Austin Butler broke into mainstream cinema fairly recently when he starred as the King of Rock’n Roll Elvis Presley in the biopic, Elvis. The movie being his first prominent role, Butler proved to the world what a wonderful actor he was when he got his first Oscar nomination for the role and even won his first Golden Globe award.
However, a tale as old as time, with fame came controversy and backlash. While some fans called him out for faking learning the Elvis accent, others very recently criticized him for referring to his ex-girlfriend of 9 years as a friend during an interview. And now a year later, Butler confesses that he wasn’t undermining her but only wanted to protect her privacy.
Austin Butler Clears The Air About Vanessa Hudgens Controversy
Austin Butler and Vanessa Hudgens dated for almost a decade, a relationship long enough for fans to categorize it as a marriage without a certificate. While both have remained tight-lipped about their long relationship, there have been a few instances when both spoke of their time together. And one of these few instances generated a huge controversy leading to Butler receiving tons of backlash from fans.
Last year, while on The Hollywood Reporter’s Actor Roundtable, Bulter had stated how a ‘friend’ had remarked that he should be playing Elvis Presley just before he was first contacted for the role. However. everyone already knew that it was his ex-girlfriend Hudgens he was talking about since she herself had stated the coincidence during an appearance on the Live Kelly and Ryan show.
And so it stirred up quite a controversy with fans calling him out for demeaning her despite their long relationship and him thanking her just days after in an interview with LA Times. But in a new interview with Esquire, the Masters of the Air star cleared the air and stated his intentions were only to protect her privacy since he still cares about her a lot despite their breakup.
Austin Butler Wanted To Protect Ex-Girlfriend Vanessa Hudgens
Austin Butler and Vanessa Hudgens understandably shared some of their weakest moments together after being together for nearly 10 years. While Butler lost his mother during their relationship, the High School Musical star lost her father to cancer. And so knowing each other better than anyone else, Butler revealed that by referring to her as a friend, he intended to save her from unnecessary media attention.
“Oh, yeah, I learned a lesson with that one. I felt that I was respecting her privacy in a way and not wanting to bring up a ton of things that would cause her to have to talk. I have so much love and care for her. It was in no way trying to erase anything.”
Butler remarked about the incident to Esquire while adding that his only intention was to not give up her privacy after their break-up,
“I value my own privacy so much. I didn’t want to give up anybody else’s privacy.”
And so after a year of backlash, fans and netizens finally seemed to have been convinced that Butler is in fact a very respectful human being (via X), who fell prey to the media’s twists and tricks.
Elvis can be streamed on Netflix.
