Whether you're coupled up or flying solo this Valentine's Day, it's always fun to hear romantic stories of the rich and famous. After all, celebrity romances are sort of like real-life fairy tales: even if they don't end up together, it's still fun to hear about their over-the-top gestures and declarations of love. I mean, sure, Ryan Reynolds will never fly halfway across the world just to visit me for a day, but it's pretty hard to hate when he and his wife, Blake Lively, are like a walking, talking, IRL Disney couple. And that's not even the craziest thing he's done for love!
Most normal people will never get the chance to be wined and dined by a celebrity, but that doesn't mean we can't dream about what it might be like to be whisked away on a private plane to an exotic location, or given a room filled with roses. Even if your idea of romance is a half pepperoni pizza since bae knows you hate pepperoni (and there is no shame in that at all!), there's nothing wrong with indulging in the most over-the-top crazy romantic things celebrities have ever done. I won't judge!
1. Justin Bieber's Titanic-Sized Movie Screening
Though Selena Gomez repeatedly says that she and the Biebs are dunzo, that doesn't stop Jelena shippers from hoping they'll find their way back to each other. And there's good reason, given that he once rented out the Staples Center in Los Angeles to treat his lady to a steak dinner and private screening of Titanic. Swoon!
2. Kanye West's Proposal
In an episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians that still actually makes me shed a tear, West surprised then-girlfriend Kim Kardashian by whisking her to San Francisco on her birthday, where their closest family and friends were waiting at AT&T Park for what they thought was a luxe surprise birthday bash. When Kardashian got out of the car, she and West walked onto the field, where a 50-piece orchestra performed Lana Del Rey’s "Young & Beautiful." With fireworks and a Jumbotron declaration, West proposed, and thus commenced the rest of their lives together. Aw!
3. Ben Affleck's Magazine Ad
Long before he married Jennifer Garner, Affleck was famously one half of the couple named Bennifer with Jennifer Lopez. The two became a tabloid sensation, likely due to scenarios like the full-page ad he took out in Variety magazine gushing over Lopez for her "astonishing talent," "beauty" and "true grace." This was in March of 2002, and did I mention this was before Bennifer came to be and she was still married to Cris Judd?! Yikes!
4. Kevin Hart's Room Of Roses
Though they're now engaged, back when they were simply dating, Hart surprised girlfriend Eniko Parrish with 1,000 roses after she left to go to the bathroom in a club. Just because. He also joked that he was sneezing all night. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the definition of relationship goals.
5. Everybody Gets A Car!
One of the most romantic (and priciest) gifts that celebrities love to give their significant others are cars. After Lamar Odom won the NBA championship with his team, the L.A. Lakers, Khloé Kardashian gave him a $400,000 Rolls Royce. But long before that, in 2004, Jay Z gave Beyoncé a Rolls Royce allegedly worth a million dollars for her 25th birthday! And they weren't even married yet. Crazy in love, indeed.
6. Fresh Delivery
Though their relationship was reportedly tumultuous and rife with rumors of abuse and infidelity, baseball player Joe DiMaggio was so distraught when his wife of nine months, Marilyn Monroe, died of an overdose in 1962, he had fresh roses delivered to her grave site once a week until he died in 1999. Rumor has it his last words on his deathbed were: "I’ll finally get to see Marilyn again." Wow.
7. Frequent Flier Miles
OK, so I can't confirm whether this was Wilmer Valderrama or not, but Demi Lovato told Buzzfeed in 2013 the most romantic gesture a boyfriend ever made for her and, well, it takes some serious dedication:
There was a time where I was out of town for a couple of months — I was away — and this person would fly out every single weekend. [They’d] take the red eye Friday night, would see me for just a couple of hours on Saturday, just a couple hours on Sunday, and would fly back to be at work on Monday. He would fly out every single weekend for the amount of time I was away. I thought that was the sweetest, most caring thing that anyone has ever done for me. Yeah. You gotta know how to find ‘em. When you do, you can’t go back to dating immature guys.
