Guy Kelly
Nobody was quite sure whether Laura Brand, Russell Brand’s wife of more than nine years and the mother of his three children, would make the journey from their home in Florida to support him for his recent trial. Those who know her didn’t question her support for her husband, nor her faith in his innocence, but they also know her to be intensely publicity-shy.
Yet there she was, at Brand’s side as he arrived for day one of his trial at Southwark Crown Court last month, wearing a chocolate brown trouser suit, sunglasses and trainers.
In his particular way, Brand told journalists he was feeling “blessed” that morning. Laura, in her way, said nothing, and she maintained her silence when she arrived at court with him on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays throughout the trial, before returning with him in the evening to their accommodation near Waterloo station, and broadcasting with him on their YouTube channel at weekends. If there was a message, it was that she intended to stand by her husband.
A penny for Laura Brand’s thoughts today, then, as she heads home from Southwark Crown Court after witnessing her husband being sentenced to 10 years and six months in prison for rape and sexual assault. When he was found guilty on Thursday (UK time), Laura rocked towards her knees in despair. Today, she and Brand had a brief conversation before he was led away by officers. Earlier he’d mouthed “we’ll be OK” to her.
Now 38, Laura wasn’t always so publicity-averse. Born Laura Gallacher, she is the youngest child of Bernard Gallacher, the Scottish golf legend and former Ryder Cup captain. Her older sister is Kirsty Gallacher, a sports broadcaster. They grew up on the Wentworth Estate in Surrey, UK, surrounded by golf, but also by nature.
Laura and Kirsty are close, but the age gap – Kirsty is 12 years her senior – meant Laura spent a lot of her childhood alone. “My parents allowed me a lot of time outside to be creative, like making mud pies or petal perfumes. To me, that was a world of magic,” she told London’s The Telegraph in 2022.
She was an 18-year-old art student when, in 2007, she was introduced to Brand, then 31, who shared an agent with Kirsty. The pair met in London after one of his live events, and started a brief relationship. Her father, it has been reported, “begged her to end it”.
At that time, Brand was hurtling to fame – as a comedian, TV host and notorious tabloid lothario – before he moved to Hollywood and gained greater renown when he married Katy Perry in 2010. They divorced less than two years later.
Brand then had dalliances with Geri Halliwell and Jemima Khan, presumably among others, before he re-met Laura – freshly single and working in hospitality – by chance in 2015. “My ex had literally moved out of our flat that day, and I was heartbroken, with mascara running down my face,” she told Grazia in 2020. “A friend dragged me out on a walk to the canal in east London, where I’d never been in my life, and as we came on to the footpath, Russell was standing there, like he’d organised it.”
Brand, she told the Made by Mammas podcast the same year, was “so different. We both immediately knew it was going to be serious”. She later recalled to You magazine that Brand said: “‘I think I want a quiet life and a family.’ And it was exactly what I wanted. So then it was about seeing if we could build a foundation to make that happen.”
They married two years later, in a ceremony near Henley-on-Thames attended by Noel Gallagher and Jonathan Ross, among other stars. The event came a few months after the birth of Mabel, now 10. Another daughter, Peggy, now eight, arrived the following year – their son, Herb, was born three years ago.
Laura took to motherhood. So much so, in fact, that it inspired a writing career. In 2020, she published The Joy Journal for Magical Everyday Play, aimed at children. She followed this with The Joy Journal For Grown-ups, aimed at adults, and then Slow Down and Be Here Now, aimed at just about anyone.
Promoting her books with a handful of interviews, the picture Laura painted of family life at their rural Oxfordshire home – where they had dogs, chickens and more than a dozen cats, as well as a narrowboat for weekend cruises – was idyllic, and full of fun and colour. “We really do have fun together,” she said in one. “Sometimes, it can look like I’m dealing with an adult toddler, but Russell’s really into doing the stuff I’m into.”
One journalist who visited the house to meet Laura remembers her as “very warm, but even then – before any [allegations] came out – very guarded about Russell. I felt like she was quite lonely, shut away in this slightly remote house, wary of publicity and judgement, and quite young”.
More than one person who spent time with the family when the children were young mentions a clear imbalance. Laura, who by all accounts is a very likeable figure, had a lot on her plate. Brand once said he’d never changed a nappy, nor spent 24 hours alone with his children because “Laura … respects and cares for their safety too much”.
