Kristin Cabot says she wasn’t amused when her former employer released a tongue-in-cheek commercial featuring Gwyneth Paltrow — a clip that leaned into the internet controversy that upended Cabot’s professional and personal life earlier this year.
In two new interviews, Cabot criticized Paltrow for stepping into the instantly viral scandal that erupted after Cabot was spotted on a concert “kiss cam” with Astronomer CEO Andy Byron at a Coldplay show in July. Byron is married.
“I was such a fan of her company [Goop] which seemed to be about uplifting women,” Cabot told The Times in the U.K. “And then she did this. I thought, ‘How dare she after the beating she got for all the conscious uncoupling stuff.’ What a hypocrite.”
According to The Times, Cabot said she got rid of her Goop products in protest. A spokesperson for Paltrow did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Cabot’s remarks.
Cabot was serving as Astronomer’s chief people officer when she and Byron appeared on the big screen at the July concert. The two looked visibly uncomfortable once they realized they were being shown to the crowd.
Coldplay frontman Chris Martin — Paltrow’s ex-husband, from whom Cabot noted Paltrow “uncoupled” in 2014 — joked from the stage about their reaction, quipping that they might be having an “affair.”
Not long after, both Cabot and Byron left their roles amid a flood of memes, mockery, and renewed debate about workplace ethics — and about how personal moments become public spectacle in a stadium setting.
In her interviews, Cabot said she wanted to set the record straight. She denied having a sexual affair with Byron and said they only kissed on the night of the concert. She also said she was already in the process of leaving her husband, Andrew. Byron, meanwhile, has since been seen publicly with his wife and wearing his wedding ring.
In the days after the incident, Astronomer — a tech company — found itself pulled into the spotlight. Paltrow, 53, amplified the attention when she appeared in a company video released on July 25.
“I’ve been hired on a very temporary basis to speak on behalf of the 300-plus employees at Astronomer,” Paltrow said in the video, which quickly racked up millions of views.
“We’ve been thrilled so many people have a newfound interest in data workflow automation,” she added.
A source previously said the commercial “came together very quickly” after Astronomer reached out to Paltrow, adding, “Gwyneth has a really great sense of humor, and it felt funny enough for her to do.”
