For most of this DC Comics star's expansive career, Ezra Miller has been regarded as a
true artist who unapologetically marches to the beat of his own drum.
But some of his antics have turned heads and ruffled feathers along the way.
This is the shady side of Ezra Miller.
Along with his work as an advocate for the LGBTQ community, Ezra Miller has been an outspoken
member and supporter of the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements.
This made it all the more shocking when the actor, who is known for doing so much good,
hit headlines for doing something that looked really, really bad.
In April 2020, the star cast himself as the villain when a video surfaced on Twitter that
depicted the Justice League actor seemingly choke-slamming a woman.
According to Variety, the incident went down around 6 p.m. after Miller was approached
by a group of fans at a bar in Reykjavik, Iceland.
In the short, seven-second video, a woman is seen gearing up next to Miller for what
looks like a play fight.
It's unclear what led up to this moment.
Miller appears to ask the woman, "Did you want to fight?" at which point he grabs the
woman by the throat and pushes her to the ground as an onlooker yells at him, saying
"Whoa, bro.
Bro!"
While it's impossible to tell if Miller was joking from the video, Variety's source claimed
it was indeed a "serious altercation," resulting in the actor being escorted off the premises.
Making matters worse, the video was originally posted on Reddit, where someone who claimed
to be at the scene alleged that Miller spit on them and staff members, showed them scars
from previous fights, and stood outside for at least 10 minutes, barefoot, while bouncers
waited for the cops.
Miller did not immediately make a public comment on the video or its contents.
Ezra Miller lives a wildly unapologetic life, and this translated to some legal issues in
2011.
New York Magazine reports that the star was shooting The Perks of Being a Wallflower when
he was pulled over by Pittsburgh police who ended up cuffing him for pot possession.
The star claimed that, quote, "pot was strewn about, covering me like a quilt" which is
a decidedly less conspicuous way to drive around than standing up in the back of a pickup
feeling infinite.
The Daily Beast reports he was holding onto about 20 grams of the stuff in total.
Miller didn't really see many consequences as a result of the incident.
He was hit with disorderly conduct, a $600 fine, and a lecture about influencing the
"young extras" on set.
And regardless of his personal feelings about cannabis use, Miller didn't exactly learn
a lesson about breaking the law, either, telling New York Magazine,
"I don't feel like there's any need to hide the fact that I smoke pot.
It's a harmless herbal substance that increases sensory appreciation."
He also advocated for marijuana legalization during his interview with The Daily Beast.
"[Legalization seems] like a fantastic idea, not only for its curative properties, but
some of the strongest bridges in Asia are built of hemp, you can put it in granola,
endlessly useful stuff.
At this point, it does seem a little silly that we can't keep some in the ol' backyard!"
Ezra Miller is a magnet for controversial roles whether he's serving as an underage
hookup for Amy Schumer in Trainwreck or ripping a hole in the Harry Potter universe as Albus
Dumbledore's brother.
In 2011, the star ruffled some feathers when he took the role of a deeply disturbed teenager
in We Need to Talk About Kevin.
The movie dives deep into controversial and upsetting topics, with Miller's character
being a conniving, manipulative sociopath, more or less from birth.
Though co-star Tilda Swinton's portrayal landed her a Golden Globe nomination, Miller really
went in deep when preparing for the role.
The star told Vogue that he couldn't talk to his mother through the process because
he didn't want to impose the personality of Kevin on her, or risk messing up their relationship
with Kevin's cold, unfeeling personality traits.
But while Miller's real-life mother may have been spared the Kevin treatment, other people
around the actor apparently weren't so lucky.
The ultimate result was a portrayal so unsettling that it bothered some of his friends.
Miller told Vogue,
"I do get a certain kind of validation and gratification from the way people will sort
of approach me tentatively, with a little bit of fear [after they see the film]…I
had a close friend see it, and we went out to some party afterwards...I thought we were
having a fine time and my friend was like, 'Listen man, I gotta go.
It's nothing personal, I love you but I'm just having a really hard time being around
you.'"
There's not a whole lot known about Ezra Miller's dating life.
He's been rumored to be linked to a number of A-listers, including Shailene Woodley and
Zoe Kravtiz, and he famously told Out in 2012 that he both identifies as queer and is, quote,
"very much in love with no one in particular."
At the time, Miller believed that people his age didn't have the tools to be in responsible
monogamous relationships, which could be why he turned to an unconventional dating style.
Years later, it still seems to be working for him.
In 2018, the star dove deep into his dating life with Playboy, claiming he was in a "polycule,"
which the outlet described as a portmanteau of the words 'polyamorous' and 'molecule.'"
"What do you think that means?"
In simpler terms, this is basically just Miller's group of concurrent romantic partners.
These people included his band Sons of an Illustrious Father and, essentially, anyone
else he votes in but the criteria for entry is strict.
He told Playboy,
"I'm trying to find queer beings who understand me as a queer being off the bat, who I make
almost a familial connection with, and I feel like I'm married to them 25 lifetimes ago
from the moment we meet.
And then they are in the squad the polycule.
And I know they're going to love everyone else in the polycule because we're in the
polycule, and we love each other so much."
Whatever floats your boat, but do the other members in the squad get to choose, too?
Ezra Miller has so far pretty much avoided most of the scandalous tropes of young Hollywood.
