NYT: Rupert Murdoch, 91, and Jerry Hall, 65, are headed for a divorce

When Rupert Murdoch was married to Wendi Deng, they lived in New York and it was said, at the time, that Wendi tried to domesticate him and make him more of a cultural elite. That marriage – his third – crashed and burned amid stinging accusations of elder abuse and torrid affairs with Tony Blair. Then in 2016, Murdoch fell in love with someone new: Jerry Hall. They had a seven-week engagement, then a tasteful civil wedding in March 2016, followed by a tasteful church wedding a day later. Murdoch became more London-based (Jerry already lived in London full-time) and much more low-key. While Jerry and Rupert did go out to premieres and big A-list events, it definitely felt like he was in his “rich aristocracy” phase. Now that’s over. Reportedly, Murdoch and Hall are headed for divorce.

Rupert Murdoch, the media titan, and Jerry Hall, the model and actress, are getting divorced, according to two people with knowledge of the decision. The people would speak only anonymously to discuss a personal matter. Bryce Tom, a spokesman for Mr. Murdoch, declined to comment. Representatives for Ms. Hall could not immediately be reached for comment.

Mr. Murdoch’s divorce, his fourth, is unlikely to alter the ownership structure of businesses he holds stakes in, which include parent companies of Fox News and The Wall Street Journal. The Murdoch family’s shares in the companies Mr. Murdoch founded reside in a strictly managed trust. Mr. Murdoch splits voting rights over that trust with his four oldest children — Lachlan, Elisabeth, James and Prudence — and has arranged them so that he can never be outvoted.

Still, the split could reverberate throughout his business empire, which maintains powerful sway in America and abroad through its right-leaning news brands including the Fox News Channel in the United States, The Sun in Britain and Sky News in Australia.

[From The NY Times]

I’m pretty sure that Rupert Murdoch – and Lachlan, the heir-apparent of the empire – learned a lot from the Wendi Deng situation. Deng fought hard to ensure that her two daughters (Grace and Chloe) would have their fair share of the empire and the trust when they came of age. The divorce from Hall will go a lot smoother simply because they didn’t have children together – Hall’s kids are all adults and they’re all Jaggers. I’m pretty sure I heard that Jerry signed a strict-but-beneficial prenup too. That’s probably why no one from MurdochWorld is confirming anything yet – they’re working on a quiet settlement with no drama. While Hall isn’t poor, she needs a nice-sized settlement from Murdoch. I hope she gets it.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

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63 Responses to “NYT: Rupert Murdoch, 91, and Jerry Hall, 65, are headed for a divorce”

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  1. equality says:

    I’d rather see the many victims of his media get a nice settlement. Don’t care what someone with such low standards as to marry Murdoch gets.

  2. vs says:

    She married this man so she is not as bad him but must not be a great person either…

    • Colby says:

      This.

      This man is evil, full stop. I have to significantly side eye anyone who spends time with him let alone marries him.

    • goofpuff says:

      She only married him for the settlement anyway.

      He doesn’t really have any redeeming qualities otherwise.

  3. Hic says:

    Who gets divorce at 91? You have to awful to spend the last remaining years at 91 divorcing! You are old enough to know better and be a good person because it’s no longer theoretical you might meet your Maker.. opps, it’s RM🙃

    • Ines says:

      In his case, and with a good prenup in place, there will not be much stress involved in a divorce. That’s for his lawyers to worry about. Plus it might not have been his choice, maybe this was her decision.

      And yes, even at his age it is theoretical that he might meet his maker. Not everybody believes in a maker, judgment or life after death.

    • thaisajs says:

      His mom lived to 105 or something, so he probably still has time to squeeze in a few more trophy wives before he kicks the bucket.

  4. C-Shell says:

    As retirement plans go, marrying an ancient, vile, autocratic billionaire ranks as possibly the most unpleasant I can imagine. *shudder*

    • Ines says:

      Meh, Mick Jagger treated her like utter crap. Maybe this guy treated her better. Who knows.

      • snappyfish says:

        Jagger did treat her poorly. Also there is the rumor that their marriage wasn’t legal because Mick didn’t file whatever he was suppose to. I remember her saying something like Rupert “asked me kindly” which made me sad for her. Of course she knew whose bed she was sliding into so questionable characters all around. He is trash and I hope she gets whatever he promised her

      • Ines says:

        @snappyfish you are absolutely right. He did not file the papers and never told her. After 22 years married and 4 children together, when she filed for divorce after it was found out he had an illegitimate child, he just said “oh, but we were never married!”. Can you imagine?

  5. L4Frimaire says:

    Jerry Hall’s goal was to be a wealthy respected widow, but that repulsive old reptile refuses to give up the ghost, and she probably got tired. Anyway, get a good settlement, hopefully a house, and hit the party circuit with the other grand dames.

