Rick Astley on his wife Lene: 'The success I'm having is due to her'
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Rick Astley can't believe his luck.
After becoming a global star in 1987 with his debut single Never Gonna Give You Up (number one in 25 countries), he gave it all up to become a family man at the age of 28.
Two years ago he made a tentative return to music with 50, an album of soulful, often revealing songs he wrote and produced in the "man cave" at his home in West London.
It immediately went to number one.
"It surprised the hell out of me, believe me," says the star. "We were all like, 'What's going on?'"
However, one person was confident of the record's success: Rick's wife Lene Bausager, an Oscar-nominated film producer who "stepped in" to act as his manager five years ago, and never stepped back.
"She probably had more belief in 50 than I did, to be honest," he says.
"I don't mean that I was negative about it. I was just being realistic saying, 'Why is anybody going to let a 50-year-old guy in the building?'
"But she produces movies and she can see a path from a script to actually getting a movie on a screen - and she's done that with the music.
"The success I'm having is due to her, there's no doubt about that. She's a massive part of the whole thing."
The couple met in 1987 when Rick was at the height of his fame and Lene was working at his Danish record label.
They got together in 1989, eventually marrying in 2013, and have a 26-year-old daughter, Emilie, who works as an artist and landscape designer.
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