When Jessica Simpson first rose to fame, she seemed to have the perfect image just like her peers Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera tried to have at the time. Once Simpson became a reality star, however, all of that seemed to change.
To Simpson's eternal credit, she has gone on to be very open about her body image issues and the ups and downs of her love life over the years. Even though Simpson is such an open book at times, it still was shocking to learn what Jackass star Johnny Knoxville seemed to reveal about her during a Howard Stern interview.
How Johnny Knoxville And Jessica Simpson Started Their "Emotional Affair"
Over the last several years, one of the biggest complaints that people have about Hollywood is the idea that nothing is original any longer. Instead, a lot of people feel like pretty much all major movies that get released are part of a legacy franchise in one way or another.
Given that the top-grossing movies of the year always seem to be legacy movies these days, it is very hard to argue that the lack of originality isn't a problem. That said, what a lot of people don't seem to realize is that the problem has been around for a long time now.
For proof of the fact that Hollywood's overreliance on legacy movies has been a problem for years, all anyone has to do is look at the fact that a Dukes of Hazzard movie was released in 2005. After all, that movie was an adaptation of a beloved show from the 70s and 80s.
Check Out Actors That Survived Cringe Interviews
When the decision was made to make a Dukes of Hazzard movie, new actors had to be hired to embody Bo, Luke, and Daisy Duke. Ultimately, Sean William Scott, Johnny Knoxville, and Jessica Simpson were hired to star in 2005's The Dukes of Hazzard.
While all three of those performers have loads of fans, Scott is the only one who was best known for his acting skills. Before being hired to star in The Dukes of Hazzard, Knoxville was famous for performing mind-blowing stunts on camera and Simpson was a pop star.
Maybe because neither Simpson nor Knoxville was used to headlining movies as actors, the two performers clearly wound up gravitating to each other. After all, when Knoxville and Simpson appeared at red-carpet events together or were interviewed in tandem, they truly seemed to like one another.
Based on the perception of Simpson and Knoxville's relationship at that time, it certainly seemed like the two performers were destined to have a lasting friendship.
What Happened With Jessica Simpson And Johnny Knoxville?
When 2005's The Dukes of Hazzard was produced, it seemed very clear that everyone involved had high hopes for the project. As a result, it seemed likely that if The Dukes of Hazzard became a hit, sequels to the film would go into production. In fact, even though the movie's box office performance disappointed, Warner Bros. still produced a prequel.
Since a direct sequel to The Dukes of Hazzard was never produced, Johnny Knoxville and Jessica Simpson have never worked on another project together. With that in mind, it certainly seems like there shouldn't have been any more headlines that focused on the two performers.
As it turns out, Simpson and Knoxville's shared history has been the subject of gossip on at least two occasions since they last worked together.
Back when 2005's The Dukes of Hazzard was being produced, Simpson was famously married to Nick Lachey. At the same time, Knoxville was still with his first wife Melanie Cates in the mid-2000s.
Given that they both were married when they worked together, Knoxville and Simpson's relationship should have been platonic.
Since Simpson and Lachey's marriage ended, he has mostly remained silent about what went on in their relationship. On the other hand, Simpson penned a memoir titled "Open Book" that was published in 2020 and revealed a lot about her past relationships.
When "Open Book" was released, it garnered a lot of headlines for what Simpson revealed about her relationship with Knoxville. According to what Simpson wrote, she and Knoxville engaged in an "emotional affair" during their time filming The Dukes of Hazzard.
As Simpson wrote, from the moment she shared a hug with Knoxville on the first day of filming, she "felt a force drawing [them] together." Once Simpson realized her attraction to Knoxville, she was left in emotional turmoil.
"I wondered why I was open to this. I was already living in a distrustful situation with Nick, and now I was afraid I couldn't trust myself."
Simpson went on to reveal that one of the reasons she was attracted to Knoxville is the way he made her feel about herself. "I could share my deepest authentic thoughts with him, and he didn't roll his eyes at me. He actually liked that I was smart and embraced my vulnerabilities. He believed in me and made me feel I could do anything."
Finally, Simpson made it clear that things never went too far with Knoxville physically, but that almost made her feel worse.
"First off, we were both married, so this wasn't going to get physical. But to me, an emotional affair was worse than a physical one. It's funny, I know, because I had placed such an emphasis on s*x by not having it before marriage. After I actually had s*x, I understood that the emotional part was what mattered. Johnny and I had that, which seemed far more of a betrayal to my marriage than s*x."
Considering that Simpson felt she had a deep emotional connection with Knoxville, it is sad to know what happened when he was interviewed by Howard Stern.
During a 2005 appearance on Stern's show, Knoxville was hooked up to a lie detector test. Since Knoxville was there to promote The Dukes of Hazzard and Stern was more of a shock jock back then, it didn't take long for Simpson to be brought up during the lie detector test.
During Knoxville's lie detector test, the Jackass star stated that he was never intimate with Simpson and he passed that question. However, when Knoxville was asked if he and Simpson ever kissed, and he said that didn't happen, the person conducting the test claimed that was a lie.
Things only got worse from there as Knoxville was asked if he believed that Simpson was "an idiot". When Knoxville defended Simpson's intelligence, the person conducting the test yet again claimed that the Jackass star was lying.
Of course, lie detector tests aren't admissible in court anymore for a reason. On top of that, Stern could have instructed the person conducting the test to lie about the results. However, given that the test confirmed Simpson and Knoxville's claims that they never slept together, that made many observers take the other results more seriously.
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