The Pursuit of Love is airing in the UK. That’s the limited series starring Dominic West and Lily James, who play father and daughter in the series but in real life had some kind of torrid affair. Their affair became public last October, when Lily and Dominic were so open about their relationship, they were seen canoodling on a plane to Rome and then they were photographed having a dirty weekend in Rome. Dominic crawled home to his wife and made her do a happy-family photocall outside of their house which, frankly, led to even more questions. In the weeks and months that followed, Lily has been choosey about doing interviews (she cancelled a lot of appearances), but when asked about the affair, she basically just says “no comment.”
I actually appreciate the fact that Lily hasn’t had to “wear” the scandal. Yes, it was a big gossip story for a few months, but she kept her head down and I honestly don’t think her career will face much of any impact from the scandal. Dominic has always seemed like a serial philanderer, and he’s the one who looks massively douchey. But I doubt his career will take much of a hit either. So the focus is now on “what will Lily say, if anything at all.” And of course the Sun had an absurdly melodramatic story about it:
Dominic West shut down contact with Lily James to save his marriage — but is now worried she will speak out about their brief fling. Dominic, 51, and Lily, 32, were seen cosying up last year as she was getting over a painful split with long-term beau Matt Smith, 38. Father-of-four Dominic told wife Catherine FitzGerald he would not contact the actress after their Rome holiday scandal erupted last year.
A source claimed: “Dom hasn’t talked to Lily properly since and promised his wife he would never speak to her again so he can’t call her. There is concern about what she is going to say about their brief fling and her side of the story. She’s remained tight-lipped but her version of events could be very different to the one he told his wife. Lily is clearly hurt about being hung out to dry publicly, so it’s likely she will set the record straight at some point.”
When asked last weekend, she hinted of future revelations, saying: “Ach, I’m not really willing to talk about that. There is a lot to say, but not now, I’m afraid.”
A source added: “Lily was left feeing hurt by his betrayal and disappointed that she was painted as the scarlet woman and hung out to dry.”
“She’s remained tight-lipped but her version of events could be very different to the one he told his wife.” Ya think? For a brief moment last fall, we even heard that Dominic was prepared to leave his wife for Lily, that’s how strong their feelings were for each other. Maybe Dominic went into it thinking it was just a fling, but I’m not sure Lily saw it that way. And of course Dominic misrepresented the affair to his WIFE. Lord. Anyway, my guess is that Lily will continue to not say much of anything about Dominic for the time being. Maybe later this year, she’ll do a major magazine cover (British Vogue, perhaps) and speak about it in greater depth. But again, it’s not like the scandal is holding her back at all. If anything, it probably gave her more name recognition.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid and WENN.
I’ve been watching some of the interviews for Andrew Scott and yes, she carries herself pretty well through this. I never really was a fan and the series is only so-so (the narration is driving me nuts and the script seems so RUSHED) but I actually like her in the role and I appreciate her more as an actress now. Also British tabloid will British tabloid, no news there.
I think Lily and the other lead actress, who played Fanny, were the best things about that show. Except for Andrew Scott, but he wasn’t in many scenes. I’ve not read the book but she managed to make a potentially annoying and unlikeable character sympathetic.
I find them both utterly abhorrent. If you’re married and have agreed to be monogamous, leave other people alone. If you come into a married person’s orbit, leave them alone. Have some honour. It’s not hard.
I actually think that they have an open marriage. His wife is an aristocrat and isn’t that their standard arrangement? She’s also a serious academic botanist and has an expensive castle to maintain, she has more important things to do than babysit her husband on location. I can’t imagine she would expect fidelity from this rake when he goes on location. Honestly, I think the deal with these couples is not to embarrass each other or to fall in love. Dominic broke the first rule. Ewan McGregor broke the second.
The majority of the blame here is on Dominic, who knows what he made up for Lily about his personal life. People lie all the time when they want to cheat. But yeah, she should have not gotten involved with a married person. That’s just asking for a public mess.
