Katy Perry appears to have had the last laugh on ex-husband Russell Brand after he started their divorce by text – scoring a £180million payday as he faces serious allegations about his behaviour with women.
Perry, 38, sold her popular back catalogue to Litmus Music on Monday, landing a fortune for her stakes in master recordings and publishing rights on five of her albums.
The extraordinary windfall could not be in starker contrast to the man she once shared her life with, whose own empire appears to be crumbling.
Brand has been accused of a series of lurid allegations from four women including rape and sexual assault.
He vehemently denies the claims, which were first disclosed by Channel 4’s Dispatches and The Sunday Times.
Perry has not made any comment on the allegations facing her former husband, but has continued to post unrelated posts on her social media.
Their romance came something of a surprise when it first became public 14 years ago.
The pair met on the set of Get Him to the Greek, the Hollywood movie in which Brand had a starring role.
The couple held a lavish wedding in India at the Ranthambore Tiger Sanctuary in Rajasthan in 2010.
At the Oscars that year, they seemed to clash in an interview with Perry calling him out on his ‘bull****’ after accusing her husband of not watching the event. Brand replied: ‘Don’t swear’ before later tugging her away from the interview.
Their marriage was set to be short lived after Brand told the singer he wanted a divorce via text message the following year.
The heartbreaking scene when she got the message was captured in a film of her life called Katy Perry: Part of Me, and showed her struggling with being apart from him.
Perry was shown clutching a necklace Brand gave her as she sobs uncontrollably just ahead of a concert in Brazil after struggling with the news.
The film showed Perry in tears backstage, unable to communicate whether or not the show would go ahead, although it eventually did.
She later admitted that she did not know if Brand had even watched the film which showed the effects of the break-up. ‘I don’t know if he’s seen it,’ Perry said in 2012. ‘But he knew the cameras were always around.’
Further footage from the film showed difficulties within their relationship, with Perry admitting in one scene that she was fighting to keep the marriage alive.
As well as showing that Perry was the one making the most journeys to visit her husband at the time, the film also revealed their different attitudes to family.
While Brand appeared to be looking forward to parenthood, at 10 years younger and with only a few years of success behind her at the time, Perry was not quite ready.
Another scene at the time showed Perry looking exhausted on a plane asking one of her entourage when her next break in the tour is so she could go and see Brand.
She looked distressed when she was informed she would not be able to see him for another 18 days.
In another shot, a crewmember asked Perry if Brand was coming to visit her.
The angry popstar responded: ‘He should but he’s not.’
She later admitted: ‘I’m fighting to keep my marriage alive.’
A friend then added: ‘She should be resting, but she wants to fly to wherever Russ is to show she cares. She’s running herself ragged.’
In another sequence, Perry received a text from Brand mentioning their future children, to which she said: ‘I will be a mother when I decide to be a mother, but not right now. A baby can’t have her baby.’
A second text then prompted the singer to break down in tears. Brand filed for divorce from Perry- who was on tour at the time – in December 2011 after just 14 months of marriage.
Speaking in a Vogue interview, the California Gurls singer said she had initially taken ‘a lot of responsibility’ for the split until she ‘found out the real truth.’
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Accusations: Brand, 48, has been accused of rape, sexual assault and emotional abuse by four women who said the alleged incidents took place in the height of his fame, between 2006 and 2013 (pictured together in 2009)
Perry said she would keep this ‘truth,’ which she could not ‘necessarily disclose,’ locked in her safe ‘for a rainy day.’
It has prompted renewed speculation about what secret the singer had been referring to following the divorce.
She said at the time: ‘He’s a very smart man, and I was in love with him when I married him.
‘Let’s just say I haven’t heard from him since he texted me saying he was divorcing me December 31, 2011.’
Perry added: ‘I felt a lot of responsibility for it ending, but then I found out the real truth, which I can’t necessarily disclose because I keep it locked in my safe for a rainy day.
‘I let go and I was like: This isn’t because of me; this is beyond me. So I have moved on from that.’
The couple reportedly had marriage therapy before their relationship fell apart and comedian David Baddiel explained the cracks were present long before they wedded.
‘I was there,’ he said. ‘Russell did tell me that they had a big row the night before they got married. I did think when he said that, of asking, ‘Are you sure?’ but I didn’t say that. Perhaps I should have done.’
Brand also appeared to have contempt for Perry’s lifestyle.
Speaking in documentary Brand: A Second Coming in 2015, which was filmed during the couple’s marriage, he said: ‘The stuff in Africa hit me really hard.
‘I’m associated with the very thing I detest: vapid, vacuous, plastic, constructed, mindless celebrity. That’s the very sea we’re swimming in, ‘Oh, who’s he?’ … ‘He’s married to Katy Perry’.’
However, he later went on to say on TikTok: ‘I really tried in that relationship. I have nothing but positive feelings for her.’
Elsewhere in the film, Brand was also seen mocking his wife in a stand-up routine and admitting to friend Stephen Merchant that he didn’t think their marriage would last.
He told him: ‘It’s definitely good I’m with someone I love.
‘But it’s not a resolution to anything spiritual.’
‘This is my suspicion, that at some point, to be happy, I’m going to have to walk away.’
This was perhaps most evident by his behaviour during their time together.
In a now notorious social media incident he posted an unflattering picture of Perry on his Twitter page that showed her without a scrap of make-up.
In the frame, the Teenage Dream star appears to have just woken up and is sporting a rather startled look.
It was quickly deleted from Brand’s Twitter page in what was taken as a sign of her displeasure at it being published.
Whatever the truth of the matter, it appears the once close pair could not be further apart in their good fortune or otherwise.
