Bec Hewitt: ‘Lleyton and I are happier than ever’
DESPITE intense public interest into the state of her marriage, Bec Hewitt tells Stellar she’s happier than ever, and ready to step back into the spotlight.
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AFTER seven years residing by the crystal blue waters of the Bahamas and living out of suitcases following Lleyton on the world tennis circuit, there’s one all-important reason the Hewitt family is overjoyed to at last call Australia home again. And that reason answers to the name of Bux.
“Bux is a little, fluffy cavoodle,” Bec Hewitt beams as she discusses her brood’s homecoming, cheerily adding that she has also “found the local place where I get my legs waxed.
So we have really settled into life in Melbourne. And I love all the friends I have made here.”
As for Bux, he was named after Lleyton’s favourite drink — a Starbucks frappuccino. “I am more of a Gloria Jean’s hot chocolate girl myself,” Hewitt, 35, says with a laugh.
Lleyton may have earned a touch under $30 million in prize money on the tennis circuit, but his wife’s days are spent, like so many other parents across Australia, shuttling her three children to school and various sports commitments.
On wintry Melbourne weekends, she can be found shivering on the sidelines of the suburban footy field, cheering on her nine-year-old son as he takes a mark.
Her idea of the perfect night is relaxing on the couch with her husband — a marriage that has now clocked up 13 years since their lavish wedding ceremony made nationwide news.
The pair met as teenagers when they were paired together for a charity tennis event in 1999. “I couldn’t play tennis, so it was quite comical,” she recalls. “I didn’t impress him with my game. He just thought it was really admirable that I gave it a go.”
They were both in other relationships at the time. “We didn’t speak for six years,” Hewitt tells Stellar.
“It was only when both of our relationships had broken up he eventually touched base in a text message to tell me something he was working on.
We caught up and that was it. It was such a whirlwind, which I think was part of the reason why we ended up with such a lot of attention — because it was after only six weeks that we got engaged.”
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Hewitt admits that if any of her friends had told her they were getting married to someone after a six-week courtship, she would have told them they were crazy. But she faced no such opposition from her loved ones.
“All the family were so happy and supportive. I guess they just saw the two of us together and saw we were happy,” she says.
When the couple married in July 2005, it was an extravagant affair. A congregation of the entertainment and sporting worlds’ elite looked on, while Hewitt’s bridesmaids included fellow soap stars Kate Ritchie and Ada Nicodemou.
At the time, Hewitt was one of the most famous faces on Australian TV after spending almost seven years on Home And Away. She had also released an album and out-danced Pauline Hanson in the first season of Dancing With The Stars.
Lleyton was also at the top of his game, having reached the final of the Australian Open in January of that same year.
Looking back on the media frenzy, Hewitt can only marvel at what transpired. “Lleyton had a helicopter follow him from Palm Beach to the Opera House,” she recalls. “It was like a police chase or something.
“I was just excited, as anyone would be on their wedding day. I was surrounded by my family and friends, eating lollies. It was great. You’re exhausted by the end of it, and I was five and a half months pregnant at the time, too!”
After their daughter Mia, now 12, was born, Hewitt walked away from her career to focus on motherhood, and in the years following the couple have added Cruz, nine, and Ava, seven, to their family.
“It was never a choice — a decision — that I made [to quit acting],” she says. “It just naturally happened because, obviously, I wanted to be there with the kids. I don’t want to miss anything.
And I was fortunate enough to be travelling with Lleyton and got to see all these wonderful places and have these memories with my kids. I am with the kids all the time. Every minute of the day. And I love it.”
The state of her marriage has proved to be a tireless source of fascination for the gossip magazines, with breathless reports of an allegedly imminent divorce making front page news week in and week out for more than a decade.
It’s a circus that Hewitt says bears no actual resemblance to the far less dramatic reality of their domestic life.
“We have a good little routine going,” she says. “When Lleyton comes back [commitments to his Bahamas-based tennis academy and role as the Davis Cup captain require him to travel frequently], it just lightens the load.
He really likes to help and every morning he’s like, ‘No, no, you’ve done the school run for the last three weeks, so let me do it.’”
