Albert Roux’s will leaves son Michel with an empty plate
WHEN I revealed the celebrated chef Albert Roux had quietly married in 2019 for a third time at the age of 83, to a woman almost three decades his junior, friends hoped she would bring some joy to his twilight years.
Sadly, Roux, who turned Gordon Ramsay and Marco Pierre White into culinary stars, died in January, around two years after he married Maria Rodrigues.
Now I can disclose he ensured Maria was well rewarded — leaving her a large portion of his £652,000 estate. Surprisingly, perhaps, Albert, who founded Le Gavroche, the first restaurant in Britain to be awarded three Michelin stars, left nothing in his will to his son Michel Roux Jr, the star of many TV programmes.
According to newly published probate documents, Roux’s estate was worth £614,727 after his outstanding affairs were finalised. Of that, £224,727 will be served up to Maria, 57, a high-flyer at City firm KPMG. She was also bequeathed all his personal items, except for his sapphire cufflinks, which go to his nephew, Alain Roux, and his ruby cufflinks to his stepson, Joshua Rodrigues, who is also left a legacy of £15,000.
He left £55,000 to his sister Martine; £250,000 to his daughter, Danielle; £20,000 to his granddaughter Rosie; and £5,000 to three grandchildren. A niece also received £5,000. The will, written last year, states that Roux had given his son, Michel, many gifts over the years.
I disclosed that Albert and Maria had wed after their first public outing, at a Restaurant Association dinner at the Savoy in London, where Roux used a walking cane. ‘Maria was very attentive to Albert all evening,’ a guest said. ‘She’s clearly given him a whole new lease of life.’
The wedding came four years after Roux divorced his second wife, Cheryl Smith, a statuesque Zimbabwean 21 years his junior.
She had met Roux a few years after his divorce from his first wife, Monique. Cheryl, whose business success had earned her a £30 million fortune of her own, later recalled how she had spurned his advances — initially, at least.
‘When I met Albert, he had seven girlfriends,’ she said. ‘I told him I would not be part of his harem.’ But Roux would not be rebuffed and they married in 2006.
But in 2013 the French chef became distracted by Nataliya Lutsyshyna, a 40-year-old Ukrainian who worked as a cloakroom attendant at his restaurant in Westminster. Cheryl ordered Roux to leave their house in Belgravia and filed for divorce.