Black-ish Star Jenifer Lewis Candidly Opens Up About Her Decades-Long Battle with Sex Addiction

The 69-year-old Hollywood veteran recently appeared as a guest on the Baby, This is Keke Palmer podcast, where she admitted to sleeping with dozens of different men throughout her career. "I have nothing to be ashamed of," she stated. "Yes, baby, it happened. I had 63 men. And it was spectacular."

Although she thoroughly enjoyed it at the time, looking back, Lewis admits she wishes she had understood back then that "the body is a temple."

"I never thought it was a problem. I thought absolutely everybody was fucking everything that moved," the actress continued. "Look, when you walk off a Broadway stage to a deafening standing ovation, applause, and screams of admiration... what do you do next? To come down from that high, you either have to shoot something into your vein, smoke it, or drink it. My drug was sex. I would just go out, find a gorgeous man, and drain the life out of him!"

According to Lewis, she finally put an end to her casual encounters when the AIDS epidemic swept the world—that was the turning point that forced her to re-evaluate her life.

"I thought, 'Okay, stop. There has to be more to life than my attempts to fill the void inside, and figure out who I am and why I'm here,'" the star recalls.

Following that realization, the actress embarked on a journey of self-discovery to find true love. "I don't know how I managed to stay in this business. I don't know how I lived to be 69, but I'm here, and I feel better than ever. I am absolutely happy," she shared candidly.

Jenifer Lewis has been engaged four times but never married. She has an adopted daughter, Charmaine.

Secrets of the Past: Bipolar Disorder and a Con Artist

In the early 1990s, the actress was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Initially, she categorically refused to take medication, fearing she would lose her creative "spark," but she eventually yielded to doctors and now takes her medication regularly.

In 2020, the actress's name made headlines again when she became one of four women fleeced by a devious romance scammer out of a combined total of nearly $400,000.

Antonio Mariot Wilson, a California fitness club owner, pleaded fully guilty to wire fraud. He met affluent women on the Bumble dating app and other sites under fictitious names (such as Dr. Tony Mariot and Bryce Carrington), initiated whirlwind romances, and then convinced them to invest tens of thousands of dollars in non-existent companies.

The con artist met Lewis at a Los Angeles gym where he worked as a front desk manager. Before approaching the actress, Wilson thoroughly researched her background online and quickly charmed the star. Three months into the relationship, he convinced Jenifer to give him money to invest in a film industry project, falsely claiming to be an Oscar winner.

The scammer swindled $50,000 out of Lewis. The actress later sued the fitness club and settled the dispute, receiving $13,000 in compensation.

Jenifer Lewis is widely known to the public for her role as Ruby in the hit ABC sitcom Black-ish, as well as for her friendship with Michelle Obama, on whose podcast she has appeared multiple times.