I agree, I bet he told her they were split up, together in name only, for the kids, open marriage, or some variation on any and all of those. But before getting involved with someone like that, best to check and see if he’s truthful.
And I think he’s disgusting and his wife should have ditched him.
It seems surprisingly difficult for some people to just be decent, and I have no patience for “the other woman didn’t make vows to you, she owes you nothing” I mean do you have to sign a legal contract ( which is what marriage is) to treat someone right? Do you need to be legally obligated to someone before you don’t trash their life to get your rocks off.
A married man (or woman or person) has agency. They made the vows by choice. They are solely responsible for breaking those vows no matter what the other party does. If they stick their tongue down the married person’s throat, the married person has the obligation to expel the tongue by any means necessary. Things getting romantic outside your marriage? Walk away, married person! The idea that married people are not 100 percent responsible for what They do with Their sexual organs that break vows They made is ludicrous.
@NCWoman
To be clear, the person knowingly sticking their tongue down a married person’s throat is a scumbag. Two things can be true: a married person shouldn’t encourage an affair and should shut it down, and the unattached party should also not take part in ruining the spouse’s life. This conversation is so dry and tired.
We have no idea what James knew or didn’t know. We don’t even know that the marriage wasn’t open. The responsibility to be faithful, if you’re monogamous, lies fully on the spouse.
This. While this is definitely Dominic’s to wear its weird she’s just gotten a pass and more famous for it.
People were willingly to make excuses for her because they think she’s sweet Cinderella. They were even some who said back then that it’s just a PR move to promote the series which made zero sense.
Especially since she tends to get with costars, several of them are married. She’s as much of a douche as he is.
Could well be he told her he was separated from his wife, and she doesn’t want to bring the story back to life by spilling the details. She probably also doesnt want to be seen as ‘ruining their marriage’ any more than she has already.
Either that or she totally knew what she was doing and is, probably wisely, keeping her mouth shut.
Either way, yes it is mildly refreshing that her career hasn’t totally tanked the way it may have in the past for a woman (whilst the man skated on by with career in tact).
I don’t think an affair tanks a woman’s career. Lots of women go on to thrive after a public affair as the affair cements them into an “irresistible woman” archetype. Liz Taylor, Marilyn, Angelina, Jennifer etc. It at least increases visibility and that’s almost always a positive. I think what kills a career is how they behave after the fact. If you flaunt your affair *at* the jilted woman then you are perceived as crazy and that’s career ending. LeAnn Rimes and Sienna Miller come to mind. It’s also not great if he returns to his wife because that means you were not indeed “irresistible”.
The thing is is that Lily was at the time friendly with his wife – I think he told her that the marriage was in name only or he wanted out, the usual BS cheaters spin.
I think if Dominic’s career is fine and his marriage is fine then why should she be punished. If Dominic gets a pass then so does she. No more double standards for women while men’s careers continue unblemished.
I don’t think people realize just how small the acting community is in the UK. Believe me, people within that community would know if he was separated from his wife AND/OR if they had an open marriage. If we’ve learned anything from being on a gossip site is that people talk.
You say the acting community is small and that she would know if his marriage was open or not. If he shags around, wouldn’t that be an indication?
The affair made them both look like assholes and if it’s true that she called the wife and told her after the Rome pics that nothing happened then she’s an even bigger asshole than I originally thought, but she’s not the married one so West keeps the status of biggest asshole in this scenario.
I had the misfortune of ending up on a charity trek once with a couple who were married to other people and had gone on the trek basically for a camping shagathon. As it happened, I lived in the same part of London and later ran into the cheating husband and his unknowing wife in the petrol station shop. He cornered me outside and begged me not to say anything in front of his wife. I told him that I had no intention of saying anything but that was entirely for his wife’s benefit and not for his and that he was a louse. Perhaps Lily is staying tight-lipped for the same reason.
Either way, I’m glad he’s worried. Stay paranoid, Dominic.
