Here are some photos of Natalie Portman watching the Paris Saint-Germain football match in Paris on Saturday, about 28 hours after the story broke about Benjamin Millepied’s affair with a 25-year-old French activist named Camilla Etienne. The story broke in the French press first, then it was picked up by People Magazine and Page Six. Portman’s people even did some damage control with People, confirming that Millepied had a brief affair and that he and Natalie are working on their marriage together.
It’s really something to watch Portman navigate this scandal. The fact that she went solo to the Paris Saint Germain match is sending a signal, as is the fact that she made a point of looking good and pulled together, and she apparently made a point of greeting several people (like Novak Djokovic, who was also at the match). She’s not hiding and she’s also not doing happy-family photo-ops with Benjamin. Natalie and Benjamin has reportedly been in France for weeks – she went to Cannes to promote May-December, then she traveled to Paris, where she and Benjamin have been seen out multiple times together (including at Beyonce’s Paris concert). I wonder if Natalie knew the story was going to break when it did. I also wonder if she maybe had a hand in how the story broke? No, maybe that’s one conspiracy too far.
People are trying to do the math on the timeline though – how long was Benjamin’s affair? Did Natalie and Benjamin have a low-key separation and when was the separation? When did Natalie find out about the affair? We’ll probably never know the answers to these questions unless she’s really done with him. And I don’t think she is. But I bet we do see more of these single-lady outings.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid.
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- Paris, FRANCE – Actress Natalie Portman puts on a brave face to watch the French L1 football match between Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and Clermont Foot 63 at the Parc des Princes Stadium in Paris, France. Natalie and her husband Benjamin Millepied are in the headlines after it was revealed that Benjamin had an extramarital affair! Pictured: Natalie Portman BACKGRID USA 3 JUNE 2023 BYLINE MUST READ: Best Image / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Paris, FRANCE – Actress Natalie Portman puts on a brave face to watch the French L1 football match between Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and Clermont Foot 63 at the Parc des Princes Stadium in Paris, France. Natalie and her husband Benjamin Millepied are in the headlines after it was revealed that Benjamin had an extramarital affair! Pictured: Natalie Portman BACKGRID USA 3 JUNE 2023 BYLINE MUST READ: Best Image / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Paris, FRANCE – Actress Natalie Portman puts on a brave face to watch the French L1 football match between Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and Clermont Foot 63 at the Parc des Princes Stadium in Paris, France. Natalie and her husband Benjamin Millepied are in the headlines after it was revealed that Benjamin had an extramarital affair! Pictured: Natalie Portman BACKGRID USA 3 JUNE 2023 BYLINE MUST READ: Best Image / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Paris, FRANCE – Actress Natalie Portman puts on a brave face to watch the French L1 football match between Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and Clermont Foot 63 at the Parc des Princes Stadium in Paris, France. Natalie and her husband Benjamin Millepied are in the headlines after it was revealed that Benjamin had an extramarital affair! Pictured: Natalie Portman BACKGRID USA 3 JUNE 2023 BYLINE MUST READ: Best Image / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Paris, FRANCE – Actress Natalie Portman puts on a brave face to watch the French L1 football match between Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and Clermont Foot 63 at the Parc des Princes Stadium in Paris, France. Natalie and her husband Benjamin Millepied are in the headlines after it was revealed that Benjamin had an extramarital affair! Pictured: Natalie Portman BACKGRID USA 3 JUNE 2023 BYLINE MUST READ: Best Image / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
Her response is so dignified! I’m glad she’s not doing happy family hand holding pap walks to cover up his misbehavior. I hope for the best for her and the kids, whatever that looks like.
Her skin is immaculate.
Feels likes she has very “French” style here. Like what we think of as French, anyway. Smooth hair, blazer and button down, perfect red lip, aloof confidence.
I said it on the other post, but I didn’t realize that Isabelle Boylston, this awesome ballet dancer I’ve been following on social media since the pandemic for her fun behind-the-scenes stuff about dancing is Millepied’s previous girlfriend!
The media strategy on this story is fascinating. I’ve got the popcorn, thanks for following this Kaiser!
SAME! I love Isabella’s Instagram account. She’s so refreshingly real, and obviously hugely talented. I remember this story from a decade ago, but had no idea that Isabella was the woman Millipied cheated on.
I was just going to say this!
This whole thing seems very “French”.
That said she really did dodge a bullet with Anakin.
What? I never knew that she and Hayden were a couple…? What happened?
I follow her too and was really disappointed to see that she had been treated that way.
The affair seems really french.
In Paris I notice the stylish women don’t have “done” hair and bold lips, the way stylish women do in America. There is more of a casual insouciance.
I think Natalie has more of a self-consciously editorial/magazine (or chic American) look here.
