29 Celebs Who Got Called Out For Telling Fake Or Exaggerated Stories
by Hannah Marder · BuzzFeedLying — we all do it. Sometimes it's innocent, and sometimes...not so much. So when I spotted this Reddit thread on celebs telling made-up stories, I was eager to see what lies they'd been caught in. And I was even more excited when I discovered these two Reddit threads on the same topic. I perused all three threads — so you don't have to — and researched all 29 of the below alleged "lies" to discover the truth for myself. Here's what I found!
1. During the 2016 Olympics in Brazil, famous swimmer Ryan Lochte and teammates Gunnar Bentz, Jack Conger, and James Feigen claimed to have been robbed at gunpoint at a gas station in Rio. Lochte himself contended that an "armed robber" had aimed a gun at his forehead and cocked it. Rio police denied this, saying that the athletes had vandalized the gas station's bathroom and then were asked to pay for the damage and leave by security guards with guns. Lochte later admitted he'd exaggerated the story, in particular the part about a robber aiming a gun at his forehead.
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"That didn't happen, and that's why — I over-exaggerated that part, " he said, though he maintained the gun was pointed towards him. As for him referring to himself as the victim in the scenario, he said, "It's how you want to make it look like. Whether you call it a robbery, whether you call it extortion, or us paying just for the damages, like, we don't know. All we know is that there was a gun pointed in our direction, and we were demanded to give money."
Lochte ended up getting suspended and leaving the Olympics over the scandal. He was also charged with filing false policy, though the charge was later dropped.
2. Steve Rannazzisi used to claim that he'd been working at Merrill Lynch in the Twin Towers during the 9/11 attacks. "I worked in the 54th floor of the second tower," he recalled in 2009. "I was there. The first tower got hit, and we got jostled all over the place. Then the Port Authority came on the loudspeaker, 'Explosion in Tower 1, things are being taken care of, everyone remain where you are, stay calm, we're figuring things out.' And I was like, 'I'm going to check this thing out. I went downstairs, went outside, saw all the pandemonium, and then about five or six minutes later, 'bang' [the second tower was struck]…"
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Sounds like a harrowing experience, right? Except not only did Rannazzisi never work for Merrill Lynch, but Merrill Lynch didn't even have offices in the Twin Towers. In 2022, he admitted his story "wasn't true. I was in Manhattan but working in a building in Midtown and I was not at the Trade Center on that day. I don't know why I said this. This was inexcusable. I am truly, truly sorry."
3. Many people believed Hilaria Baldwin was Spanish for years. She spoke with an accent, said, "I liked that I brought in a bit of my culture" about wearing a Spanish veil at her wedding, stated her family couldn't pronounce her new last name, retweeted an article referring to her as Latina, and memorably forgot the English word for "cucumber" on The Today Show. Multiple interviews referred to her as Spanish-American or half-Spanish.
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But then, in 2020, it was revealed that Hilaria was born in Massachusetts and that her parents are not Spanish at all — they moved to Spain later in life. Baldwin addressed the controversy, confirming she was born in Boston but said she spent some of her childhood in Spain, so she grew up speaking two languages. "It's not something that I'm, like, playing at. So I want that to be very, very, very clear," she said, suggesting, "I've tried in the past to be clear, but sometimes people don't always report and write what you say, and I've kind of just put my hands up." Her husband, Alec Baldwin, supported her, saying she had never claimed she was from Spain. This was true — she had never explicitly said those words. Alec had, though, on The Late Show with David Letterman.
4. One of the most infamous examples on this list is when Jussie Smollett claimed in 2019 that he'd been the victim of a hate crime in Chicago. Police investigators later determined Smollett had staged the attack, releasing the two men accused of attacking Smollett. Smollett was fired from his hit show Empire, and charges were filed against him for making a false police report and wasting police resources. A 2021 trial found him guilty of five out of the six counts he'd been charged with, and he was sentenced to 150 days in county jail, though he only served six.
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Smollett has continued to maintain his innocence. Earlier this year, the Illinois Supreme Court said it would hear an appeal from Smollett (his attorneys are arguing he was punished for the same crime twice), but the results have yet to be seen.
5. Another massive ruse that was exposed? Milli Vanilli's music career. The R&B duo reached worldwide fame in the late '80s with their debut album, leading them to win the award for Best New Artist at the 1990 Grammy Awards. However, their careers quickly took a nosedive when their producer Frank Farian revealed they didn't sing any of the album, which was confirmed by member Rob Pilatus. The Grammys swiftly revoked their award, and their careers were essentially over.
