Joe Lycett has become a familiar face on TV through shows like Late Night Lycett and Travel Man, but he keeps his personal life largely out of the spotlight. The comedian, from Birmingham, has other credits including The Great British Sewing Bee, LOL: Last One Laughing UK and The Celebrity Traitors.
Romance with 'Denise'
Joe confirmed his relationship with his girlfriend in 2024 and explained why he uses a pseudonym for her. Speaking on The Pieces podcast with Drag Race star Bimini Bon-Boulash, he said: “So I’ve got Winston the cat, and my partner Denise. And, um, she’s not called Denise, but I don’t talk about her, because she has a job that she can’t be in the public eye. I call her Denise because she hates the name Denise, so I live with Denise.”
In October 2024, Joe revealed he had welcomed his first child, a son, with Denise. He shared a post thanking Birmingham Women’s Hospital staff for welcoming his son into the world.
Fatherhood joys
In 2025, Joe spoke about the “beautiful” experience of being a dad, six months after his son was born. On ITV's Lorraine, he said: “I'm amazed I've strung a sentence together because I'm so underslept. It's so beautiful the whole thing. It's very hard not to be clichéd when you talk about parenthood because everything everyone says about it is exactly right. It's everything and maddening and beautiful. I'm having a lovely time with it, I'm in love with it.”
Referring to the photo he shared of his son, Joe told viewers: “He's not a potato. This is what everyone said on Instagram. 'The neck - he's not holding the neck right!' The number of people who tell you how to parent through Daily Mail comments.”
Hospital dash and parking ticket
In April, Joe recalled a health scare with his son, whom he jokingly nicknamed “the punisher”. He explained: “The punisher was poorly recently, we had to go into hospital and whatever. I got a real sense of, ‘I would take any pain that you have, a thousand times over. I would bulldozer through a nursery to save you. I would do whatever it takes.”
Joe shared that his son had to be assessed in A&E and recalled a parking debacle during the dash. He said: “So, the punisher was ill. I drove to A&E, Birmingham Children’s Hospital. Parked up, took a picture of the Ringo number but didn’t do it straight away, like, ‘Oh, I’ll just wait while my son was unwell’, I thought, ‘I’ll do it in there’. So, he was being assessed and I was paying for parking whilst he was being assessed, so I had one eye on him and one eye on this,” before revealing he ended up getting a parking ticket.
Joe appears on Celebrity Deal or No Deal on Saturday (August 15) at 7pm on ITV1.
