With a handful of major splits announced in quick succession, it seems like this is the Summer of Celebrity Divorces. According to some experts, the timing may not be entirely coincidental.
Former Hollywood publicist Rob Shuter explained to USA Today most celebrity couples plan their divorce announcements for weeks or even months with the goal to break the news at a time when it is easy to overlook.
“(The marriage) might have been over for months but they announce it during the slow days of summer or on a big holiday or when another big celebrity divorce is announced,” he said. “So you often see a rush of these breakups but it just means they chose to announce them on that day, not that it just happened.”
Summer is a particularly opportune time for stars to announce their splits for a couple of reasons. For one, many people in the public take vacations and/or spend less time tracking celebrities. Another aspect is that, unlike the stretch between fall and spring, there are fewer red carpet events… So the celebrities can lay low for longer periods of time. And when another couple is dominating the headlines with split news, the timing is even better.
SelectiveSearch.com marketing director Megan Daniels offered the alternative explanation that summer is usually a time of reflection for people, including celebrities who may realize their marriages have gone off the tracks.
“Summer is a time of focus, your schedule is calmer, you can spend more time focused on your relationship and maybe come to realize it’s not where you want it to be,” she said. Megan added diverging careers may also contribute to splits, which is what she speculated happened to Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale.
“When they met, they were equally successful, then he left his band (Bush) and tried to go solo and had failed attempts at growing his own brand, while she skyrocketed, as a TV host, in fashion, with her solo music and with her band (No Doubt),” Megan said. “All this compounds the pressure, and maybe led to him pulling away or withdrawing.”
Regardless of how much thought celebrities put into the timing of their divorce announcements, Megan said it’s nearly impossible for them to fly entirely under the radar.
“Across the world, we live in entertainment-based society with a preponderance of media, so we get to know these people and feel like we have an intimate bond with them, they become our friends of sorts because we’re so digitally involved in their lives,” she said. “The consumers feed a constant need for updates and details about their favorite celebs.”