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6. And, of course, Ashlee Simpson was exposed in her infamous SNL performance, where she was caught lip-synching. When the wrong track began to play (the same one she'd already performed), Simpson did not sing but did a strange dance. She initially blamed her band, saying, "My band started playing the wrong song, and I didn't know what to do, so I thought I'd do a hoedown. I'm sorry." However, she later admitted this wasn't true, saying it was "silly of me to blame the band." Instead, she claimed she'd lost her voice and a doctor had ordered her to use a backup track instead of singing live, which she still maintains.
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7. In a more heartbreaking example, Kate Winslet lied about the birth of her first child. She initially said the birth was an "uncomplicated natural birth," but she later revealed, "Mia was an emergency C-section. I just said I had a natural birth because I was so completely traumatized by the fact that I hadn't given birth. I felt like a complete failure." She admitted she'd "gone to great pains to cover it up."
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8. Hulk Hogan claimed in his autobiography that Elvis had been a fan of his and even came to some of his matches in Memphis — except Hogan didn't wrestle in Memphis until 1979, and Elvis died in '77.
9. Hogan also claimed he was asked to play bass for Metallica by member Lars Ulrich. After Ulrich denied this, Hogan clarified he'd only sent an audition tape.
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10. Dove Cameron was born Chloe but legally changed her name when she was older. She's been open about this more recently, but early in her career, there were times she did not correct those who suggested it was her birth name, like in the below appearance on Live with Kelly and Micahel.
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11. Ahead of Taylor Swift's 1989 release, a purported tracklist was leaked online. In an interview, Swift was shown the leaked tracklist and asked if it was correct. She denied it—except when the album actually came out, it turned out the leaked list (presumably the one she had been shown, though it isn't shown on camera) had been 99% right (it described "How To Get The Girl" as "How You Get The Girl," for example).
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12. Paloma Faith claimed she was 23 when she first signed with her record label — she even edited her age to be 23 on her Wikipedia page. She was actually 27. "My plan had been to get to a certain level of success and then have a conversation about my age, but I was forced to do it sooner because someone kept changing my Wikipedia page," Faith revealed. "Every time I set my age to 23, they would change it back to 27. Eventually, they provided my birth certificate to Wikipedia so I was blocked from editing my own page – it really brought home to me how much my age was going to be a factor in my career."
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13. It appears that SZA used to claim she had a degree in marine biology from an Ivy League school. However, she later said she'd gone to Delaware State for two semesters, then stopped going to class and thus flunked out.
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14. Lily Allen once claimed on Reddit that she was offered a role as Theon's sister on Game of Thrones. Allen, the real-life sister of Alfie Allen, who plays Theon, wrote that she declined because "I would have had to go on a horse, and he would have touched me up and s**t." Allen later denied this, telling Vulture, "I heard about this, yeah. The only thing I'm going to say on that is that it's not true. And also that Gemma Whelan was always their first choice for the part. And she's fantastic. And that's the only thing I'm going to say about that." We don't know for sure who's right — or if anyone intentionally lied — but I have my guesses.
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15. Justin Bieber appeared to claim he'd received a private jet for Christmas in 2014. The then-20-year-old posted a photo of the jet on Instagram, captioning it, "New jet for Christmas, and she's beautiful." However, it was later reported that Justin hadn't bought or received the jet — he'd simply chartered it for a flight around Christmastime. He'd also previously posted a snap with a yacht captioned "It was about that time," which led fans to believe he'd bought it, though it turned out it wasn't his. While Justin may not have explicitly lied, TMZ called him a "poser."
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16. Justin isn't the only celeb to have a private jet flex-turned-fail. In 2017, Bow Wow posted a photo of a private jet, captioning it, "Travel day. NYC press run for Growing Up Hip Hop. Lets gooo." This seemed to imply he was traveling via the jet. But then a Twitter user posted a photo of Bow Wow flying commercial, writing, "So this guy lil Bow Wow is on my flight to NY but on Instagram he posted a picture of a private jet captioned 'traveling to NY today.'"
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17. This also isn't *quite* a lie, but Oprah also got exposed online — actually, she inadvertently exposed herself. She'd been raving about the Microsoft Surface for weeks when she tweeted about buying 12 of them as Christmas gifts— but the tweet itself noted that it had been posted from her iPad.
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18. This is also pretty innocuous, but St. Vincent appears to have lied about how long she's been a Kate Bush fan. After Kate Bush was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, St. Vincent wrote on Facebook that she first heard one of Bush's songs when she was seven or eight and recalled being "so taken with her" at age 16 after buying her CD. Except St. Vincent had previously said in 2007 (when she was 25) that she had "just discovered Kate Bush, probably six months ago."
19. In another innocuous example, Sharon Stone used to claim she was a member of MENSA and had attended a Mensa program in high school. This doesn't appear to exist, though there is a Mensa honor society. Stone retracted her claim in 2002.
