ACTRESS Billie Piper has spoken for the first time about her divisive ex-husband Laurence Fox, saying: “Divorce speaks for itself.”
It has been eight years since the former Doctor Who star split from the activist — but she is forced to confront his controversial views almost daily as they have children together.
Outspoken Fox has been criticised for making “misogynistic” and deliberately provocative comments on TV and on social media.
He recently lost a libel case at the High Court against a drag artist who he called a paedophile online.
Throughout the years, Billie has maintained her silence - until now.
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The 41-year-old star of stage and screen, said: “Of course I have feelings on that, I’m not dead inside.
“I’ve had to make some choices and a divorce speaks for itself - or at least it should.
“I try to keep people from telling me stuff but it’s really, really hard.
“I don’t read it but everyone wants to talk about it.
“Sometimes I have to say to people: ‘Please don’t bring this to me, now or ever.’”
Former pop star Billie married Fox in December 2007 and they have two sons, now aged 11 and 15.
But the couple separated in March 2016, with their divorce finalised two months later.
It 2019, Fox began to move from his acting work — where he is best known for detective series Lewis — to sharing controversial views online.
He has blamed YouTube videos for “totally radicalising” him against “woke culture” and “political correctness”.
Billie has now spoken of the change in him in an interview with British Vogue.
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She said: “Look, if people want to try and understand the workings of the guy, they ought to either ask him or his family.
“What is paramount for me is the privacy and anonymity of my children.
"They deserve not to be extensions of the parents and to forge their own identities.
“We co parent with enormous difficulty. I close everything down and keep a very strict routine with the kids so that there’s consistency.
“I keep them close. That’s all I can do.”
It’s made me feel stronger in many ways. I’ve learnt I have a lot of resilience I didn’t know I had
Billie Piper
In 2022, Fox accused Billie of denying him access to their children, alleging he had not been able to see or speak to his eldest son on his birthday.
He ranted on X, formerly Twitter: “Put children first. Don’t use them as weapons.”
Billie told Vogue: “What’s a positive spin on this? It’s made me feel stronger in many ways.
“I’ve learnt I have a lot of resilience I didn’t know I had.”
Against the Covid vaccine, Fox used his platform to question the science — often appearing at anti-lockdown marches and wearing a badge stating: “No vaccine needed. I have an immune system”.
In 2020, he called a fellow panellist on BBC’s Question Time “racist” for branding him a “white privileged male” in a debate over Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex.
When two professional dancers on BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing reportedly declined to get vaccinated, he tweeted: “Sack them and replace them with jabbed dancers.
“Would you apply the same rules to HIV positive dancers?”
After clashing with London Mayor Sadiq Khan, he tried to run for the job himself under his own political group, the Reclaim Party.
However, he lost his £10,000 deposit after only managing to pull in 47,000 votes in 2021.
Two years later, he stood in the Uxbridge and South Ruislip by-election to replace former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, but finished fourth with just 714 votes.
And last September, he was sacked from GB News for breaking broadcasting rules with his “misogynistic” comments, when he called female journalist Ava Evans “pathetic” and asked: “Who’d want to shag that?”
Earlier this year, Fox lost a High Court appeal to overturn a libel case against him for defamation against Drag artist Crystal — real name Colin Seymour.
Crystal lodged the case for defamation after Fox branded the performer and ex-Stonewall trustee Simon Blake “paedophiles” during a social media row.
Their clash was sparked by Fox calling for a Sainsbury’s boycott after they promised to provide a safe space for black employees during Black History Month.
Billie said: “You have to laugh because it’s a lot. It’s a good way of kind of soothing yourself.
“I’ve had to learn the hard way that you can only control yourself and how you react to things. It’s really f**ing hard.”
With acting, I like it, but I don’t love it or need it like I did in my 20s
Billie Piper
Billie first rose to fame in 1998 at just 15 years old, when she became the youngest female to have a solo single debut at No1 in the UK charts with Because We Want To.
Her roles across TV range from Doctor Who companion Rose Tyler — playing opposite Christopher Eccleston and David Tennant — to Secret Diary of a Call Girl and Sky comedy I Hate Suzie.
But she is also the only person to take all six of London theatre’s best actress awards — including an Olivier — in the same year, for Yerma at the Young Vic in 2017.
Next, she will be seen as another brilliant woman — Sam McAllister, the broadcast fixer credited with landing Emily Maitlis’ history-making Newsnight interview with disgraced Prince Andrew.
Called Scoop, the drama features actor Rufus Sewell as the royal, while Gillian Anderson is Maitlis.
The man behind The Crown, Peter Morgan, made the 90-minute Netflix drama, which has been adapted from McAllister’s memoirs.
The jaw-dropping interview with Andrew saw the Prince talk about his relationship with disgraced financier and convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
In her interview with Vogue, Billie continued: “Work, for me anyway, at this point in my life, has to mean something.
"I have to really want in on that female character. Sam is an absolute force. She is it. “I didn’t know anything about her and yet I knew everything about that interview.
“I was obsessed with it. Everyone has seen that interview — it’s been ripped and memed to f.”
Viewers will remember tales of the Duke of York’s widely publicised dinner at Pizza Express in Woking and his alleged inability to sweat.
And Billie said of the upcoming drama: “How are we now going to tell a very serious story that people had been outraged by, but mostly laughed at?
“We know that the interview is going to happen. How is the story interesting? You know that line where ‘funny-haha’ meets ‘f**ing hell’?”
Billie is clearly passionate about the piece — streaming from April 5 — which is how she now likes to choose her work. In the wide-ranging article, she concludes: “With acting, I like it, but I don’t love it or need it like I did in my 20s.
“I wonder if I don’t like being an actor for hire any more because I can’t control the outcome in the way I would want to, whereas before I didn’t give a sht.
“Because these days I really do give a sh*t, you know?”
Evans was one of the good guys
BILLIE Piper has declared her first husband Chris Evans as “one of the good guys”.
When the couple wed in a secret Las Vegas ceremony in 2001, the marriage was considered hugely controversial.
Piper was 18, while Evans was 35, and they had been dating for just six months after meeting on his TFI Friday TV show.
It is a fact, Billie tells British Vogue, she is reminded of daily.
She has been dating Johnny Lloyd, the frontman of band Tribes, since 2016 and they had their daughter in January 2019.
Asked about her time with Chris, the actress said: “I’m not someone who thinks all men are b*stards, but I was exposed to a lot of stuff, let’s say, and I consider him one of the good guys.
“People would shout things about the age gap at us in the street. Street trolling. I mean it was pretty terrifying, actually.”
The couple separated in 2004, then divorced in May 2007.
Billie added: “People still ask me about it at parties. Strangers! It was 20 years ago.
"It makes slightly more sense to constantly be asked about husband number two [Fox] but even then I resent that because we’ve been separated for almost ten years.”
And the star admitted: “I felt very unhinged in my early 30s and kind of mentally not well. A lot of that has been in relation to men, I suppose.”
- The April issue of British Vogue is available via digital download and on newsstands from Tuesday 18 March.
