On Friday we heard that Drew Barrymore, 41, and her husband Will Kopelman, 38, had separated after three years of marriage together. Page Six broke the news and then it was confirmed with a statement to People Magazine that they still considered themselves a family and would put their daughters, aged four and nearly two, first:
Sadly our family is separating legally, although we do not feel this takes away from us being a family. Divorce might make one feel like a failure, but eventually you start to find grace in the idea that life goes on.
Our children are our universe, and we look forward to living the rest of our lives with them as the first priority.
That’s nice and I hope it’s the case. Additional stories claimed that a difference of opinion on where to live, New York or Los Angeles, led to the split and that Will was “devastated.” Page Six’s original story hinted that it was Drew who wanted the divorce, with a source stating “Drew had a very rebellious and wild childhood, with no family around her, and while she is a very different person now, and a great mother, some of that can stay with you.” People, E! and other outlets also included past quotes from Drew about how she was seeking stability and Will offered that. What’s more is that E! quoted a source who claimed that Drew wanted out, basically:
“They were good friends who blossomed into something more,” another source told us Friday. “Drew felt, after dating so many guys who were wrong for her, that he would be good for her. But she kind of always had a feeling it might not be forever. Then they had kids and she stuck it out for them. Because of what she went through as a child, she didn’t want to break the family up…
“Now she feels like she needs to live her own life,” the source added.
Drew isn’t letting the news of the split hold her back. She promoted her Barrymore wines at the Pebble Beach Food & Wine Festival in Carmel, California on Saturday. Some attendees posted photos of Drew pouring wine and posing with fans. She looked happy and relaxed. Maybe she had a weight lifted from her shoulders after breaking the news to the press.
Several of you pointed out that Drew, who just got a new tattoo on her wrist of her daughter’s names, has said that she enjoys practicing Judaism, which is Will’s religion. (It’s unclear whether she actually converted.) Tattoos are frowned upon in the Jewish religion. In 2013, Star Magazine reported that Drew was getting her tattoos lasered off for Will. That may have been the case as she used to have a large tattoo on the inside of her left forearm that said “Breathe,” but it’s nowhere to be seen in recent red carpet photos. So she got a new tattoo, announced her split and then promoted her wine all on the same weekend. She’s going to do her own thing for a while and she’s already started. She may have to give up a chunk of her over $125 million fortune, but she’s not slowing down.
Why would a recovering alcoholic produce their own wine? Either she is still drinking or she must have some pretty strong will power.
I like Drew and she has been through a lot but I always felt that she is her worst enemy.
When she gets something good, she ends up doing something to break it.
Will seems to be a nice guy so hopefully this won’t turn messy.
I want good things for her! She is her own worst enemy though…. this whole situation has me worried.
P.S. She needs to burn that oversized shirt.
I wondered the same thing. Apparently she had said she does drink in moderation. I hope she has a good support system around her, and that this is not a bad decision.
I don’t know if I believe that alcoholics can drink in moderation. Moderation for my mom was a bottle of wine everyday and so drunk that she would have to have my sister to drive her around. Even in “moderation” I would still get verbally/emotionally abuse voicemails and text messages. I had to threaten to block her calls/texts to get her to stop.
I just don’t believe that alcoholics can drink at all. I’ve never seen it happen. In my family non-alcoholic beer (contains .05% alcohol) was “not drinking.” It always quickly led to a relapse.
In general I agree, I think abstaining is probably more effective and safer.
That said, I don’t know if Drew was an alcoholic in the way that we typically think of adult alcoholics, but who knows.
@Lyssa
There is a medication now that alcoholics can take before drinking that really does allow (some of) them to moderate their intake. I believe it blocks the “reward” feedback their brain gets from drinking, so they don’t get the same knee-jerk impulse to keep pouring booze down their throat.
If she’s taking that medication, then she maybe can handle it. I agree that a lot of alcoholics spout lies to try to avoid being called out on their drinking, but it’s no longer always true that’s what’s happening.
Glad you said it before me, but the close proximity of a recovering addict to wine production and tasting makes me uncomfortable.
Drew hasn’t been truly sober in many years (not judging, but this is from shots of her smoking pot and her own admissions about drinking). To be honest, I wonder if she was really an addict, or if she went to rehab because it was the only way she would have ever been taken seriously again and she was mature enough to understand that, not to mention it was probably the only way she could get insured on a film set. This was in the Era of Just Say No, and I don’t think she had much of a choice.
I’m not sure she was really an alcoholic either, but she was using from a VERY young age. 8 I think? She may have just needed to quit until, you know, she was 21.
She was on an Oprah special with him and her one child at the time. She seemed to be trying so hard to be “normal” which is a stretch considering her life prior. I was happy for her and hoping this relationship would work. But she has the misfortune of being a Barrymore who don’t have much luck with happy endings.
It’s a shame that things didn’t work out – but the fact that both sides have been pretty quiet, and that the statements we have seem pretty nice – I think there’s a good chance that it is quite amicable.
I tend to think that they got together because he was what she never had – a stable guy who wanted to have a nice, solid family life. I think it was probably intoxicating – and probably not really something she regrets either. I think though- that with all of the damage she’s been through growing up, that as much as she probably wanted the nice happy family life, it might also kind of freak her out.