When I first saw her with him I had trouble seeing the big attraction. When I read he cheated on his partner with Natalie I knew this would not end well.
I love her in everything shes in which is why I feel bad for the predicament she’s in especially since she has kids.
I have a horrible feeling he’s been cheating the entire time.
I wish her luck in what decides to do.
There’s a lot of anti-Natalie sentiment floating out there, which I find grossly misogynistic and sad. Like, “Well, she’s such a controlling snob OF COURSE he cheated.” I’m not a huge Nat fan in terms of actual acting ability (kinda one-note, to me), but I admire her activism even if it sometimes seems a little overdone (and certainly inaccessible) to me. And Ben has ALWAYS struck me as skeevy — and there have been endless rumors about his wandering peen, so can’t say I’m surprised. Best her her and the kiddos.
Whoa I missed that. That’s sexist bs.
That scabbies ballerina stepped out on one partner and then another, Natalie.
It’s hard to say what she knew at the time or how many times he’s cheated.
What I will say is that the only person responsible for his actions is him. No one forces someone to cheat. That’s on him and him alone.
The anti-Natalie sentiment is because she had an affair with him when he was in a very serious committed relationship with someone else and was unrepentant. So there are not a lot of tears for her from those who remember her own lack of empathy and respect for another woman’s relationship and feelings.
*shrug* These things happen. Relationships end. They weren’t married, and we certainly don’t have any insight into what Benjamin’s relationship with Isabelle was like. Sounds to me like has probably infatuated with Natalie and love bombed her — but that’s just me speculating and holds zero scientific merit.
Regardless, it does not make her a bad person deserving of bad things. I’m disappointed in how reductive some people can be regarding cheating, regardless of circumstances. Like, there is significant daylight between carrying on a long-term affair while lying to both parties, and having some overlap between relationships. I have some compassion for the latter.
Exactly. Camille did what natalie did before her.
@ SquiddusMaximus
“What dose They weren’t married” even mean?
Do you think it’s only cheating if they’re “married”?
@SquiddusMaximus – I don’t “blame” Portman for her husband’s behavior, although I do question her taste in marrying him in the first place. BUT, my dislike of Portman has nothing to do with her marriage, it’s because of her support of Roman Polanski. If you want to call people “misogynistic,” maybe you can start with the ones who support men who drug and rape underaged girls?
I’ve never seen anyone refer to Natalie as controlling. Annoying, yes, but not controlling.
The only reason she’s been considered annoying is because she can be a bit judgemental while doing the same things as everyone else.
And I don’t think anyone thinks she deserved to be cheated on. People are simply not surprised Millipied would cheat on someone or anyone. He has a history that precedes him.
I think people (especially women) seem to hate her because she isn’t the perfect victim.
She’s effed up in the past so if she gets cheated on now (as a mother of two small kids, mind you) people react as if she deserved it.
I’m honestly disturbed by the lack of empathy that people exhibit nowadays just about everywhere…
I would like to take this opportunity to pre-empt all the “One a cheater, always a cheater” nonsense and every other grandma aphorism that’s gonna be thrown out there. Life is complicated. Timing is not always right. Relationships end, sometimes messily. Sometimes another person comes along that is a better fit. When one person does not want it to end, it feels horrible, no matter how it happens. EVERYONE has the autonomy to end relationships when they are not right. Mr. Thousandfeet was not married. Even if he were, it’s ok to end that relationship if it’s wrong. I am sick of the frantic moralizing.
Of course relationships break down, and sometimes messily.
However in my opinion there is such a thing as respect. Dumping a long term live-in partner to publicly shack up with someone else is humiliating and says a lot about one’s character.
I remember Portman gushing about Millepied in her Oscar speech- at the time I thought it was very callous. He dumps his live in partner for a Hollywood star, and she acts as if said partner didn’t exist. Pretty shit in my view.
Cheating is never a good sign- even without the moralising. Someone who’s happy crossing that line once is statistically more likely to do it again.
Someone who’s happy about cheating is a narcissistic nob, no arguments there 😉 But that’s an extreme end of the spectrum — one that 100% exists (been there, seen that), but isn’t always the case.
Another example would be a devoted monogamist who makes herself miserable trying to fix an unfixable relationship… until someone else comes along and makes she see that she doesn’t have to be miserable. She ends the relationship, albeit with some overlap. Throw in some mental health issues about being afraid to end relationships, and you have a difficult, fairly complex, but certainly not malicious situation. Seen that one, too. No judgment here. We get one life to be happy.
In this case it appears to be true though. 🤷♀️
There are also so many relationships where one person is miserable and the other is blissfully happy and unwilling to see that there might be problems. I look back at the long drawn out end of my marriage and think that having an affair might have gotten me out of there quicker.
