Strange Things About Nick Jonas And Priyanka Chopra's Relationship
Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra surprised everyone when they started dating in May 2018. And months later, people were shocked yet again to learn that the former Disney Channel darling and the "Quantico" actor were engaged to be married! After all, they had only just begun going out. But while some former Jonas Brothers fans have likely remained shaken by their past teen idol getting taken off the market, others are surely intrigued by this celebrity couple. And that's super understandable, especially when you consider all of the seriously strange details about about the A-list pair's romance.
From the questionable conception of Jonas and Chopra's intimate relationship to their significant age difference — not to mention Jonas' history dating older women — there are definitely a lot of things about this couple that raise eyebrows. Keep reading to learn all the oddest things about Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra's May-December love affair.
Did they have a fling?
Unlike most celeb couples, Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra made their grand red carpet debut together before they were even romantically involved — or at least, that's what they claim. On May 1, 2017, Jonas and Chopra walked the Met Gala's red carpet together, showing off their designer duds for the cameras as they posed side by side. At the time, Chopra insisted to late-night TV's Jimmy Kimmel that the two weren't an item. "We were both wearing Ralph Lauren. We decided to go together because it was fun," she said. Sure! Needless to say, romance rumors took flight faster than a time machine to year 3000. Were Jonas and Chopra secretly hooking up?
From the looks of it, it's hard to say. According to a Vogue profile, the pair first met in real life at the 2017 Vanity Fair Oscars party (which happened before the Met Gala). A week before the Met Gala, the two got together for what Vogue calls "a proper drink," and then Chopra invited Jonas to her place afterward. Apparently, things stayed PG that evening, as Chopra's mom was present and watching "Law & Order." Yes, before they graced the Met Gala carpet together (and effectively kicked off an avalanche of rumors and speculation), he met at least one of her parents.
Nonetheless, Chopra and Jonas still maintain that they didn't start dating until 2018. Chopra even posted an image of the first photo they took together at Dodger Stadium sometime that year.
Priyanka initially dismissed Nick as boyfriend material
Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra may be crazy in love now, but that wasn't always the case. As Chopra admitted to BBC Radio 2's "The Zoe Ball Breakfast Show" in 2021, she didn't initially consider Jonas to be a real contender for a long-term partner. "I think that I may have discounted Nick a little bit before I met him, which is a good lesson in humility and never judge a book by its cover," she shared (via Express).
Indeed, it took a couple of years for her to agree to a real date. As she told Elle UK, "We were just sporadically meeting for about two years." They'd text and attend events together, but while Chopra was admittedly drawn to Jonas, she also wasn't ready to commit. "I was taking a hiatus from guys at that point," she confessed. "I didn't want anyone romantically." Luckily, Jonas persisted, and she eventually listened to the inner voice nudging her on. "There's always been something about Nick, which is why we always ended up staying in touch, no matter where we were," she mused.
Once they did finally go out, she quickly realized what she had been missing. "I kind of just knew that this was my person," the actor to BBC Radio 2, recalling how their first official date made her see Jonas in a completely different light.
They moved at lightning speed
Nearly one year to the date after the pair's 2017 Met Gala red carpet rendezvous, Jonas and Chopra are said to have started dating. At the time, Us Weekly reported that the two celebs had just started their relationship, though things were looking good for their future. "They are dating and it's brand new," a source told the magazine. "It's a good match and they are both interested in each other."
Not long afterwards, Jonas and Chopra hit some major relationship milestones when they met one another's families. In June 2018, Jonas brought the "Baywatch" star with him to his cousin's New Jersey wedding, where he introduced her to his family (per TMZ). "It's a huge deal that Nick brought Priyanka to his cousin's wedding," a source close to Jonas shared with People. "He's dated a lot over the last couple years but it's never been anything serious, so this is a big step."
Weeks later, a source told People Chopra invited Jonas along with her to India and the two grabbed dinner with her mother. Clearly, things heated up quickly for the celebrity pair — and that wasn't all that happened. In late July 2018, Jonas and Chopra were reported to have gotten engaged. These two have no trouble moving fast, and there's no sign that they'll be slowing down anytime soon.