She was bored to tears with Kopelman and the marriage. Drew would be better as a girlfriend, not a wife.
Kinda reminds me of how Tom Green filed for divorce from her after 5 months.
Grossmaster Tom Green!??!!
He low key dissed her for a while, then clammed up afterwards.
What did Tom Green say? I have long suspected that sweet little girl routine she puts on is an act. I mean how does that kind of woman even come to date let alone marry Tom Green?
To her credit, she made it ‘years’ instead of mere months like the last two marriages.
My first thought upon reading the title was “wait-didn’t she have substance abuse problems as a child?”
The word “conservative” in Conservative Judaism doesn’t mean exactly the same thing as it means in the vernacular. So the fact that she married a Conservative Jew doesn’t mean that she turned into a dowdy housewife who had to change her entire being.
Many Conservative Jews have tattoos; if she had hers removed it was a personal decision. She also began dressing more conservatively post baby, which many women do, and mentioned it has to do with how she feels about being a mother and the way her body looks. Those are personal choices she made, not requirements to convert.
Yeah, this. And there are plenty of different ways of being Jewish — much of my family is Jewish and they don’t care about tattoos. (Or dressing “modestly” or etc.) Saying Judaism as a whole frowns on something is like saying Christianity as a whole frowns on something. It’s nonsense.
That last video “it goes down soo easy” haha I love you Drew!
I hope she takes very good care of herself. She has talked about the fact that she can drink and it’s not a problem for her. I hope that continues to be the case.
I have a friend who is a recovering heroin addict, clean several years, and she drinks occasionally. I was shocked and worried at first. I always thought that if you are an addit you should not and can not have any substances whatsoever. I guess maybe this is not always the case.
Wishing her the best in this post-divorce life she will be constructing for herself. She’s a truly sweet spirit.
Some people do just have a problem with one thing. On the other end of the scale, some people can and will become addicted to anything and everything.
Think of it like quitting smoking. Some people also find they have to give up or dramatically reduce their drinking, because they’ll smoke when drunk. For most though, it’s no issue.
True. I don’t think I would have been successful at quitting smoking ten years ago if they hadn’t outlawed smoking in bars in my area a few weeks before I quit. My friends and I meet up at our favorite pub every weekend and I didn’t want to give up my social life when I gave up cigarettes. Being able to go out for a drink without having people smoking all around me helped a lot.
I feel bad for him, her biological clock was ticking, she was lucky to get pregnant in her late 30s she played house in a stable environment for a brief time and now it’s back to her free true ways.
I read an article where science really studying dating and in the end “opposites” Do Not work well.
The hubby sounds sad especially if he comes from a family that is stable and doesn’t divorce. Hopefully he finds a match who comes from a more similar background.
As for Drew love her but old habits die hard.
I have always liked her, but giving up after three years with two children involved is sad to me. I mean, I don’t know the details, obviously, but unless there was abuse or she was in some danger, it seems hasty. Of course things will change after two children. Maybe take some time and focus on each other and let things settle down? It seems almost like she used him to get a family, then blew him off.
She was on ‘the chew’ a little while ago and told a very long story about the holidays and how it was at her in-laws. She gushed about the kids and spoke about her in-laws but never even mentioned her hubby. It was so strange and made me suspicious. Et voila!
Its only been three years. She might have to buy out her half of their homes, but what else would she have to give up.
She is a product of her upbringing. Clearly she desires a stable, secure home life, but having never really seen it modeled for her I don’t think she knew how to handle it once she got it. It’s such a shame; her parents really did a number on her. All that being said, she has had a remarkably good life considering how awful her childhood was. I hope she’s able to find a lasting relationship eventually and really be happy.
Her parents were awful. I think you hit on something. She seemed to think she couldn’t just be herself with him. She had to change into earth mother or something. I wish her the best, too.
I’m such of fan of hers because she didn’t let her chaotic upbringing hinder her endeavor to build a stable home and develop a strong work ethic. Too bad this marriage didn’t last. Who knows what the details of her and Koppelman’s break up are but sometimes you don’t need anything more than a couple not fitting well after all to bring forth a split. They seem like good people who love their children, so hopefully it will be a relatively easy break and they’ll be able to co-parent without many problems
Let’s just call a spade a spade and admit that Drew only married him to have kids because she felt her time was running out. She used him. If it were the other way around everyone would be freaking out. She very obviously wasn’t in love, just complacent. I feel bad for her kids.
As much I like her, I agree with everything you said. I read in the blinds months ago that they were getting ready to separate and how it was all okay because she got the kids she wanted, so cool, right? No, not really, not cool at all.
I think there are some truths in some of these posts regarding her trying and wanting to be somethiing she doesn’t know how and still being the free spirit that complicates things. She has been married three or four times now and there seems to be a pattern of it not lasting long at all and the men are the ones who leave – not her. I have a feeling she is not easy to live with and tends to do what she wants regardless of how her beau’s feel about it. Some may say she should be able to do whatever she wants, but most married couples do compromise and take eachother’s feelings into account.
So you guys are both close friends with her then? You seem to know an awful lot about her personal life