Will ‘new’ Ronnie be a better dad to twins than to his other kids?
His fellow Stones think he’s too old at 68 and his ex-wife isn’t overjoyed
THERE have already been congratulations from best mate Rod Stewart, who fathered his last child aged 66. And the father-to-be is proudly boasting that he has gone one better than his pal Paul McCartney, who was “only 61” when he fathered daughter Beatrice.
In all, it’s fair to say that Ronnie Wood, the 68-year-old Rolling Stones guitarist, is feeling entirely cock-ahoop with delight at the moment.
Friends say he was as astonished as everyone else when his wife, Sally Humphreys, 37, let him know he was to be a father again – of twins.
“Ronnie was shocked because he didn’t think that it was going to happen, but he is very, very proud of himself,” said a source.
“He is saying things like ‘I may be 68, but I’m not firing blanks’.”
The news was announced to the rest of the Rolling Stones on Sunday and they are said to be “completely nonplussed, especially Keith (Richards), who feels that they are more at grandparent age than parent age”.
Indeed, when the babies arrive in June, they will be younger than Ronnie’s troupe of nine grandchildren, ranging from 15 to three months old – a mind-boggling thought.
It’s fair to say the previous Mrs Ronnie Wood, rock chick Jo, is less than delighted by the news. “Gobsmacked” is the word used to describe her reaction.
Although amicable nowadays following their very public and messy split in 2008, when Ronnie ran off with a Russian waitress days after their daughter Leah’s wedding, Jo nevertheless hasn’t been gushing congratulations.
“Ronnie did go around saying they weren’t going to have children, and then suddenly Sally is pregnant with twins,” she said.
Possibly significantly, neither Jo nor Leah – both prolific Twitter users – chose to refer to the big news online this week.
Approached for comment, Jo’s agent Julia Champion said: “She just doesn’t want to comment on it – it’s nothing to do with her.”
It is true that Sally has made no bones from the very start of the relationship that she wanted babies.
“I would like children but not yet,” she said just before they were married in 2012.
Two together will be quite a handful. Multiple births are increasingly common these days, not least because of the general increase in IVF babies, so there are support networks out there.
Ronnie, who is said to be utterly devoted to Sally, was happy to start again. For, let’s face it, when it comes to fatherhood, Ronnie could benefit from a chance to do things properly this time.
He wasn’t much of a dad to his first brood: Jamie, 41, who is Jo’s first son by a previous relationship; Jesse, 39, from his marriage to first wife Krissy; and Leah, 37, and Tyrone, 32, from his marriage to Jo.
He famously forbade them to eat meringues, for instance, because he often mistook the crumbs for rocks of cocaine, and he and Jo surrounded them with hell-raising, rock ’n’ roll chaos, punctuated by long months of absence when he was on the road.
His first family were raised between London, LA and New York, with nannies and boarding school filling the gaps while their parents were partying. Eldest son Jamie, now a successful art gallery owner, clocked up 15 schools before eventually being expelled aged 16. This time around, it will all be different.
With Sally, a theatre producer, Ronnie is clean and sober. They live a delightfully middle-class existence in a home in Holland Park, West London. She is the daughter of two classical musicians, and was head girl at King Edward VI Grammar School in Handsworth, Birmingham. She barely drinks, doesn’t smoke and loves to bake.
Evenings are spent playing backgammon, doing jigsaws and watching TV box sets. Ronnie particularly liked the American drama Breaking Bad, and introduced Mick Jagger to the melodramatic delights of Game Of Thrones.
“Sally has transformed Ronnie,” said the long-standing friend. “For instance, he now goes to the dentist regularly like a normal person, whereas before he used to use glue to put on his crowns if they fell off. He has what you would recognise as a normal life, and he actually eats.”
He’s not a complete angel, however; Ronnie remains an enthusiastic smoker, and was seen waving what appeared to be a fat “spliff” (cannabis cigarette) while on stage with the Stones in Macau last year. Compared to the Ronnie of old, however, he has undergone a complete transformation.