Richard Gere and his girlfriend of six months, Bravo’s Top Chef host Padma Lakshmi, have ended their romance.
The New York Post‘s Page Six first reported the breakup, with a source explaining that Gere and Lakshmi “decided they would be better as friends.”
The couple have been very private about their relationship and they were rarely photographed.
In a recent television appearance, Lakshmi announced that she was single. She also didn’t mention the split during Friday’s appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show nor on NBC’s Today Tuesday.
Last week, while speaking at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, Gere said he’s very proud of his new movie, Time Out of Mind, in which he plays a homeless man.
“What probably really helped was I was right in the middle of a divorce [from Carey Lowell], so the emotions were right on the surface,” the 64-year-oldstar quipped.
Padma Lakshmi and Richard Gere split: http://t.co/RykBKrVJ92 pic.twitter.com/i7aZHaMsMV
— AOL.com (@AOL) October 16, 2014
Lakshmi, 44, was married to author Salman Rushdie from 2004 to 2007. She later dated billionaire Teddy Forstmann until he died of brain cancer in 2011. Lakshmi also has a three-year-old daughter, Krishna Thea Lakshmi-Dell, with venture capitalist ex-boyfriend Adam Dell, the brother of computer maker Michael Dell.
Breakup alert! Richard Gere & Padma Lakshmi have officially called it quits: http://t.co/q99MUPgdCF pic.twitter.com/s48YKAYdMY
— E! Online (@eonline) October 15, 2014
Gere is set to begin work on a new film, Oppenheimer, by award-winning Israeli director Joseph Cedar. Meanwhile, Lakshmi has been traveling quite a bit after filming in Boston wrapped for a new season of Top Chef.
Gere and Lowell have a son together, 14-year-old Homer.
Time Out of Mind is in limited release and Top Chef airs 10 p.m. ET each Wednesday on Bravo.