As we discussed yesterday, Scarlett Johansson’s super-bohemian and evolved split from Romain Dauriac has taken a turn. Scarlett filed for divorce earlier this week and asked for temporary custody of her daughter Rose. Romain – a Frenchman – has been living in America long enough to know how this sh-t is played. He hired an American lawyer and he tucked in to fight this in the press. Romain is seeking primary custody of Rose and he thinks ScarJo’s divorce filing was a “hostile act.” ScarJo released a statement basically saying that she would not be fighting this custody dispute out in the press. Except that’s exactly what she’s doing, she’s just doing it through unnamed sources and her lawyer. Yesterday, Scarlett’s lawyer Judith Poller responded to Romain’s lawyer’s statements (he claimed Romain was “shocked”) by saying this that Scarlett’s divorce filing was done with zero malice, that they had been separated for months and it was procedural, not hostile. An insider tells People Mag:
“Under the law in NYC, the filing of an action for divorce is merely procedural. No request for a judge was requested. While her lawyer did request that Scarlett get residential custody, again, for procedural purposes, they preserved all rights she had if they didn’t resolve the case. It wasn’t a secret that the parties were separated. So filing for divorce is no big deal. This is not a hostile act by Scarlett.”
People Mag did a follow-up story in which the magazine describes Scarlett and Romain’s divorce negotiations as “broken down” because of their fight over custody.
Dauriac’s lawyer Hal Mayerson, who previously told PEOPLE his client was “shocked” by Johansson’s divorce filing on Tuesday, now says child custody was a main point of contention during the private negotiations. Johannson, who travels often for work, is pushing for “hybrid schedules and changing schedules,” according to Mayerson, who says her ideas for custody are not in the best interest of his client. (Dauriac wants their 2-year-old daughter Rose Dorothy to live with him in his native France). In her divorce filing, Johansson asked for primary residential custody.
“No mother or father wants to be the drop-in babysitter for the other parent,” Mayerson argues. Now that the divorce has been filed with the courts, the attorney says his client will pursue joint custody and primary physical custody, in addition to “economic relief” for child support and counsel fees.
While Dauriac claims he was caught off guard by Johansson’s filing, a source close to Johansson tells PEOPLE the decision was not meant to be malicious.
“Her team is just following standard legal procedure when you’re going through a divorce,” says the source. “His lawyer seems to be contradicting himself by asking for privacy but then making public statements.”
Here’s my take: I think Scarlett and Romain were quietly trying to figure out how they were going to do everything, from the divorce filing and custody and whatever. Romain suggested that with Scarlett’s busy schedule, he should be the primary caregiver and he would move back to France. Then Scarlett freaked out and decided to get the ball rolling on the divorce so she could take the upper hand, legally and in American courts. And now she’s freaking out because Romain was prepared for that, and he’s playing the “unfairly maligned husband who has always put their daughter first while Scarlett travels the world” card in the press. It’s fascinating from a media-relations perspective. I actually have to give Romain an A+ for his gamesmanship, although I absolutely think Scarlett has some cards up her sleeve and it will be interesting to see how she plays this.
Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet.
I think this could get pretty ugly. They tried to remain civil during the early stages of divorce , but when you talk about custody , that’s a whole different thing.
yes, and i agree with kaiser that scarlett probably wanted to file first and get this thing started in american courts. i don’t know if their child was born in france. but if little rose is a french citizen, and romain filed in french courts first, i wonder if they might favor giving him custody over scarlett (as it would be a situation in which the primary caretaking french parent of a french-born child is asking for primary custody).
Unless it turns out Romain is some horrid abuser in some way, I dont really see why he shouldn’t get primary custody. Its hard enough to shuffle kids between different states, let alone different countries, Even then its possible if there is a defined homebase for each parent but there isnt for Scarlett and it doesnt seem like she would have nearly as much time as Romainto raise the child. For the kid’s sake I hope they can come to an agreement without sending their lawyers and ‘sources’ to the press…
Also hopefully this is a lesson for her to not ever get married again, from every interview shes done about relationships, a traditional marriage/family life clearly isnt for her…
totally agree
I don’t know about them but this article suggests they currently live in the US. If they do, they need to stay there. As for her career, let’s be honest, actors are on set maybe a month or two for a leading role. A week or two of hardcore promo. A really active actor will have maybe three leading roles a year, most of which shoot in LA. This leaves a lot of free time even at the Peak of one’s career. And certainly an actress of her clout could still have a healthy script selection shooting exclusively in LA .
I’m just sick of divorcing parents trying to rob their children of a parent. I mean she was always an actress, what was the plan before they divorced? Did he intend for a young kid to not see his mum for a month while she earns an income? Of course not, some travel for off set shoots was always expected. So just drop the move to France, stay in LA and share the child.
