Great British Bake Off star Prue Leith, 84, thought her husband was “mad” to marry her due to their age difference. In her autobiography I’ll Try Anything Once, Prue detailed the contrast between her retired fashion designer spouse John Playfair, in his late 70s, and her previous husband, property mogul Rayne Kruger.
“John describes himself as a short, grey-haired, knock-kneed coffin-dodger, but to me he’s a dream come true,” she affectionately remarked. Bake Off star Prue recalled how Rayne preferred a more secluded lifestyle, one far removed from the social whirlwind she now enjoys with John.
“I love the fact that I now have someone to go to parties with,” she expressed. Highlighting the age dynamics in both of her marriages, Prue noted: “Rayne was positively reclusive, avoiding the neighbours and much happier at home than anywhere else.
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“We never went to films, seldom to restaurants, almost never to friends for dinner. I was used to attending parties on my own.
“John is seven years younger than me. Rayne was nearly twenty years my senior and thought of me as a spring chicken. Now I was more an old duck trying to disguise my age.”
She also recounted an amusing yet telling incident where, during a countryside stroll with John, she tripped and fell, which led her to worry about appearing old.
She said: “I had three distinct thoughts before I hit the deck: thank God there isn’t a car coming; oh hell, I’m going to take the skin off my hands; and oh, no, John is going to think I fell over because I’m old. I fall over a lot.”
Prue also spoke about her hesitations about getting into serious relationships, due to age-related self-consciousness, especially after undergoing three surgeries in two years. Speaking affectionately of her partner, she said: “I thought he was mad to take me on.
“In our first two years together I’d had two new knees and an operation on my back.” She opened up about how, following the death of her first husband, she never imagined remarrying, yet found herself longing for another wedding: “Strangely, I began to want it, to need to tell the world, make a public declaration.”
Despite her growing desire, the fear of rejection kept Prue from proposing marriage herself. “Rejection would have been unbearable,” she admitted.
However, during a holiday in Namibia with John, he surprised her with an unorthodox proposal that changed everything. As they laughed over an elephant calf’s antics, John hinted at a future together.
Prue recalled: “We were in the wilds of Namibia, laughing at a baby elephant trying to shove his way to water through the legs of his family, when John said, ‘Do you think we’ll still have this much fun when we’re married?'”
The moment caused her heart to flutter, but Prue doubted his seriousness, adding: “I confess my heart missed a beat, but I thought he didn’t mean it. Just a slip of the tongue.”
It took Prue a week to gather the courage to confirm John’s intentions, and she still believes in the magic of marriage.
She added: “We wanted to be Mr and Mrs: a declaration of happiness and commitment, to have and to hold, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health. Somehow those words still do the business.”