Lenny Henry’s ‘light bulb’ moment with ex-wife Dawn French

Lenny Henry has been dating casting director Lisa Makin for over 15 years, but before he met her, the former Comic Relief presenter was married to The Vicar of Dibley star Dawn French.

The pair first met on the alternative comedy circuit, and Lenny attempted to approach Dawn and her comedy partner, Jennifer Saunders, to join his own show. Although he was turned down by the pair, an attraction developed between him and Dawn.

Speaking to The Times in 2022, Lenny admitted that he had come from a string of bad relationships, but that following a conversation with Dawn, he had a “light bulb” moment with her, that made him realise he had fallen for the star.

“During this period, I’d been serial dating a variety of dancers from summer shows, funkateers and fellow clubbers,” he explained. “None of these relationships was based on companionship, fellow feeling or a ‘meeting of minds’. Most of them were fuelled purely by physical attraction.

“Besides, I lacked attention span when it came to actually being with someone. So, I found myself growing lonelier by the minute. I was yearning for something more substantial, but I just didn’t know what that was.”

He continued: “The next time I met Dawn I realised that you could have a reciprocal conversation with someone and not have to perform or amuse them all the time. They could make you laugh too. A massive light bulb went off over my head. I was compelled by [Dawn]. We talked about everything, performance, politics (my family voted Labour, but I hadn’t really connected with the whys of it until I met Dawn), family, relationships, food, the future.

“Even at the worst of times we used humour as sword and shield. My mind was at last tuned in, focused and functioning as an equal in a relationship. In other words, I was in love.“

In the same article, Lenny also revealed that he and Dawn both knew that they wanted “as big a wedding as we could”. He added: “To my mind, if we weren’t going to get married in the right way – big church, reception, dress suits, food, friends and family jammed into a fancy-schmancy chi-chi hall with a big band and Big Al the DJ winding up the day’s events with a big disco – then we might as well not do it at all.”

Lenny and Dawn’s split

After marrying in 1984, Lenny and Dawn remained together for 26 years, before they called time on their relationship in 2010. At the time, they released a statement which read: “The separation is entirely amicable and they fully intend to maintain their close friendship. Their priority is to commit to the future joint parenting of their daughter.”

Following their separation, they have both made a few rare comments about the reason their marriage broke down. “I got divorced… it wasn’t that bad,” Lenny said to The Mirror in 2012, adding he became closer to Billie.

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Four years later, he told the Express: “There’s generally a situation where one partner wants the marriage to finish more than the other. I think maybe one of us did, then the other one did, and then the other did over a period of time and then, in the end, we thought, ‘Oh, actually maybe we both do’. We knew it wasn’t possible to continue.”

Dawn told The Mirror in 2017: “Remarkably, we seem to have shifted with relative ease from a 25-year marriage to a lasting friendship. I am amazed by us. There is no war, we’ve turned out to be the best of friends. There were lots of good years but one tricky last year.”