@ squiddusmaximux Thank you for summing up want I have wanted to say for numerous of these “cheating” posts. Not everything in life happens and ends as neatly as lots of people seem to hope. Well said.
How glorious it will be to read such a generous and magnanimous take on the next Julia Roberts Danny Moder post.
If that’s your attitude, why be mad at the wandering weenie this time around? Their relationship may be approaching a messy end, but life happens, there’s some overlap, people make choices …I agree with a lot of that, but it doesn’t make me especially sympathetic towards Portman. She made her choices, and now she has a few more to make.
But ethical and fully consensual relationships are choices we can all make…they are kinder better choices we should make…. So it is not just a “grandma” sort of thing to take issue with Ben or Natalie or the current other woman. It makes perfect sense to be critical of such behavior.
Right, Millepied, what a crazy last name. I can’t think of many other insect names people have. Bee, Mariposa…
Agree. Pique was also with someone when he met Shakira and dumped his girlfriend. Yet nobody questions him being a dck now and cheating on Shakira after they’ve had two kids and have been over 10 years together. And nobody says Shakira deserved it…
I like Natalie. I hope she gets through this on the other side happy and healthy with her children and if it’s possible her marriage.
She’s definitely getting in front of this scandal to hopefully have it blow over as soon as possible. May December could be an Oscar contender and they’re talking noms for the whole cast. I think she’ll do a lot of solo events without leaving him…yet.
Good Luck to her…
This story made me nostalgic as i discovered celebitchy with the portman-millepied affair,as the french medias were mute on the subject more than ten years ago.
It’s very interesting as she isn’t given the same grace Johnny Depp is ,here in France.
I will never forget a journalist said stories about arguments or disputes in the Vanessa Paradis -johnny Depp couple were killed because of the love from french bobo audience jack Sparrow was benefiting from.
And with the Amber Heard backlash,i Can Say he was right.
It will be hard to navigate during 10 months until the oscars ,with millepied unable to be discreet and faithful or weaponizing it as a ticking bomb against his wife, paparazzi on alert for more, the now Notorious mistress in absolutely messy place,and the poor children.
I think she’s leaning into the whole “French” thing.
Most Americans assume that cheating is sort of a hobby in France and it’s just understood that it will happen and that in France or with French people – the relationship can keep going afterwards without issue
Just a thought.
I don’t think she knew this exact story was going to break. Meaning she might have known the media found out about his cheating hence her People magazine statement where everything is fine, the affair is over and Benjamin is begging for forgiveness.
I think she didn’t know the story of Benjamin still seeing Camilla was going to come out hence the solos outing.
But why is she doing any of this at all? She was so private for the last 12 years or so, is it an ego thing? She didn’t care if we forgot about her while she was having babies but now that there’s the idea out there that a man chose someone else over her she has to squash that?
It’s because her film premiered at Cannes and the best time for any press is when you’ve got something to shill. Even bad press brings the mention of “currently in Cannes with her new film May December.”
Natalie is stunning, smart, and extremely talented obviously. But she either needs a makeup artist or needs a new one. The foundation line at her hairline is driving me nuts! Good for her for going out and living her life, I feel horrible for her.
I think it might be sunscreen?
It seems she’s trying to please two audiences, the French one and the American one. PDA with him for the French audience. It is no big deal, oui? But for the outraged American audience, she is seen going out separately from him (maybe with no wedding ring on)?
Lastly, I guess she needs to please her Israeli audience because that’s her native country. I don’t know how they feel about cheating?
She was born there and used to be quite extreme and then I think she’s actually spoken for the Palestinian cause in recent years, so don’t know how Israeli she is now.
She seems to be an observant Jew, and in the Jewish religion/culture (of course, there are variations), divorce is not an attractive option, especially with young kids. Family is everything. The Israeli culture largely follows this the same way. I would guess she will stick with him, until and unless he continues to be still blatantly cheating.
I actually thought they’ve been over for a while now. And with her husband not being in Cannes, I was wondering if they split up for good. Of course they’re private but even before these timeline of events, something has been off with their relationship . Then we had confirmation that Ben cheated.
Natalie has too many options to be humiliated like this.
I think she is done…except for co-parenting.
Just checked out Isabella Boylston’s IG out of curiosity as posters here have said she’s awesome on IG. Have to agree she does IG very well – very tongue in cheek and full of character and no narcissism. She’s married to a very (outwardly, however you want to define it) successful finance guy; his LinkedIn is IMPRESSIVE. Also better looking than Ben, LOL.
Also, check out their apartment in AD! It is so well decorated with lots of art.
Common knowledge says she’s a huge bisch
Yeah not feeling sorry for her. It’s pretty much common knowledge that she’s not so nice a person. Really nasty to fans. It’s not aging well for her