Copyright Vulture
Lily Allen hard-launched her split from David Harbour with her diartistic West End Girl, the singer’s first album in seven years. Allen and Harbour, who wed in Las Vegas on September 7, 2020, separated early this year, and if her lyrics on West End Girl are even remotely autobiographical, it’s poised to be one of the messiest celeb breakups in years. Over 14 detailed tracks, Allen chronicles cheating allegations, an unwanted open relationship, and the pain of a marriage crumbling. On “Madeline,” Allen describes seeing a message from a woman who was having sex with a man that certainly seems to be Harbour, and whom Allen seems to know personally herself. “We had an arrangement / Be discreet and don’t be blatant / There had to be payment / It had to be with strangers / But you’re not a stranger, Madeline.” Harbour, for his part, hasn’t let the public’s fascination with Allen’s confessions keep him out of the spotlight. He’s currently promoting the final season of Stranger Things on the red carpet, even if he is reportedly skipping out on various press junkets. His absence is less likely to do with his ex, though, and more to do with filming for Evil Genius with Courteney Cox. But what’s actually going on with the former couple and their “Pussy Palace”? So far, there do not appear to be any public court filings indicating that either Allen or Harbour have officially filed for divorce, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t anticipate how their seemingly inevitable split would play out. Three of New York City’s top matrimonial lawyers answered all our questions about what could be next — other than another Allen album. How much do all of Allen’s cheating allegations matter in a divorce? “In a vacuum, the answer is no. As is often the case, the real answer is ‘Well, it depends,’ said Michael Stutman, a partner at Alter Wolff Foley & Stutman LLP, who said “misbehavior” can matter if it affects the children or shared finances in some way. (Allen has two children, daughters Ethel and Marnie, from her prior marriage to Sam Cooper, with whom she shares joint custody.) With celebrities, the money part gets particularly interesting. “Sometimes that impact is not merely a matter of spending money on your paramour, but it could be that the misbehavior is negatively affecting someone’s celebrity presence and thus reducing their marketability,” he said. In other words, if a celebrity’s cheating costs them work — impacting the couple’s financial future — then a judge might give the aggrieved spouse more assets to make up for whatever loss was caused by this errant behavior. But if neither kids nor finances are related, Stutman says courts generally don’t really care about who’s sleeping with whom. David Harbour is rumored to see a $9.5 million payday from this season of Stranger Things, whereas Allen previously said she sold feet pics as streaming pays so little. Is he going to have to pay spousal support? Bonnie Rabin, a high-profile New York City divorce attorney who has counted celebrities among her clients, said this depends. “If there’s a prenup, it’s likely covered in there,” she speculated. “So that’s the threshold issue: Was it already covered in the prenuptial agreement?” If there isn’t a prenup, the court is supposed to examine a couple’s assets before and after marriage to see whether “maintenance” payments would be necessary. “Are they both earning enough money to sufficiently support themselves? Or was there a lifestyle that each of them was living, or only one can continue to live and the other one can’t, because of the separation or divorce?” If both sides have sufficient funds — which they could get from divvying up marital assets or their own incomes — ”it’s unlikely there’ll be maintenance paid from one to the other.” And generally speaking, the shorter the marriage, the shorter the maintenance period. Stutman voiced similar sentiments. To get spousal support, “There’s a certain amount of need that needs to be demonstrated by the proposed recipient.” He explained, “If the one who wants support makes, say, $5 million a year, and the other spouse makes $8 million a year, the mere fact that one makes more than the other doesn’t mean that the spouse who has already got $5 million a year coming in is going to get any support at all.” What does the split look like if Allen and Harbour signed a prenup? How would having a prenup (or not!) affect things? Mary-Kate Olsen’s divorce lawyer Nancy Chemtob is a good person to answer this. “Most celebrities put in the prenup that the other spouse can’t get any of their fame, fortune, anything that is part of their likeness” or being. Both sides have to agree to a prenup; whatever agreement isn’t one-sided. “The reason that people would want to do a prenuptial agreement is, if they’re a celebrity, is to be able to get out easily … to know how much money my spouse is getting, how much money I would have to give.” “The only thing that you can’t do in a prenuptial agreement is do anything to dictate the children,” Chemtob said. In other words, a prenup won’t cover custody or child support. If fame is a potential commodity in a split, it’s unclear who has the most in this situation. Sure, Harbour’s star took off with Stranger Things, but Allen’s new album has propelled her to celebrity beyond her aughts peak. They’re selling their Brooklyn townhouse. Who gets the money? If there’s a prenup, then that will govern who gets whatever proceeds from the home. If there isn’t, Rabin said, a court would consider distribution of property on the principle of equitable distribution. New York has what’s called equitable distribution, which basically means divvying up marital assets fairly, not necessarily a 50-50 split. Things that factor into this calculus might include how much each person makes, whether they had property before going into their marriage, and both sides’ financial outlook down the road. In New York, if a person had money before they got married — an inheritance or earnings — and they kept it separate from their spouse, that generally wouldn’t be considered a “marital asset” up for grabs. On the other hand, “anything that they earn during the marriage in New York is considered marital, and then it’s subject to all the mental distribution factors.” (This is very different from California, which has what’s called a “community property” doctrine in divorce. Generally, community property see that both sides get 50 percent of property amassed during marriage, unless there’s some sort of agreement in place.) Lily has several children from her first marriage. Is Harbour on the hook for child support? It’s “really unlikely” that step-parents would have to pay child support, Rabin said. There are some “very unusual situations” where spousal maintenance might include child-related costs, but step-children have “their own other parents.” What about custody of Ethel and Marnie? Harbour would almost certainly not have any custody or visitation rights. “If you aren’t a legal parent, whether that’s by birth acknowledgement or paternity or adoption, you don’t really have any obligation, and you don’t have you don’t you don’t have many rights,” Rabin said. However, the situation could become a bit murkier when a nonparent has fully learned into that role. Did a step-parent go to parent-teacher conferences? Fully support their step-kids? Did they call them “Daddy” or “Mommy”? But, the chances of a step-parent getting custody remains incredibly slim. “It would be unusual if those children have other parents.” When both parties are high-profile but only one is publicly talking about the relationship, who benefits? Generally, courts don’t care much about trash-talking. Rabin said that courts might take note when said trash-talking harms one of the unhappy partners. “There are times when a party will say negative things about a spouse that can affect their work and affect their careers, and the court can take that into consideration,” Rabin said. Say a spouse in a divorce had a job at a bank. If the other estranged spouse made claims about theft or insider trading, and that cost them a promotion, “the court can absolutely take that into consideration.” With a celebrity, if outspoken cheating allegations caused their ex to lose parts or opportunities, the court could consider that as well. “If she’s the one speaking out, then she probably has a PR person who is telling her to do that. So, my assumption would be that she doesn’t want to be the person that looks bad, and she’s trying to get in front of the story,” Chemtob said. However, there are times when unhappily married couples don’t speak out, no matter how miserable they might be. Chemtob said that “there are a lot of times” when prenups include a “confidentiality agreement.” These may state “one person can’t speak, or both people can’t speak.”