    • Kiera says:

      I mean if that end bit isn’t life goals. Personally I’m aiming to be 80 walking around in bejeweled kaftans in a turban with a Bellini in one hand and my pet jaguar in the other.

  6. LizzieB says:

    I missed that these two got married and the whole thing is horrifying to me. I mean, I thought she had enough money to not need to marry people like this. And I know some people just make bad decisions, but four divorces when you’re a man always to me means you’re an absolute arsehole. Still, hopefully this means he’ll die alone and unloved like he deserves.

    • Seraphina says:

      Oh he won’t die alone – there are money hungry people who will want some of that so they will be next to him.

    • Alexandria says:

      In my culture, if you’ve done deplorable evil, you’ll have a hard time dying peacefully. You’ll be in a state of limbo and pain. I think about this when I see RM and DT.

    • Jan90067 says:

      Jagger is VERY tight with his money. IIRC, she didn’t even find out their marriage wasn’t legal until she went to file for divorce over his constant cheating (and kids w/other women). So after 22 yrs and 4 kids, they’re NOT married. He also tried to stiff her in the settlement.

      Still, how could she NOT know how awful Murdock is? She has to share some of the same values to have even been with him, let alone stayed for this long.

      • AnnaKist says:

        Someone please set me straight if I’ve got this wrong.
        I seem to remember that when it ended with Jagger, he even tried to do her out of her home. In the end they had an arrangement whereby she was allowed to live in the house until such time as the youngest child was of a certain age or she got married. It was as if he expected to be commended for his “generosity and consideration” of his former partner.
        This is the bit where I’m confused:
        When Jerry got with Murdoch and he found out that she did not own the house she was living in but that it was owned and control by Jagger, did he buy that house for her? For some reason I have it in my head that Jagger was absolutely livid about it, as if he wanted to hold that house over her for evermore, and totally blindsided when Jerry married Murdoch and Murdoch=bought the house. I wasn’t really following it at the time so I’m hoping someone can set me straight, because I read today that Jagger was absolutely seething with rage when she wed Murdoch, apparently saying “he did not want Murdoch to be a part of *his* family”.

        Sky News Australia is staffed by (possibly) Rupert-hand-picked reporters and presenters – and almost as vile as he is. And if he wants a new, younger wife, with a character more like his own, he need look no further than the awful Peta Credlin. She is right up his alley. Or he is up hers. 🤢

  7. Plums says:

    She must not have been in the will to not have stuck it out until he dies. What a waste of her time that marriage turned out to be.

    • MoneyBear says:

      He’s worth billions. I bet she get 10 million every year they were married. And if they are still friends maybe more. I think he liked her more then Wendy.

  8. MoneyBear says:

    Most likely she’s more of a nurse then a wife at this point. A nice eight figure settlement she’ll be very well off. Mick is notorious cheap, to be vulgar. I wish her & wish her all the best. She seems like someone whose fun to be around and treats others well.

  9. Izzy says:

    Well, so much for true love. /s

    • TOM says:

      Exactly. If these two crazy kids couldn’t make it work, what chance for the rest of us?

  10. JustBitchy says:

    #WhereIsJerry is a frequent tweet of mine. I totally get that she was up for maybe 3-4 years with him for a good payout. But he must be such an ass that she just can’t stand it.

    She definitely does need the money. Mick Jagger didn’t provide her much (or much to his kids). He’s also a miserly old man that I hope dies alone too.

  11. Naomi says:

    Well we know he’s been a blight to the world but Jerry to divorce him now rather than wait until he dies given his age must’ve found a complete monster

  12. Well Wisher says:

    He should not know happiness, this misanthrope, was one of the main instigator for Brexit because Europe did not want to talk to him.
    Brexit, the self harm that lead to the present day misery for millions.

    He can find comfort in the 14 billion dollars.

    • Korra says:

      This man also played a huge role in the erosion of democracy in America. If karma were real, he and Putin could do a coin toss over who serves the worst fate.

  13. Yep says:

    Jerry wanted the security and elite high-flying lifestyle with this one (though someone, even if a hard-headed and perhaps unethical businessman, with Murdoch’s connections and insider knowledge would be fascinating to have conversations with) but I’m guessing his energy levels aren’t what they used to be.
    He was crazy about Wendi Deng but yes she cheated with Blair. As for Jerry, think she was super dependant on the douchebag ex in every way. Hope she gets a smart advisor to manage her settlement and doesn’t need to partner up for status/money/security again

  14. Yep says:

    Also will just add Wendi Deng is a super, super smart woman. Not just educated but street smart and a real go getter, knowledgeable about the biz world. He went through a lot to divorce 2nd wife and married her just three weeks after finalising. Think Murdoch was captivated by her amazing ambition and energy. Can’t imagine Jerry would offer the same brainy companionship.

