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'She built him': Austin Butler slammed for calling ex Vanessa Hudgens ‘a friend’ despite 10-year relationship

Fans of Vanessa Hudgens were enraged by the way the actor referred to the woman he was in a relationship for 10 years

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: ‘Elvis’ star Austin Butler has angered a lot of people online after he referred to his former flame, Vanessa Hudgens as just a “friend”. The actor was telling the story of how he landed the main character role in the 2022’s film directed by Baz Luhrmann during The Hollywood Reporter's Actor Roundtable when he mentioned the ‘High School Musical’ alum, with whom he had been together for nearly a decade before parting ways.

During the show, the 31-year-old star reportedly told Jeremy Pope, Colin Farrell, Brendan Fraser, Ke Huy Quan, and Adam Sandler that “the month before I heard that Baz [Luhrmann] was making the movie, I was looking at Christmas lights and there was an Elvis Christmas song on the radio and I was with a friend of mine. I was singing along and my friend looked over at me and said, ‘You gotta play Elvis.’ I said, ‘Oh, that's such a long shot.’”

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He then added, “A couple of weeks later, I was playing the piano. I never really sang for any of my friends or anything. That same friend was there and I was playing the piano. She said, ‘I'm serious. You gotta figure out how you can get the rights to a script.’ Then my agent called and said, ‘So Baz Luhrmann is making an Elvis film.’”

Though Butler did not directly name Hudgens, fans quickly understood that the “friend” was her. In 2019, the 34-year-old actress apparently revealed a story like this while appearing in an episode of ‘Live with Kelly and Ryan’. She had said, “Last December, we were driving along and we were listening to Christmas music, and then an Elvis Presley Christmas song came on. He had just dyed his hair dark. He's a natural blond, and I was looking at him and he was singing along and I was like, ‘Babe, you need to play Elvis.’”

The ‘Spring Breakers’ star had also stated, “Then in January, he was sitting at the piano. And he's playing and he's singing and I'm like, ‘I don't know how, but you need to figure out how you can play Elvis. Like, I don't know how we get rights or what we do, but you need to play him.’”

Meanwhile, Butler’s alleged insult of Hudgens was not taken well by her fans a user wrote, “She built him I trust she can break him ✌🏽.” The second one said, “him calling vanessa hudgens a ‘friend’ PLEASEEEE.” The third user tweeted, “look at you boy I invented you. I know vanessa and her friends are blasting that song.” The fourth one shared, “He’s of course very talented but so much of him getting away from the hot guy on kids/teen tv image is because of her. Men are so 😭.” The fifth one remarked, “Imagine spending entire decade with someone only to refer to them in interviews as a ‘friend’ Iaawd I’d shed real tears.”

A tweet read, “this is just…absolutely diabolical.,,,,hope she pulls a gone girl,” and the second tweet added, “She made him famous and he's ungrateful. Besides, can't he stop talking like Elvis already? 🙄”

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