Sure, I can't confirm that this was actually Valderrama, but since the two have been going strong since then, and with that telling last line about immature guys, it seems like she's still with the guy who racked up plenty of frequent flier miles just to see her.
8. Smuggled Across The Border
Ryan Reynolds isn't afraid of a good romantic gesture, but this one takes the cake! He recently told a story of nearly getting arrested all in the name of pie for wife Blake Lively. On The Graham Norton Show, he shared his near brush with the law:
My wife is a foodie. She loves these apple pies that they make at this place in Vancouver where I grew up, so we grabbed a bunch of them and we were driving back down to the States. We were crossing the border — you’re not allowed to cross the border with vegetables. It’s illegal ... My voice always gets really high when I’m lying. He’s like, "You got anything, any sort of fruit, any vegetables in there?" And I was like, "Nooooo. Noooooo." I go, "That’s crazy!" And basically he just had me on the hook. He looks at me and he goes, "Hey, you remember that movie you did? That movie Just Friends?" He was like, "You know that song at the end of it where you sing ‘I Swear’ by All-4-One?" And I was like, "Yeah, yeah." And he’s like, "Yeah, yeah. Go ahead." Basically he was saying, "Dance, monkey." ... I danced. Oh man, I sang that thing in the best falsetto I have, and I was on my way through the border, eating pie by the next stop.
9. Dear Brad
They have to frequently spend time apart due to filming movies all around the world, but Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie found an old-fashioned and totally romantic way to keep connected during weeks apart. Jolie told Australia's TV WEEK magazine that she Pitt wrote each other love letters while filming on opposite ends of the world. She said, "We decided to be of that time when we could imagine he was in the European theater and I was in the Pacific theater and we wrote hand-written letters to each other that were very connecting for us, thinking of the people that were separated for months if not years at a time back then." Heart eyes, for sure!
10. Wino Forever
Lots of celebrities get their loved ones' names permanently tattooed on their bodies, and it almost never works out in their favor. From Rob Kardashian's huge "Adrienne Bailon" chest tattoo, to Johnny Depp's "Winona Forever" (which he changed to "Wino Forever" after their split), it seems like they'll never learn that permanently declaring your love for someone on your body probably isn't the best idea. Though it hasn't always turned out badly, such as the case of Victoria and David Beckham, who are still happily together even though he had a photo of her inked on his arm in 2007. Ain't love grand?
11. This Melted More Than Her Heart
It should go without saying that Seal was a romantic due to his swoon-worthy lyrics and the fact that he and ex-wife Heidi Klum renewed their vows every year, but his most romantic gesture came (hopefully!) equipped with parkas and snow boots! Klum revealed to Marie Claire that her ex-husband proposed by taking her in a helicopter in the Canadian Rockies: "He had an igloo built there, and they'd brought up everything: a bed with sheets inside the igloo, rose petals everywhere, candles. Very, very romantic! There was food and champagne, and then the helicopter left. It was a little scary, too, because you're so cut off from the world. No trees, nothing — it was hardcore. But I was ecstatic." Looks like her ring wasn't the only rock she got that day!
12. The Joy Of Christmas
Must be something about Canada, eh? Back in 2005, Tori Spelling and husband Dean McDermott celebrated Christmas by getting engaged — nothing out of the ordinary about that, except for how he did it. According to People, the two were visiting a Christmas tree farm in Toronto, and "Dean's sister put out lights for half a mile leading to a table for two surrounded by decorated Christmas trees. McDermott and Spelling rode up in a horse-drawn carriage, then he presented his fiancée with a diamond and sapphire ring." In a statement, the now-married couple said: "We're so incredibly happy and in love. We cannot wait to start our lives together." How magical!
Even if these grand gestures are not on your agenda this Valentine's Day, it's clear to see that all of us, famous or not, can get swept up in the whirlwind of romance. Just be careful when your romantic gesture is permanent. No one wants to end up with a tattoo that says "Wino Forever," right Johnny?
