Kevin Clifton's wild love life – three divorces, bitter jealousy and Strictly curse

Former Strictly Come Dancing professional Kevin Clifton has had a complicated run at love.

As he turns 39, Daily Star Online has looked into his love life, ranging from three divorces, falling into a depression after a split and his now loved-up life with Stacey Dooley.

His romantic life certainly hasn’t been easy, with even his happiest of romances with Stacey facing a public break-up as the pair were rocked by the infamous Strictly curse.

Now that the dust has settled, the happy couple are more loved-up than ever before – but what has Kevin’s love life truly looked like in the past?

Anna Melnikova

Kevin has always been an old-school romantic and first fell in love at a very young age. His first marriage occurred in 2003 to his professional Latin dance partner Anna Melnikova, reports say.

Kevin and Anna were partners between 2002 and 2006.

Speaking about his first marriage Kevin has said: “We got to a stage where we were at the top of our game but we hadn’t won a world championship. We were approached and told that if we paid the right people we would be guaranteed the title but it would cost more than £10,000 in all and I just felt somewhere it had all gone wrong.

“My parents believed we could win without it, but I wanted to walk away from the whole thing. My wife divorced me because it was her life.”

He said that he “fell into depression” after they split because his life had “burst apart”.

Clare Craze

When it came to his second wife Clare Craze Kevin didn’t spare a minute. The couple met during a night out at a salsa bar and instantly hit it off.

Clare was also a dancer and had studied ballet from when she was two years old. They performed together on the world tour of international dance show Burn the Floor.

However, by 2010 they had drifted apart and called time on their marriage after Clare became increasingly uncomfortable watching Kevin perform sensual routines with other women.

Their divorce was finalised in 2013.

Kevin has since said that his marriage was unhappy and referred to it as his “rebellion”.

He said: “” was never particularly happy in my previous marriage.

“I wasn’t myself – a lot of friends and family were telling me that. It was just a bit of a weird time. When I met Karen, I could get on with her on a completely different level.”

Karen Hauer

Kevin first met Strictly Professional Karen Hauer in 2011 on the Burn The Floor tour. The Venezuelan dancer hit it off with Kevin and when they both joined Strictly just a year apart with Karen becoming part of the cast in 2012 and Kevin following suit in 2013.

He later proposed to her on stage on her birthday during a performance of Burn The Floor. They got married on July 11 2015. The star-studded bash featured on the cover of HELLO! magazine.

However, things weren’t meant to be and things soon turned sour as Karen later admitted her jealousy started to mount, telling The Divorce Club podcast: “It’s six years down the line and things started going wrong, just little things, like a phone call, like, ‘You didn’t call me the whole day.

“There were little attacks that we would do to each other.”

She added: “Then the fights, I was getting jealous, but I was only jealous because I wasn’t getting the attention that I wanted from my husband and then I didn’t understand why so I started gripping, trying to pull him.

“‘Why are you not doing this? Why are you not doing that?’

Kevin announced they had split on March 15 2018.

While they had split romantically, they have continued to dance together in pro dances for years. Kevin explained: “Privately we are not together anymore but professionally we are stronger than ever before.

“Dance is how we came together and is what glues together. We’re still the best of friends and we still have a lot of love and respect for each other.”

Stacey Dooley

Kevin met Stacey when she took part in the 2018 series of Strictly Come Dancing.

The duo made an iconic coupling, hot-footing their way to the final and going on to win the iconic Glitterball trophy as champions of the season.

At the time, romantic rumours erupted around the couple, though Stacey was in a relationship, making them one of the couples targeted by the “Strictly curse”.

Stacey has previously said that she didn’t fall for Kevin while they were training together, but after the show ended she wanted to “hang out with him” still.

Ultimately, months after their Strictly pairing, the duo confirmed their relationship on social media after Stacey split from her ex-boyfriend of five years Sam Tucknott.

The couple moved in together last year due to the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdown.

They have remained relatively low-key about their relationship, keeping out of the public eye as much as possible.

Journalist and documentary maker Stacey, 34, has previously opened up about their choice to keep their relationship private.

She told The Guardian: ”Kev and I have agreed not to go into too much detail about our private lives because you can’t really indulge that and then ask for privacy.

“That’s why we’ve turned down interviews that have offered us tens of thousands of pounds.”

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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk