Sydney Sweeney may have been a solo bombshell at the Emmy awards on Sunday night. But I can reveal that, behind the scenes, the actress’s romance with older music-manager Scooter Braun is really heating up.
When news of the liaison broke around two weeks ago, sources close to Sydney, 28, insisted the romance was ‘casual’ and added: ‘Everything is casual. She is living her life and working hard.’
But now friends have confessed that the blossoming romance is already serious – and could even prove to be the real thing.
Here’s what Scooter, 44, did to stand out from all the other guys ‘hitting on her’, what her friends really think and the ‘issues’ she’s dealing with from her previous romance.
A source says: ‘Compared to past relationships, Scooter is a real breath of fresh air.
‘Sydney’s friends and family are incredibly happy that she is with someone stable who treats her with complete respect.
‘With so many users in her life, her inner circle is relieved that Scooter doesn’t need anything from her, not money or fame which has been a big issue for her previous relationships. They can already see how much he takes care of her.’
I’m told that lots of the male guests at Jeff Bezos’s wedding in Venice, where the couple met, were ‘hitting’ on Sydney. That includes A-list bachelors such as Tom Brady and Orlando Bloom.
Sydney Sweeney’s romance with older music manager Scooter Braun is said to be heating up
The pair met during Jeff Bezos’s wedding in Venice and have been seeing each other since
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The 44-year-old was Justin Bieber’s manager for 15 years but now works for a media giant
But Scooter reportedly held back and waited to see if there was a spark on her side – which there was. So much so that Sweeney and Braun privately spent the Labour Day weekend together (August 30th to September 1st).
There are reasons for them to move slowly. Both have battled negative publicity, with Sweeney on shaky ground after her American Eagle denim ad sparked a huge backlash and allegations of ‘racism’ over an ill-considered pun on ‘good jeans/genes’.
It has also been revealed that the blonde beauty is a registered member of the Republican Party, which provoked a divided response.
Meanwhile, Braun has faced controversies with high-profile clients including pop star Justin Bieber. They went their separate ways after 15 years as manager and client in 2023 – and this year it was reported that Bieber had agreed to pay him $31.5million (£24million) for cancelled shows and commission.
Braun retired from artist management last year and now has an advisory role with Korean-owned entertainment giant HYBE America.
Then there’s Sydney’s love life, which has been tumultuous of late. She only recently came out of a long romance with businessman Jonathan Davino, to whom she was engaged. Insiders say there were ‘difficult’ and ‘toxic’ elements to that relationship, which left both Sweeney and Davino with serious issues.
Braun was married to mining heiress Yael Cohen from 2014 until 2021. They have three kids – Jagger, ten, Levi, eight and Hart, six. He reportedly paid Yael $20million (£14.6million) to settle their split, and agreed to $60,000 (£44,000) in monthly child-support payments.
He told a podcast this summer: ‘Me and Yael talk every day. My ex-wife is one of my best friends. That’s the mother of my children. That is my family for life. I have a tattoo on my finger that says “same team” after my divorce because she and I are the same team for life.’
Sydney has declined to speak about the end of her own romance, but told the Wall Street Journal recently how her career has taken off.
She said: ‘If I wanted to lock everything in, I could probably be booked for the next three or four years. I don’t want to take six months off. I get anxiety thinking about just taking a few days off.’
Sweeney recently finished making the third season of gritty teen drama Euphoria and is promoting the boxing biopic Christy, based on the life of Christy Martin, which won rave reviews at the Toronto International Film Festival.
She also has three films – Echo Valley, Eden and Americana – out at the moment; and another – The Housemaid, in which she plays a young woman who chooses to start over… as a cleaner – releasing at Christmas.
Veteran film journalist Richard Rushfield wrote of Christy: ‘This could be the movie that makes the entire culture war explode. I don’t think there is a person in America above the age of seven who hasn’t gone on the record in the past few months with their opinion about Sydney Sweeney.
‘For the Sweeney haters, they will be chagrined to find that she is incredible in this gritty and intense role that doesn’t rely on her “good genes” in the least…
‘For MAGA’ites who have recently adopted Sweeney as their own icon of sorts, the bad news for them is that this story is largely about a same-sex relationship.’
In work as in love, it seems Sydney likes to keep her critics guessing.
