Wilde and Styles’ relationship kicked off in the lead-up to shooting her 2022 film “Don’t Worry Darling” and ended weeks after its premiere.

Olivia Wilde says she resented being told to keep quiet about Harry Styles relationship

Wilde and Styles' relationship kicked off in the lead-up to shooting her 2022 film "Don't Worry Darling" and ended weeks after its premiere.

By Ryan Coleman

Ryan Coleman

Ryan Coleman is a news writer for with previous work in MUBI Notebook, Slant, and the LA Review of Books.

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June 24, 2026 5:23 p.m. ET

Olivia Wilde and Harry Styles in London in 2022. Credit:

Neil Mockford/GC Images

- Olivia Wilde is looking back on pressure to keep quiet about her relationship with Harry Styles.

- "I was told, 'Don't say a f---ing word. Just go out there and smile,'" Wilde told 'The Cut' on Wednesday. "I resent that."

- Wilde cast the musician in the lead role of her 2022 psychological thriller *Don't Worry Darling* after which the pair began dating.

Olivia Wilde isn't taking orders any longer.

The actress and director is back on the press line, gearing up for the release of her third directorial feature, *The Invite*. But back in 2022, leading up to and following the release of *Don't Worry Darling*, her second feature in the director's chair, Wilde couldn't make it through a single media engagement without being buffeted by gusts from a maelstrom of rumors and gossip consuming her life.

Some speculated on the true story behind Shia LaBeouf's departure from the film's leading role; others were convinced she got into a screaming match with the film's other lead, Florence Pugh; and everyone had opinions on her relationship with LaBeouf's replacement, Harry Styles.

That wasn't pure rumor — Wilde and Styles confirmed their relationship, but went their separate ways two months after *Don't Worry Darling *opened in theaters. Wilde has looked back on the media circus surrounding the romance in the time since, but now she's providing an inside view of the pressure to keep quiet about it all.

The 'Don't Worry Darling' cast in Venice in 2022.

Laurent KOFFEL/Gamma-Rapho via Getty

"I was told, 'Don't say a f---ing word. Just go out there and smile,'" Wilde told *The Cut** *on Wednesday. "I resent that, but it taught me it's not the way I want to handle things."

It wasn't the backlash to their age difference (Wilde is 42, while Styles is 32), or being served with divorce papers from Jason Sudeikis in the middle of a *Don't Worry Darling *event, but one feeling provoked by the public reception to her relationship with Styles that stuck in her craw.

"I deeply hate the feeling of being misunderstood," Wilde explained.

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As recently as last week, Wilde began to open up more about the relationship, which began in 2021, after she cast him in the psychological thriller, and ended November 2022.

"It was crazy. I don't know how much I understand it yet," Wilde shared on a June 17 episode of *Call Her Daddy*. "That's one of the factors that I never really felt like I fully… I don't know. I know that it has existed for a long time in our society. I understand it had very little to do with me."

Wilde wondered aloud, "It is something that… We've done this to women for a long time. Why is it? I don't know. People were f‑‑‑ing pissed."

Wilde and Styles in 'Don't Worry Darling'.

At the time, Styles admitted that he similarly was puzzled by the furor.

"Can you imagine going on a second date with someone and being like, 'Okay, there's this corner of the thing, and they're going to say this, and it's going to be really crazy, and they're going to be really mean, and it's not real… But anyway, what do you want to eat?'" Styles shared, referring to the social media platform X as a "shitstorm of people trying to be awful to people."

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