He was the baby-faced star of the 90s and 00s. As he resurfaces in a climbing caper, the actor talks about being mistaken for Justin Timberlake – and his plan to get into the hospitality industry
Back in 2006, when Ryan Phillippe was 32, he flew to Costa Rica in the hope of escaping a media maelstrom. He and his wife of seven years, Reese Witherspoon, had announced they were separating, and the LA paparazzi, then at its peak madness, pursued him everywhere. So he left the country in search of anonymity. No such luck: when he landed, some people excitedly approached him.
“They said to me, ‘Excuse me, are you Justin Timberlake?’” Phillippe, now 48, recalls with a self-deprecating chuckle.
