Russell Crowe’s ex-wife Danielle Spencer lifts lid on rumour about their 2012 split

Danielle Spencer has rebutted rumours that Russell Crowe's career caused their marriage break-up. Photo / Getty Images

Danielle Spencer has finally addressed speculation about the cause of her split from Russell Crowe.

The singer and actress, 56, married the Gladiator star in 2003 but they split in 2012, with the divorce becoming official in 2018. They share two sons: Charlie, 22, and Tennyson, 19.

While Crowe has been famously private about his personal life over the years, rumours circulated after his break-up with Spencer about what had gone wrong – with plenty of suggestions his blossoming career was to blame.

But in a new interview with the Sydney Morning Herald, Spencer shot down the long-standing rumours.

“There’s been this narrative that Russell’s escalating career and him being away contributed to the break-up of our marriage, but that’s not true for me,” she revealed to the publication.

“I don’t need to be with my partner 24 hours a day to feel safe or secure.”

Elsewhere, Spencer – who is the daughter of well-known Aussie entertainer Don Spencer – gushed over her “loyal” ex, whom she says would call her “a hundred times a day” during their marriage while he was away filming.

“Russell’s most admirable trait is loyalty. He’s also a deep thinker. I am an actor as well, so I totally understood him being away on film sets.”

Spencer explained that when their kids were young, they’d travel with Crowe on work trips, but once their eldest started school, he’d found “all the moving a little traumatic”.

“I felt our kids needed routine rather than living in hotels or renting houses for a few months, so I settled them in Sydney … We’d visit Russell, or he’d call me a hundred times a day.”

Spencer also spoke about the split in an interview on Stellar’s Something To Talk About podcast last year, admitting she felt she’d been “driving” the break-up of their family.

“It’s really sad breaking up with somebody that you’ve known for so long, that you’ve had children with,” she said.

“Me kind of breaking up the family – and it felt very much like I was driving that – so I had to deal with my almost sense of guilt that I was fracturing the family, but obviously I did it for a number of reasons and I wouldn’t have done it if I didn’t think it needed to happen.”

Both Spencer and Crowe are now in relationships with other people.

Spencer has been with her current partner, artist and writer Adam Long, since 2016, while Crowe met now-girlfriend Britney Theriot on the set of Broken City in 2013, although they only started dating in 2020.

During an interview with 60 Minutes last year, Crowe addressed speculation he was planning to tie the knot again.

“All these reports keep coming out saying that Britney and I are engaged and I’m going to get married again. No, we are very good friends and we have a wonderful relationship,” he told the programme.

“My life is so joyous and happy at the moment. Why would I ruin that with a wedding? Why would I go through [that]?” he told Karl Stefanovic on the programme.

“I’ve been married once, you know, I know how it can go and where it can go. So, I don’t need to go to that place. Where’s the romance? Where’s the romance in you?”

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