‘Angry’ Mariah Carey reflects on past marriage to Tommy Mottola

Mariah Carey is opening up once again about a chapter of her life that continues to stir deep emotions. 

In a new interview with Harper’s Bazaar UK for their September 2025 issue, the Grammy-winning icon reflected on her marriage to music executive Tommy Mottola, and how she has worked through the complex feelings that come with that part of her past.

“Sometimes I feel angry about that time, but I think I’ve made peace with it, in any case, I vowed I’d stop talking about it,” Carey, 56, shared candidly. 

She also touched on how humour plays a crucial role in how she copes with difficult memories. 

“Humor is my release, and people who know me know that,” Carey explained. 

“I’ll make little jokes about what happened because otherwise I could make every day a sob story. It’s a coping mechanism, but it’s in my nature to laugh.”

Carey and Mottola’s relationship began in 1991 when he was leading Sony Music.

They married two years later in a highly publicized ceremony and officially divorced in 1998. During their marriage, Carey says she often felt creatively restricted. 

“I wanted to do more R&B, more urban music, and any time I would bring that up, it would get shot down,” she told the magazine. “It wasn’t that I didn’t like the music I was making – I just felt there was more inside me that I wanted to release.”

Her perspective echoes comments she made back in 2019 during a Cosmopolitan interview, where she described the experience as extremely controlled. 

“You might want to picture a child bride,” she said at the time, adding, “There was no ­freedom for me as a human being. It was almost like being a prisoner.”

Now, with her new album Here for It All set to release on September 26, Carey is moving forward both personally and professionally. 

Two tracks from the upcoming album, Type Dangerous and Sugar Sweet, are already available, giving fans a taste of what’s to come from an artist who continues to evolve, reflect, and reclaim her voice.