There's a mighty big age gap between them
While Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra seem perfect for one another — they both appear to be likable, genuine people in the entertainment biz — their romance was definitely unexpected. Why? Well, there's a ten-year age difference between the two. At the time of their engagement, Chopra was 36 years old to Jonas' 25. To put that into perspective, Jonas was just a 10-year-old in middle school when Chopra made her big-screen acting debut in the Indian drama "Thamizhan."
But, of course, Jonas wouldn't be out of touch with the world of entertainment for long. A few years later, he and his older brothers, Kevin and Joe, would become internationally known as the Jonas Brothers and would appear on the Disney Channel in the hit original movie "Camp Rock" and their own scripted show "Jonas." As fans already know, more acting roles and a thriving solo music career followed.
It's entirely possible that Nick Jonas' early career success may have helped him mature faster than most people in his age group, making him the perfect match for Chopra. And, considering his dating history, that certainly seems to be the case...
Does he have a thing for older women?
Looking back at Nick Jonas' past, it seems clear that he quickly grew tired of dating women his own age. Following short-lived relationships with the likes of Miley Cyrus and Selena Gomez — his fellow Disney Channel stars — Jonas pursued a couple famous women who were notably older than him. In 2011, Jonas dated Australian singer Delta Goodrem, who is eight years his senior. The two obviously didn't work out in the end, and they split after ten months together, per Daily Mail.
Then in September 2015, Jonas got together with "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" star Kate Hudson, whom he later described as "incredible." Jonas and Hudson, who was older than the actor-singer by 14 years, reportedly only had a quick fling, but it was enough to leave a lasting impression on the "Jealous" singer. Speaking with Complex in 2016, Jonas shared, "We had an unbelievable connection as two humans who just admire things about each other, and see something in each other that's beautiful."
So, does Jonas like the older ladies? Well, according to one insider's report to Us Weekly, Jonas just "loves women who are mature like him," which "usually means he dates a little outside of his age bracket." Hey — as long as both Jonas and Priyanka Chopra are okay with their age difference, what does it matter? It's just a number after all.
Nick Jonas slid into Priyanka Chopra's DMs
It's unclear if Nick Jonas woke up feeling like James Dean or is just naturally that cool, but his relationship with Priyanka Chopra began like a millennial bachelor right of passage. In 2016, he slid into her DMs with one simple message (via Vogue): "I'm hearing from a few mutual friends that we should meet." It's smooth. It's to-the-point. And it worked.
"She responded day of with a message that said, 'My team can read this. Why don't you just text me,'" he told Vogue in 2018. As Chopra put it, "Boy got the number," and the pair quickly started a friendly (but flirty) text thread. Despite this, Chopra still had reservations, mostly because of their 10-year age gap.
"I didn't honestly take it very seriously when Nick was texting me," she said during an appearance on Oprah Winfrey's Discovery+ talk show "Super Soul" (via Today). "I was 35, I was like I want to get married, I want to have kids. He's in his 20s, I don't know if that's something that he'd want to do."
Less than two years later, Jonas proposed. Never judge a Jonas by his method of flirtation.
Why she is 'still upset' about their first maybe-date
Nick Jonas seemingly pursued Priyanka Chopra with laser sharp focus. As he recounted to Vogue, when the pair first met in real life at Vanity Fair's 2017 Oscar party, he got down one knee in front of everyone and loudly asked, "You're real. Where have you been all my life?" That's very decisive, so why has there been so much confusion about their first date? Was it even a date at all? From Chopra's perspective, she at least expected a kiss.
It all boils down to the week before their infamous dual appearance at the Met Gala. The pair went out for a drink, Jonas went back to Chopra's apartment, and it sure looked like a date. But then nothing happened. Zilch. Jonas left with a friendly "back pat."
