When Nicola Peltz met Brooklyn Beckham at Coachella music festival in 2017, it was hardly love at first sight.
In fact, the daughter of US billionaire Nelson Peltz claimed they ‘didn’t get along’. But Brooklyn, eldest son of David and Victoria Beckham, ‘always thought she was really beautiful’.
Fast-forward two years and the pair met again at a Halloween party hosted by Leonardo DiCaprio in Los Angeles. So began one of the most discussed relationships in showbusiness – one that has since driven a rift through Brooklyn’s tight-knit family.
Recounting their love story in a gushing joint interview with the German edition of Glamour magazine earlier this month, 26-year-old Brooklyn was the picture of husbandly devotion as he looked at his wife and cooed: ‘[The party’s] where I fell in love with you.’
But, instead of returning the sentiment, the 30-year-old actress awkwardly giggled and replied through clenched teeth: ‘That’s true.’
Brushing off the apparent snub, Brooklyn touched her on the knee and insisted: ‘We’ve been inseparable ever since.’
True, the young couple has rarely been seen without one another since their lavish wedding in 2022. But many are beginning to question if this is through mutual adoration or because of ‘obsession’ from Brooklyn – and has sparked alarm among his family.
Those who know the aspiring chef and amateur photographer say he has a tendency to ‘fall head over heels in love’ with women very quickly. But even they were shocked at the speed that it happened with Nicola.
‘Brooklyn has had other girlfriends, some very long term, but we have never seen anything like Nicola before,’ a source close to him told the Mail. ‘This is pure infatuation.
‘They met and just a few months later he moved to the States to be with her. He wanted her to be the one.
‘He is absolutely besotted. They have barely spent a night apart since they have been together. It’s like he can’t imagine life without her – he will literally do anything she wants him to.’
While friends jokingly agree that Brooklyn is ‘soppy’ with his girlfriends, his infatuation with Nicola has deeply worried his parents.
Sources suggest that Nicola ‘very much enjoys’ Brooklyn’s devotion and that this has been a key factor in the feud with his family – which escalated when the couple snubbed David’s 50th birthday celebrations last month.
‘He will do anything Nicola wants,’ says one friend. ‘And that has very much been a thing in the fallout.’
Brooklyn’s attachment to Nicola has not gone unnoticed by the masses.
Clips have begun circulating online of the couple interacting at red carpet events, with social media users branding Brooklyn an ‘obsessive man’ due to his apparently bizarre behaviour.
One widely-shared clip shows the couple at Victoria Beckham’s show at Paris Fashion Week last year when they were still on speaking terms.
Brooklyn – who has previously admitted that he ‘always’ tries to match Nicola’s outfits because he ‘really likes it’ – wore an almost identical white shirt and bow tie to his wife.
As the couple move through a crowd arm in arm, Nicola peels off momentarily to hug another person. Left alone briefly, Brooklyn appears visibly frightened before grabbing her around the waist and pressing his face into her ear when she returns.
Other clips show the couple at the Met Gala in 2021 and 2023 when, on both occasions, Brooklyn tries to hide behind her by picking up the train of her luxurious gown.
Another video that has picked up traction is a 2023 interview with Cosmopolitan magazine, in which Nicola has to guess things that annoy Brooklyn.
Her first (correct) answer is: ‘When I don’t say I love you back in five seconds?’
Her next telling guess is: ‘When I don’t text you back right away?’ He replies: ‘That’s not one I was thinking of, but that does annoy me.’
The clips have divided the internet with some branding his behaviour ‘creepy’.
One social media user commented: ‘[Brooklyn’s behaviour] makes me feel really uncomfortable, I once had an obsessive man and it wasn’t healthy for either of us.’
Another added: ‘I hate obsessive men, I can’t stand them. They become controlling and anxious without you. It’s weird.’
However others have defended him, saying they want ‘a man who is that obsessed with me’.
One social media user commented: ‘It’s my fantasy to have a devoted worshipper, personal cheerleader, emotional support man like this.’
Others, however, have suggested Nicola’s ‘got him wrapped around her finger’.
Regardless of the online debate, it’s unlikely to heal the ongoing feud with his family that has bubbled to the surface over the past month.
Rumours of a rift have circulated since the couple’s £3million wedding at her parents’ estate in Florida, when Nicola snubbed one of her mother-in-law’s designs for a custom Valentino gown.
But they exploded last month when Brooklyn skipped all four of his father’s birthday parties, despite being in London with Nicola at the time.
His wife’s team tried to brief the US media that the reason they didn’t attend is because she had fallen out with Kim Turnbull, the then girlfriend of Brooklyn’s younger brother Romeo.
But, regardless, Brooklyn made it clear that he had taken his wife’s side in the fall-out, posting a video on Instagram with the caption: ‘I always choose you baby.’
So severe has the situation become that the Beckhams now refer to Brooklyn as ‘The Hostage’. He no longer speaks to his brothers Romeo, 22, or Cruz, 20, and failed to congratulate his father after the footballer was given a knighthood.
While the Beckhams are primarily based in London, Brooklyn has now permanently settled in Los Angeles where he bought an £11million mansion.
Detailing his life with Nicola, Brooklyn has said they spend most evenings alone together when he likes to run her a bath and watch television with her by the fire.
It’s a far cry from the partying lifestyle he led as a young man in London when he’d enjoy nights out with his former friends Jack Ramsay, the son of celebrity chef Gordon, and Anais Gallagher, the daughter of Oasis frontman Noel.
But perhaps that ‘happy ever after’ is a price worth paying for the most eyebrow-raising of romances.
