James Blunt appears to address speculation he was the ‘very famous’ man in Hayden Panettiere’s boat story
James Blunt has seemingly refuted any rumours that he was the 'very famous man' referred to in a controversial story in Hayden Panettiere's book.
The singer, 52, shared an article on X yesterday (24 August) titled 'Hayden Panettiere and James Blunt – An Internet Lynching', which was featured on the WTF With Dean Piper Substack.
The essay critically assesses and debunks a lot of the claims and rumours that the star was the man waiting in bed on a boat, highlighting inconsistencies that mean the man couldn't be Blunt.
Heroes star Panettiere tragically died on 16 August, aged just 36, after she was found unresponsive at a home with her ex-boyfriend Brian Hickerson and his brother, who called 911 saying she had experienced a 'cardiac arrest'.
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Police have since confirmed they don’t suspect ‘any signs of foul play or suspicious circumstances’ surrounding her death.
Following her passing, there has been a renewed interest in her life and the memoir she wrote, called This Is Me: A Reckoning, in which she discussed an alleged incident which took place on a boat when she was just 18 years old.
She had talked about the moment on a podcast with Jay Shetty, where she said she was 'betrayed' by a friend who put her in bed with a famous man while out at sea on a boat.
She recalled: “By the time I'd realised I was in danger, I was quite literally out to sea. I had been having a great time. There was no hints of anything like that happening. So I was shocked."
Panettiere said she was taken there by someone she 'had grown to trust and saw as a protector, and somebody who had my back’.
The star said her friend 'physically put me in the bed next to this undressed man who was very famous,' saying it seemed like 'like this was just an average day for him, and this is something that happens all the time.'
“He was shirtless and propped up on a few pillows with his arms positioned behind his head. From the waist down, he was covered by bedsheets, and I could see the outline of his body underneath,” she wrote.
According to E! News, in the book she claimed the man in the bed was a ‘famous thirty-something British singer-songwriter.'
It is this comment which led people to question if it was 'You're Beautiful' star James Blunt, after he was seen with Panettiere at the amfAR charity event in Cannes in 2009, according to The Mirror.
The next day he was photographed smiling with her on a boat.
Panettiere had been linked to T4 star Steve Jones at the time and had spent several days on David Furnish's boat with him, before Jones flew home.
It was then she allegedly met Blunt and they struck up a friendship.
Explaining the incident on the boat further, Panettiere wrote: "My thoughts were a blur, but I’d spent my life trusting that others had my best interests at heart.
"Being ‘managed’ was routine, to the point where I lost faith in my intuition.
“I could feel my heart pounding, as I settled in underneath the sheets, I disassociated. My body no longer felt like my own. The shock was so great it didn’t even occur to me to say no.”
In Piper's essay, he debunked many of the rumours, pointing out differences in the facts compared to what was written in the book.
“People are saying whatever they like and getting away with it and that is wrong,” Piper insisted.
“Guys, it only takes the smallest of AI searches to find out that in May 2009, when the pictures of Blunt and Panettiere were taken, she was 19, almost 20," he insisted.
"So, if the incident happened when she was 18, Blunt’s not your guy to start with.”
Piper added: “And as she says she hadn’t met the man before the incident, and that she fled the boat immediately after, it takes nothing to work out that the cabin incident was the first and last time she met the man.”
A timeline of Hayden Panettiere’s troubled Hollywood career
August 1989
Hayden Panettiere is born to firefighter Skip Panettiere and Lesley Vogel, who would go on to be Hayden’s manager.
1990
Panettiere appears in a commercial at 11 months old, later landing recurring roles in soap operas as a child actor.
2004/2005
Aged 15, Panettiere said someone on her team started offering her ‘happy pills’. She later tells People: “They were to make me peppy during interviews.
"I had no idea that this was not an appropriate thing, or what door that would open for me when it came to my addiction.”
2006
Aged 17, Panettiere lands one of the defining roles of her career as Claire Bennett in Heroes.
2007-2009
Panettiere later reveals several disturbing incidents that happened during this period in her memoir This Is Me: A Reckoning.
Aged 18, she claims she was led onto a yacht by ‘somebody that I had grown to trust and see as a protector’ and placed into bed next to an ‘undressed man who was very famous’.
In 2008, she alleged a network executive kissed her on the lips at a party.
Aged 19, she said a ‘well-respected, award-winning actor’ tricked her into looking at his testicles through an unzipped fly.
In 2007, she also starts dating Heroes co-star Milo Ventimiglia - she is 18 and he is 30. They split in 2009.
2009
Panettiere starts dating Ukrainian boxer Wladimir Klitschko.
Meanwhile, her father Skip is handed two years of informal probation after pleading ‘no contest’ to spousal battery.
2013
Panettiere and Klitschko get engaged.
December 2014
Panettiere and Klitschko’s daughter Kaya is born. Panettiere endures an incredibly difficult pregnancy, haemorrhaging during her c-section and being forced to undergo a three-hour surgery.
2015
Panettiere begins suffering severe post-partum depression. She later tells Jay Shetty on his On Purpose podcast: “I knew something was terribly, terribly wrong. I wasn't connecting with [Kaya] the way I should be.”
She uses alcohol to manage her mental health struggles and enters treatment when Kaya is four months old.
She later says she became dependent on medication to sleep, and then turned to drinking vodka.
2018
Klitschko presents Panettiere with custody papers asking for full custody of Kaya. After initially fighting back, she eventually accepts and Kaya goes to live with Klitschko in Ukraine.
She writes in her memoir: “Not being under the same roof with her every day has been the most gut-wrenching experience of my life”
Meanwhile, her long-running role in TV show Nashville comes to an end and she doesn’t have any more TV or film roles for five years.
In the same year, she starts dating actor Brian Hickerson.
2020
Panettiere spends an eight month stint in rehab.
She experiences brutal alcohol withdrawal symptoms including insomnia and intense headaches.
Meanwhile, her now-ex Hickerson is charged with felony assault.
2021
Hickerson pleads no contest to two felony counts of injuring a spouse/cohabitant/girlfriend/child's parent and is sentenced to 45 days in jail and four years probation.
2023
Panettiere returns to acting, reprising her role as Kirby Reed in Scream VI.
In the same year, her brother Jansen dies aged 28 from an enlarged heart.
May 2026
Panettiere releases her memoir in which she makes disturbing allegations against film stars and industry execs from when she was a teenager.
She also opens up on her experience of postpartum depression and comes out as bisexual.
August 2026
Panettiere tragically dies. Police say: “The preliminary investigation has not indicated any signs of foul play or suspicious circumstances.”
Topics: Celebrity, Entertainment, UK News, US News
Jen Thomas