"There was no kiss. There was nothing," Jonas told Vogue, adding that he thought it was "a respectful first night" and that Chopra was "still upset about that." In her opinion "it was too respectful," but Jonas is the kind of guy you bring home to your mother (even on your first almost, maybe, sort of date).
Wedding bells rang after date two
From Twitter DM to wedding, it seems like Nick Jonas' marriage was a whirlwind. As he told Vogue, he knew he was going to marry Priyanka Chopra by their second date. That's fast, but what most people don't realize is that the date came about two years after the pair started chatting in 2016, and about a year after their first sort of date before the Met Gala in 2017.
But Jonas knew Chopra was the one during their second date. Before they went to see "Beauty and the Beast" at the Hollywood Bowl, they met up at another Tinseltown landmark and the sparks were undeniable. Jonas told Vogue, "She walks into the Chateau, and I feel an overwhelming sense of peace and understanding about this next chapter of my life."
That was it. When you know you know. The next day, they crossed the 101 Freeway and headed to Dodger Stadium for their third date (presumably, the game where the couple took their first official selfie). And with that, Jonas was ready to pop the question. The rest is history.
A birthday surprise
Speaking of their engagement, Nick Jonas reportedly asked Priyanka Chopra to marry him while the two were vacationing in London, per People. And, while some couples get engaged on a special date — like, say, an anniversary — Jonas had the unusual idea to pop the question to his beloved on her birthday. Yep, that's right: Jonas proposed to Chopra while the two were celebrating her 36th birthday.
But, from what we can tell, Jonas didn't just ask for Chopra's hand in marriage on her birthday to make the most of their good time. He'd apparently been planning to propose for a while, as he reportedly closed down a Tiffany & Co. jewelry store to pick out the perfect ring for his future wife. That sparkler was one heck of a birthday present, and it surely set him back a few bucks. (A source in the diamond industry told E! News that it probably cost around $200,000.)
Still, we can't help but wonder why Jonas got down on bended knee around the time of the actor's birthday. Couldn't he find time in his busy schedule to propose on another day? And what if she had said no? That would've been one bummer of a birthday.
A Bollywood director leaked the news
While most people may worry about family members and future in-laws oversharing about their personal lives, Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra apparently had a Bollywood director to watch out for. On July 26, 2018, one day before news of the couple's engagement made headlines, Ali Abbas Zafar, an Indian film director who's worked on projects like "Mere Brother Ki Dulhan," took to Twitter to blab the news about Chopra's engagement to Jonas.
Announcing that Chopra would no longer be appearing in his film "Bharat," Zafar tweeted out, "Yes Priyanka Chopra is no more part of @Bharat_TheFilm & and the reason is very very special." Growing more obvious by the second, Zafar added, "She told us in the Nick of time about her decision and we are very happy for her ... Team Bharat wishes @priyankachopra loads of love & happiness for life." Just in the "Nick" of time, huh?
While he didn't flat-out share that Jonas and Chopra were engaged, he definitely hinted at their big news and may have led news outlets do some digging about the couple's relationship. For shame, Zafar.
They work well together, too
Priyanka Chopra's world is in film and television, whereas her hubby is firmly planted in the music industry and occasionally dabbles in acting. Broadway is the perfect middle ground, so it was hardly a leap when the pair announced that they signed on to help produce the Broadway comedy "Chicken & Biscuits," as reported by Deadline. Yup, the couple are officially colleagues.
Nick Jonas has always had an affinity for Broadway. It helped launch his massive Disney Channel career — the gift that gave us both a deep questioning of purity rings and "Camp Rock," the arguable edgy stepsister of "High School Musical." Meanwhile, Chopra is already an Oscar nominee. "The White Tiger," which she starred in and produced, was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay at the Academy Awards in 2021.
What fans don't know is that this endeavor was a long time coming. Last year, the star hinted that the pair had been lowkey working together, if only because quarantine kept them in close quarters. "I think both of us also spend a lot of our time bouncing our ideas off each other," he told ET. "Having that support kind of built-in at home is such an amazing thing. We're actually working on a number of things together as well, so it's kind of a family business at this point." From the looks of it, it's not just kind of a family business — it is a family business.
