Natalie Portman Denies Teen Relationship with 'Creepy' Moby

UPDATE 5/22/19 at 7:10pm PT: Moby has hit back at Portman's denial, sharing a photo of the two of them together back in the day and saying he was "confused" by her statement.

"I recently read a gossip piece wherein Natalie Portman said that we'd never dated. This confused me, as we did, in fact, date. And after briefly dating in 1999 we remained friends for years," he wrote on Instagram. "I like Natalie, and I respect her intelligence and activism. But, to be honest, I can't figure out why she would actively misrepresent the truth about our (albeit brief) involvement. The story as laid out in my book Then It Fell Apart is accurate, with lots of corroborating photo evidence, etc."

He added: "Ps I completely respect Natalie's possible regret in dating me (to be fair, I would probably regret dating me, too), but it doesn't alter the actual facts of our brief romantic history."

Original story below.

Natalie Portman is looking to set the record straight regarding Moby's claims in his recent memoir that the pair were briefly a couple nearly two decades ago.

Portman and Moby are 16 years apart in age, which may not be a huge thing as adults, but when she was still a teenager, it was enough. In fact, as she recalls it now, Portman says he was a "much older man being creepy with me."

The actress told her version of events to Harpers Bazaar UK, wanting to make it crystal clear that Moby's recollection of their relationship is vastly different than hers.

She was also disappointed that neither he nor anyone involved with the publishing of his book did any fact-checking on his claims about the two of them, as she'd have been more than willing to present her side of the story.

In his book, Moby claims that Portman was 20 when they met (and he was 33) and that he "tried to be her boyfriend" for awhile, but felt he wasn't able to do it because of his own issues. He says she broke up with him because she'd met someone new.

That math doesn't quite add up as Portman is now 37 and Moby is 53, so how does a 13-year gap in his book become a 16-year gap in reality? Plus, Portman insists she was only 18 when they met.

"I was surprised to hear that he characterized the very short time that I knew him as dating because my recollection is a much older man being creepy with me when I just had graduated high school," Portman told Harpers.

She says they met after one of his shows and he suggested, "Let's be friends."

"He was on tour and I was working shooting a film, so we only hung out a handful of times before I realized that this was an older man who was interested in me in a way that felt inappropriate," she said.

In Moby's book, he writes that she approached him backstage after a show, "I was nervous, so I made small talk," he wrote in the book. "'We're going to New York in a few days,' I said. 'For the VMAs.' She smiled again and looked straight into my eyes. 'I'll be in New York, too. Can we meet up?'"

He continued, "I was a bald binge drinker and Natalie Portman was a beautiful movie star. But here she was in my dressing room, flirting with me."

While she wasn't willing to come right out and accuse the singer of lying on purpose, Portman did say, "It almost feels deliberate. That he used this story to sell his book was very disturbing to me. It wasn't the case. There are many factual errors and inventions. I would have liked him or his publisher to reach out to fact check."

Moby's latest memoir, "Then It Fell Apart," was released on May 2. The singer has yet to respond to Portman's counter-recollection of their association.

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