New Zealand actor Kim Crossman has separated from her husband, cameraman Tom Walsh, after roughly two and a half years of marriage, and has flown back to Los Angeles with their nine-month-old daughter, Coco.
According to NZ Herald's Society Insider column, the couple had been living with Crossman's mother, Jill, in Auckland's eastern suburbs when the marriage broke down over winter. Walsh, 46, moved out in August and soon after travelled to Sri Lanka to work on a New Zealand TV series. Neither is commenting publicly, but a source confirmed the split, and a friend says Crossman's focus is on providing for her daughter as a single mother.
Crossman, 36, who rose to fame on Shortland Street in 2007 and later appeared in Step Dave and Funny Girls, is picking up work in the US. She's believed to be lined up for a role in a Hollywood soap opera, continuing work she started earlier in the year. She owns an apartment in Santa Monica and has long split her time between New Zealand and California — she and Walsh took Coco to LA in February, with Walsh returning to Auckland in March and Crossman following in April.
The couple's relationship had a strong travel thread from the start. They met in 2022 on the set of TVNZ 2's Snack Masters NZ, where Crossman co-hosted with Tom Sainsbury and Walsh worked as a camera operator (he's also the face of Tip Top's famous "togs, togs, undies" ad). Things turned serious while they filmed a Discovery Shark Week production, travelling through New Zealand, Australia, the US and Mexico. They got engaged on holiday in Italy in 2023, travelled to Uganda with World Vision that same year, and married in April 2024 on the shores of Queenstown's Lake Wakatipu. Coco was born on December 6 last year, and the family spent her first Christmas in Pauanui with Crossman's extended family.
Crossman has written openly about motherhood in her Pretty Postpartum column on Capsule, covering everything from a postpartum injury to the emotional ups and downs of new parenthood. In her most recent post, written the day before she flew out, she described recent months as among the most challenging and anxious of her life, and also the most hopeful, while adjusting to life as a single mum.
Why should travellers care? Beyond the celebrity angle, the story traces a genuinely appealing New Zealand-to-California double life: Queenstown's lakefront wedding country, the Coromandel beach town of Pauanui, and Santa Monica's walkable coastal vibe are all spots worth a spot on your own itinerary if any part of this story resonates.