Justin Timberlake: Career, the 2024 Arrest and the Lyme Diagnosis

Justin Timberlake finished a 120-date world tour in 2025 and then told his audience he had spent much of it in nerve pain, having been diagnosed with Lyme disease partway through. It reframed a run that critics had spent months describing as inconsistent, and it was the most revealing thing he has said publicly in years.

Quick Bio / At a Glance

Memphis, Disney and NSYNC

Timberlake was born in Memphis on January 31, 1981, and appeared on The All-New Mickey Mouse Club as a child alongside Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and Ryan Gosling — one of the more improbable talent concentrations in television history.

He joined NSYNC in the mid-1990s. The group became one of the biggest acts in the world, and No Strings Attached set first-week sales records that stood for years.

Going Solo

Justified and FutureSex/LoveSounds

His 2002 solo debut Justified, made largely with the Neptunes and Timbaland, moved him decisively out of pop and into R&B. FutureSex/LoveSounds followed in 2006 and is generally regarded as his best record, producing “SexyBack,” “My Love” and “What Goes Around… Comes Around.”

The Later Albums

After a break for acting he returned with The 20/20 Experience in 2013, the year’s best-selling album. Man of the Woods followed in 2018 to a considerably cooler reception, and Everything I Thought It Was arrived in 2024.

He has won ten Grammy Awards and four Emmys, the latter largely for his work on Saturday Night Live, where his digital shorts with Andy Samberg became a genre of their own.

Acting and Trolls

Timberlake’s most substantial acting credit is David Fincher’s The Social Network in 2010, as Sean Parker. He also led Friends with Benefits and appeared in Inside Llewyn Davis.

Commercially, the largest thing he has done in the last decade is voice Branch in the Trolls films and record “Can’t Stop the Feeling!”, which won a Grammy and was nominated for an Academy Award.

The Super Bowl Appearances

He has performed at the Super Bowl halftime show twice. The 2004 appearance with Janet Jackson ended in the incident that dominated American media for months and had career consequences for Jackson that Timberlake did not share — an imbalance he has since publicly acknowledged. He returned as the solo headline act in 2018.

The 2024 Arrest

In June 2024 Timberlake was arrested in Sag Harbor, New York, on a driving while intoxicated charge. He ultimately pleaded guilty to the lesser offence of driving while ability impaired.

As part of the resolution he delivered a public safety statement in September 2024 urging people not to drive after drinking. He has since taken legal action to prevent the release of body camera footage from the arrest.

The Lyme Disease Diagnosis

The Tour

The Forget Tomorrow World Tour began in April 2024 and ran for more than 120 shows, closing in Turkey in 2025. It was dogged by cancellations and by criticism of his onstage energy.

The Disclosure

In July 2025, immediately after the tour concluded, Timberlake disclosed on Instagram that he had been diagnosed with Lyme disease, describing living with it as relentlessly debilitating.

He said the diagnosis explained the massive nerve pain, fatigue and illness he had been experiencing on stage, and that he had considered ending the tour but concluded the joy of performing outweighed the physical cost.

Lyme disease is a tick-borne bacterial infection which, when it becomes persistent, can produce exactly the neurological and fatigue symptoms he described.

Family

Timberlake married the actress Jessica Biel in 2012. They have two sons, Silas and Phineas, and have kept both almost entirely out of public view.

Where He Stands

Timberlake spent the 2020s in a more complicated public position than the 2000s afforded him, and 2024 was a genuinely bad year. The Lyme disclosure did not erase any of that, but it did explain a great deal about the twelve months preceding it.

More music profiles: Michael Jackson and Tom Petty.