Russell Crowe and Danielle Spencer Are Breaking Up for Some Inexplicable Reason

Russell Crowe and his wife of nine years, the Australian musician Danielle Spencer, are splitting up after nine years of marriage according to the Sydney Morning Herald. Crowe has been quite the busy-body, jetting back and forth between Australia and the States to film seven movies, including a biblical epic about another guy whose marriage was on the rocks, Noah. The split is said to be amicable so far, with Crowe and Spencer pretty insistent that their two boys, ages eight and six, be shielded from any media highbeams.

Speculation will abound in coming days about just what series of unfortunate events precipitated this split. The couple had just moved into a newly-renovated $10 million home in Rose Bay in Sydney, and seemed, by all accounts, stable. However, earlier in the summer, there were rumors that not everything was awesome in the Crowe-Spencer manse when Spencer was photographed gamboling about town with her dance partner from Seven’s Dancing with the Stars, Damian Whitewood. Crowe, who was immersed in half-a-dozen projects, met his wife at the airport for an affectionate (and public) kiss, prompting many gossip columnists to wonder if they had not just witnessed some public relations damage control.

Observers have pointed to Crowe’s recent work schedule as a possible source of stress. It also might be noted (though, in this context, it seems irrelevant) that Russell Crowe doesn’t come off as a warm, gregarious fellow — this is the same man who once called Gladiator producer Brank Lustig (then a 77-year-old Holocaust survivor) just to say, “You motherfucker. I will kill you with my bare hands.” Anecdotes like that don’t exactly scream “sensitive,” but it’s impossible to tell which party initiated the break-up. Maybe they’re just tired of each other, which somehow seems to convey a more understated sadness, as if nothing can last forever and people who really do love each other just grow steadily apart. Ugh, now I’m upset. Thanks a lot, Russell Crowe.

Crowe, Spencer split amid actor’s hectic filming schedule [Sydney Morning Herald]