Rupert Murdoch reportedly got engaged for the sixth time at age 92.
On March 7, the Australian-born media mogul's office confirmed that he will marry retired molecular biologist Elena Zhukova, 66, with the wedding taking place in June at his California estate and vineyard, Moraga.
The upcoming wedding will mark Murdoch's fifth marriage. The mogul was last married to supermodel and Mick Jagger's ex-wife, Jerry Hall, from 2016 to 2022. He first married in 1956 to flight attendant Patricia Booker. However, the couple divorced after 11 years of marriage in 1967. They share a daughter, Prudence Murdoch.
The same year he divorced Booker, Murdoch married his second wife, Scottish journalist Anna Maria Torv, and they shared three children: Elisabeth Murdoch, Lachlan Murdoch, and James Murdoch. In 1999 they divorced after 32 years of marriage. Months later, Murdoch married Wendi Deng, with whom he shares two daughters, Grace and Chloe Murdoch. The couple divorced in 2013.
After he and supermodel Jerry Hall divorced in the summer of 2022, Murdoch had a short-lived engagement to retired dental hygienist Ann Lesley Smith in the spring of 2023, but it ended after just two weeks.
That summer, Murdoch and Zhukova reportedly began seeing each other. When the news of their relationship broke, it was revealed by the daily mail that Murdoch's third wife, Wendi Deng, was the one who introduced the couple.
Zhukova is a distinguished molecular biologist who primarily studies diabetes and brings her research to institutions around the world, including the University of California, Los Angeles. Toward the end of the Soviet Union, she came to the United States from Moscow with her ex-husband, Alexander Zhukov, who eventually became a billionaire energy investor. Her daughter, philanthropist Dasha Zhukova, was married to Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich until 2017.
News of their engagement comes months after he handed the reins of his conservative media empire to his son, Lachlan Murdoch. Last year, he announced that he would retire as director of his business, but planned to maintain an emeritus position while his son assumed the position he left behind.
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