Nick Jonas thinks Priyanka Chopra is a snack
There's nothing like some good, old fashioned celebrity PDA. If the internet has barely begun to roll its eyes at Travis Barker sucking on Kourtney Kardashian's face, other A-listers certainly get a free past. Admittedly, sometimes it's a little much and Priyanka Chopra definitely walked the line with her cheeky — and we mean cheeky — Instagram photo.
In the August 2021 snap captioned "snack," Chopra posed in a bikini as Jonas took a knife and fork and dined on her literal buttocks. Hey, if you got it, flaunt it. It's still unknown whether he paired his meal with some fava beans and a nice chianti. (We heard somewhere those go great together.) Either way, her friends were loving it. Drew Barrymore commented, "Amazing," and arbiter of hotness Paris Hilton put nothing more than a fire emoji, proving the point that some things are sweeter than cake by the ocean.
At the time, E! News reported that Chopra had just returned to Los Angeles. She was previously filming the Amazon series "Citadel" in the U.K.
Priyanka Chopra's ties to royalty
As could be expected by such a high-profile pair, Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra have major ties to some big-name celebrities. But we're not just talking about Jonas' BFF Demi Lovato. We're actually talking about Chopra's friendship with former "Suits" actor and the Duchess of Sussex herself, Meghan Markle. That's right — Chopra and Markle are super close. Chopra even attended the royal wedding in 2018.
Given Chopra's connection to the British royal family, we fully expected to see Jonas hanging out with Harry on the regular once the couple made it official. After all, he's basically royalty too — Disney Channel royalty, but that still counts for something. While they don't party it up often, it looks like Jonas has gotten to know the Sussexes.
The very same week he proposed to Chopra, the couple visited Markle and her husband at their home in Oxfordshire, England. They even flew over in 2019 to pay baby Archie a visit (putting those weird Chopra-Markle feud rumors to rest). Actually, Markle and Jonas reportedly get along great. According to E! News, Markle was "very excited" about the pairs relationship and totally approved (though she unfortunately had to skip the wedding). Once you get approval from the BFF, you're in for good.
The couple has one rule
During the height of novel coronavirus lockdowns, both Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra saw their careers temporarily slow down. The Jonas Brothers weren't able to tour, and travel restrictions made international work a little dicey (if not completely impossible). This newfound quality time was a big deal for a couple who more or less spent the beginnings of their relationship almost never seeing each other in real life. Needless to say, it was a learning experience — and in the best possible way.
In an interview with "Today," Chopra admitted that the most surprising thing she learned about her husband during lockdown was "that I still like him after spending so much time with him," but lockdowns only lasted so long. By mid-2020, the couple's schedule had picked back up. The Jonas Brothers hit the road and Chopra went to work on projects like "The Matrix Resurrections" and "Citadel." How do they make the seemingly inevitable distance work? They've got one simple rule.
"We don't go more than two/three weeks without seeing each other," she told Tatler in her May 2020 cover story. "That's a rule. It's too hard otherwise, and you've got to work on the relationship, to prioritize it."
Priyanka Chopra may have manifested this
Sure, Priyanka Chopra was hesitant about Nick Jonas. Not too many 20-somethings are ready to settle down so quickly, but the Disney Channel alum has lived a lot more than most people his age. His older brother, Kevin Jonas, also married young. In some ways, it seems like the pair's marriage was fate. Destiny. A mother's wish come true.
During an appearance on "Super Soul" (via Today), Oprah Winfrey referenced a passage from Priyanka's book, "Unfinished," where the "Quantico" star admitted that she thought her mother, Madhu Chopra, "dreamed him up or had some spiritual force" bring the pair together. Perhaps that's what happened, or perhaps it's a situation where Priyanka actually manifested the whole thing herself.