Laura was asked about that. “Russell’s always been completely hands on,” she told Grazia in 2020. “What he meant, I think, is that he calls me 100 per cent the boss, because it took me a long time to relax into motherhood and I found it hard to let others in … I’m learning to be less controlling.”
Kirsty, for her part, came to his defence over the nappy comment, too. “I think that was a flippant comment, Russell does loads. He’s very hands-on,” she told You magazine in 2019. “I’ve known Russell a long time. He’s amazing, and they lead a fabulous lifestyle. Those little girls are his life. He’s so wonderful with them.”
Fully embracing the good life, the Brands briefly started working together as wellness gurus, even running a festival, “Community with Laura + Russell Brand”, in Hay-on-Wye in the summer of 2023. The three-day vegan, alcohol-free event included “holistic therapies”, a “practical life workshop”, canoeing and comedy.
If that was to be the start of a new era as a mindfulness power couple, it was short-lived. Just two months later, a joint investigation by The Times, The Sunday Times and Channel 4 saw five women publicly accuse Brand of sexual assault, as well as sexual and emotional abuse. Brand, in response, posted a video in which he said he had been “very very promiscuous”, but that all of his relationships had been “absolutely, always consensual”. He always denied all of the allegations made against him.
The reporting led to the Metropolitan Police opening an investigation, which saw Brand charged in April last year with two counts of rape, one count of indecent assault and two counts of sexual assault, in relation to alleged offences involving four women between 1999 and 2005. New charges were brought in December last year, alleging one count of rape and one of sexual assault against two women, said to have taken place in London in 2009. During his trial, the court heard that Brand was a “ruthless, calculated and manipulative sexual predator” who bragged about wanting to sleep with 5000 women in his lifetime.
As the investigations took place, the Brands escaped the press scrutiny in Britain by moving to Florida. Brand came back and forth, including to be baptised by Bear Grylls in the River Thames in 2024, yet before the family left, he’d already reinvented himself as a YouTuber who specialises in conspiracy theories. In Florida, where such displays of faith and anti-establishment views are less unusual, he’s been welcomed – especially by the MAGA crowd.
All the while, Kirsty continued to support him. After the initial allegations surfaced, she reposted a denial video Brand had posted, and added a love heart. As for Laura, she has maintained a strict omerta. There have been no more books or wellness events. Her social media pages, once full of craft ideas and nature photography, have been deactivated. Yet she does occasionally sit beside Brand in his videos.
Quite what Laura does now is anyone’s guess, but it seems unlikely she will stay in Florida, given Brand will be imprisoned in Britain, and her family remains here. That said, the couple’s children will have to deal with their father’s notoriety in his home country. On Monday (UK time), Brand’s lawyer, Ian Winter KC, said Laura is “standing by” her husband, and told the court: “Words are completely inadequate […] to convey the total devastation she’s experiencing. They are wrestling with how to explain to a child, who’s just turned 10, what has just happened here and the consequences of this conduct to totally innocent people who have been caught up in it.”
Earlier this year, Laura spoke in a Facebook broadcast titled, “This is what me and my wife are doing now”. Dressed down and sitting on the floor of a terrace balcony, the Brands appeared together at home, with a crucifix behind them and a coffee table covered in lit candles. Brand had a Bible on a reading stand. Both wore cross necklaces. All around them were trees.
It was never entirely clear what the “this” of the title meant – the video featured a mix of prayer, Bible lessons and rambling discussion over matters of the soul. “I know you hate this world, the culture of creating content,” Brand told his wife, after reflecting on his recent podcast appearances, which included one in which he confessed to sleeping with 16-year-olds.
Laura, he eventually said, had agreed to join him for his new faith-based venture. Later, she would explain that she is a Christian, but seldom joins her husband at church or in the public eye. “I don’t find it easy, and that’s why I don’t ever really want to be doing any of it,” she said of content creation. “I have so many questions about it, and the exposure it inevitably leads to does expose you to a sort of dark energy.”
That much is clearly true. Still, as they set off on their free-form program, Brand thanked her for being with him. Laura smiled meekly. “I must be crazy.”
The Telegraph, London
Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732) or the Men’s Referral Service on 1300 766 491 or Lifeline on 13 11 14.
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