The Truth About Scarlett Johansson And Ryan Reynolds’ Divorce

You read that right — Ryan Reynolds was married to Scarlett Johansson. Some fans don’t even know about it, but we can’t blame them. After all, it’s hard to imagine Reynolds without his troll-some marriage to Blake Lively. Also, Saturday Night Live star Colin Jost has already “baby-trapped” Scarjo.

However, that’s not the actual reason fans have forgotten about the Marvel Cinematic Universe stars’ past romance. The ex-couple was just super private about their relationship. But years after their divorce, the Black Widow star hinted at what ended her marriage to the Deadpool actor. Now we get why they reportedly refuse to work together…

How Scarlett Johansson & Ryan Reynolds Met

The pair started publicly dating in April 2007, two months after Reynolds and then-fiancé Alanis Morissette called it quits. They’d been dating for almost five years at that time. A year later, a source told E! News that he and Johansson had been engaged “for a little while” but kept it under wraps because “they want to keep things private.” In September 2008, they tied the knot in an intimate ceremony on Vancouver Island.

“I never thought that I’d be planning my wedding in a dark alley somewhere,” Johansson told David Letterman of how they kept the wedding away from the press. “But it turned out that way. It was really quite secretive and I felt like I was doing a drug deal without all the fun… I got married in a very remote part of Canada. There were bears and whales and eagle.”

A year later, the two both signed in their respective superhero movies. Johansson was cast in Iron Man 2 in March 2009. Four months later, Reynolds got the lead role in DC’s Green Lantern where he met Lively. On her September 2009 Glamour cover, Johansson opened up about her marriage to Reynolds. “I never really thought about getting married — it just kind of happened,” she said. “You hope that the relationship makes you better, that you learn things about yourself.”

Inside Scarlett Johansson & Ryan Reynolds’ Marriage

In December 2009, Johansson told Time Out New York that she and Reynolds hadn’t been going on dates due to their busy schedules. “We have no time for dates. We work and then go home and I, anyway, just stare at the wall for a few hours before I go to sleep,” she shared. “Like in any profession, it’s difficult. You want to make sure you have time to invest in your family. It’s a challenge, but it’s worth it.”

When 2010 started, the two were living separately due to work. The Lucy star had her nightly Broadway performance in A View From the Bridge while the Free Guy actor was shooting Green Lantern in New Orleans.

Rumors of their split began swirling around March that year. In a May interview with InStyle Magazine, Johansson assured fans that she and Reynolds were still together. “I mean, you’re married and suddenly you have your own family. There’s a nice comfort in that,” she said. “That part of your life is certain, in a way. You’ve got your home in that other person.” Shortly after the interview, the couple put up their $4.5 million Hollywood home for sale, fueling more speculations. Months later, they purchased a $2.8 million home in Los Angeles.

In October, Reynolds finally shut down the breakup rumors. “Things change when you get married in general. But in terms of being a couple that’s in a public situation and speculated about and all that nonsense, it’s changed a little bit. I’m a little more guarded, I think,” he said. “I’m just a little bit more wary of having my relationship turning into a soap opera. I’ve unilaterally not addressed it. That’s kind of been the fail-safe for me. I choose to remain as private as possible without being secretive.”

Why Scarlett Johansson & Ryan Reynolds Divorced

The two eventually announced their divorce in December 2010. “After long and careful consideration on both our parts, we’ve decided to end our marriage,” said Reynolds’ official statement. “We entered our relationship with love and it’s with love and kindness we leave it. While privacy isn’t expected, it’s certainly appreciated.” Fans never knew the reason behind the split — at least not until 2016 when Scarjo revealed that her ex-husband might have felt threatened by her success.

“Acting is a very strange world to be co-existing in,” she later told Parade. “It’s very volatile. There’s always going to be the more successful person. It’s related to rejection. Because actors, if they’re not having success, connect it directly to unpopularity—to the fact that nobody wants them.” She also implied that those issues might have strained her marriage to Reynolds. “[Marriage] takes a lot of work,” she added. “It takes a man who’s not only confident in the love that you have for one another, but confident in what he has going on in his own career. He has to be in a field that’s completely different from yours.”

Then there were rumors of Reynolds being “controlling” during the marriage. “He can be an overbearing control freak,” a source told InTouch. “When he wanted her there, he expected her to drop everything and come to him. She got tired of the double standard.” Many fans also believe that he had cheated on Johansson with Lively. They even have a theory that when Reynolds and Lively hit it off during a double date, the latter was with her then-boyfriend Penn Badgley while the former was with Scarjo — with whom he was still married. None of them has disclosed the specific details of that date.