With their three kids now happily settled in at school, Hewitt has decided the time is right to return to the small screen as a travel presenter on the Nine Network’s new series Helloworld, wherein she will showcase New Zealand and Queensland.
After a 13-year absence from television, she admits to feeling nervous about performing again, confessing she is so out of practice she got butterflies when giving a speech at her sister’s wedding in 2015.
However, entertainment reporter Peter Ford, for one, is confident Hewitt will step back into the spotlight with ease.
“In a perverse way, all the crap she has had to endure through the mags has served to keep her interesting and relevant,” he tells Stellar.
“How many times has she walked out, packed her bags or called it quits? Yet that relationship seems rock solid. It’s a testament to her endurance and self-confidence.”
There are also lifestyle adjustments that her new role on Helloworld, alongside presenters such as Sonia Kruger, Steve Jacobs and Ray Martin, will bring.
“I will be able to actually sit and read a magazine,” Hewitt says of the transition to flying solo after years of travelling with three kids in tow.
“I’ll feel a little strange. Like I lost my right arm. I’ll be like, ‘What am I missing?’ And my hand luggage will be that bit lighter without all the snacks to keep them going.”
It was love at first sight between audience and actor when Hewitt, then a fresh-faced teenager named Rebecca Cartwright, joined Home And Away in 1998.
“I recall the first autograph I was asked for was after my first night on air,” she says. “We stopped at a surf shop and someone recognised me after just one night, which I found really odd as I didn’t even talk in the first scenes.
“I was so young and enthusiastic and had all the energy in the world,” she recalls of the long days on set. “And I loved it. I would turn up and people would say, ‘Bec, it’s too early to be that happy!’ I was jumping around ready to go.”
She still counts many of the cast and crew among her close friends, including Kate Ritchie. “Living in different cities makes any free-and-easy catching up impossible,” Ritchie, who lives in Sydney, tells Stellar.
“But that is a testament to our friendship. Our connection remains the same. Our history, love for each other and interest in our growing families remains the same regardless of location and ease, meaning we will long remain friends for all the right reasons.
“What I know about Bec is that she has put her children and family life before everything else for so long. Not out of sacrifice, but out of love and dedication.”
Despite her immense popularity, Hewitt managed to escape the bad press that can engulf teen stars and never had any run-ins with the law — unless you count the time the police pulled her over just to meet her.
“I had a really lovely family that kept me grounded,” she says. “It’s just your job. You turn up. You dress up. I got to play dress-ups for a living.
I really hope I remained humble throughout. Family was always the most important thing. So when I left work, I left it all behind.”
For as long as she can recall, Hewitt wanted to perform.
“My mum used to tell this story that we would catch the train into the city to go to the castings, and by the end of it I would have the whole carriage talking to me,” she laughs.
“I would do little songs and dances. When I was five she put me into an agency. I started out with commercials and I loved it. Yes, there was the bonus of getting the day off school, but I really loved being in front of the camera and I loved dancing as well.”
Two decades later, Hewitt now finds herself the one ferrying children to dance classes — among other activities.
“Mia is very creative,” she says with visible pride. “She loves doing fashion illustration. Little Miss Ava is a serious gymnast. She does 15 hours a week and eight hours of dance on top of that.
Cruz is interested in anything to do with a ball, but tennis he loves. He will hit balls until the sun has gone down.”
Cruz is so passionate about tennis that he spent his summer holidays training at his father’s tennis academy — but while Australians might hope to see another Hewitt on centre court one day, his mother stays resolutely neutral.
“I hope he doesn’t feel that pressure,” she says. “Cruz is such a strong individual. He will just do his own thing, hopefully. But he has the dedication and commitment.”
As for Hewitt, despite her husband’s patient attempts to help her improve her game and after all these years in the presence of a pro, she still considers herself an “absolute beginner”.
“When I met Lleyton, I didn’t know anyone from tennis,” she recalls with a laugh. “I had never seen a tennis match. Roger Federer could’ve been a swimmer for all I knew.”
Helloworld premieres 4.30pm, Sunday October 7, on the Nine Network.
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Originally published as Bec Hewitt: ‘Lleyton and I are happier than ever’
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