Their home base was never LA. They split their time between NYC and France. So why should their home base suddenly become LA?
@Nyawira: totally agree 100% with you.
Don’t they live in Paris? Or at least he and their daughter have a base there, as there have been plenty of stories of fans/people bumping into them (him and their daughter) grocery shopping and walking in the parks of Paris. It would, however, be much easier if all parties were US based, but unfortunately I don’t think that’s the case here.
Nah. If they split their time between France and US, why should the US suddenly become the ‘main base’ just conveniently the country where the mother comes from? If anything, they can keep doing the same splitting time if they want joint custody.
And Scarlett works a lot which means a lot of script reading to learn lines (which doesn’t get stuck in your head after 1 reading), Michael Fassbender and other actors have said they read their scripts over 100x times and that’s the easy part. Interpreting character takes a while too and many don’t even get the characters before they start filming! I don’t know, there’s this idea that a working actor has free time to spare when acting is quite a lot of prep work for any role. Add to the fact that Scarlett is an action actress and your work doubles as you add the physical and choreography. That’s a lot of time to spend BEFORE filming and during filming there is no time to be lazy. And then when you finish it’s a sprint to the next script because you’re only as good as your last film. And then there’s the promotion.
They bought a place in LA in 2015. I’m not sure how much time they’ve spent there.
http://variety.com/2015/dirt/real-estalker/scarlett-johansson-surreptitiously-snags-l-a-digs-1201426541/
LA really is the perfect place to,raise children. Such a healthy ideas about wprk ethic, healthy relationship with food and looks all around….
Come on, don’t tell me that Paris and France are worse choice than LA for a child of the celebrity, or any child. Especially in the atmosphere currently in the USA. France is not much better when talking about radicalization of politics, but it’s still ahead of Trump’s USA.
It may be convenient and rational for a child to remain with the father but it’s not right. The main interest of the child is to have an equaly consistent relationship with both parents. How do we even know we is the casegiver and not the nanny. Is that because we generaly do not know what he does because he is not famous and he is not in the public eye? So we just assume he stayed home and changed diapers and cooked dinners? I don’t know why but he gives me the douch vibes. Scarlet did move to france. There were consistent rumours that she is not happy there. But he still wanted the whole family to live as he wanted. I would assume that was a factor in the separation. You can not expect a happy family life when one part is misserable
I don’t know how we do know the child won’t be only with nannies when with Johansson. i mean, we can flip all of these questions you asked and ask them about her. The only dofference is her celebrity and gender.
Of course I have no idea what else there is but from what’s been presented to us, it would seem the courts would give primary custody to the father. It’s a shame they couldn’t work something out that would give them both custody but I guess both parties didn’t want to find a middle ground and instead wanted it their way. I do find it interesting though that it was Scarjo who first filed for primary custody. I’m guessing when she found out her ex was taking their child to France she wasn’t a fan. Maybe the original plan was for him to remain in NYC? I don’t know but damn this sucks for their baby girl.
I am no legal expert, but I also think the father has a better case. If I were Scarlett I think I would agree to him having primary custody with the stipulation that they must live in the US. That would be my end goal if I were her, that way she gets to spend more time with her and doesn’t have to hop an international flight each time she wants to see her daughter.
I agree. I’m not here to dictate someone else’s life but I think what makes most sense is for the father to make NYC his home base (not France). He can be the primary care giver and they can both share custody which would allow Scarjo to see her daughter whenever she would want. And also like you said not have to hop on an international flight to see her daughter.
But an international flight from France to Usa and vice versa is just a little bit longer than transcoast flight in USA. It’s really not a big deal. You get two shitty meals instead of one. You get greater choice of shitty movies to watch. Visa is practically automatic. She’s flying at least bussiness class, so she wouldn’t have majority of the problems us regulars have….. I just don’t get the whole “international flight” as such a hindrance in this day and age.
Why can’t they just split custody? Why is everyone saying one or the other should have primary? Even if she doesn’t cut back on work, she’s still entitled to have her daughter half the time. And if she were shooting a movie, she’d be spending just as much time with her daughter as any other working mom, if Rose were on set with a nanny.
I think she asked for sole physical custody which is why this whole thing suddenly blew up. It seems they had a joint physical custody arrangement before. For a while they were headed into Goop/Chris Martin territory and going to have a pretty amicable split and then this issue suddenly soured it.
Everyone is talking about primary custody because that’s what Scarjo filed for. Originally it was supposed to be a split custody type ordeal and then Scarjo filed in court with primary custody of the child. So maybe ask Scarjo this question instead.
To me it just seems like he is in fact in a better position to be the primary custodial parent. I wouldn’t think less of Scarjo as a mother if this were the case.
