Next month marks 10 years since the premiere of Twilight (yes, we're all old now) and thanks to their roles as angst-ridden teens Bella Swan and Edward Cullen in the films, Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson became one of the most talked-about Hollywood couples.
As we come close to a decade since #TeamEdward vs #TeamJacob, we reflect on how Kristen Steward really felt during the height of her fame, and it's not what you'd imagine.
In an interview with The New York Times’ TMagazine, Kristen revealed that playing out her relationship with Robert Pattinson - whom she dated for four years - in the public eye felt ‘gross’ and unreal to her.
‘People wanted me and Rob to be together so badly that our relationship was made into a product,’ she told T. ‘It wasn’t real life any more. And that was gross to me.’
‘It’s not that I want to hide who I am or hide anything I’m doing in my life. It’s that I don’t want to become part of a story for entertainment value.’
Kristen and Robert broke up in 2012, after the actress was photographed kissing her Snow White and the Huntsman director Rupert Sanders. She later released a public statement, writing that ‘this momentary indiscretion has jeopardized the most important thing in my life, the person I love and respect the most, Rob.’
After a media storm blew up around the split, Kristen has understandably been reluctant to discuss her relationships. Since she has begun dating women, though, she has become more prepared to open up about her personal life.
‘I would never talk about any of my relationships before, but once I started dating girls it seemed like there was an opportunity to represent something really positive,’ she explained to T. ‘I still want to protect my personal life, but I don’t want to seem like I’m protecting the idea, so that does sort of feel like I owe something to people.’
Kristen, who has previously spoken out about suffering from severe anxiety at the height of Twilight mania, revealed that these days, ‘I’m not sad any more. I’m not saturated any more. I’ve been dropped back into everyone else’s reality and now I can live again.’