EXCLUSIVE: Friends reunited at Hollywood star Jennifer Aniston’s £2m wedding

Jennifer began dating Justin in 2011 while working together on the film Wanderlust

HOLLYWOOD newlyweds Jennifer Aniston and Justin Theroux have spent £2million on their wedding, including flying their families and friends with them on their South Pacific honeymoon.

 

Twelve lucky guests who attended their secret marriage ceremony last week were also invited to join them afterwards on a Gulfstream V jet bound for the paradise island of Bora Bora in French Polynesia.

All of them were yesterday enjoying the luxurious surroundings of the five star Four Seasons hotel, where the bride and groom are staying in an £8,000-a-night villa that has three bedrooms, four bathrooms and its own private swimming pool.

As well as relatives, honeymoon invitees included Aniston’s Maid of Honour and former Friends co-star Courteney Cox, her 11-year-old daughter Coco and Irish rocker fiancé Johnny McDaid, US chat show host Chelsea Handler and actor Jason Bateman and his wife Amanda Anka.

One guest at the surprise wedding, which was held at Aniston’s £14million Bel Air mansion three years to the day after actor and director Theroux, 43, proposed to her, said yesterday: “Jen loved the idea of having a simple ceremony at home and then honeymooning somewhere wonderful with all the people she loves.”

The plan comes straight out of the playbook of fellow A List star Johnny Depp, who married actress Amber Heard in February in a simple civil ceremony at his LA home overlooking Sunset Strip before flying her and more than 24 of their friends to his private Caribbean island Little Halls Pond Cay for a weekend-long party.

The source said: “It might seem strange to some people, but when you have a certain level of wealth and celebrity, you can pay to ensure complete privacy pretty much whenever you want.

Jen loved the idea of having a simple ceremony at home and then honeymooning somewhere wonderful with all the people she loves

 

“Like Johnny and Amber, Jen and Justin decided they wanted to share this special time with the people who truly matter to them.

"They can be alone in their private villa whenever they want, but they love the idea of having friends and family join them for what is going to be a week-long celebration of their love for one another in one of the most romantic settings in the world.”

It is also one of the most expensive, with the cheapest Four Seasons villas renting for around £2,500 a night.

Staff there are under strict instructions not to discuss the honeymooners.

Aniston, who began dating Theroux in May 2011 while they were working together on the 2012 film Wanderlust, last week hoodwinked wedding guests who thought they were attending an early surprise birthday party for her fiancé, who turns 44 tomorrow (Monday).

Instead, celebrity pals including American “shock jock” Howard Stern, TV chat host Ellen DeGeneres and actress Lisa Kudrow, another of Aniston’s former Friends co-stars, found themselves at a “delightfully informal but meticulously planned” marriage service.

To throw fans and photographers off the scent, Aniston used a vacant £6.9million property adjacent to her mansion as a storage and staging area where her wedding dress was kept under wraps for more than a week.

The ceremony could not have been less like that of her first marriage in 2000 to Brad Pitt.

They married at sunset on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean in Malibu before “vanishing” on honeymoon by themselves.

The source revealed: “You have to remember that Brad broke her heart when he fell for Angelina Jolie and she divorced him in 2005.

"It’s as if she’s taken the exact opposite path this time by turning it into a long, expensive party for those closest to her and Justin.

“She did the maths well in advance and realised how big the bills were going to be.

"More than $330,000 (around £213,000) has gone just hiring the G5 for a 16-hour round trip.

“But she thinks it’s worth every penny to create a special memory with the man she loves.”