Yeah that’s the thing. If the genders were reversed it would be less of a story. Sad, but they all have to make the best of this.
Oh and Hollywood actresses need to STOP with the “Look at me, I’m moving to Europe where it’s so cultured and my children will be so deep and we read books and I’m so artistic!!”….
GOOP tried it…she’s now living full time in Los Angeles.
Natalie Portman tried it….she’s now moved back to L.A. too.
Scarlett….well, that’s already a disaster and she wants to live mostly in NYC apparently.
Not enough eye roll emojis in the world. 🙄🙄🙄
Even MADONNA of all people could never fully adapt to the English culture and they’re kinder than French people (I found London very welcoming whereas Paris was difficult :/) and she spoke the language. Uprooting your life to another country is HARD. It takes celebs long to adapt and then they just give up lmao. Which just goes to show how little they are just like us as sometimes you don’t have a choice and it is normally very difficult for any parent to just ‘decide’ after a break-up that their country should be a priority when it comes to childrearing. If a father wants and can fight for equal custody, then he’s making use of a right he already has.
Co-sign Artemis.
He’s playing the same game Brad Pitt did by feeding tabloids that angelina was moving to london, typical.
Let’s see if those same people who attacked Angelina for releasing 1 statement and only fought back on court documents will attack Scarlet as well.
For me it seems that both women tried to go the civil way for the children’s sake but the men played dirty so the women had no choice but to fight back.
Agree, it’s interesting how this being perceived by the masses as was Angelina’s case.
He is a Frenchman- always has been- and he wants to live in France. I certainly don’t know their private details or what’s best for their child but a Frenchman living in France doesn’t merit a snarky *typical*.
I agree. There’s nothing wrong with living in France.
I’d add that nowadays I’d rather raise a little girl in a country working toward gender equality and women’s rights than in country working as fast as possible against them. In that aspect I would say that it’s much better to live in France.
There I said it.
Janefr, exactly! I don’t get all the pearl chitching about wanting to raise your DAUGHTER in a country that has a much better laws and cultural stance about women’s rights, tbh.
I wish the best for the little girl. Both of her parents, though, just leave me cold.
I don’t know why but I find ScarJo one of the hardest celebs to like, and I always try to find a reason to like her because I’m not sure where my dislike comes from. I just get this feeling , that she isn’t the nicest person…
Well I mean, it could be the fact that she’s an active supporter of Woody Allen, and some of the incredibly idiotic things she says regarding whitewashing, feminism etc. But yeah, she’s not exactly the most likable…
Regardless, I hope they manage to find a good solution for their daughter…
At Some juncture and that juncture lies somewhere between Kelly “White Cloth of Innocence” Rutherford Renner and his Pacheco lady and the Brangelina split and the Frankel/Hoppy Sh!tshow watching Custody things has become so Gross and mudslingy
“Kelly “White Cloth of Innocence” Rutherford Renner and his Pacheco lady and the Brangelina split and the Frankel/Hoppy Sh!tshow”
LOL. QQ- you and your turn of a phrase.
But you got you a clear picture of what im saying, Right?? LOL
i see a pattern of American marrying Frenchmen and then.. want to move back to France when there is a divorce. What holds Melissa George? She always seem miserable especially after the whole ordeal of last year public abuse when she ended up at the hospital.
I think with ScarJo and her ex, the ex never fully left and moved out of France. It’s not like they hooked up and then he left France for years and only now wants to return because of the divorce.
They were based in France for awhile during their marriage and then, I believe, as their daughter got older and ScarJo’s action career really took off and she became more in demand they split their time between the US and France. He still has at least one business venture in France.
Hope SJ and her ex figure it out. I wish the best for the baby.
Btw OT.. I think Scarlett is so beautiful.
off-topic….her hair illustrates her confused state of mind I think. but good luck. divorce is ugly
If I were, I would tread with caution and study the Kelly Rutherford case carefully to not make any mistakes.
I’m tired of hearing about custody battles.
“Economic relief”? LMAO. Does this fool even work, other than in ScarJo’s popcorn shop? Sorry, but I don’t have much sympathy–sounds like he married a Hollywood actress as a meal ticket, and then proceeded to be shocked and appalled when she did her job. Here’s an idea, if you don’t like the nature of a Hollywood actor’s work, don’t marry and have children with a Hollywood actor!
@STARKILLER-his family has $$$$$$$
funny how on the other thread people were saying that Romain was old money and didn’t need Scarjo’s money. lol
I’ve experienced the whole love is blind thing myself, but she sure did rush into marriage and a baby or maybe the other way around with a foreigner who lives and works (such as it is) abroad. That really complicates things when the relationship goes south.
Maybe these mall brats should stop trying to live in a ciltured exotic european fairy tale of female fragility.