Paul Merton has opened up about finding love again six months after the death of his wife.
The Have I Got News For You comedian married writer and producer Sarah Parkinson in June 2003, three months before she died of breast cancer, aged 41.
Merton “fell in love” with Suki Webster half a year later – a development he has described as “natural”.
“I don’t think it’s one of those decisions you can make,” he told The Times.
“You see what happens. You’re not looking necessarily because you have to grieve.”
Merton, 65, met fellow comic Webster, 60, as part of their troupe The Comedy Store Players and the pair discovered they had romantic feelings for each other while touring in India.
“We were on brandy and there was a magician in the dark. You don’t think anything except, this is great fun. You don’t think, “oh, is this right or wrong?” It felt natural. It felt OK.’
In the same interview, Webster, who married Merton in 2009, added: “When you fall in love, you fall in love.”
Parkinson was Merton’s second wife following Men Behaving Badly actor Caroline Quentin, whom he divorced after eight years in 1998.
He met Parkinson when she was Quentin’s understudy in the play Arthur Smith’s Live Bed Show.
Parkinson worked on a number of projects with Merton, including writing Suicidal Dog, a BBC Two short film that marked Merton’s debut as a director.
In a statement issued at the time of Parkinson’s death, Merton said via his agent: “After her initial devastating diagnosis of cancer in February 2002 Sarah successfully lived with the disease for the next 19 months.
“She refused chemotherapy because she knew it would finish her off. Instead, she boosted her immune system with a mixture of nutritional therapy, yoga, meditation, positive thinking and laughter.”
Merton has been a team captain on the satirical show Have I Got News For You since its premiere in 1990.
He shot to fame as part of the British version of comedy improv show Whose Line is it Anyway? in the late 1980s.