Not trying to pin that Scarlet A on her but wasn’t she implicated in the ending of Armie Hammers marriage too? Like it was that affair that first caught Elizabeth Chambers attention and the reason she left him. Then once she had separated from Armie, the non-famous girls he had been stringing along realised he had just been using them when the only girl he would semi-claim was one of the Moore-Willis girls
I’m sure Lily and Armie irked Elizabeth… but I’m willing to bet Elizabeth had known about his many many many affairs for years. After they quarantined together in the caymans and she saw how unstable he was (she was having him get drug tests to see the kids after they separated) she was out of there.
I don’t think she knew. Looking at his leaked text messages he was preoccupied with hiding the girls from her. Constructing reasons to leave the house (“I’ll tell her I’m walking the baby”), scolding girls for cryptically posting about him and even immediately breaking up with the girl that reached out to Elizabeth. Its very easy to miss online chatter if you make it a point not to Google yourself. And the little that filtered through was easily dismissed as crazy Charmies. You are right that it was only when he fled his family during the pandemic that she pulled the trigger but I do believe that the marital schism began with this affair.
I suspect that’s true, but based on various sources it seems like Lily and Armie did have some kind of thing going on during and maybe after filming. Being openly flirtatious on set (according to crew), the texts, etc.
In both cases, the men were the married ones so she wasn’t cheating on anyone. But I do think she showed poor judgment in both cases, and crossed some lines. It’s messy. She is smart not to talk about it, because as others said, if she had talked it would have made things worse for her. As it is she is still working steadily.
I don’t think she’s a great actress, and her character on Downton Abbey particularly annoyed me, but I’m glad to she she isn’t being shunned for her involvement here. West’s career hasn’t taken a major hit (he’s going to play Prince Charles on The Crown next season), so hers certainly shouldn’t.
Maybe one should worry about what a mistress might say BEFORE taking a mistress, Dominic?
As for her career, she’s working on that Pamela Anderson thing. She seems to be getting lots of work over the past few years and pops up in everything: The Dig, Rebecca, Darkest Hour, Yesterday, Mama Mia, Baby Driver. She’s in demand and will do fine.
And she has an actual boyfriend now in Mikey Shoes from QOTSA
I bet he told her that he and his wife were separated/divorcing.
I’m sick of this narrative that the “other woman” has a responsibility for the man who made the vow. Stop buying into that. HE owes the allegiance. Period.
Exactly. We don’t know what he told her, and it’s none of our business. The blame lays on Dominic. I’m tired of women getting blamed for men’s actions. Maybe she knew he was married and slept with him anyway. Maybe he lied to her. Maybe the marriage was open. There are SO MANY possibilities here, yet some people only want to fall back onto the misogynistic argument that blames the other woman.
Why sleep with someone who is married in the first place? Why take the chance you are ruining another woman’s life and causing her pain? Maybe we should buy into being considerate and compassionate people. There’s plenty of single people to sleep with.
No, you don’t have responsibility for what the man does, but you do have responsibility over your own self, what you do, and the repercussions your actions have.
“ Why sleep with someone who is married in the first place?”
Because she wanted to? This feels like an obvious answer. There’s plenty of people in open marriages. Are they commiting adultery, in your opinion?
Again: we don’t know what she knew. We don’t know that the marriage was, in fact, closed. There’s plenty of possible reasons why she slept with someone who was married. It’s very telling to jump to the one narrative that makes her a bad person intentionally trying to steal a married man, when there’s no more evidence for that option than any other.
@ Sigmund
Whatever his arrangement with his wife was, I don’t think trotting around Rome in full view of the paps was on the menu. Both of them knew what was happening and didn’t seem to care how his wife might be affected. They’re both idiots.
I never said she’s a bad person. But if the Armie Hammer situation is also true, then she has a discernible pattern like Dominic does. I’m not going to bend myself into a pretzel trying to justify her getting her rocks off with married men.
