Leighton Meester Reacts to Husband Adam Brody’s “Scorching Rabbi” Nickname
In relation to Adam Brody and Leighton Meester’s love story, who does not need one thing prefer it?
The O.C. and Gossip Woman alums’ romance is like the final word TV crossover for millennial viewers: Seaside group boy-next-door with the soul of an artist meets impeccably dressed New York Metropolis socialite, they usually fall head over heels? As they are saying, opposites entice!
And whereas we could be complicated them with Brody’s Seth Cohen and Meester’s Blair Waldorf, the tip end result was the identical.
The actors—who shall be working collectively once more when Meester visitor stars on the second season of Brody’s acclaimed Netflix comedy Everyone Needs This—married in 2014 after a number of meet-cutes, all that had come earlier than paving the best way for his or her future as a meant-to-be couple.
However whereas their pairing clearly attracted all of the OMFG-attention you’d think about, Brody and Meester determined they have been—apart from their continued work in motion pictures and TV—going to reside their finest lives off-camera.
“She’s extra inherently non-public than I’m,” Brody, 45, advised GQ in 2019. “I do not search publicity but when I am sitting subsequent to you on the subway, I am going to let you know every thing about me. We’re homebodies. We do not go to a variety of issues that maybe we might, and do not hunt down promotion in that approach. I am not s—ting on anybody who monetizes that facet of their life as a result of I get it. However we have discovered this nice steadiness up to now that basically works for us. We’re additionally not very lively on social media.”
Kevin Mazur/Kevin Mazur/Getty Photographs for PEOPLE
In actual fact, Brody—at his spouse’s suggestion—restricted his scrolling time to half-hour a day after the 2020 election, and he is since stop the positioning previously generally known as Twitter fully.
“I can nonetheless do as a lot NPR as I would like and my blood strain’s steady,” he famous on a March 2021 episode of the podcast Anna Faris Is Unqualified. As for not having an Instagram account, Brody continued, it “intrigues me, however I do know these are Pandora’s field and as soon as I am going I will not come again.”
Meester, however, has greater than 7.5 million Instagram followers. However apart from the occasional publish that acknowledges the person in her life—comparable to by sharing snapshots of her and Brody on the premieres of his movies Prepared or Not and American Fiction and raving she’s “so proud” of his film The Child Detective—it is a zone largely reserved for selling work, good causes, meals, memes and fairly pics of her and her buddies.
Evidently, the actress’s account has remained a kid-free zone as effectively, with Meester opting to not publish pictures of daughter Arlo Day, 9, or her 4-year-old brother whose title has by no means been publicly shared.
Eric Charbonneau/Getty Photographs for UTA
“On this world, everybody desires to know every thing about you, and I feel that is humorous,” the 38-year-old advised Cosmopolitan in 2009. “I can not be aggravated. Individuals speculate so much about me, saying there’s one thing else that is actually the reality…”
The rationale Meester thinks followers flip to gossip versus what’s truly happening her life?
“Possibly I am simply too boring,” she recommended. However after a long time of performing, The Roommate alum is completely happy to concentrate on crucial position: Being true to herself.
“When you’re simply your self, you may by no means lose,” she added. “I wish to be myself. That is while you really feel probably the most snug, that is when you could have probably the most success, and that is while you’re probably the most completely happy.”
Apart from, Meester has dropped too few bread crumbs for folks to essentially get a learn on what she was as much as behind the scenes.
Take, for example, her former relationship with Sebastian Stan, who joined Gossip Woman for an arc as Higher East Aspect troublemaker Carter Baizen. Meester, whose personal biopic-ready story began when she was born whereas her mother was serving a jail sentence for drug trafficking (“I might’ve turned out so much worse,” she quipped), would not discuss her boyfriend particularly. However she did observe that she did not look after unhealthy boys in actual life.
Understandably.
“I feel the time period is silly,” the Texas native defined to Cosmopolitan. “A man who cheats on you or will not be good to you? What’s that?”
“These days,” Meester added, “I am far more mature in relationships. I’ve let go of the bulls–t. I feel extra concerning the deal makers than the deal breakers. I desire a man I can look as much as.”
And no, she would not reveal if she was in love proper that minute, however thanks for checking.
“I have not been in a variety of relationships, however I have been in love,” Meester shared. “There’s an inexplicable chemistry. You simply actually, actually wish to, like, stare on the individual. I’ve by no means fallen in love proper off the bat. I get scared to say ‘I really like you’ too quickly as a result of it means a lot. It means you are not seeing an finish to issues.”
Frankly, she had by no means not seen an finish.
