AMERICAN MUSICIAN MOBY has apologised to the actress Natalie Portman after claiming that the pair were romantically involved while she was a teenager.

The 53-year-old posted an apology on Instagram after criticism arose following the publication of his memoir, Then It Fell Apart, in which he claimed himself and Portman went on a number of dates.

In one passage, he described an incident where Portman flirted with him in his dressing room after a show when she was 18.

However, Portman dismissed the claim as “inappropriate” this week, telling the fashion magazine Harper’s Bazaar that she was “surprised to hear” that Moby recalled their relationship in such terms.

“My recollection is a much older man being creepy with me when I just had graduated high school,” she said.

“He said I was 20; I definitely wasn’t. I was a teenager. I had just turned 18. That he used this story to sell his book was very disturbing to me.”

Natalie Portman hit back at claims that herself and Moby dated a number of years ago. Kay Blake / PA Images Kay Blake / PA Images / PA Images

Initially, Moby hit back at Portman’s interview, posting a series of photos showing the pair together with the caption: “Sincerely what should I do when people believe accusations and not evidence?”

However, in an Instagram post on Saturday, he rowed back on his comments and said that he should have acted “more responsibly and respectfully” towards Portman when they first met.

He said:

As some time has passed I’ve realized that many of the criticisms leveled at me regarding my inclusion of Natalie in Then It Fell Apart are very valid.

I also fully recognize that it was truly inconsiderate of me to not let her know about her inclusion in the book beforehand, and equally inconsiderate for me to not fully respect her reaction.

I have a lot of admiration for Natalie, for her intelligence, creativity, and animal rights activism, and I hate that I might have caused her and her family distress.

The singer added that it was “truly inconsiderate” of him not to tell those he included in his book that they would feature in it before it was published, and accepted that he should have acted more appropriately towards Portman in light of their age difference.

He added: “So for that I apologize, to Natalie, as well as the other people I wrote about in Then It Fell Apart without telling them beforehand.”