Mischa Barton once said that she was advised to sleep with Leonardo DiCaprio when she was 19 and he was 30.
The “O.C.” star reportedly made the statement in a 2005 interview, which gained new attention this week amid chatter about DiCaprio’s penchant for dating younger women. Barton reportedly claimed that her then-publicist advised her to sleep with DiCaprio, who had recently broken up with then-25-year-old model Gisele Bündchen, when they saw him at a photo shoot in Malibu, California.
“Isn’t Leo, like 30 or something?” Barton told Harpers & Queen (now Harper’s Bazaar), according to a 2005 writeup in British outlet The Times. The original Harpers & Queen article does not appear to be online.
After the now-48-year-old DiCaprio was spotted Sunday with 19-year-old model Eden Polani at a Grammys event, a pop culture-focused Twitter account posted about Barton’s 2005 interview with the comment: “this aged well.” The tweet received nearly 5 million views.
While a source told Page Six that DiCaprio wasn’t dating Polani, the actor has long made headlines over the age gaps in his relationships. He was even ribbed at the Emmys last year by Kenan Thompson, who joked 26 was “too old to date Leonardo DiCaprio.” The “Titanic” star most recently dated model Camila Morrone, but they split soon after her 25th birthday.
Barton was at the height of her fame during the reported encounter and starred in films like “The Sixth Sense” before leading the hit “O.C.” show beginning in 2003. DiCaprio has been an A-lister since the ’90s.