“My downside is, I lose curiosity,” she advised British Glamour later that yr. “Each time I’ve fallen in love, it is simply momentary.” Placing it much more bluntly, Meester added, “Actually, I’ve hated each boyfriend I’ve had.” Furthermore, she did not wish to have any boyfriend, she mentioned, if she did not see a chance of ceaselessly and, at that time, ceaselessly hadn’t been within the playing cards.
Her relationship with Stan solely lasted for therefore lengthy—however not less than it sounds just like the Winter Soldier warmed her coronary heart whereas it lasted.
“I’ve by no means actually appreciated anyone earlier than,” Meester advised Seventeen towards the tip of 2010. “Even after I would date guys, it might form of be on the floor and it was at all times a reduction after we broke up.”
With out naming names, she added, “I’ve solely had one expertise the place it was actually arduous and I used to be actually unhappy when it ended, however that is what taught me so much about myself and love and life—and that is good.”
Nonetheless, she was definitely open to making an attempt once more. “If I shut love down or did not let it in,” she continued, “I might simply be this actually chilly, unhappy individual.”
In the meantime, over on the West Coast, Brody was choosing up roles in movies comparable to Within the Land of Girls, Jennifer’s Physique and The Romantics since concluding his four-season run as good man Seth Cohen on The O.C.
The San Diego, Calif., native additionally discovered love on set, relationship co-star Rachel Bilson on and off for a number of years. However by the point Seth and Summer season Cooper tied the knot within the collection’ 2007 finale, Bilson and Brody had reverted to simply buddies off-screen.
Waxing philosophic about his personal views on love, he advised Anna Faris on a 2021 episode of her Unqualified podcast that certainly he thought he was in love together with his fifth-grade girlfriend who broke up with him after every week, leading to utter heartbreak, so he did not put an excessive amount of strain on the phrase itself.
“As you become older and clearly you recognize somebody extra, you recognize extra of the sides of them,” Brody defined. “And greater than that, you share a historical past. That is additionally what I feel differentiates you with somebody. ‘Trigger there’s tons of people that you is perhaps suitable with on this earth, however it’s additionally just like the historical past and the life you share collectively that provides as much as your love, not simply them, particularly and solely them.
“It is what you have finished collectively, be it children, be it household, be it inside jokes. I imply, you’ll be able to take the love out of it and say finest buddies, too, however it’s how effectively you recognize one another and all of the belongings you share, not simply every thing that makes this individual DNA. It is the act of sharing a life with somebody.”
Brody and Meester managed to test all these packing containers for one another. And although it might be a number of years earlier than they paired off for good, 2007—the yr The O.C. ended and Gossip Woman’s six-season run started—was after they first met. And not less than one among them remembers.
“Josh Schwartz produced each exhibits and actually the primary time we met, that entire solid was consuming at Canter’s and I lived at Canter’s for like my total 20s,” Brody advised Faris, name-checking a famed Los Angeles deli. “And I used to be leaving, and he launched all of us.”
Their young-Hollywood paths crossed right here and there, he recalled, however he by no means spent a lot time together with her till they have been each solid within the romantic-dramedy ensemble of The Oranges, which began filming in New Jersey in March 2010.
“I used to be very drawn to her from leap,” the American Fiction actor mentioned with amusing. “She’s a heavenly creature…However I had no thought whether or not she was a great individual or not. And actually, type of assumed she in all probability wasn’t for, like, the primary handful of years that I did not know her, simply ‘trigger, I do not know, Gossip Woman?”
Not that he did not already know from expertise that actresses might be completely good folks (“I by no means imagine that stigma”) and that the entire level of performing is normally that you simply’re not the individual you play onscreen. However as he mentioned, he did not know her.
“I believed she was beautiful,” Brody added, “and even after we did the film there was chemistry there, however I used to be seeing somebody. And I used to be like, ‘Oh, she’s cool,’ however I nonetheless did not know.”
Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Photographs for Tony Awards Productions
They lastly began seeing one another a couple of yr later, as soon as he was single once more.
“However I nonetheless did not know [what Meester was really like],” the Promising Younger Lady solid member added, “and that continued even to after we first began relationship.”
Satirically, whereas Meester mentioned she was searching for a great man she might “look as much as,” Brody ended up discovering somebody that he might look as much as, as effectively.
As a result of when he did lastly get to know his future spouse, he mentioned, he realized “she’s actually like Joan of Arc. She is the strongest, finest individual I do know. She is my ethical compass and North Star, and I simply can’t say sufficient good issues about her character. It is loopy. She’s the type of one that, at the same time as a 4 yr previous, she would’ve been excellent. And no person has a foul factor to say about her.”
