In spite of being one of the most famous and photographed families in the celebrity sphere, the Beckhams are pros at retaining their privacy. So it’s no surprise that David’s new self-titled documentary, Beckham, is where he and Victoria have decided to speak about the effects of his alleged affair with Rebecca Loos for the first time — on their own terms.
The four-part series is released today on Netflix, and gives an endearing glimpse at the intricacies of the couple’s nearly 25-year relationship. Their inseparable early days, David’s love of err... bees, and most tellingly how they coped with the cheating allegations nearly 20 years ago. Aptly, the pair have described the experience of recording the documentary as like “therapy” for them.
Here’s a reminder of the events that shocked Beckham fans everywhere in the Noughties, plus everything they have now revealed about that time — and how they and Loos moved forward.
Who was Rebecca Loos anyway?
The then 26-year-old Loos worked as David Beckham’s PA. When David relocated to Spain to play for Real Madrid, Victoria remained in the UK with their two young sons, Brooklyn and Romeo.
Meanwhile, in his documentary Beckham recalls feeling lonely: “When I first moved to Spain it was difficult because I had been part of a club and a family for my whole career, from the age of 15 to when I was 27. I get sold overnight, the next minute I’m in a city, I don’t speak the language. More importantly, I didn’t have my family.”
The alleged affair
The News Of The World published a story in 2004 citing an affair between Beckham and Loos, in which she claimed it lasted several months. Loos then went on to give multiple interviews about the allegations, telling Sky News that the supposed affair began during a group dinner.
Loos said to the network: “there was a huge risk if I got involved with this man”. Though she claimed there was chemistry at the dinner that led her to pursue it. “That night we just really hit it off.” Adding: “It was the first time, we were just locked into each other all night conversation wise. We just connected. People noticed it.”
The aftermath of the allegations
The Beckhams have always vehemently denied infidelity allegations, though have now spoken about the effect they had on their relationship for the first time.
Victoria Beckham says the aftermath of the headlines in the months that followed made them the “hardest” of her life, and says she felt the couple no longer “had each other.” She added: “It was the hardest period for us. Because it felt like the world was against us.”
Meanwhile, David recalls how he “felt physically sick every day” while his marriage was suffering.
Victoria went on to relocate to Spain to be with David, where she says she decorated a new home herself to make a base for the family. They went on to welcome son Cruz in 2005.
In the documentary, she said: “As soon as I could get the kids in school, we then move full-time. Did I resent David? If I am being totally honest, yes I did. It was probably, if I’m being honest, the most unhappy I have ever been in my life. It wasn’t that I felt unheard because I chose to internalise a lot of it because I was always mindful of a focus that he needed.”
Victoria also shares how much she was affected by this heavy media scrutiny, calling it a “nightmare” and a “circus”. While David recalls the kids’ school run was “live on Spanish TV.”
“Here’s the thing, we were against each other, if I’m being completely honest,” the designer recalls. “Up until Madrid sometimes it felt like us against everybody else but we were together, we were connected, we had each other. But when we were in Spain, it didn’t really feel like we had each other either. And that’s sad. I can’t even begin to tell you how hard it was. And how it affected me.”
They recall: “Every time that we woke up we felt there was something else. We both felt at the time that we were not losing each other but drowning.”
Speaking about how they managed to get through the period in Madrid, David says: “Victoria is everything to me, to see her hurt was incredibly difficult, but we’re fighters and at that time we needed to fight for each other, we needed to fight for our family.”
“And what we had was worth fighting for. There were some days that I would wake up and think, ‘How am I going to go to work? How am I going to walk on to that training pitch? How am I going to look as if nothing’s wrong?’ I felt physically sick every day when I opened my eyes, ‘How am I going to do this?’”
Moving on
Relief came for the couple in 2007 with a move to LA, where David played for LA Galaxy. It helped Victoria to finally feel “at peace,” she says in the documentary.
“I was so relieved to be going from such a tricky situation in Spain. It [LA] was a place where everything was just so much easier. Easier to find a house, easier to find a school, you don’t have a language barrier. And so for me, it was all my dreams come true,” she recalls.
The couple only cite one more bump in the road for them after this: David leaving to go to Italy temporarily in July 2007. “What do you mean, you wanna go to Milan? We’ve just moved from one side of the world to the other for you,” she recalls saying to her husband.
“What I signed up for was us being in LA as a family, so I didn’t expect to turn up in LA, have everything perfect, and then he go, ‘Oh guess what, surprise! I’m going away again’. I respected his career, I always have done immensely, but not again. I was really upset,” she explains.
The couple are gearing up or their 25th wedding anniversary next year and the final episode of the series sees them at their current home in Oxfordshire. It also features interviews with their children, including youngest daughter Harper, born in 2011.
So where is Loos now?
Now 42, Loos made a reported £1m from interviews and media appearances about her affair claims. She then went on to appear in multiple reality shows in the Noughties, including Love Island.
She now lives in Norway with doctor husband Sven Christjar Skaiaa (whom she met on a TV show) in a remote hamlet in the mountains. The pair have two sons and Loos is a keen yogi.
