Gregg Wallace’s second wife described their marriage as an “utter hell” in an unearthed interview. Denise Lovell and Gregg split in 2004, with her claiming that the split left her financially and emotionally drained, leading to a nervous breakdown as her children moved in with Gregg in Whitstable, Kent.
Denise spoke out in 2012, shortly after Gregg’s split from his third wife, Heidi Brown.
Reflecting on Heidi and Gregg’s marriage, Denise ominously remarked: “If my own experience is anything to go by it will have been utter hell and very, very lonely.”
Denise died in 2017, five years after her interview with the Daily Mail and over a decade after her divorce.
The MasterChef star, 60, has since found love again with his fourth wife, Anne-Marie Sterpini, reports the Mirror.
In her interview, Denise claimed the presenter was a womaniser with an obsession for sex, and claimed he “was always in charge of the money”.
Initially smitten, Denise reminisced about her early infatuation with Gregg; after a lengthy nine-year courtship, the couple tied the knot in 1999, by which point they had welcomed two children.
However, the romance soured as Denise grew increasingly worried about Gregg’s conduct.
The former pastry chef confessed: “I had nowhere to go. I felt completely desperate. Even though I’d worked for years, I had nothing of my own by then. I just tried to focus on being a mother. I put up with it because of the children.”
Gregg himself has acknowledged his past behaviour in his 2012 memoir ‘Life On A Plate’, writing: “As long as I was home when the children woke up in the morning, she could overlook the other women.
“That was the rule. There was her life, there was my life and there were holidays together.”
Last week it was confirmed that Gregg will be stepping away from MasterChef amid an investigation into complaints about his behaviour.
Multiple women have stepped forward with allegations against the presenter, dating back almost 20 years.
His lawyers have strongly denied “he engages in behaviour of a sexually harassing nature”, according to BBC News.