“She’s by no means been impolite to love a single individual in her life, besides—and I give her credit score for this—paparazzi, the place I am too self-conscious,” Brody continued. “I would not say impolite, however, like, folks will attempt to get her to signal some horny previous photograph or one thing that are not followers however they fake to be followers… I, simply out of self-consciousness, I am like, ‘Oh, I want them to love me so I am going to simply do it,’ however she has no downside being like, ‘You may hate me. I do not care.’ However when you’re an individual who’s real, no real individual has a single unhealthy factor to say about her.”
They’ve averted too a lot of these awkward situations by being terribly non-public with their time, not splashily making the scene throughout their courtship or publicly discussing marriage ceremony plans.
As a substitute, Meester and Brody quietly bought engaged in November 2013, simply 9 months after they have been first not-quite-photographed-together, after which tied the knot in an oceanside ceremony in Northern California on Feb. 15, 2014.
“It was a really small and intimate marriage ceremony with shut household and buddies,” a supply advised E! Information on the time. “It was stunning.”
The 2 have been simply as discreet about household planning, welcoming Arlo Day Brody on Aug. 4, 2014—with nobody being the wiser for nearly two months—after which simply as quietly grew to become dad and mom of a son in 2020. They by no means commented on both being pregnant, their second impending arrival solely reported when a photographer snapped a photograph of a visibly expectant Meester out together with her husband.
“I’ve a brand new child,” Brody revealed whereas collaborating in Maintain the Telephone TV’s The Enjoyable Time Boys Recreation Evening Spectacular in September 2020. “Since final I performed I’ve a brand new child. I’ve a boy. He is a dream, he is a dream boy.”
Todd Williamson/Getty Photographs
That yr proved to be “an OK time to do it,” he advised Faris of being house with a brand new child. “We have been in our home all yr, prefer to have a new child, it is what you wish to do anyway. I do not wish to make gentle of the horror present that we’re residing by means of [out in the world, with the pandemic], however among the timing has been OK for us. To search out the sunshine!”
And spending all that point collectively in shut quarters at house in L.A. was no downside for the proud, drained dad and mom.
Brody bought to play the ex-boyfriend of Meester’s character—and the unreliable father of her child—in her ABC sitcom Single Dad and mom, their first time performing collectively for the reason that 2014 indie comedy Life Companions, a deal with every time they will swing it.
“He is my finest buddy,” she gushed to The Hollywood Reporter in 2019. “I wanna work with him on every thing, and I feel he is the most effective in every thing. He is actually good. I used to be by no means, like, nervous if he would fully do wonderful at that half. It is a great, nice, beautiful factor.”
Working with Brody, “generally I will be like, ‘Oh yeah, I forgot I am married to you,'” Meester advised Leisure Tonight. “But it surely’s been very nice having him right here. He is very a lot part of the household.”
“On the present, he is such a little bit dummy and it’s extremely cute and he is very good-looking,” she mentioned. “And in actual life that is 98 % not true. He is principally, completely, like a grown-up.”
Arlo, for the file, did not look after the association. “Our daughter was like, ‘You have been at work for therefore lengthy,'” Meester mentioned. “It is like, I have been right here for in the future. She’s like, ‘Each of you guys cannot work on the identical time.'”
Brody can vouch for that, having mentioned on Unqualified, “Marriage and being an grownup and having a household, it was a brand new frontier for me, the place, earlier than that, I’ve type of felt like ‘I haven’t got to alter. Like me or, when you do not like me, then you do not like me. That is who I’m, and it is unreasonable to ask anybody to alter something.’ However, when you’re in a protracted dedication and you have got obligations, I do perceive now—it is nonetheless a wrestle—however that it is wholesome to type of alter just a few issues.”
“There are compromises that must be made if you are going to share a life with somebody and it does not all must be destructive,” he concluded. “And actually, a few of it, [or] all of it, may be optimistic.”
Kelsey McNeal by way of Getty Photographs
Among the many issues they get pleasure from collectively is music, Brody having been a drummer within the indie rock quartet Massive Japan and Meester laying down the occasional monitor earlier than placing out her debut album, Heartstrings, in 2014. Having grown up browsing (and skipping fairly a bit of college to hit the seashore), Brody additionally taught his spouse how, and she or he advised Form in 2019 that catching waves had change into her favourite type of train.
“Browsing is an incredible exercise that you do not even notice you are getting,” she mentioned. “It is such a religious expertise that you simply overlook concerning the bodily.”
