Right-Wing Media Mogul Richard Murdoch Marries for the 5th Time
Rupert Murdoch gets married. Again. Pete Davidson’s got nothing on him.
The 93-year-old media mogul tied the knot with Elena Zhukova, a retired marine biologist 26 years his junior. The intimate ceremony happened on Saturday in Moraga, Murdoch’s 14-acre vineyard in Bel Air, California.
Pictures of the blushing bride and doting groom were released by The Sun, a British tabloid newspaper he owns. Several high-profile guests were photographed at the location, including CEO of the New England Patriots Robert Kraft and his wife Dana Blumberg, along with Robert Thomson and his wife Wang Ping.
This marks the Australian-American business magnate’s 5th marriage.
The billionaire media proprietor first wedded Patricia Booker, an Australian flight attendant. They got together in 1956 and divorced over a decade later in 1967. They have only one child together, daughter Prudence, who has held several directorial positions in Daddy Dearest’s sprawling collection of companies.
He married his second wife, Anna Maria Torv, the same year. They were together for 32 years, making it Murdoch’s longest relationship. He shares three children with the Scottish journalist, novelist, and actress: Elizabeth, Lachlan, and James.
Lachlan, his first son, was anointed heir to an empire that spans multiple continents.
Two weeks after his divorce was finalized, he married Chinese-born entrepreneur Wendi Deng, 37 years his junior. She has been credited with introducing him to a younger crowd with the likes of Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey. They welcomed two daughters, Grace and Chloe, and split in 2013 citing an “irretrievable breakdown” in their marriage.
According to an August report by Daily Mail, Deng introduced Murdoch to Zhukova at a family gathering.
Zhukova was previously married to Alexander Zhukov, a billionaire energy investor and Russian politician. An unnamed source who has met the Russian expat told The Sydney Morning Herald that she was charming, intelligent, and someone “who knows her way around the corridors of extreme wealth and power.”
Rumors of her relationship with Murdoch first emerged when the two were spotted cruising the Mediterranean on the Christina O, once owned by Greek shipowner Aristotle Onassis. According to Luxury Yacht Charter, it costs €700,000 per week in the summer and €740,000 per week in the winter.
Expenses are added separately, by the way.
News that the two were dating hit the press two months after the billionaire called off his engagement to Ann Lesley Smith, a former police chaplain. According to reports, Murdoch got “increasingly uncomfortable” over her “outspoken evangelical views.”
David Fulkonwick, the author of Murdoch’s World: The Last of the Old Media Empires, shared his two cents on the subject. “This would seem like a character with attributes you wouldn’t want inside the tent no matter how charming she might be,” Fulkonwick claimed.
Fulkonwick added that “Murdoch likes to have companionship”—and that couldn’t be any truer. After all, the right-wing media mogul did say he was planning to marry his partner Ann after splitting from his fourth wife, Jerry Hall—one of the most sought-after models.
Murdoch, who is worth a sweet $9.77 billion, stepped down as chairman of News Corp and Fox last year. It marks the end of the controversial figure’s seven-decade career where he served as kingmaker in conservative politics.
He will be making a public appearance in Australia with his new wife on July 25. His trip, a first since 2018, will grace The Australian’s 60th anniversary, an event that promises “a feast of journalism from the past six decades.”