Well, disregarding the whole pot arrest thing.
While he was filming The Perks of Being a Wallflower, one of the shadiest things he
did was participate in a wholesome dance party with his cast mates.
But because of timing and poor choice of venue, this turned out to be a problem.
In an interview with the Daily Beast, Miller admitted he went on a "mischievous bonding
trip" with his Perks co-stars Emma Watson and Logan Lerman.
This turned into some good ol' teenage debauchery, and the group ran around parking lots in the
Pittsburgh suburbs, screaming at the top of their lungs.
It was a typical suburban high school experience, but things turned sour when they went back
to the hotel for a late night, '90s dance party inspired by the Perks movie soundtrack.
Not everyone is a fan of '90s jams blasting through a hotel wall.
Miller told the outlet,
"We had a four-hour music session 'til 5 in the morning and got a bit of a chastising
the next day because a family checked out of the hotel in a hot rage."
Clearly, those people didn't appreciate the gift of being awoken by the sweet voice of
Emma Watson rocking out in the early morning.
Maybe mind the neighbors, next time.
Hotel walls are thin.
Much like annoying hotel neighbors by singing to '90s songs a little bit too loud, Ezra
Miller's past minor indiscretions seem largely unintentional.
The star inadvertently corrupted the innocent children of Moonrise Kingdom at his third
Cannes Film Festival in 2012.
Hey, it's show-biz.
It was only a matter of time.
According to Vulture, Miller who won the Chopard Trophy for emerging talent alongside Shailene
Woodley was only trying to pay a compliment to Jared Gilman, the lead child actor in the
Wes Anderson flick, when he approached the cast outside of a theater and accidentally
started cursing like a sailor.
Describing the occasion, Miller said,
"I was so excited about their performances that I accidentally just kept spewing profanities.
I was like, 'Great performances.
Great f---ing job!'...I just immediately played into the role of film as something that corrupts
children, which I felt bad about."
Miller was just 14 years old when he first attended Cannes for his role in Afterschool,
so he should know a thing or two about being a kid in a grown up world.
As a teen, it seems like Ezra Miller flippantly made one of the most important decisions of
his life: he dropped out of school completely on a whim.
Thankfully, the entire thing worked out, but if it were our parents, we'd probably be grounded
for the rest of our lives.
Speaking with both ShortList and New York Magazine about the decision, the actor admitted
he dropped out of his junior year at Hoboken's Hudson School because of a dream involving
Beethoven the composer, not the dog from the ‘90s flick, although wouldn't that have
been amazing?
Anyway, the whole thing was extremely serious to the star, in what he describes as his,
quote, "highly energised, romanticised brain."
He credited this dream with giving him a "burning sense of purpose to make art."
In Miller's dream, he said, Beethoven was crying about how he felt none of his symphonies
were any good.
Miller came along and encouraged him to write five more.
There was also some sort of zombie apocalypse happening, and Miller woke up in a cold sweat
with the strong sense that he had to drop out of school.
Miller explained the rationale behind that to New York Magazine, saying,
"I think [the dream is] about how it's the responsibility of every artist to make sacrifices
and seemingly irrational decisions in order to carve out their little pebble of work to
put on the big, like, art kingdom that everyone's been building for so long."
Remember when Katy Perry made her own shady headlines for giving a 19-year-old American
Idol contestant his first kiss on the show?
At the time, it was a massive scandal especially when the The New York Times reported that
the hopeful contestant was "a tad bit uncomfortable" but Ezra Miller had a similar incident that
seemingly flew under the radar.
In a 2017 video from Comic-Con, Miller who seemed a bit plastered in our opinion was
asked by a fan if he was drunk.
The star then pleaded his case that The Flash couldn't possibly get drunk because his metabolism
was so, well, fast.
The fan subsequently asked if he could smell Miller's breath as proof, and that's when
Miller planted a big, fat kiss on the man's lips.
The crowd cheered, and the man was left absolutely stunned as Miller continued to repeatedly
kiss his face.
Miller then asked, "How'd it smell?" before walking away.
As some outlets argued at the time, the kiss at least looked consensual but it's shocking
nonetheless.
Who goes around kissing fans without asking first?
Ezra Miller likes weed.
That's something he's made abundantly clear.
He even smoked up a journalist who was profiling him for Playboy and lit a spliff during an
interview with The Hollywood Reporter.
It almost seems like a requirement in order for the star to give a solid interview, and
that's before we bring in his past pot arrest.
What we didn't previously know was that Miller has a history of rather bizarre experimentation
with substances.
When Miller was 14 years old, he landed his first film role in Afterschool, and he was
already an avid smoker at the time, according to New York Magazine.
He told the publication,
"I would smoke anything back then, man!
Dried bananas, you know, orange peels.
Anything that burns, essentially.
Tea used to be not for drinking."
During this time, Miller was already surprisingly comfortable with his sexuality, too.
New York Magazine reveals that he "wasn't a virgin" and struggled to be awkward in Afterschool's
sex scenes but let's go back to that smoking thing.
Can anyone explain the logic behind rolling a cigarette filled with Lipton's tea?
"My mind moves too fast to properly focus to answer questions, because I'm a millennial."
Check out one of our newest videos right here!
Plus, even more Nicki Swift videos about your favorite celebrities and scandals are coming
soon.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit the bell so you don't miss a single one.