Or you know, we can drop black and white narratives and just say that they are both wrong. He more than her but she’s definitely a PoS too. And she has a pattern. Armie Hammer anyone?
I am not inclined to give her a pass for a number of reasons. OK, maybe he told her he was in an open marriage, maybe he told her he was leaving his wife. But they were quite public about it. She’s a recognizable actress, she’s been in a couple of blockbusters and does a lot of public events and magazine shoots. And she’s 31-32 and has been in the business for a long time. So to be openly canoodling in a touristy city in Europe, and then go to the airport together, is just asking to be recognized.
Open marriages are almost always based on an assumption of discretion. That was indiscreet, and she knew it, or should have. If he told her he was divorcing, wait for the divorce to happen before doing that. He’s not just married, he has four young children. Think of them. Think of someone besides yourself and what you want in that moment. I don’t care how many people someone sleeps with, or with whom, so long as no one gets hurt. Well, someone was going to get hurt here.
And as you said, this wasn’t her first rodeo. I don’t know exactly what happened with Armie Hammer but apparently it was something, something that crossed a line. Again, he has young kids. Two married guys in the space of less than two years, that’s kind of a pattern. One she seems to have broken, but still. It just leads me to believe her ethical compass is a little broken and she’s thinking only of her own needs/wants and not the ripple effects and potential damage.
Of course I’m not letting West or Hammer off the hook, they’re both scummy. But it takes two to tango, and all that. There are plenty of fish in the sea for someone like her, so why go for the ones that are already hooked and haven’t been let go yet?
I would enjoy Lily opening her mouth to spill the beans since it’s already agape in every, single, photo of her.
She’s no Angelina Jolie, but she’s still pretty and yet she looks horrible in the header photo. She should stop trying to look “sexy”.
Yes, I’ve noticed that and it’s off-putting. It’s part of her acting repertoire too. She often has that mouth-half-open look, which is meant to convey a number of emotions I guess but it strikes me as (a) lazy acting and (b) as you said, an attempt to look sexy. I call it “Orgasm Acting.” And I’m with Thirtynine on this, I’m tired of seeing her. She’s good but she’s not so good that she needs to be cast in everything. Especially since there is something stagey about her acting presence, and she tends to suck up attention as opposed to playing off her co-stars, which is why she never has great chemistry with them IMO. Granted I haven’t watched any of her movies all the way through except Rebecca, but I’ve seen enough scenes of her in different roles to know my opinion of her acting.
I’m just tired of seeinģ her. It seems like she’s in absolutely everything and I’ve got so I just switch off now. She must have a v ery hardworking agent.
I just started watching The Affair on Amazon and didn’t even realize he was in it until the first episode. I find the actor and content a bit ironic considering all of his recent headlines.
WORD.
His character, Noah, on that show was such a shit. I can’t remember the beginning of the series, but as t goes on, he just gets worse and worse. Now I can’t see Dominic West as a person- I see him AS his character.
As far as Dominic being paranoid- Good. As others have said, who knows what he told Lily? Honestly, it wasn’t like they were hiding the affair in any way. It was all out there in public spaces, AND his agent, who knows his wife was there. I think as a human, if you meet someone and they are married but SAY they are separated/divorcing/have an open marriage etc, you should *maybe* go into it a bit skeptical because if nothing else, Celebitchy has shown us what a bunch of cheaters/liars there are in the world. But in Lily’s defense, once he was all openly PDA? I don’t blame her for believing him. I mean, who knows if any of what I am saying applies- but it *could*.
Noah is definitely one of my most hated characters ever. I never watched the last season, and struggled through those I did watch, because I loathed him so much.
He was a cheating a-hole in The Wire (as McNulty the detective) and he was a traitorous a-hole in 300 so he’s had good practice.
I really HATED him with the force of a thousand suns in 300…I literally almost stood up and cheered when the Queen stabbed his traitorous, raping ass! Could not watch The Affair because it looked like what every said it turned out like. Depressing.
