“He inhabits a private universe”: Inside the remarkably quiet life Daryl Somers has shared with Julie
For more than five decades, Daryl Somers has been one of the most recognisable faces on Australian television.
He made generations laugh on Hey Hey It’s Saturday, became a familiar presence on Family Feud and later fronted Dancing With The Stars.
But while millions of Australians watched Daryl perform, joke and entertain from the other side of the screen, there has always been another part of his life that he has carefully kept away from the spotlight.
A life shared largely with his wife, former Australian Ballet dancer Julie da Costa.
And as Daryl prepares to breathe new life into the Hey Hey legacy, that long-standing privacy has become more intriguing than ever.
“You won’t hear much from me in the media”
Daryl has never been particularly interested in turning his private life into public entertainment.
During a rare interview with The Age in 2004, he offered a remarkably candid warning:
“After this, you won’t hear much from me in the media.”
More than two decades later, the words still seem to fit.
Daryl has remained remarkably guarded about his marriage, his children and the life he shares away from television.
His former Hey Hey It’s Saturday colleague Red Symons once captured that distance in just four words, describing Daryl as someone who “inhabits a private universe”.
It is an unusually fitting description for a man whose professional life has been anything but private.
The woman who has shared that private world
Daryl is married to Julie da Costa, a former senior artist with the Australian Ballet.
The pair’s relationship has occasionally surfaced in public over the years, but rarely in the way celebrity couples usually do.
Instead, their appearances have tended to be connected to their shared love of performance.
In 2002 and 2003, Daryl and Julie appeared together in Australian Ballet School productions of The Nutcracker at Melbourne’s Myer Music Bowl, playing Clara’s parents.
A The Age review of the 2002 production noted that the pair appeared to be thoroughly enjoying themselves in their roles.
Away from those occasional glimpses, however, Daryl has largely kept their relationship out of the public conversation.
The couple have reportedly raised three children — two adopted daughters and a biological son — although Daryl has generally chosen not to make family life a subject for media attention.
A love story without the spotlight
Perhaps that is what makes Daryl and Julie’s relationship so unusual in the world of Australian television.
There have been no constant magazine covers, no regular updates about their home life and no attempt to turn their family into a public brand.
Instead, there is a sense of two people who have built a life alongside one another while allowing Daryl’s enormous public career to remain just that — a career.
Julie has also been involved in charitable and community work alongside her husband, and both have been listed as patrons of The Lost Dogs’ Home.
Their public appearances have therefore offered occasional glimpses of a partnership that has endured through an extraordinary period of Daryl’s career.
The father behind the television legend
For all his reluctance to discuss his private life, Daryl has occasionally opened the door to memories of the people who shaped him.
Some of the most touching came when he spoke about his parents.
His father was a passionate supporter of Geelong Football Club, a loyalty Daryl inherited.
In 1989, when Geelong reached the VFL grand final, Daryl had hoped the occasion would allow him to do something special for his dad.
He remembered the disappointment vividly.
The reserves lost by one point. The seconds lost by two. Then the senior team lost by six.
For Daryl and his father, it was devastating.
Two years later, his father passed away from cancer.
The memory remained with him — not because it was a great sporting triumph, but because it represented something much more personal: time spent together.
“When I’m older…”
His memories of his mother were just as tender.
Daryl once recalled a conversation from when he was only six years old.
As a child, he dreamed of one day owning a farm.
He told his mother that when they were both older, he would be able to wheel her around the farm.
It was the sort of innocent promise a child makes without understanding how quickly life moves.
Years later, Daryl reflected on those words with the painful knowledge that his mother was no longer alive.
“She’s no longer with us. I’m not wheeling her anywhere now,” he recalled.
Behind the television entertainer was a son who had held onto those small memories long after his parents were gone.
A career that became part of Australian life
Daryl’s television career began in the early 1970s, eventually leading to the creation of one of Australia’s most enduring television institutions.
Hey Hey It’s Saturday ran for 28 years before ending its original run in 1999. It returned for a brief revival in 2009–10 and later received renewed attention through anniversary programming and social media.
Daryl also became a three-time Gold Logie winner and was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia in 2004 for his contribution to television and entertainment, charitable organisations and the community.
His career then took another turn when he became the original host of Dancing With The Stars in Australia.
The series became another major television success, giving audiences a different glimpse of Daryl while maintaining the warmth and humour that had defined his earlier career.
And now, Daryl is looking back
At 75, Daryl is showing no signs of completely stepping away from the world that made him famous.
In August 2026, he revealed plans for Hey Hey TV, a new on-demand streaming service designed to bring the Hey Hey It’s Saturday archive to audiences again, alongside new material.
The original program’s enormous archive is expected to form the heart of the project, allowing longtime fans to revisit decades of Australian television while potentially introducing the show to a younger generation.
Daryl has spoken enthusiastically about the idea, suggesting that the story of Hey Hey is far from finished.
It is another chapter in a career that has repeatedly found ways to reinvent itself.
Still private, even after all these years
And yet, despite the renewed interest in Daryl Somers, one thing remains remarkably consistent.
He still appears to have little desire to put his private life on display.
Australians may know his voice instantly. They may remember the characters, the sketches, the laughter and the countless hours he spent on their television screens.
But the man behind it all has always kept something for himself.
His marriage to Julie, his family memories and the quieter moments of his life have largely remained outside the glare of celebrity culture.
Perhaps that is why the glimpses he has offered over the years feel so meaningful.
A football grand final watched with his father.
A childhood promise made to his mother.
A shared stage with Julie.
And a quiet family life protected from the cameras.
Daryl Somers spent decades inviting Australians into his television world.
But when the lights go down, he has always seemed determined to keep one world entirely his own.