Why HAS Rowan’s girl ditched her dad’s name?
WHEN comic Rowan Atkin-son’s daughter, Lily, launched her career as a burlesque dancer and singer two years ago, it was not just her sultry vocals and racy outfits that attracted interest, but her father’s world-famous surname.
Now, however, 22-year-old Lily has ditched the Atkinson and adopted the maiden name of her mother, Sunetra Sastry, whom the Black-adder star dumped for a woman little older than his daughter.
‘It’s a real mystery,’ says one of Lily’s admirers. ‘Atkinson has been Lily’s name all her life, but she’s now dropped it and is styling herself as Lily Sastry.
‘I hope she hasn’t fallen out with her dad. The divorce was really hard for everyone in the family.’
After a string of successful per-formances in London last year, including at St James Theatre, Lily suddenly disappeared from social media — the only platform she relied on to promote her work and forthcoming gigs — leaving her 45,000 followers in the lurch. She also deleted her entire catalogue of posts on the picture- sharing website Instagram over the past two years.
But what has now really set tongues wagging is her decision to eradicate
all traces of her father from her public profile. I disclosed in 2014 that Atkinson’s 24- year marriage to former BBC make-up artist Sunetra, 55, had hit the rocks and that he had a new woman in his life.
She was subsequently named as Louise ford, a 33-year-old actress he met while they appeared in the play Quartermaine’s Terms in 2013.
Last year, it was reported that Atkinson, 62, had moved Louise into his £4.65 million cottage in north London just weeks after his divorce from Sunetra, with whom he also has a 23-year-old son, Benjamin.
Lily is planning to release an album next year, which she appeared to confirm this week when she suddenly broke her social media silence with this racy picture in which a topless Lily sports a translucent skirt (above). Hinting at a release date for her new music, she wrote: ‘14.02.18. The process begins.’
While Atkinson has insisted he is ‘on board’ with Lily’s career choice, he was pictured apparently falling asleep in the audience when she performed in Chelsea last year.
The comedian could not be reached. Lily’s spokesman would not comment on why she dropped Atkinson’s name, but insisted: ‘There is no truth in the idea that Rowan and Lily have fallen out.’