Calling fatherhood “the most effective in each approach,” Brody advised GQ in 2019, “I imply this cliché, ‘pleasure and pleasure.’ It is very apt. She’s the factor I am most happy with and offers me probably the most pleasure. She’s simply so dang superior. It simply offers you a brand new perspective in the easiest way—one thing to concentrate on that is larger and extra vital than your self. Additionally that is 100% true and even in one other approach. She has even change into my safety blanket for the skin world by way of ‘I do not want your approval I’ve my daughter, f–k you.'”
That does not embody his spouse, in fact, whose approval he nonetheless wishes, and now he is bought a son who’ll want impressing.
In the meantime, Meester could also be her husband’s North Star, however she additionally bought precisely what she needed in a associate after years of assembly guys and questioning, What is the level?
“We’re tremendous, tremendous fortunate, and I feel we acknowledge how fortunate we’re with each other,” she advised E! Information in November 2023. “We give one another a variety of respect and time and a focus and focus. Like, actually put our time and vitality right into a relationship.”
As for Brody, he “very completely happy” with how his life turned out.
“I am so fortunate to have such an exquisite associate and such f–king wonderful [kids],” he advised Faris. “Subjectively, in fact, but additionally objectively—my daughter’s so charming and so enjoyable, such good firm. Something with them. We’ll go to the seashore, my spouse surfs too now and we’ll kinda commerce off, doing that. Hanging at house is simply beautiful with everybody, after which I additionally go together with my daughter a variety of locations.
“We’ll choose her up as we speak from faculty after which we will go grocery purchasing collectively, and I am wanting ahead to it.”
Amy Sussman/GA/The Hollywood Reporter by way of Getty Photographs
You realize you’re keen on them. And fortunately, Meester and Brody aren’t so non-public that there are not any footage of them wanting cute collectively. Retrace their romance proper right here, xoxo:
Splash Information/Shutterstock / SplashNews.com
Out and About
Leighton Meester and Adam Brody confirmed some candy PDA whereas heading to a Mexican restaurant in 2013.
AKM-GSI
Mums the Phrase
As romance rumors continued to swirl, the pair declined to publicly touch upon the standing of their relationship. However you recognize what they are saying, an image’s value a thousand phrases.
Allan Bregg / Splash Information
NYC Love
Noticed: After retaining underneath the radar for months, Meester and Brody resurfaced in New York Metropolis collectively.
Tania Coetzee/Shutterstock
He Put a Ring on It
In 2013, information broke that The O.C. actor and the Gossip Girl star have been engaged. Practically a month later, they have been photographed stealing a smooch in South Africa.
Henry S. Dziekan III/WireImage
Wedding ceremony Bells
Meester and Brody bought married in a super-secretive ceremony in 2014.
Gregg DeGuire/WireImage
Crimson Carpet Prepared
The actress supported her husband on the premiere of his film Shazam! in 2019. Little doubt their daughter, Arlo, loves that her dad is a superhero!
Richard Cartwright/ABC by way of Getty Photographs
Image Excellent
Brody beforehand shared that turning into a father is “the most effective in each approach.”
Araya Diaz/Getty Photographs
Do Gooders
Of their spare time, this couple enjoys giving again to their group.
Kelsey McNeal by way of Getty Photographs
Co-Stars
After engaged on 2011’s The Oranges, the 2 as soon as once more reunited on the set of Meester’s present Single Dad and mom in 2019. In his visitor position, Brody performed her character’s ex.
Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Photographs
Proud Dad and mom
Whereas the couple by no means introduced they have been anticipating child No. 2, Brody confirmed in September 2020 that Meester gave delivery to their second baby.
Noam Galai/Getty Photographs
Trendy Pair
The celebs dazzle on the 2022 premiere of his present Fleishman Is In Hassle.
Araya Doheny/WireImage
XOXO
Meester and Brody additionally made an excellent duo on the March 2023 premiere of his film Shazam! Fury of the Gods.
Amy Sussman/GA/The Hollywood Reporter by way of Getty Photographs
Film Evening
Hey Higher East Siders, the Blair Waldorf alum and Seth Cohen actor attended the screening of his movie American Fiction in December 2023.
Eric Charbonneau/Getty Photographs for UTA
A Golden Night
Meester and Brody have fun the 2024 Golden Globes at an after-party in Beverly Hills, Calif.
Monica Schipper/FilmMagic
Date Evening
And the award for cutest couple on the 2024 SAG Awards goes to…
(Initially revealed April 9, 2021, at 6 a.m. PT)
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