Olivia Wilde is officially shutting down rumors that she left her ex-fiance, Jason Sudeikis, to start dating Harry Styles in the fall of 2020. “The complete horses*** idea that I left Jason for Harry is completely inaccurate,” she told Vanity Fair. “Our relationship was over long before I met Harry. like any relationship that ends, it didn’t end overnight. Unfortunately, Jason and I had a very bumpy road, and we officially dissolved the relationship towards the beginning of the pandemic. We were raising two kids during lockdown, so we co-parented through that time. Once it became clear that cohabitating was no longer beneficial for the children, it became the responsible thing to NOT, because we could be better parents as friends who lived in different houses.”
Although Olivia and Jason split during the spring of 2020, according to the actress, news of their breakup wasn’t made public until November of that year. At the time, Olivia was in the midst of filming and directing Don’t Worry Darling, which Harry also starred in. Her relationship with Harry went public at the very beginning of 2021 when they attended a wedding together.
While Olivia and Jason were able to keep any of their personal issues out of the public eye for more than a year following the split, their breakup made headlines once again in April 2022. Olivia was promoting Don’t Worry Darling in front of a very public crowd at CinemaCon when she was served custody papers from Jason right onstage. A source insisted to HollywoodLife that the actor was “shocked” by the timing of the papers being served, and said that he was unaware that they would be given to Olivia in such a public manner.
However, Olivia is not convinced that the timing wasn’t intentional. “I wasn’t that shocked,” she admitted. “There’s a reason that I didn’t stay in that relationship. Unfortunately, that was consistent with my experience of the relationship. So I was probably the least shocked.” Olivia made similar comments about Jason in a recent interview with Variety, as well.
In the Vanity Fair piece, she expanded on how she felt during the situation. “I was also deeply saddened by it–and disturbed by it in a lot of ways,” she continued. “I know it took an extraordinary amount of energy [for the server] to get in that room. It took a tremendous amount of forethought. And I will tell you, there are so many other ways to do that. I am not someone who lives in hiding. If that experience hadn’t been public, I never would have spoken of it, because I would never want my kids to know that happened. Unfortunately, they will know what happened.” Olivia and Jason share two children together.
As for her relationship with Harry, Olivia continued to keep tight-lipped about the romance. However, she did gush over watching him perform and seeing how many “happy women” there are in the crowds of his shows. “I instantly started crying,” she shared. “Where else do we see this? Happy women? Women brought together with joy, loving each other, and cheering for each other? This has been like a gift to be amongst this.”
Meanwhile, Olivia also said that she isn’t opposed to getting married again (while she never wed Jason, she was previously married to Tao Ruspoli from 2003 until 2011). The actress admitted that her parents are the reason that she believes in marriage, despite her past relationship troubles. “[Their marriage] is incredibly supportive and they’ve evolved, individually and as a couple, through so many unexpected twists and turns,” she raved. “They’re best friends. And I think that’s what marriage really is. It’s a commitment to best friendship. And a partnership. I think I now really understand what that means.”