Musician Moby has said he was “confused” to read that Natalie Portman had denied once having a relationship with him – but said he respects the actress’s “possible regret in dating me”.
Moby, 53, had said in his book Then It Fell Apart that he met Portman when she was 20 and that they dated briefly.
However, Portman told Harper’s Bazaar UK online that she was 18 when they met and that her recollection of their relationship was much different.
The actress, 37, told the outlet: “I was surprised to hear that he characterised the very short time that I knew him as dating because my recollection is a much older man being creepy with me when I just had graduated high school. He said I was 20; I definitely wasn’t. I was a teenager. I had just turned 18.”
The musician has now responded on Instagram, insisting the pair did date and stayed friends for years.
Posting a picture of himself with the Black Swan star, he said: “I recently read a gossip piece wherein Natalie Portman said that we’d never dated.
“This confused me, as we did, in fact, date.
“And after briefly dating in 1999 we remained friends for years.
“I like Natalie, and I respect her intelligence and activism.
“But, to be honest, I can’t figure out why she would actively misrepresent the truth about our (albeit brief) involvement.
“The story as laid out in my book Then It Fell Apart is accurate, with lots of corroborating photo evidence, etc.
“Thanks, Moby.”
He added: “Ps I completely respect Natalie’s possible regret in dating me (to be fair, I would probably regret dating me, too), but it doesn’t alter the actual facts of our brief romantic history.”