I don't even understand why a full grown man would WANT to date a teenager.
It's an unfortunately common phenomenon of our society that men will often date younger women — especially when it comes to male celebs. A lot of famous male celebs have even "dated" teenagers. I say "dated" because some of these people were literally minors — and frankly, in my opinion, if you're "dating" a teenager in your 30s or even 20s*, you're a predator.
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*Obviously, I'm not talking about a 19-year-old dating a 20-year-old here, people. I'm talking about a 28-year-old dating a 16-year-old.
A while back, u/Pranav_p_n posed a question about beloved celebs that are actually creepy, and I noticed there were a ton of celebs nominated for allegedly problematic relationships with minors and teenagers. Read on to find out which of your faves are just major creeps.
1. Millie Bobbie Brown was only 16 when she reportedly dated then 20-year-old TikToker Hunter Ecimovic. They never went public with their relationship, but photos came out of them kissing, and later when Ecimovic was accused of grooming Brown, he agreed, though he then stated "Everything that I did was completely legal" and that he "had nothing to apologize for," also alleging Brown's parents were fine with the relationship.
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Ecimovic later apologized for his comments, saying, “I never groomed her. I never put pressure on her to like me.” Brown's teams called his comments "dishonest, but also are irresponsible, offensive, and hateful."
2. Bret Michaels dated Tracy Lewis — who he later wrote "Every Rose has its Thorn" about — when she was 16 and he was in his mid-twenties.
Emma McIntyre / Getty Images for SiriusXM)
3. Woody Allen's sexual abuse allegations are well-documented, but his relationships with teenagers are lesser-known. Besides having met his wife when she was underage (she was his wife's adopted child — though they did not start dating until she was of age), he also dated 17-year-old Stacey Nelkin when she was still in high school, and Christina Engelhard claimed they'd dated when she was 16 and he was in his forties.
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Allen declined to comment for the Hollywood Reporter interview with Engelhardt linked above, and he himself has admitted to a relationship with Stacey Nelkin.
4. Kobe began dating his future wife Vanessa when she was 17 and still in high school — the two became engaged when she was still a senior. The two were together until his death in 2020.
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5. Lily-Rose Depp was only 16 when she reportedly began dating 24-year-old model Ash Stymest (who had previously been married and had a child). In fact, Stymest even joined her family on vacation a few months after they reportedly began dating. They're rumored to have broken up after two and a half years, at which point they'd still never confirmed their relationship.
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6. Here's one case where the man wasn't necessarily famous, but it was still messed up — Lorde was similarly 16 when she began dating photographer James Lowe, who was 7 years older than her. The two reportedly split near the end of 2015 after three years together.
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8. There were heavy rumors that Kylie Jenner and Tyga were dating when she was 17 and he was 25. Just days after Tyga denied they were dating, Kanye West, then Jenner's brother-in-law, said, “I think he got in early, I think he was smart. They’re closer in age than a lot of relationships I know." Tyga then seemed to confirm their relationship on Instagram a month later.
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Kylie's sister Khloe Kardashian also seemed to confirm they were dating when Complex asked her about the two: "I think at 16, I was probably fucking someone that was in their 20s, for sure. I wouldn’t say I was even dating, probably just sleeping with them. But again, Kylie is not a normal 17-year-old." Tyga also got a tattoo of Kylie's name.
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9. As the lead singer of Aerosmith, Steven Tyler has been beloved for decades. But for some reason, people seem to ignore the fact that he once "dated" a 16-year-old. He literally admitted to it in his memoir, writing, “She was 16, she knew how to nasty, and there wasn’t a hair on it."
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It's likely that Tyler is referring to Julia Holcomb, who actually sued him last year for sexual assault, sexual battery, and intentional infliction of emotional distress back in the '70s. Like Tyler stated in his memoir, she claims that Tyler persuaded her mother to signed over guardianship to him, which is corroborated in Tyler's own memoir, in which he writes “her parents fell in love with me, signed a paper over for me to have custody, so I wouldn’t get arrested if I took her out of state. I took her on tour with me.” Tyler was 26 at the time.
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10. Chad Michael Murray proposed to One Tree Hill extra Kenzie Dalton in 2006, when she was a senior in high school and he was 24. She was reported to be 18 at the time. They two had met when Kenzie was 17 (both episodes Kenzie appeared as an extra in were filmed/aired when she was 17), though there are no reports they dated before she was 18.
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11. Similarly, Milo Ventimiglia and Hayden Panettiere did not announce that they were dating until Panettiere was "barely 18" and he was 29 — but they'd been appearing on the show Heroes together for about a year, so it's unclear when the relationship turned from coworkers to dating, though they had denied dating in the past.
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Also, the first episode aired when Panettiere was newly 17, so she must've been 16 during filming. Again, this is when they met, not started dating, but still.
12. Elvis Presley met his wife Priscilla in Germany when she was 14 and he was 24. They began a relationship that involved lying in bed with their arms around each other nightly — although Priscilla maintains they did not sleep together until they were married. They stayed in touch after he went back to the US, and Priscilla says he eventually convinced her parents to let her move to the US and live with his family (but not him) when she was 17. However, she soon moved in with Elvis instead. She was still in high school.
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13. Anthony Kiedis of the Red Hot Chili Peppers also admitted to a relationship with a minor. He once told the story of a Catholic school girl who had come to his concert that he slept with, and her eventually revealing she was 14, a runaway, and her father was the chief of police — Kiedis said, "I did want to get her the hell back home right away. So, we had sex one more time.” He was in his mid-20s.
