Dani Dyer reveals her dad Danny was furious when he learned she’d signed up for Love Island

Dani Dyer has revealed that her actor dad Danny was so furious when he learned she’d signed up for Love Island back in 2018 that he stepped talking to her for weeks.

The TV personality, 24, shot to stardom on the hit ITV2 show, which saw her get into a romance with Jack Fincham before the couple went on to win the series.

However, in a candid chat with EastEnders star Danny, 43, on their Sorted With The Dyers podcast, Dani revealed that her dad was initially far from happy about it.

Broaching the subject, Dani admitted: ‘I loved being a dental nurse but it wasn’t somewhere I wanted to be forever. Then Love Island happened.’

Danny said: ‘Everything was going all lovely and you were getting on with it and all of a sudden you sat me down.’

Explaining her decision, Dani went on: ‘I wanted something different, I never took risks and I thought this could be a good one.’

Danny then quipped: ‘You really did roll the dice baby didn’t you. It didn’t go down well at first.’

Things went frosty between the pair when rumours started to swirl that Dani was signing up for the show, before she’d even decided to do so. 

‘You hated me,’ Dani said, prompting her dad to clarify: ‘I didn’t hate you, I never hated you ever.’

Recalling his annoyance, Dani said: ‘He didn’t like me. We didn’t really talk. It was very awkward. Oh my god, I’d walk into the room and it would be so awkward.’

He conceded: ‘No we didn’t talk. I think I was upset because we were very close and you’d spoke about it to everyone, I was the last fu**er.’

‘Because you kept saying to me, it sort of came out a couple of months before that I was supposed to be going on Love Island and in my brain I wasn’t,’ explained Dani.

Then you said to me “am I going to go on Love Island?” and I was like, “no it’s all a rumour”. But that was a rumour then and then I sat there and thought maybe I should consider it.’

Even as screen star Danny waved his eldest offspring off on her flight to Spain, he remained peeved, as he said: ‘I set you off, I put your suitcase in the boot all fu**ing angry and I said, “go on just f***ing go and do what you got to do.”‘

However, all of his fears soon became pride, as he watched his daughter become one of the show’s most popular contestants. 

He admitted: ‘I was petrified but it turned out well. I just became a viewer like everyone else and I didn’t have any contact with you and I just watched this very authentic vulnerable thing unfold.

“If you could write a script for doing eight weeks on Love Island that would be the script you would write, because you were loyal in there and you turned your life ’round.’

While Dani would win the show with then-boyfriend Jack, they would go on to break up in April 2019. Jack welcomed his daughter Blossom just nine months later.

Dani eventually rekindled her romance with Sammy Kimmence, and the pair became parents earlier this year, when they welcomed son Santiago.

She recently has told how she and Sammy ‘didn’t plan’ on falling pregnant, admitting that it was a ‘shock’ when she discovered they were expecting.

The TV personality also told how her actor dad Danny Dyer gets ‘so emotional’ around her new arrival.

Speaking to OK! magazine about her pregnancy shock, Dani told of the moment she informed beau Sammy she was with child. 

She said: ‘We didn’t plan it. It was more a case of if I fall pregnant then that’s fine, so it was a shock really. I remember Sammy was downstairs playing FIFA while I was upstairs and I just thought I’d take a pregnancy test.

‘I remember going “babe I’m pregnant!” He just looked at me like “really?!” with the control still in his hand.’

Danny added that though it was an ‘exciting time’ for the couple, the prospect of becoming partners was ‘so scary’.

Despite not expecting to fall pregnant when she did, Dani added that she’d been maternal since she was 16 years old and wanted a child young as she’s best friends with her parents, who had her in their teens.

Speaking of her EastEnders star parent, Dani told how despite his hardman persona on TV, Danny is a softy when it comes to baby Santiago.

She explained: ‘Dad is so emotional around Santi. The other day he was nearly crying like “I love babies and that, but your baby… I’ve never felt anything like this”. Santi’s his first grandchild and I feel like that’s hit him more after the birth.’

The reality star also added that her mother Joanne Mas is ‘obsessed with him’.

The beauty also discussed Santiago’s difficult birth and told of her disappointment within herself as she had to have an emergency c-section after the umbilical cord became wrapped around Santiago. 

She said: ‘I felt like my body failed me. I was so upset with myself and really beat myself up about it. Looking at myself for the first week, I hatred myself.’

Dani insisted that she soon moved past her feelings and ‘accepted’ what was as she realised that her baby being ‘healthy and happy’ was the important thing.  

‘But it’s all worth it I have my beautiful boy, I am trying to eat more healthier just so I do feel better about myself!’

However, Dani insisted she’s trying not to worry too much about her weight while she is still a new mother.  

‘But I’m not stressing too much about the weight, being a mum is a full time job. My body can wait.’