Orlando Bloom’s celibacy confession: Here are other stars who undertook vows of celibacy
Fans were shocked when Orlando Bloom made a candid confession about his sex life this week. Turns out a few other big stars have done the same.
It's a practice we associate more with monks than movie stars – yet Orlando Bloom isn't alone in abstaining from sex.
From Mariah Carey to Peter Andre, a surprising number of celebs have undertaken vows of celibacy at certain moments in their lives – although some have lasted longer than others.
Bloom, 43, confessed this week that he chose not to have sex with anyone or even masturbate so that he could "figure" out his life and be more open to another serious relationship.
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The Lord of the Rings actor maintained his abstinence for six months.
So how long did other celebrities last?
Bloom’s ex-wife Miranda Kerr seems like a good place to start – and hers was a fair while longer than her ex.
MIRANDA KERR
How long? Two years.
What happened? Bloom’s ex-wife – and mother to the couple’s now nine-year-old son Flynn – Miranda Kerr, now 36, also embraced celibacy after meeting billionaire Snapchat founder Evan Spiegel in 2015.
The Victoria’s Secret model split with Bloom after three years of marriage in 2013 before taking up with Spiegel, and subsequently revealed that the pair would not consummate their relationship until she had a ring on her finger because of her fiance’s old-fashioned views.
“Not until after we’re married,” she said in one interview. “Spiegel is very traditional. We can’t … I mean we’re just … waiting.”
MARIAH CAREY
How long? Two months.
What happened? In 2008 singing superstar Mariah Carey revealed she had employed a no-sex-before-marriage decree ahead of her union with American rapper and comedian Nick Cannon, claiming that sex would be “more special” if they waited until it was official.
“It's not that we had no intimacy,” she explained to theMirror .
“We just didn't have complete intimacy. It's just me, and my feelings.
“But we both have similar beliefs, and I just thought that it would be so much more special if we waited until we were married. And it was, and it still is.”
They didn’t have to wait long: Carey and Cannon split two months after they first met.
They divorced eight years later – and Mariah’s clampdown on premarital sex is even claimed to have contributed to her 2016 split from her subsequent beau, Australian mogul James Packer.
JESSICA SIMPSON
How long? 22 years (her age when she tied the knot).
What happened? Preacher’s daughter Jessica Simpson, now 39, famously declared that she would remain a virgin until her 2002 marriage to fellow singer Nick Lachey.
“Virginity can be cool and sexy,” she said in an interview.
And it seems it was worth the wait. Simpson later raved about their wedding night.
“It was the most amazing moment of my life,” she revealed to Blender.
“I’m so lucky I didn’t lose my virginity in the back of a Jeep or something. Instead, I had this amazing, elaborate wedding and I topped it off with that.”
PETER ANDRE
How long? Seven months and eight days.
What happened? Following the 2009 breakdown of his four-year marriage to Katie Price, Andre announced he would embrace celibacy until his divorce was finalised.
It took seven months and he was as good as his word – even waiting eight days after it became official before embarking on a three-month fling with former glamour model (and Price lookalike) Maddy Ford.
LENNY KRAVITZ
How long? Three years that we know of.
What happened? Kravitz may have dated no less than Madonna and Nicole Kidman in his time, but in 2008 he revealed in a magazine interview that he hadn't slept with anyone for three years and was waiting for someone special.
"It's just a promise I made until I get married. Where I'm at in life, the women have got to come with something else, not just the body, but the mind and spirit. It usually trips them out, but that's the way it's going to be," he told Maxim.
"For some periods of time it's easy, and then it's really hard."
But by 2011 he seemed to reverse his claims, saying the statement had "got blown way out of proportion".
BRITNEY SPEARS
How long? Between one and two years.
What happened? The original Pop Princess vowed celibacy until marriage when she sprang to fame in 1998 aged 17.
It’s a promise she didn’t keep however, as five years later it was revealed she had slept with young love Justin Timberlake during their three-year relationship, which began in 1999.
Undeterred, in 2004 she pledged to embrace celibacy once more after a string of disastrous relationships and a shock 55-hour wedding to childhood friend Jason Alexander.
LADY GAGA
How long? About a year.
What happened? In 2010 Gaga revealed she was under a self-imposed sex ban and urged others to consider a similar stance.
“I can't believe I'm saying this – don't have sex. I'm single right now and I've chosen to be single because I don't have the time to get to know anybody …” she told fans.
“So it's OK not to have sex, it's OK to get to know people. I'm celibate, celibacy's fine.”
By 2011 she had taken up with American actor Taylor Kinney and, it’s assumed ‘got to know him’ more intimately.
COLIN FARRELL
How long? Unclear – but well-intentioned.
What happened? In 2015 a friend claimed that Farrell, 44 had embraced celibacy after taking up Buddhism.
He had form. Six years earlier he had announced he was embracing a period of celibacy after splitting up with long-term girlfriend, British writer Emma Forrest.
STEPHEN FRY
How long? Seventeen years.
What happened? Fry, 62, raised eyebrows when he revealed he was celibate for an ‘insane’ 17 years – from the early eighties onwards – because he was repelled by human biology.
He said he had questioned what kind of God would create human beings who would “find delight in organs of the body that are parked exactly adjacent to or indeed share a function with the organs of excretion?”.
“I got on with my life without sex. It seems insane now that I think about it,” he recalled.
Stephen Fry is now married to comedian Elliott Spencer.
This article originally appeared on The Sun and was reproduced here with permission.
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