Florence Pugh Reflects On Zach Braff Relationship

Florence Pugh is reflecting on her past relationship with Zach Braff with the benefit of hindsight.

In a new interview with British Vogue, the “Black Widow” actor touched on the scrutiny she and Braff, who is 21 years her senior, endured over the course of their three-year romance because of their age gap.

“I had to be public in the past because people were bullying me and bullying my partner,” Pugh said. “Mine and Zach’s relationship was actually quite private until it was nasty, and I could see the toll that it was taking on him and us and our families. And that’s when I spoke out.”

She went on to note: “I think for anyone I’m with, I want to protect them. It’s not nice knowing that people are saying the worst things I’ve ever read about someone that I love. So that was necessary. I needed to talk about it. I think any relationship in this limelight is going to be stressed.”

Pugh didn’t list specific instances in the new profile, but she has pushed back on online negativity before. In April 2020, the actor decried the “abuse” she received online after acknowledging Braff’s 45th birthday on social media.

“I do not need you to tell me who I should or should not love, and I would never in my life ever, ever tell anyone who they can or cannot love,” she said. “It is not your place and really, it has nothing to do with you.”

Braff, an actor-director best known for “Scrubs” and his 2004 film “Garden State,” directed Pugh in 2023′s “A Good Person,” which garnered mixed reviews.

About a year prior to the movie’s release, Pugh confirmed that the couple had called it quits, telling Harper’s Bazaar that she and Braff aimed to keep the media speculation regarding their relationship’s demise at a minimum.

“We haven’t signed up for a reality TV show,” she said. “We’ve been trying to do this separation without the world knowing, because it’s been a relationship that everybody has an opinion on. We just felt something like this would really do us the benefit of not having millions of people telling us how happy they are that we’re not together.”

Elsewhere in her British Vogue chat, Pugh confirmed that she is currently in a relationship. Though she didn’t identify her partner by name, she said the pair are “figuring what we actually are.”

“I love knowing that someone is thinking about me and someone cares for me in the same way that I’m thinking about caring for them,” she said. “I think in this portion of my life, I’m trying to make sure that I’m making all the right decisions so that I can have the thing that I want … which is safety, family, a home and security.”

Pugh is set to return to the big screen this fall in “We Live in Time,” co-starring Andrew Garfield and directed by John Crowley. The romantic drama premiered this month at the Toronto International Film Festival to mostly positive reviews, with The Hollywood Reporter calling it “beautifully performed” and “thoughtfully executed.”