Glen Powell had a bit of an eyebrow-raising response to his ex Gigi Paris’ retelling of their split.
The couple split several years ago amid a swirl of speculation about his chemistry with Anyone But You co-star Sydney Sweeney, with Powell, 36, and his former leading lady, 27, later admitting they intentionally embraced the rumors to promote their film.
Powell’s relationship with his then-girlfriend did not survive to see the movie hit theaters, however, with Paris, 32, recently claiming the actor had put his job above her concerns about the publicity stunt.
The split came up during Powell’s cover story for GQ magazine, where Powell said Paris was entitled to her own ‘narrative’ on the events leading up to their break-up.
‘I will always have nothing but love for her and respect for her,’ he told GQ over breakfast in Glasgow. ‘Everybody’s always going to have their own narrative on things and all that. And she’s welcome to it.’
The interviewer noted Powell then motioned towards their own gathering, saying, ‘Relationships are really hard. And when two people break up, they each go to their own brunch and they will each tell their own narrative.’
Glen Powell had a bit of an eyebrow-raising response to his ex Gigi Paris’ retelling of their split
Powell reflected on the split in his cover story for GQ magazine
Powell is now on the path to becoming a household name since releasing the film, and, as his star rises, has been listening to advice given to him by A-lister Tom Cruise.
‘He basically said, “Hey, it’s going to get really, really loud. It’s your job to just turn the volume down. Just remember you have your hand on that switch. You have your hand on the ability to turn up that noise or turn it down.” And really just turning down the noise and trusting your own gut has been a real godsend for me,’ he told GQ.
The rom-com Anyone But You was released in 2023 amid speculation Powell and Sweeney (who was also in a relationship at the time) had an affair during the making of their movie.
It was reported in April 2023 that Powell and Paris had split up, and the following year the actor admitted he and Sweeney deliberately played into the romance speculation as part of a marketing ploy.
Powell admitted that the gambit ‘worked wonderfully,’ as the film was a smash hit, and he added to the New York Times: ‘Sydney is very smart.’
His girlfriend at the time, however, later said she was left ‘blindsided’ and ‘shattered’ when the romance rumors hit the headlines.
In a June 2025 interview with the Too Much podcast, Paris revealed to her reaction to the affair rumors – claiming he waved away her concerns by saying: ‘This is what I have to do for my job.’
Paris said that once she was faced with Powell’s argument that the situation was a professional necessity, she ‘had two options.’
She explained: ‘I could either pretend like I was going along with everything and have everyone wonder: “Are they hooking up? Are they not hooking up? Is she okay with this? What the f***?” Or stand up for myself and say: “No, I’m actually not okay with this, and I’m waking away.” So that’s what I decided to do.’
The Miami-born model insisted: ‘It wasn’t a way to monetize the breakup. It wasn’t a way to twist the story around. I was shattered, shattered.’
Powell and Sweeney were hounded by speculation they had an on-set affair during the making of Anyone But You
The pair later admitted to embracing the scrutiny as a way to promote the film
Paris added: ‘I just wanted respect. Especially if it’s gonna be public, like don’t make an a** out of me. Just don’t make a fool out of someone you’ve been with for over three years, talking about forever with. Just have some decency, you know?’
She claimed that for Powell, ‘at the end of the day, it was like: “Well, work comes first.” And if that’s the case, power to you, that’s your priority. I gotta walk away.’
In her view, the situation was ‘handled’ improperly from a publicity standpoint and left her feeling ‘like I was just fed to the dogs, like: “Good luck. You handle this.”‘
Paris decided to exit the relationship because ‘I just hit a threshold of what I could take, and I was just so disappointed and that was that.’
She shared that she ‘flew across the world to look at him in the face and say: “I can’t do this anymore,” and was ‘bawling’ throughout the flight to Australia, where Anyone But You was predominantly filmed.
Powell’s relationship with Paris didn’t survive to see Anyone But You hit theaters; pictured 2022
Glen’s girlfriend at the time said she refused to stand by the scrutiny her ex was being unfaithful
Paris also argued that Powell should have issued a public statement denying the affair and insisting that he was faithful to her.
‘I know that I deserve a lot better, and I know that the bare minimum of any relationship is to have your partner’s back, period,’ she contended.
‘Where are you when you just need to stand up and say: “No, I would never cheat on my girlfriend. I wouldn’t do that.” That’s all that needed to be said.’
She observed: ‘Also it was serving them for their PR. Later on it turned out that it was all – I don’t know if there was a relationship there or not, but then they came out to say it was all a PR scheme at the expense of our relationship.’
Her feeling is that ‘it was pretty obvious what was going on, and if people didn’t really see what was going on, that’s fine, but to me it was just like, whoa, that’s pretty crazy, just to sell a movie – or not, who knows?’
Sydney was also in a relationship with then-fiance Jonathan Davino at the time the affair rumors came to be; pictured with Powell in 2023
She said with a wan laugh: ‘And I honestly hoped that they’d end up together, ‘cause I was like, at least it would make it worth it for me. Hope they are in love or whatnot.’
In the months after his split from Paris, Powell said he gave Sweeney ‘all the credit’ for using the affair rumors to fuel publicity for their picture.
‘I don’t have the mental capacity to pull anything like this off, but she’s very smart. She’s very smart,’ the Hollywood Adonis remarked.
‘I had such a wonderful journey with her on this thing. But in terms of actual dating and actually being together?’ he added, laughing, to Business insider.
He added that ‘the only reason it made things harder for me to lean into that stuff was that I was going through a very real breakup amidst a promotional tour.’
Powell maintained: ‘I was with someone that I really loved and cared about and was trying to kind of make sense of a lot of stuff.’
Powell has since praised Sydney’s efforts in making their movie the success that it was
He noted that ‘it was a lot easier for Sydney to lean into something like that because she’s in a very committed and wonderful relationship and she’s very happy.’
At the time, Sweeney, 27, was engaged to her longtime boyfriend Jonathan Davino, 41, whom she publicly confirmed her split from this May after months of breakup rumors.
Sweeney, who was an executive producer on Anyone But You, has stated that she ‘was on every call’ that involved promoting the film.
‘I was in text group chats. I was probably keeping everybody over at Sony marketing and distribution awake at night because I couldn’t stop with ideas.’
The busty blonde bombshell dished: ‘I wanted to make sure that we were actively having a conversation with the audience as we were promoting this film, because at the end of the day, they’re the ones who created the entire narrative.’
