What to Know
Some celebrities use social media like the rest of us. They comment on posts with encouragement or rage, they share intimate photos from their private life, and they follow the latest hot gossip. Kind of like Christina Ricci, who commented on a post made by Hello! Magazine about Hilary Duff and ex-boyfriend Joel Madden’s relationship from once upon a time.
A screenshot shared on Reddit shows that Ricci commented on an Instagram post from the outlet wherein it was written that Duff and Madden dated from 2004 until 2006 when she was 16 and he was 25 during the relationship. Ricci’s response was confusion over the casual mention of the age gap and now the caption of the post makes it sound like it’s totally normal for a teenager under the age of 18 to date someone old enough to rent a car.
The social media post very casually mentioned Hilary Duff and Joel Madden’s age gap from their relationship.
The Instagram post features an updated photo of Duff and Madden with their respective spouses. But it also has a dated photo of them from when they were a couple. The caption speaks to their working relationship now, but it also mentions that wildly inappropriate age gap that seems to be glossed over.
“Hilary and Joel dated from 2004 to 2006, when she was 16 and he was 25, and today they’re happily living very different lives, Hilary with husband Matthew Koma, and Joel with wife Nicole Richie,” the caption says.
Ricci, for her part, responded to another person who commented about not normalizing “a grown man grooming a teenager.”
Ricci wrote, “Yeah seriously wtf?”
In the Reddit post about it, users commented to share their own confusion as to why Hello! Magazine put the ages in the caption as though there isn’t anything inappropriate about a relationship between a teenager and an adult. Some even suggested that the information was added as rage bait of sorts.
Other people were as confused as Christina Ricci.
One person in the Reddit thread commented, “I hate that they put the ages in the post as if it was common everyday information.”
Another wrote, “Legitimately insane. It feels like we are regressing so much as a society. Because YUCK. Christina thank you.”
Even Instagram users who commented on the magazine’s original post didn’t hold back on thoughts regarding Duff and Madden’s former relationship.
“Dropping that age gap like it’s a lil fun fact of the day??” A user commented. “Hell nah.”
Others surprisingly came to the defense of the relationship. But some still commented about their shock at Duff and Madden’s age gap being treated as the norm.
Hilary Duff’s music might hint at the former relationship.
When Duff released the 2026 album “Luck…Or Something,” one of the songs, “Mature,” features lyrics about a relationship between a younger girl and older man. Some fans took this song to be in reference to Duff’s own experiences, possibly involving Madden.
She hasn’t come out to confirm that, but the lyrics, which include, “She’s me, I’m her in a different font / Just a few years younger, a new haircut / Very Leo of you with your Scorpio touch,” clearly mention such a relationship.
Duff addressed the lyrics in an interview with Vogue. She revealed, “I was looking back on this relationship and thinking about whether this guy had a habit of dating younger women or whether I was special.”
After Madden and Duff broke up, Madden went on to date and then marry Nicole Richie, with whom he shares two children.
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