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14. He also "dated" Ione Skye when she was 16* and he was in his mid-20s. She even moved into his house.
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Skye says she was 17 in the article linked but recently said she was "16 going on 17" on Tiktok.
15. It's also a bit unclear when Johnny Depp and Winona Ryder began dating — they met at a premiere in June 1989, when Ryder was 17 and Depp was 26. Depp described it as "love at first sight," and said they started dating a few months later — Ryder turned 18 in October 1989 (four months later), and according to US Weekly, they began dating in February 1990.
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US Weekly reported they started dating five months before their July 1990 engagement, which would have made Ryder 18.
16. Melanie Griffith moved in with her boyfriend Don Johnson when she was just 15 after meeting him at 14 — he was eight years older than her. They later got engaged when she was 18, then split before coming back together to remarry and have Dakota Johnson.
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17. Joel Madden dated teen Disney Channel star Hilary Duff for three years starting when she was only 16 — he was in his mid-20s.
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18. Jimmy Page, according to Rolling Stone, began an affair with Lori Maddox (sometimes spelled Mattix) when she was 14 years old and he was in his late 20s. It does not appear Page has ever addressed or responded to these claims.
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Lori claimed he "basically kidnapped" her after telling her he was going to be with her, then often left her at the hotel with security at the door. Lori — who also claimed she slept with David Bowie when she was underage — said in the context of #metoo, "I never thought there was anything wrong with it, but maybe there was. I used to get letters telling me he was a pedophile, but I’d never think of him like that." But she also said, “I don’t think underage girls should sleep with guys. I wouldn’t want this for anybody’s daughter."
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19. One more rockstar who "dated" an underage girl? Bill Wyman of the Rolling Stones. He met 13-year-old Mandy Smith in 1984 (when he was 47), and married her after she turned 18 (allegedly having groomed her for those five years, while he was in his 40s). Smith said they had sex when she was 14. Wyman did not directly contradict these claims, but said, "It wasn’t how it was reported to be. A lot of people understood, but a lot didn’t, especially the media.”
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He claimed her mother approved of the relationship.
20. Jerry Seinfeld was in the height of his fame, in his late 30s, when he similarly "dated" a teenager (Shoshanna Lonstein), though he claims she was 18 when they began the romantic aspect of their relationship. After she turned 18, he told Howard Stern, “I didn’t realize she was so young. This is the only girl I ever went out with who was that young. I wasn’t dating her. We just went to a restaurant, and that was it.” He confirmed their relationship a few years later.
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In case you don't find all this charming enough, Jerry also said, “I don’t want my wife to work," which may have contributed to the breakup between the two.
21. Demi Lovato initially similarly claimed that she was 18 when her romantic relationship with 29-year-old Wilmer Valderrama began, though they had met when she was 17, and she called it "love at first sight." However, her song "29" is all about "dating" a 29-year-old at 17 and feeling taken advantage of, and many believe it's about Valderrama.
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22. In fact, this appears to be a pattern for Valderrama. He also dated Mandy Moore when she was "16 and 17," according to Moore herself. Valderrama would've been in his early 20s.
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23. Valderrama also dated Lindsay Lohan when she was 18 — though they were first linked when she was 17. On her 18th birthday, they were seen kissing. He was 24.
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24. We obviously all know R. Kelly is a creep, but we couldn't go this whole post without mentioning him. Kelly famously married Aaliyah in 1994, when she was 15 and he was 27— a marriage that was annulled because Aaliyah was too young. Witnesses have claimed that R. Kelly began a sexual relationship with Aaliyah when she was 13 or 14.
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25. At the time of his death at age 40, Paul Walker was dating 23-year-old Pilchard-Gosnell. The two had reportedly met and started dating when Pilchard-Gosnell was only 16, and Walker was in his early 30s.
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He'd also allegedly dated Aubrianna Atwell starting when she was 16 — Atwell stated herself at age 28 that the two met at the Hollywood Canteen a dozen years before, meaning she would've been 16, though she did say they were friends before they dated.
26. Lita Grey was only 8 when she met Charlie Chaplin, and the two later reconnected during the casting process for his film Gold Rush, when Lita was 15 and Chaplin was in his mid-30s. They began "dating," and Grey got pregnant...so Chaplin secretly married her to avoid criminal charges, according to Vice.
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27. Rocker Ted Nugent also "dated" a minor — Pele Massa — when she was 17 and he was 30. VH1's Behind the Music even reported that he had gotten parental approval and became her legal guardian, but Nugent has since denied claims that he "adopted" her, and the guardianship issue is unproven.
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“It just really wasn’t a terribly appropriate situation in most people’s eyes, and now, it would be criminal," Massa said in the Behind the Music documentary. The two dated for nine years.
28. Beloved French singer Claude Francois reportedly had an affair with 17-year-old France Gall in 1964, when he would've been 25.
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29. And finally, we'll end on one where they may not have dated until they were both of age, but that's still pretty sus: René Angélil and Céline Dion. While Angélil and Dion did not officially start dating until she was 19, Dion said their romantic relationship had begun around a year earlier. And Dion had known Angélil since she was 12 years old, when the then-38-year-old became her manager, calling him "part of the family" and saying she'd pined for him in secret. They later married.
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Did any of these surprise you? Let us know in the comments below.
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