As the "Baywatch" actor shared in "Unfinished," before her relationship with the JoBro began, she wrote down a list of essential qualities that she "would not compromise on" in a future partner. Only "a mere five months" would pass before she would connect with Nick, who evidently fit the bill. Well, there you have it. Put something out in the universe, and you may very well see the results of your wildest dreams. Brb, we're manifesting a wildly rich A-list celebrity husband now, too. Harry Styles, are you still taken?
She removed her husband's last name from her Instagram
Following her 2018 wedding to Nick Jonas, Priyanka Chopra decided to add her husband's last name to hers, becoming Priyanka Chopra Jonas. As she told the "Chicks in the Office" podcast in 2021, she did so because "I wanted to sort of honor traditions, but at the same time, I didn't want to let go of my identity, and this was my in-between." Saying it was her own decision and that no one forced her into it, she did admit to having some second thoughts. "Maybe, hopefully, in another 50 years, it'll be guys taking our names, too, or just not changing our names," she mused. What's more, the actor revealed that the first time she saw her new name in print on the cover of her memoir, "Unfinished," she wasn't totally sold. "I was like, 'Uhhh, hmmm,'" she confessed.
Later that year, it seemed Chopra still wasn't loving the new moniker because she dropped "Jonas" from her Instagram handle and reverted back to @PriyankaChopra. The change sparked a barrage of divorce rumors, but she tried to dismiss them in a 2022 Vanity Fair interview. "It's just a professional hazard," she mused, saying folks were simply reading too much into it. "Because of the noise of social media, because of the prevalence that it has in our lives, I think it seems a lot larger than it is."
Is Priyanka Chopra feuding with Danielle Jonas?
Prior to Joe Jonas and Sophie Turner's 2023 split, all three Jonas brothers and their wives appeared to be a solid family unit, even appearing together in the viral "Sucker" music video. However, there may have been some bad blood behind the scenes, at least according to online critics. In 2018, Kevin's wife, Danielle Jonas, missed Priyanka Chopra's bachelorette party, writing on Instagram that it was because she was busy moving house. Given that Turner did attend, folks saw that as a slight toward Chopra. The feud rumors grew louder when Danielle gushed about Turner on Instagram in 2019, writing, "My girls and I are so blessed to have you in our lives." Followers thought that was her way of throwing major shade at Chopra, even though she assured them she wasn't. "No shade about Priyanka," Danielle wrote in the comments section, per Comments by Celebs. "I think everyone should stop with thinking that we don't like Priyanka, she is lovely."
Jump to 2023, and Danielle appeared to admit she did hold some resentment toward her sisters-in-law when she told the "LadyGang" podcast, "The two boys married somebody who, they're actresses, they're out there, everyone knows them, and I feel like ― I'm Danielle." Speaking directly to Kevin, she added, "I'm out there, celebrity-wise, because I've married you." Saying she wishes she had her own claim to fame, she added, "When I'm with the other girls, I feel just less than sometimes."
The time she Photoshopped herself into a pic of the Jonas Brothers
Priyanka Chopra will do anything for her man, apparently — even bust out her Photoshop skills. It happened in 2019 when the Jonas Brothers headed to the MTV Video Music Awards for the first time since their reunion as a band. While Joe and Kevin Jonas were accompanied by their partners, Sophie Turner and Danielle Jonas, Nick was flying solo that night. He didn't seem to mind, as he sat with his brothers, enjoying the ceremony, but he may have experienced some second thoughts when the group won Best Pop Video for "Sucker." As Joe and Kevin received congratulatory kisses from their wives, Nick awkwardly stood between them, smiling tightly and looking off into space.
It became one of the most viral moments of the night with fans poking fun at Nick's "forever alone" demeanor, but Chopra quickly came to the rescue by Photoshopping herself into the freeze frame. And she didn't just absentmindedly slap something together. No, she made sure to choose an image in which she's got her eyes closed and is hugging Nick. She even paid attention to include his hand on her back. "I'm always with you @nickjonas," she quipped in the Instagram caption, adding, "I'm so proud of all of you!"