Dax Shepard Denies 'Controlling, Abusive' Claims About His Marriage to Kristen Bell: 'Deeply Insulting'
Actor and podcast host Dax Shepard used the November 9 episode of his Armchair Expert podcast to publicly address an online narrative describing him as "controlling" and "abusive" toward his wife, Kristen Bell. According to PEOPLE, Shepard, 51, said he had been avoiding this latest round of commentary, but decided to speak out after it reached Bell and hit her hard.
"Another round of me being a terrible person was in the media, and I avoided that," he said on the podcast. "But then it hit Kristen's doorstep really hard, and then I got to find out everything that people are saying about me." He summed up the online description of him as "controlling, abusive, and now flirting with people in public," and flatly denied it, saying he does not do that. He called the narrative frustrating and deeply insulting to Bell, asking whether she is supposed to be sitting at home with their two daughters modeling an abusive relationship, and said it is very offensive to her.
He also spoke about his own upbringing, saying he grew up around abusive men and has dedicated his whole life to being the opposite of them. He said he never yells at his children and never yells at his wife.
The discussion began with Bell's October 26 appearance on the same podcast. She said then that when the couple go out to dinner, Shepard compliments people and is generous to those around them, and that without even looking up she knows he is being, in her words, the best boy. Co-host Monica Padman joked that he was in fact flirting with the restaurant employee, and Bell laughed that making someone else feel good is flirting with her. Once the clip spread online, some commenters reinterpreted it, and the reading hardened into accusations about the marriage. Shepard and Bell married in October 2013 and share two daughters.
Source: PEOPLE
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: Kristen Bell 资料图（2026年10月在 New York 拍摄，Colleen Sturtevant 摄，CC BY-SA 4.0，经 Wikimedia Commons；原图为竖幅，已制成虚化背景16:9成品，人物完整未裁切）
