Joe Alwyn Speaks Out on Taylor Swift Breakup 1 Year After Split

Just over one year after their split, Joe Alwyn opened up about his breakup from Taylor Swift in a new interview for The Times, published on Saturday, June 15. The Boy Erased actor, 33, was asked if he’d listened to his ex’s latest album The Tortured Poets Department, which has songs on it that some fans have speculated was about their breakup after over six years together. Joe gave a pretty level response to the question. “This isn’t a direct answer to your question, but just thinking about what I want to talk about,” he said as he gathered his thoughts.

Joe didn’t directly respond to any of his ex’s songs or really speak publicly about the latest Taylor, 34, album, but he spoke about how strange it is to work through a split in the public eye. “I would hope that anyone and everyone can [empathize] and understand the difficulties that come with the end of a long, loving, fully committed relationship of over six and a half years. That is a hard thing to navigate. What is unusual and abnormal in this situation is that, one week later, it’s suddenly in the public domain and the outside world is able to weigh in,” he said, via Entertainment Tonight. “So you have something very real suddenly thrown into a very unreal space: tabloids, social media, press, where it is then dissected, speculated on, pulled out of shape beyond recognition.”

The Mary Queen of Scots actor explained that he understands and has “made my peace” with the fact that there’s “always going to be a gap” between what’s public knowledge and the nuances of his personal life. Still, he said that he felt like he was “in a really good place in my life” and emphasized that he felt “good” both “professionally and personally.”

At another point, the interviewer asked if he’d been in touch with Taylor, and he tiptoed around the question. “I’m sure you can appreciate, given the level of noise and scrutiny about my past relationship, why I wouldn’t want to just open the door to things like that right now,” he said.