Prince hid his partying from his wife, Chris Rock has claimed.

The 61-year-old comic recalled how he once went to the Paisley Park home of the late Purple Rain hitmaker - who died from an accidental overdose in 2016 - for a celebration after one of his own concerts nearby, but Prince insisted all of the guests be quiet and turned off the music in order to take a call from then-wife Mayte Garcia.

Speaking to the New York Times newspaper, Chris said: "I remember, I was at Prince's house. I'm in Minneapolis. I'd just done some shows, and he had a party for me at Paisley Park.

"I am literally in the vault, and he's playing me new music, and there's lots of people there, and his wife called.

"I think he was married to Mayte at the time. And he was like, 'Everybody be quiet! Be quiet!' It's like 200 people.

"Mayte called, he's picking up the phone, and he goes, 'Hey. Nothing. Nah, I'm just chillin'. Yeah, I'll probably go to bed in a couple of hours. Love you, too.'

"And then the party started again. [singing] Gett Off!' Right away!

"Even Prince had the check-in."

The Misty Green director and actor regrets always being slightly starstruck around Prince instead of being able to establish a proper friendship.

He said: "Not to name-drop, but one of my biggest regrets in life is I could never relax around Prince.

"He wanted to be friends. Hanging out, I couldn't not be like, 'Oh f***, Prince is drinking iced tea!'"

Asked if they ever got to a place where he was normal, he added: "I mean, a normal rock star. Those degrees of normal are so different than yours."

Earlier this year, Mayte - who was married to Prince from 1996 to 2000 - reflected on the "intense sadness" she felt following the music legend's death.

She told Us Weekly magazine: "It was an intense sadness. An intense sadness, that's all I can remember of losing him.

"And then I remember, I mean, I've heard because I couldn't watch TV and my phone was going off the hook, just the monuments. They lit it purple and they honoured him, which was, at the time, it was really hard to accept, but I thought that was very impactful."

The 52-year-old dancer recalled how she was driving when she learned of the tragic news of Prince's passing and explained how she was consumed by disbelief at first.

She said: "(April) 21 was a horrible day. I was driving. I got called, and I don't know how I drove home.

"I don't know how many nos I said. It's something that we are all going to have to deal with, losing somebody we love, but it was really hard, and I didn't want it to be true."