sam Taylor-Johnson and Erin Taylor-Johnson. Freshly divorced and deep into
16:44 directing her debut feature film Nowhere Boy, the then 42-year-old Sam Taylor-Wood fell for her star,
16:50 then 18-year-old Erin Johnson. "Don't tell Mimi. Please. This is our secret. Promise me."
17:00 Although Johnson was just seven years older than her eldest child, the pair hit it off
17:05 and by the film's premiere in October 2009 were officially engaged. Marrying in June of 2012,
17:11 the couple both took on the name Taylor-Johnson and also adopted a one film per year policy,
17:17 which allows either of them to work while the other raises the family and tends to the garden.
17:23 In Erin's case, he enjoys his fathering and gardening so much that he once contemplated
17:28 retiring from acting. "What inspires you?" "Sam." "Erin." Number 3. René Angelil and Céline Dion.
17:38 Although they were ultimately together until his death in 2016, the beginnings of the Angelil-Dion
17:43 union saw Dion meet Angelil when he was 38 and she was not yet a teen. "She was 12." "She was 12."
17:50 With Dion seeking management, René not only took Céline on as a client, but also put up his house
17:57 to bankroll her debut album. When she was around 17 or 18, Dion began to have feelings for the
18:03 older René, despite him still being legally married. They began secretly dating in 1987,
18:09 and while Céline's mother was initially opposed to the courtship, it actually had more to do with
18:14 René's prior failed relationships than the whole position of authority thing, or the massive age
18:20 gap. "Had you fallen in love by then?" "I was in love a long time before that." Number 2. Jerry Lee
18:27 Lewis and Myra Gale Brown. Jerry Lee Lewis has been married many times, but the only one that
18:33 lasted in the public memory was wife number three, the teenaged first cousin once removed, Myra Gale
18:39 Brown. The discovery of Lewis's underage bride unsurprisingly completely derailed his career.
18:45 "The press had a field day denouncing 22-year-old Lewis as a baby snatcher." Busted at the beginning
18:51 of a quickly aborted 1958 tour of the UK, Lewis's booking fees dropped from $10,000 to $250 per show,
19:00 while radio blacklisted him. Despite this, the couple was married until 1970, by which time
19:06 Brown had doubled in age and had given birth to two children. "How do you want to remember him?"
19:11 "Alive and playing great balls of fire." Before we continue, be sure to subscribe to our channel
19:16 and ring the bell to get notified about our latest videos. You have the option to be notified for
19:21 occasional videos or all of them. If you're on your phone, make sure you go into your settings
19:26 and switch on notifications. Number 1. Elvis Presley and Priscilla Ann Wagner. Presley's army
19:34 life was eventful to say the least. The only time he left the US was when he was stationed in
19:39 Germany, and this was also when he was introduced to substances, karate, and teenager Priscilla Ann
19:46 Wagner. "I was with him when I was 16, 17, 18, 19." Meeting in 1959, Elvis was smitten, but was
19:54 initially denied a second date when he broke her curfew. Regardless, the couple dated until Presley
19:59 returned stateside in 1960. They then kept it up long distance until Priscilla moved to Graceland
20:06 in 1963. They got engaged in 1966 and tied the knot the following year, which according to Priscilla
20:14 at least, was also the first time they did the deed. "I'm much more comfortable with it now because
20:20 I am my own person and my own right now." Lisa Marie, the couple's only child, was born nine
20:25 months later. Which of these significant age gap relationships shocked you the most? Let us know
20:31 in the comments. She explained for the jury details of R. Kelly and Aaliyah's 1994 marriage certificate.
20:37 Did you enjoy this video? Check out these other clips from WatchMojo,
20:41 and be sure to subscribe and ring the bell to be notified about our latest videos.
20:46 [Music]
Comments