    • Mia1066 says:

      Deng is a manipulative pos who also fxxxed putin. She’s absolutely gross. I hope she and her ex both rot in hell

      • CC says:

        She’s an awful human being, but it’s in such an unapologetic way that I kind of respect it? At least she’s not trying to convince anyone that she’s a good person, unlike her friend Ivanka.

      • Yep says:

        CC, totally agree. Wouldn’t admire her and she’s just as unethical as Murdoch but you have to look at her trajectory from backwater in China to getting an American couple to sponsor her to go to the US (she seduced the husband once in the US and then cheated on him), to going to biz school at Yale or whatever it was, to rising so quickly in Murdoch’s Star in the HK offices, to seducing Murdoch, etc.

        The woman is a trashy Jeffrey Archer book in herself! Serious go-getter without qualms about stepping over others to get ahead and definitely doesn’t try to pretend she’s anything else.

        There are probably hundreds of millions of people in China trying to do what she did but she actually did it. LOL. (I am of East-Asian descent myself and I’m not being racist; just saying the current mainstream culture in the PRC is all about getting ahead.)

        Also, I say she’s very, very smart in her own way but if you look at the notes she wrote to herself, the notes that came into the public domain when her affair with Blair was exposed (by household staff, think it was), she’s rather immature and simplistic in a way. Kind of like a high-school girl. It’s that black-and-white approach to life that makes certain people so ruthless and “successful”; they’re not hindered by ethics and a sense of social obligation to others.

      • Anonymous says:

        Some say Wendy is foreign intelligence, probably working for China, but maybe Russia. Look at where she’s been (incl. Yale) and with whom she has/has allegedly gotten cosy. Rupert, Tony Blair, Putin, Ivanka, to name a few. Her trajectory was probably not all hard work and luck. She was probably trained as a spy perhaps from birth. This was probably a plan. The end game of which has probably yet to fully materialize. Hers is part of a long game.

        Jerry Hall, Jerry Hall. Well, she has certainly lived an interesting life. She seems like a good mom. The situation with Mick during her divorce was so shocking it may have broken her in some way-it would most people. It certainly sounded like fraud and abuse (of trust, if nothing else) on “Sir” Mick’s part. Doesn’t sound like he was acting in good faith in the least-it almost sounded criminal and then not just unsportsmanlike, but malicious. And if the “letting” her live in the house thing after is true, it sounds super controlling. Yet she still poses and smiles with him-I wonder, is that for the children or because she was so broken. Or is it just a lot of amazing therapy. I wonder how many years of lying, manipulating, gaslighting, etc. she put up with and how bad it was. I wonder how bad her finances were. Her self esteem and confidence were probably at rock bottom-and maybe her finances too-when Rupert came around. And then he was so nice to her. I won’t judge her on her marriage to him. She looked so happy and beautiful at the wedding. She probably felt so loved. And maybe some of it deep, deep down was a FU to Mick. Maybe that’s why it didn’t last.

        OMG all those news channels-the lot of them! Fox, CNN, CNBC, all the UK
        & Aussie ones-they all give me SUCH totally toxic vibes.

      • Yep says:

        The foreign-intelligence / spy thing was a rumour started by Murdoch’s team, no? A spy would have far better temper than she does (multiple household staff have said she’s a horror to work for) and would have stayed “happily married” to Murdoch forever for the intel opportunities and not have been so promiscuous (some of her conquest were totally random). If she was, she went rogue after she married Murdoch and if so a loose canon like her probably wouldn’t have been left around to spill the beans on her origins. Just my take. I know Roald Dahl was definitely an MI6 asset for a period of time.

  15. MsIam says:

    He’s a waste of space and oxygen as far as I am concerned so I hope she gouged him but good. But I’m sure a greedy reptile like Murdoch has an ironclad prenup.

  16. HoneyBear says:

    “Rupert Murdoch, 89, and Jerry Hall, 63, puchased. a £30million house in the Cotswolds that they plan to renovate in 2021 and a 200 million Montana Ranch around the same time.” So less then 2 years ago they were buying their retirement home. Maybe Jerri doesn’t have the education Wendi had, but Jerri seems to know what she’s doing.

  17. JMoney says:

    Word on the street is that b/c of the big lawsuit that can go through against Fox News then she can “take him to the cleaners” so that Murdoch’s net worth won’t be as high affecting what he has to pay as a result of this lawsuit and then Jerry gets a nice reward for doing this. I’ve known rich (not wealthy) ppl who have done this so this isn’t unusual.

