Alice Evans broke down in tears during a court appearance on Thursday, recounting the moment she discovered her marriage was over. The news came not from her husband, actor Ioan Gruffudd, known for his role in Fantastic Four, but from a lawyer.
“I was terrified and utterly alone in Los Angeles,” the 57-year-old actress tearfully recounted, explaining that Gruffudd, 52, never personally informed her of his intention to divorce.
Adding to her distress, Evans testified at the LA Superior Court that she later learned through Instagram about Gruffudd’s romantic relationship with a younger Australian actress, Bianca Wallace, a revelation she described as “the biggest shock” of her life.
Throughout her testimony on the fourth day of the trial, where Gruffudd is seeking to extend a domestic violence restraining order against her, Evans frequently dabbed her eyes with tissues, visibly emotional.
The couple’s separation in early 2021 led to a contentious divorce, which was finalized in 2023. However, their disputes have continued, particularly over financial matters and the custody of their two daughters, 16-year-old Ella and 12-year-old Elsie.
Since then, they’ve been locked in a bitter feud over money and custody of their daughters, Ella, 16, and Elsie, 12.
Alice Evans wept in court Thursday as she recounted learning from a lawyer that her husband, Fantastic Four star Ioan Gruffudd, was divorcing her, saying the emotional turmoil drove her to send harassing messages to him and his now-wife online
Gruffudd and Evans split in early 2021, finalizing a messy divorce in 2023. Since then, they’ve been embroiled in a bitter feud over money and custody of their daughters
Welsh actor Gruffudd accuses his ex of a ‘relentless five-year campaign of harassment and abuse’ against him and Wallace, 33, whom he married in April last year and who bore him his third daughter Mila in November.
Evans, 57, denies any ongoing harassment and is asking Judge Michael Convey to throw out Gruffudd’s request for a new restraining order against her.
She claims she’s broke and wants the court to order Gruffudd to increase the $1,500 a month he pays her in spousal support and the $3,000 a month he pays in child support for their two girls, who, he says, have been ‘poisoned and alienated’ against him by their mother.
Gruffudd wants to stop paying spousal support altogether, based upon Evans’s ‘persistent domestic abuse of him and her many violations of the (previous) restraining order’ and maintains that he has already ‘overpaid’ Evans to the tune of more than $300,000.
Evans – dressed Thursday in a plaid jacket over a black blouse and long orange skirt – told the court that when Gruffudd, whom she’d been with since 2000, left their LA home in January 2021, ‘I thought he just needed some space…to get his head straight.
‘I thought we were just taking a break. I just wanted to keep the family together for the sake of the children.’
Evans had hoped to reconcile with her estranged husband, until her hopes were dashed when Gruffudd let her follow him on Instagram, and she saw that he had begun a relationship with young Australian actress Bianca Wallace
Evans told the court she had clung to hopes of reconciliation, not wanting her daughters, Ella, 16, and Elsie, 12, to grow up in a broken family
But a month later, a lawyer called her and said that Gruffudd had filed for divorce, she told the court.
‘I didn’t want a divorce,’ declared Evans, who said she tried to contact Gruffudd by phone and email, but he didn’t respond.
It was then, she admitted, that she started sending angry and frustrated internet posts and emails to Gruffudd. ‘Too often,’ she replied tearfully when asked how often she was emailing him.
‘It was a sense of panic. My world was being overturned because I couldn’t communicate with him. I felt in limbo because in the 20 years together, we had spoken every single day.
‘I was desperate for us to work things out by talking to each other. I just wanted to talk to my husband… I stupidly thought we could get back together.
Any hopes she had of reconciling with Gruffudd were dashed when, in October of 2021, while Gruffudd was in the south of France filming a movie, she asked if she could follow him on Instagram, and, she said, he replied that ‘he accepted me as a friend.’
Hurt by news of Gruffudd’s new relationship, Evans began posting derogatory messages about him and Wallace on social media – posts she now says she ‘very much regrets’
When she went on Instagram, the first thing she saw was an announcement that Ioan and Bianca Wallace were in a romantic relationship.
With her feelings hurt by news of Gruffudd’s new love, Evans started posting derogatory social media messages about him and Wallace – posts she now ‘very much regrets’.
Looking at Gruffudd, who sat in court in front of her, less than 20 feet away, Evans said: I now can say I’m sorry… I was posting way too much. Now I feel ashamed and humiliated.
‘I’m mortified and hugely regretful and apologetic to Bianca too.’
Evans didn’t show up at the court hearing in August 2022 when Gruffudd and Wallace were granted a three-year restraining order as a result of her online trash-talking.
‘I was terrified of seeing them together,’ she told the court Thursday. ‘I could not go. I stayed home. It was stupid.’
Responding to Wallace’s accusation that a November 2021 post ‘outed’ Bianca’s multiple sclerosis diagnosis, Evans told the court that she thought it was public knowledge but that she was now ‘deeply apologetic’
Of Wallace’s accusation that in a November 2021 online post, Evans had ‘outed’ Bianca’s multiple sclerosis diagnosis, Alice told the court that when she made the post: ‘I honestly thought it was public knowledge. I feel terrible about it – I am deeply apologetic.’
And when asked about Gruffudd’s complaint in court earlier in the week that she sent disturbing emails to his mother, she said: ‘I was just a desperate person because my family was falling apart, and I didn’t know what to do.
‘I thought she (Gruffudd’s mother) could help us somehow keep our family together. It was terribly stupid.
‘I feel a huge sense of shame and embarrassment. I don’t recognize that person – she lost her mind.’
