Against All Odds, Phil Collins Reunites With Ex-wife

Eight years after Phil Collins divorced his third wife, Orianne Cevey, he has not revealed that they are back together and raising their two children in the same household.

The former Genesis frontman had a decades-successful career as a musician but did not have as much success with marriage. In fact, when Collins and Cevey split in 2006, with him stating that they had “grown apart,” he had to pay the biggest alimony payment in British History, €25 million, topping the previous record that was held by Paul McCartney. Collins never remarried after that point in time, though he revealed several years later that he still loved, and still had contact, with Cevey, but that she was in another romantic relationship. However, things apparently changed some time ago, although it’s not been made public until now.

Collins has suffered from health problems including neuropathy, which causes numbness in his feet and makes it difficult to play the drums. He never remarried after his 2006 divorce from Cevey.

He purportedly told Billboard magazine about the reconciliation, according to Sky News. They bought a house and are now living in Miami, Florida. He says it didn’t seem to attract much attention.

“I’m actually back with my third wife – haven’t really talked about it. We’ve been back together a while, and nobody’s really noticed.”

Cevey was never in the music industry. Prior to marrying Phil Collins, she worked as a language interpreter. While it doesn’t appear they have remarried, being back with Cevey and his children full time seems to have given him some motivation to possibly get back in the studio and create new music.

“But my kids want me to do shows so they can brag to their friends. I intend on doing some things. I stopped going into the studio because I was sad, but now I’m getting a taste of it again.”

Although Cevey has married a millionaire again after her divorce from Collins, things didn’t seem to work out. Cevey, 42 years old, found herself in a bad situation after she was left using a wheelchair after she was partially paralyzed due to complications from a 2014 surgery to repair a slipped disc in her cervical spine. She is now reportedly walking again.

She and Collins, 64 years old, are alleged to have been back together for six months. They originally married in 1999, and their marriage of just seven years produced two children, now adolescents. Matthew Collins is 14 and Nicholas Collins is 10. Phil Collins moved back to the United States from Switzerland last year after having a battle with alcoholism which he has said stemmed from missing his family, according to the Daily News.

He is no longer drinking and in far better health, although he has yet to return to the studio. Each of his failed marriages have been costly and produced children. His first marriage to drama student Andrea Bertorelli in 1975, which ended in 1980, resulted in his first two children, son Simon Collins and his wife’s daughter Joely, whom he adopted.

With his second wife Jill Tavelman, he had daughter Lily Collins, who is a successful Hollywood actress and model. He and Jill married in 1984 after meeting in 1980, but they divorced in 1996. Just three years later he married Cevey.

Now with five children, scores of number one hit songs, a reconciliation with the woman he claims to love, improved health, and a current triumph over alcoholism, it seems as if Collins is preparing to re-enter the music world. Few musicians have pulled themselves from such dire circumstances, but after all, Phil Collins has always been “Against All Odds.”

[Photo by Dave Hogan/Getty Images]