Chris Pine Addresses Harry Styles ‘Don’t Worry Darling’ Spitting Controversy

Chris Pine is finally willing to discuss the controversy surrounding the world premiere of Don’t Worry Darling at the Venice Film Festival, including the rumor that co-star Harry Styles publicly spit on him. While Pine’s representative shut down the narrative from the jump, calling it a “complete fabrication” and a “ridiculous story,” the actor is finally clearing things up himself in a new interview with Esquire.

“Harry did not spit on me,” Pine said in a video for the outlet. “Harry is a very kind guy. I was on the plane and we’re flying back from Venice having a great time on the plane and my publicist wakes me up and says, ‘We have to craft a statement on what happened in Venice.’ She showed me the thing and it did look, indeed, like Harry spit on me. He didn’t spit on me.”

Instead, Styles leaned down to whisper an inside joke to Pine. “I think Harry leaned down and said, ‘It’s just words isn’t it?’” the actor continued. “We had this little joke. We were all jet lagged and trying to answer questions and sometimes when you’re doing these press things your brain goes befuddled and you start speaking gibberish, so we had a joke: ‘It’s just words.’”

In addition to “Spitgate,” the Don’t Worry Darling premiere and press tour were rife with controversy, as rumors swirled that Olivia Wilde and star Florence Pugh were feuding with one another. Pine said of the reports of on-set tension, “If there was drama, there was drama. I absolutely didn’t know about it, nor really would I have cared.” He continued, “If I feel badly, it’s because the vitriol that the movie got was absolutely out of proportion with what was onscreen. Venice was normal things getting swept up in a narrative that people wanted to make, compounded by the metastasizing that can happen in the Twitter-sphere. It was ridiculous.”

Wilde previously shut down rumors of a feud with her leading lady during a press conference at the Venice Film Festival, which Pugh did not attend due to reported scheduling issues. “As for all the endless tabloid gossip and all the noise out there, I mean, the Internet feeds itself,” Wilde said at the time. “I don’t feel the need to contribute. I think it’s sufficiently well-nourished.”