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Robyn Doreian
April 30, 2026 — 5:00am
Musician and actor Danielle Spencer has released three solo albums and starred in several Australian TV shows, including Home and Away. She was married to actor Russell Crowe before their relationship ended in 2012. Here, the 56-year-old talks about the men in her life, including her famous father, Don Spencer.
My maternal grandfather, Peter, was from Yorkshire, England. A couple of times, we stayed in the pub he ran there. I remember hearing the murmurs downstairs and smelling the cigarette smoke as it floated towards us.
My childhood was split between Australia and England – my dad, Don, hosted Play School in both countries. He’s a singer-songwriter and, before he did TV, did a support tour with the Rolling Stones.
He’s been a fantastic father who set off my love of music and songwriting by teaching me piano from age four. I can talk to Dad about anything – we are extremely close. When I started acting, he was very supportive. But he was probably pleased when I returned to music.
Dad and my mum, Julie, separated when I was in my 20s. I was sad but I can think of no better example of a couple who divorced and remained great friends. Mum has been remarried for more than 25 years. Dad will call my stepfather, Gerard, and they’ll watch sport together. It’s all very adult.
Dad, now 89, had a stroke earlier this year, his first real health hiccup. Yet he’s still playing tennis, performing and running his Australian Children’s Music Foundation charity. He is recovering well.
I was focused on acting and dance as a teenager. My first job out of high school was in the chorus of a musical called Rasputin, where I experienced my first proper relationship, with Terry, who was also in the show and 15 years older than me. I was 18 and still living at home, so the fact he had his own apartment felt very grown up. My parents were not happy about it at first but they came to really like him. We went out for about three years.
I met my former husband, Russell Crowe, at a cafe in Sydney prior to shooting [1990 film] The Crossing. The director wanted us to meet and Russell was also intent on us forming a bond. We didn’t get into a relationship until about a year after filming finished.
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. When our kids – Charlie, now 22, and Tennyson, 19 – were little, I’d travel with him.
Once Charlie was in school, he 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. I wanted them to have friends and to feel secure. We’d visit Russell, or he’d call me a hundred times a day.
Russell and I separated in 2012. 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. I don’t need to be with my partner 24 hours a day to feel safe or secure.
Russell is a very loving dad. Our sons stay with him in the summer holidays and he takes them away mid-year for a few weeks. He gets the holiday times, I get the boring routine.
I met my partner, Adam, an artist and illustrator, on the promenade near where I live. He approached me and said we had a tenuous connection: Russell and I had looked at his [former] mother-in-law’s house when it was for sale.
Adam described the house and I recalled his mother-in-law had about 150 papier-mâché clowns. He also said Russell had taken his two sons to see the South Sydney Rabbitohs after their grandmother said they were fans. We had a cup of tea and it went from there.
Adam is very kind. He possesses a good sense of humour and a lovely, positive, peaceful energy. Neither of us has a typical nine-to-five lifestyle, so he understands how I live my life. We’re similar, so it works.
Regenerate is out now.
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