Hugh Grant occasionally runs to the “loo” to get some peace and quiet from his five children.
During an episode of “The Kelly Clarkson Show,” Grant, 64, who was promoting his film “Heretic,” was asked about life with five children, who range in age from 6 to 13.
Speaking with Clarkson, who is a mother of two, he admitted that while he enjoys a little bit of roughhousing, he has his limits.
“I love a bit of that,” Grant said, before adding with his trademark deadpan humor, “I mean, there’s a lot to dread ’cause I’m old, and it’s noisy, and it’s unbearable. And I do a lot of hiding in the loo. I do a lot of sleeping in there now… There’s a lock, but they’ve pretty much broken it now.”
Despite his age affecting his tolerance, Grant emphasized to Clarkson that he deeply loves his children and being a father.
“It is nice,” Grant said. “I’m going home tonight, and you know, let’s face it, the bit where they jump in your arms… the 6-year-old, you know, she calls it her chimpanzee hug. I quite like that.
“I’ve made myself cry,” he noted.
Grant shares his oldest children: daughter Tabitha, 13, and son Felix, 11, with his ex, Tinglan Hong.
Grant and his wife, Anna Eberstein, have three children: son John, 12, daughter Lulu, 8, and daughter Blue, 6.
Only last month, Grant revealed the names of his youngest children on an episode of “Jimmy Kimmel Live.”
“We thought it might be nice for [Lulu] when she was older if she could say in bars that her middle name is Danger, so we named her Lulu Danger Grant,” he told Kimmel in October.
Previously, Grant had been private about his children’s lives. In 2018, the “Notting Hill” star told People that he loved to make his kids laugh.
“I think it’s always amusing to put your underpants on your head,” he told the outlet at the time. “I made the mistake of showing one of my sons my a– all the time. ‘Hey, look at this!’ Then he got the habit and taught every single child in west London to do the same.”
The star had to learn how to balance his work and his personal life, which led him to appreciate time spent with his family.
“I thought, ‘Oh, fantastic opportunity to get away from my screaming children,’” he recalled to people about filming “The Undoing” in the U.S. “As soon as I got to New York each time… I missed them so much. It was awful. I remember almost every scene I acted in made me cry.”
