Lily Allen has called David Harbour’s reaction to her tell-all divorce album “generous”.
Released last year after the 2024 breakdown of Allen’s marriage to the Stranger Things star, West End Girl covered themes such as cheating, gaslighting, and sex addiction.
Harbour stayed silent for months following the album’s release, finally addressing the album in an interview published in June of this year. “I do believe that it is the privilege of every artist to use their experience to create art, and so I respect her for doing that,” Harbour told Variety.
Asked about her ex-husband’s reaction to the record in an interview with The Cut, Allen said: “I think that was a generous thing for him to say.”
While the “Smile” singer did not elaborate any further, she did take the opportunity to applaud Harbour on his flourishing career.
“He’s having a real moment of success as well, right?” she said. “He’s been nominated for an Emmy, and it’s great. We’re all doing our own thing, and we’re all doing what we’re supposed to do. If there’s one thing I know about David Harbour, it’s that he’s an excellent actor.”
For his performance in HBO’s DTF St. Louis, Harbour was nominated – and later won – the Emmy award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie category.
As well as speaking about his “respect” for Allen, Harbour said at the time: “I can’t really say that much more because it’s my private life. In spite of the fact that a lot of people don’t allow me a private life – I value it. And I also value the lives of the people that I interact with privately. I just won’t speak about that.”
When asked if he wanted to respond to any of the claims made on the album, including allegations of cheating and sex addiction, Harbour said: “Stories are complex and that’s why I say I respect her creation of art to channel her experience. It wasn’t my experience.”
Upon its release, Allen described her album as “a mixture of fact and fiction”. That said, her and Harbour’s relationship was put under the spotlight for months as fans dissected the candid lyrics for clues as to the reasons behind their divorce.
Asked what it was like to watch fans speculate about her life, she said: “I don’t really mind that so much. If I feel really strongly about something, then great, because I will use it for my art and I will write about it. The rest of it is noise.
“I think when people really get it wrong – when they say things that are just plainly untrue and rehash old rumours from ten or 15 years ago that I don’t want to comment on because I don’t want to add fuel to the fire – that makes me sad, yes.”
Allen went on to say that several people have misinterpreted the lyric “Why are we here talking about vasectomies?” in her song “Just Enough”.
The singer, however, would not be drawn on the real meaning of the lyrics. “I’m not going to explain to you what it actually means or why I added it in there,” she said. “But it’s truly a f***ed-up lyric.”
The line is part of a wider lyrics, reading: “Why are we here talking about vasectomies?/ Did you get someone pregnant?/ Someone who isn’t me?/ Did you take her to the clinic?”
West End Girl is Allen’s fifth studio album. The critically acclaimed record was hailed as a “brutal, tell-all masterpiece” in Hannah Ewens’s five-star review for The Independent.