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20. One more innocent but funny example: Sam Smith once claimed they were too sick to greet fans after a show in Nashville — except they then posted about doing karaoke that very night.
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21. Kylie Jenner repeatedly lied about having lip fillers. She later told Complex she had been worried about being a bad influence on young fans and that she "didn't want people to think you had to get your lips done to feel good about yourself." She continued, "But they thought it was crazier that I was lying about it because it was so obvious. I wish I had just been honest and upfront."
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22. In his standup, Hasan Minhaj used to tell a story about once being sent a letter with white powder inside, which spilled onto his daughter. Afraid the powder was anthrax, he brought her to the hospital, but it turned out not to be anthrax after all. Except there was no record of this happening – Minhaj later admitted his daughter hadn't been involved in the story but claimed he had received a letter with white powder in it and joked with his wife about it being anthrax.
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23. He also told a story about an FBI informant who wormed his way into his local mosque when he was a teenager in Sacramento. Minhaj later said that story was based on a different experience where he would play pickup basketball with older men who he thought were secretly undercover cops. In both cases, Minhaj claimed, "The punch line is worth the fictionalized premise" because the stories had "emotional truth."
24. We can't confirm who was telling the truth here, but at the very least, this one is contested. Elon Musk once tweeted, "My firstborn child died in my arms. I felt his last heartbeat." His ex-wife Justine denied this, tweeting that their son had died from "A SIDS-related incident that put him on life support. He was declared brain-dead. And not that it matters to anyone except me, because it is one of the most sacred and defining moments of my life, but I was the one who was holding him." She had previously spoken about holding her son when he died in an interview with Marie Claire.
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25. We also can't confirm this is a lie or exaggeration, but there is zero evidence that Paula Abdul was ever in a plane crash in the '90s, as she claimed. In the alleged crash, she said she suffered injuries that led to her retreating from the spotlight for some time. But there is no record of the crash ever happening. Abdul's description doesn't match any crashes at the time, though it is possible it was not reported and the wreckage was not found. Still, this would mean Abdul and the other passengers just left the burned-out plane in a field and never reported it. It's also possible it was not reported because it was so minor, but this does not at all match Abdul's story, where she claims the aircraft was on fire.
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26. Another example we can't confirm involves Jameela Jamil and bees. Yes, bees. It all started when journalist Tracie Egan Morrissey pointed out inconsistencies in Jamil's stories about past health issues. In one story, Jamil said she had a spinal cord injury after running into traffic to avoid bees at age 17. She has also said she was hit by a car while fleeing bees in 2016 in a separate incident. And then, in 2015, Jamil claims 500 killer bees swarmed her and Mark Ronson. Contradicting her, Ronson said it was only "one or two" bees. Ronson later tweeted, "Spoke to my friend Jameela. We're good. also bees suck." So, Jameela may have been telling the truth, but at the very least, the story appears inconsistent.
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27. Finally, we'll end on a few that are just silly: Robert Pattinson once claimed he'd witnessed a clown die while promoting Water for Elephants on the Today show. When Matt Lauer asked if Pattinson had ever wanted to run away to the circus, Pattinson said he didn't because "The first time I went to the circus, somebody died. One of the clowns died.” When Lauer asked how he died, Pattinson said, “His little car exploded. The joke car exploded on him.” Lauer then asked if Pattinson was being serious, and Pattinson confirmed, saying, "My parents had to — everybody ran out. It was terrifying. It was the only time I’ve ever been to the circus.”
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A few weeks later, Pattinson admitted he made the whole thing up. “I said those things. But I actually made the whole thing up. It’s coming back to haunt me. I said it on some show. It was really early in the morning the day after the New York premiere. Someone asked me what my experience with the circus was, and I was like, I have nothing interesting to say. I don’t know why I said that!”
28. Pattinson's fiance Suki Waterhouse similarly told a harmless yet bizarre lie. In 2017, she told Us Weekly, "I rinse my hair with Coca-Cola sometimes. I don't like my hair when it's washed — it's fine and limp — but Coca-Cola makes it tousled, like I've gone through the Amazon or something." This led to multiple outlets testing the apparent beauty hack.
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However, she later came and said that she had been lying – when a fan on Twitter, asked her if she still used Coke on her hair, she replied, "ok.. i have to be honest, i got bored doing hair interviews and said this. i have never done this ma'am."
29. Lastly, Dakota Johnson once memorably lied that she likes limes. In her home tour with Architectural Digest, she shows off a bowl of limes in her kitchen, saying how much she loves limes: "They're great and I love them so much, and I like to present them like in my house." The clip went viral, and Dakota later went on Jimmy Fallon, where she revealed she hadn't put the limes there — they were set dressing. She doesn't love limes at all; in fact, she's allergic to them.
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