Gwyneth Paltrow Reacts to Rumored Celeb Pal’s Bathroom Incident, Association with Ex Brad Pitt

Among the topics the actress spoke about in the wide-ranging interview with the magazine for its April issue was the rumor about one of her celebrity pals regarding an alleged bathroom incident.

Back in July, a rumor spread online that one of Paltrow’s friends — who was staying at a guesthouse at one of her properties — allegedly soiled a bedroom in a catastrophic diarrhea incident.

Paltrow, 52, commented on the headlines for the first time, telling Vanity Fair, “I understand,” and I also, like, am just not going to…”

The magazine noted that while the Goop founder didn’t confirm or deny the speculation, her reaction was telling. Vanity Fair noted that Paltrow appeared “pained,” with the reporter writing that she “trail[ed] off with an existential cringe, saying nothing more but, I note, not leaping to denying it.”

Meanwhile, Paltrow also reflected on her continued association with Brad Pitt, shared whether she believes the #MeToo movement ultimately worked, opened up about working with an intimacy coordinator for the first time while shooting sex scenes with Timothée Chalamet, and more.

Read on for more takeaways.

During the conversation with Vanity Fair, Paltrow reflected on her continued association with her ex-fiancé Brad Pitt over 25 years since they split in 1997.

Paltrow was only 22 when she met Pitt during readings for Legends of the Fall before going on to star in Se7en. The couple became engaged in December 1996, before calling it quits six months later. In the nearly three decades since, the two appear to remain on good terms.

According to Vanity Fair, Paltrow doesn’t appear to be bothered that her past relationship continues to be brought up to this day.

“He’s a very intriguing character,” she said. “It’s like having dated, I don’t know, Prince William or something. That’s always going to come up.”

The Oscar winner even referenced Pitt herself earlier in the interview when she recalled how she felt that a producer early on in her career made her feel “entitled” when she asked to spend her birthday with Pitt, who was her then-boyfriend, during a film shoot.

“My boyfriend at the time, Brad Pitt was over for my birthday,” she said, adding that she appealed for a 12-hour shoot, claiming that she had been shooting for up to 20 hours a day at the time.

While Paltrow said the producer signed off on her request, “he made me feel like I was the most entitled… It was such a horrible feeling.” She added that she could see the producer “crafting a story that I’m being difficult … and of course you didn’t say anything, because you could already tell that the guy with the power was like, ‘I don’t like what I’m seeing here.'”

Paltrow reflected on the #MeToo movement during her interview, as well, sharing her thoughts on how it ultimately impacted the industry.

Paltrow accused disgraced film producer Harvey Weinstein in 2017 of sexually harassing her in her 20s after she was cast in Emma. She’s previously discussed how Pitt purportedly came to her defense after Weinstein allegedly made an inappropriate pass at her, claiming he threatened to “kill” the filmmaker.

Of course, the Weinstein scandal sparked the #MeToo movement, which unveiled the prevalence of sexual harassment and abuse in Hollywood, and resulted in major changes on and off set regarding the abuse of power, including the presence of intimacy coordinators.

Now, looking back, Paltrow was asked if she think #MeToo ultimately achieved what it set out to do.

“I think so,” she told Vanity Fair. “There are no meetings set up in hotel rooms, from what I understand, or if there are, it’s multiple people in the room. That bubble has definitely burst. I’m sure people still abuse power in Hollywood because they do everywhere, but it has definitely changed.”

As previously mentioned, one big change in Hollywood post-#MeToo is the role of intimacy coordinators, something that was new for Paltrow, who marks her return to acting in the upcoming A24 film, Marty Supreme, in which she revealed she has numerous intimate scenes with her costar, Timothée Chalamet.

“I mean, we have a lot of sex in this movie … There’s a lot — a lot,” Paltrow told Vanity Fair.

“There’s now something called an intimacy coordinator, which I did not know existed,” she shared, recalling how the intimacy coordinator on the Josh Safdie-directed film asked her if she was alright with a certain move while filming an imitate scene with Chalamet.

“I was like, ‘Girl, I’m from the era where you get naked, you get in bed, the camera’s on,'” she said.

As for Chalamet, meanwhile, Paltrow praised working with the 29-year-old Oscar nominee.

“He’s such a thinking man’s sex symbol,” she said. “He’s just a very polite, properly raised, I was going to say kid … He’s a man who takes his work really seriously and is a fun partner.”

According to Paltrow, she and Chalamet decided to forgo the intimacy coordinators while filming.

“We said, ‘I think we’re good. You can step [back] a little bit back,'” she told Vanity Fair. “I don’t know how it is for kids who are starting out, but … if someone is like, ‘Okay, and then he’s going to put his hand here‘  … I would feel, as an artist, very stifled by that.”

The magazine said Paltrow brushed off filming the sex scenes with Chalamet. “I was like, ‘Okay, great. I’m 109 years old. You’re 14,'” she joked.

Elsewhere in the Vanity Fair interview, Paltrow opened up about her children — whom she shares with ex-husband Chris Martin — being away at college.

Apple, 20, started college at Vanderbilt University in fall 2022, while her son, Moses, 18, is a student at Brown University. While speaking with the magazine, Paltrow shared her thoughts on her kids attending college as the spawn of two celebrities, noting that she believes that “college is a great equalizer.”

“Look, they’re the children of two super-famous people, and so they understand what comes with that,” she said. “They’ve grown up in it … You would be surprised at how lovely and unassuming and down-to-earth they are.”

Meanwhile, as for how Paltrow is doing as an empty nester, her husband, Brad Falchuk, said, “Gwyneth is a supermom and she was generally extremely happy when the kids were growing up. She has room to feel herself now. To have her own needs and experiences and moods. And she is loving it. It’s really fun to be around.”