They both suck and so does her acting. They’re trying to make fetch happen, but the talent just isn’t there.
I’ve been following their castle Insta account for more than a year now. It’s usually pretty pictures of the castle and the grounds.
In the past few weeks they’ve suddenly posted a lot of full family pictures, A-hole included. I wondered if something else was coming out, but maybe it was just prepping for this.
What’s going on with her mouth?
You mean in that picture or in general? It’s been mentioned (by me among others) that she often has it half open, both on screen and on the red carpet. The general consensus is she’s trying to look sexy.
She’s trying to look sexy. Scarjo does the same thing. I think it was on Girls5eva where they made a joke that went like “open your mouth that’s where the d*ck goes” or something along those lines when they took a selfie.
My mom stumbled across the show The Affair on my Amazon Prime account so she’s been slowly working her way through it. I’ve watched some episodes here and there, enough to understand the storyline as my mom will fill me in the gaps. His character Noah Solloway is such a jack***, there is nothing redeemable about him. He is so self-involved and so selfish. The other lead played by Ruth Wilson is Allison and she is just as big of a trainwreck. I guess I shouldn’t expect anything less from a show called The Affair, it’s not going to be bunnies and roses but I was surprised by how unlikeable the two lead characters are. I really do feel like I’m watching Dominic just play himself on screen.
I can’t remember if this site covered it but Ruth Wilson exited The Affair and there was a lot of drama when it came out that she wasn’t comfortable with some of the nudity the scenes required. She felt pressured by some of the showrunners to disrobe and there was a lot of toxicity on that set, supposedly. I always wondered if maybe she didn’t get along with Dominic or if he played a part in it but she never named him.
I’ve always thought he told her he has a totally open marriage, or that he was separated. The whole thing didn’t ring right any other way.
I don’t think she cared about the state of the marriage. They were still handsy on their way back to London after all hell broke lose. His wife’s first reaction when her friends spoke to the DM didn’t imply any sort of arrangement , and yet she was all over the guy until he went back to his wife with that weird note after the flight.
She probably hoped he would leave his wife for her. She was friends both of them which makes West and James’ behavior even worse.
Married means you have chosen a life partner. Single means you do not have a commitment with a life partner. Separated means that you are still married to your life partner. It seems simple. Stay in your lane, stop getting involved in others family business.
I agree. It’s crossing a line, literally.
I think eventually Lily is going to hint at it in interviews, without naming him directly. And I hope he is worried about it! He deserves to be worried.
LOL at all this “he promised to never call Lily again” as if it was ever about Lily. She just happened to be the woman this time.
Exactly. It isn’t that Lily was the one and only woman that was just too tempting for him to resist. She was just the one he cheated with *this* time. When you are the spouse who gets cheated on, I think it might seem better to think that all will be well if they just avoid that one person, but honestly, once you know they are a cheater, you will likely worry every time they are out of your sight. The guy is an actor that goes on location, so shall his ife just worry about every co-star, and every person on location, including staff at hotels and airports? Because it isn’t JUST going to be Lily.
In all things Lily Allen, this scandal should be the least of her concerns. I hope in the time since, she’s taken more time for her mental health.
Lilly Allen and Lilly James are 2 different people
To add another layer of grossness, West’s daughter Martha plays his other daughter in the show. So, he was carrying on an affair with the actress who plays his daughter while his real daughter was on set.
Ugh, he’s truly the worst
Ugh!!!!
I’m wondering if he even told her their affair was over and he wouldn’t be contacting her anymore.
I don’t think she’ll be saying anything.
She’ll be too busy banging Sebastian Stan.
She has a new boyfriend she is dating Mikey Shoes from QOTSA
If you’re hooking up with a married person, I think blame should be 80/20. Mostly theirs, but if you knew, then you’re a dick, too. It’s likely he told her some bs about them being separated or open though.
That dress just looks plain stupid.