Actor David Harbour has spoken out following his split from Lily Allen admitting that he can go to “dark places.” Their relationship is believed to have broken down after three years following reports he “cheated” on the songstress with a costume designer he met on a film set.
It’s claimed that the relationship between David and the costume designer lasted three years, with him allegedly paying for her to fly out to Australia when he was filming Stranger Things. He was also reportedly spotted on a celebrity dating app during his marriage to Lily.
Pop star Lily had been looking for women that were also on the app and cross-referencing with women that David had been following on social media to find out who he was seeing, reports claim.
Previously, David has remained tight-lipped on their split and the accusations of cheating but in a new interview, has given an insight into his new single life. The New York native revealed that recently, he had let himself go “physically and emotionally.”
It comes just hours after he confirmed their split after ditching his wedding ring on the red carpet at the premiere for the Marvel movie, Thunderbolts, on Tuesday night.
David said: “I can go to these dark places.” He also found solace in Buddhist monks he first met when he went through a rough period in his thirties, and still goes to see them every couple of years. “You just talk about life,” he said of his time at the monastery in Escondido, California.
However, he hasn’t been to the monastery in the past few years as “things have been busy” for him. When prompted directly about his split from Lily, David gave a two-word response. “Oh boy,” he commented. But he later opened up about his reasoning for remaining silent.
“I’m protective of the people and the reality of my life,” he said. He added to GQ Magazine that he didn’t see the point in engaging with the interest surrounding the split as it had been based on “hysterical hyperbole.”
David also admits he has a new appreciation for his body after social media users had branded him a “DILF”. He said when he was in his “romance period” with social media, he thought it was “great, culturally” to see people celebrating “real bodies.” He added: “It was like, Oh – the guy with love handles, who’s a mess? That’s the guy you love? OK! Good for you guys!”
Harbour shared a rather introspective viewpoint on his craft, stating, “It seems kind of silly to say this, but the art that I’m creating is about you” and it reflects the audience’s “experience of life”, rather than just the actor portrayed on screen.
For Harbour, who is known for his role as police chief Jim Hopper in the hit Netflix hit, there’s a risk of getting overly absorbed by one’s public persona. “I think, for me, it’s dangerous, too, to get lost in the personality in any way,” he shared.
Discussing the fickleness of fame and its emotional impact, he elaborated, “Whether it’s good or bad, it’s the same thing. It’s the same feeling: it’s this feeling of grasping and permanence. It’s this feeling of like, ‘Oh, now they love me. So do you like me now? Do you like me now? And what about now? And it’s, oh, now they hate me. Well, you hate me now. Do you hate me now?'”
Continuing candidly, he stated, “It’s, like, whatever. I’m human. I’m working through stuff.” Anticipation builds for the final season of the show, expected later this year, with Harbour teasing that a “tremendous amount of change” will feature prominently. He sees change as an inherent part of life and art, advising: “You can deny this change, be afraid of this change, you can kind of be chaotic about it and, like, eat your way through – whatever you need to do,”.
Regarding his approach to personal experiences, he expressed: “The best thing that I can do is take all of that experience and pour it into work, because my experience, no matter how awful or great, will always be useful to someone else if it’s channelled through art. I can always be of use. And so that’s what I’m doing.”
Offscreen, Lily revealed in January her decision to take a hiatus from her BBC podcast Miss Me?, which she co-hosts with her friend and TV presenter Miquita Oliver, citing a downward spiral in her mental health. She made a comeback the following month, revealing that she had been in a treatment centre to ensure she was her “strongest self” for her kids and was developing a musical in LA.
Lily and David, who tied the knot in Las Vegas back in 2020 seemed to be the complete “it couple.” But rather than meeting at a glitzy showbiz event, the pair met on an exclusive dating app the year prior. However, the Not Fair songstress admits that she didn’t have high expectations of falling in love on it.
During an interview on The Jonathan Ross Show, she explained: “It was the first time I’d been on this dating app. I was scrolling through and landed on David’s profile and pressed accept. I didn’t know who he was. I thought he was just like a sexy policeman from a reality TV show because he was wearing a policeman’s uniform. It was a still from Stranger Things. I’d never seen Stranger Things. I don’t even know what I was looking for. It was just something to do on holiday, swiping, it’s a bit of fun.”
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