Rupert Murdoch Reportedly Dumps Fiancée Over Her ‘Outspoken’ Views
AP Photo/Mary Altaffer
If a $2.5 million engagement ring, shared politics, and a multi-billion dollar media empire aren’t enough to keep two lovebirds together to ride off into the sunset for their happily-ever-after, what hope do us peasants have?
Rupert Murdoch, the 92-year-old with four previous marriages (that’s one more than Gone With the Wind’s Scarlett O’Hara, for those of you keeping track), joyfully announced his engagement to Ann Lesley Smith last month in the pages of The New York Post, one of the many newspapers he owns through his international media conglomerate, News Corp.
Smith, a 66-year-old former dental hygienist who was married to country musician and television/radio entrepreneur Chester Smith until his 2008 death, met Murdoch less than a year after his divorce from model and actress Jerry Hall.
“I was very nervous. I dreaded falling in love — but I knew this would be my last,” Murdoch told the Post’s gossip columnist Cindy Adams. “It better be. I’m happy.”
Murdoch also said he had proposed to Smith on St. Patrick’s Day because he was “one-fourth Irish,” and that he popped the question with an “Asscher-cut diamond solitaire” ring he selected himself. The Daily Mail reported the diamond was 11 carats and worth a whopping £2million ($2.5 million).
But apparently one-fourth isn’t enough luck of the Irish to get these two to the altar.
According to a report by Vanity Fair’s Gabriel Sherman, the couple “have abruptly called off their engagement.”
“One source close to Murdoch said he had become increasingly uncomfortable with Smith’s outspoken evangelical views,” Sherman wrote, noting that Murdoch’s spokesperson declined to comment.