    • Jan90067 says:

      Someone posted something somewhere that perhaps this “divorce” is a sham, a transference of money, so he can “hide” it from the lawsuit(s). She takes him for a bundle, that he can later recover, and they will “reconcile” later on. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. Wouldn’t surprise me at all.

  18. AG says:

    Did anyone else see the reality show Jerry Hall did in 2005, called “Kept”? It was insane, about her search for a “kept man”. It was also insanely entertaining.

    • Rakely says:

      Yes! For some bizarre reason it was one of the first things I thought of when I saw this story. It was such an odd show but at the time I enjoyed it.

    • Ines says:

      Yes, I remember that show.

    • dj says:

      Yes. I remember her on some reality show. That is where I learned how miserly Mick Jagger was in their “divorce.” She did not even own her own house Mick did. JH did seem to marry money. She did not have much of her own which seemed not great considering she was a super model.

  19. Flower says:

    Am I the only one who thought this was a political/ media marriage ?

    Jerry famously got screwed by Mick Jagger – who later pointed out they were never legally married on the beach in Bali (???) and Murdoch has up until recently being making a play to be made a big fish in the UK after having being rejected in Australia and the USA.

    In the end Jerry Hall got about £10M from Mick Jagger, property and child maintenance which must have run out by now. I am guessing she will get considerably more from Murdoch so good for her.

    Since Trump did not secure a second term and the war in Ukraine exposed the ownership of media interference in all three countries I am guessing he is taking a step back to focus his energies elsewhere.

  20. Cee says:

    This could also be a way to hide assets, in a legal way. A lot of divorces are filed to protect the money/assets before something like a lawsuit is filed. It’s also risky because nothing can guarantee the spouse will be willing to “return” the money awarded in a settlement. I guess time will tell if Murdoch is legally reducing his wealth by divorce of if Jerry Hall decided to bail, prenup in hand.

  21. Matilda says:

    Jerry Hall was a betting woman. She bet that she would be this crypt keeper’s last and final wife, benefiting monetarily from his hopefully soon to be death. Well, she lost this bet, and her soul while at it. Whilst Mick didn’t give her the proper respect as a wife and mother to his children, I think that is why she sought out to soothe her ego and marry a billionaire that actually asked her and made it legal. Problem is, the most hideous person asked her and she said yes. Everyone and their mother knows why she married this decrepit foul being. To be with Rupert is tantamount to being a necrophiliac.

    • Yep says:

      Very good take, esp on the ego part. I think she wasn’t only devastated by Mick’s cheating and leaving but also deeply embarrassed as they were so public. Remember reading an interview of hers in the ’90s and she seemed completely crazy about him while he was cheating on her all the time and having babies with randoms he met on tours.

    • kirk says:

      Wow, harsh take on Jerry Hall being a betting women. But probably accurate.
      Is her wedding dress supposed to be bunched up around her knees like that?

  22. Jaded says:

    He’s facing an almost $2 billion defamation lawsuit from Dominion Voting Systems, alleging that he and his son Lachlan intentionally pushed election lies via Fox News. I think this is a tactical move on Jerry’s part to get the hell outta dodge before other voting systems companies jump on the bandwagon. She wants to get her payout and remove herself from Murdoch’s hard right-wing world ASAP.

    • Julia K says:

      This is what I thought at first. Get out while you can. Then I reread the above post from Cee and now I wonder if this is an asset protection plan to reduce his wealth while facing a lawsuit. Either one could be true! And neither would surprise me.

  23. olliesmom says:

    Get that cash girl!

    Just the thought of having to touch that evil, old man. Shudder.

  24. Bobbie says:

    Well, she’ll get some money in a divorce. I suspect money is why she married him. He shouldn’t be surprised by that given she is young enough to be his daughter. Although for some reason that doesn’t seem to bother some men — that the woman is after his money. I don’t get it.

  25. Isabella says:

    At least now she can wear heels. Those flats look awful with that fancy silk dress.

  26. Justwastingtime says:

    Think she is a bit older than 65?

  27. jferber says:

    AnnaKist, As far as I know, you are completely correct in all you said. I believe Jagger only gave Jerry 20 million dollars when they separated. He was very supportive when she lost her twin sister and she accepted the amount. She didn’t own the house and he “let” her live in at until their youngest was 18 (which has happened). I think Rupert bought Jerry the house as a wedding gift. That was her home and I’m sure it meant a lot to her. She may even have been desperate to get the house if it were her primary home. Jerry also said Mick made her pay for everything relating to their four children. Mick is a dick. She only “divorced” him from their fake marriage when he had a child out of wedlock with a Brazilian model. So yes, Murdoch is evil, but she said he was always a gentleman to her and that must have felt so good to her.