New details are emerging about the woman currently accompanying media tycoon Rupert Murdoch on a lengthy vacation in the Mediterranean.
On Monday, the Drudge Report described scientist Elena Zhukova as the Fox boss’ “new woman,” apparently suggesting that he’d started a new relationship just four months after breaking off his blink-and-you’d-miss-it engagement to conservative radio host Ann Lesley Smith.
Guardian Australia then reported on Wednesday that Zhukova, 66, met 92-year-old Murdoch at a “large family gathering” held by his ex-wife Wendi Deng. Sources told the outlet that Murdoch invited Zhukova out afterward and that they have spent several weeks cruising around the Med together.
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The report apparently backs up a Daily Mail report Tuesday that published pictures of Murdoch and Zhukova together while enjoying their getaway. The Mail further reported that Zhukova had boarded the Christina O—the famous yacht once owned by Aristotle Onassis during his romance with Jackie Kennedy—in July, and they’ve spent much of the last few weeks aboard the vessel and another yacht.
Both of the most recent reports also confirmed that Zhukova is the ex-wife of the Russian-born billionaire Alexander Zhukov. According to the Mail, Zhukov amassed a fortune in oil worth around $7 billion and owns a private jet as well as properties in Russia, Britain, and, Sardinia.
After her marriage to Zhukov ended, molecular biologist Zhukova reportedly took a job at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston in 1991 as the Soviet Union collapsed. She then moved to UCLA two years later where she specialized in diabetes research, according to the Mail.
Zhukova is also the mother of Darya “Dasha” Zhukova—the art collector and socialite who married Russian oligarch Roman Abromovich in 2008. They announced their plans to separate in 2017 and Dasha has since married Stavros Niarchos II—himself the grandson of a Greek shipping magnate.
A source close to Murdoch told the Mail that Murdoch and Elena Zhukova’s romance is still “very early days.” Presumably, Murdoch is hoping the relationship will last longer than his last relationship.
Last spring, Murdoch ended his marriage to his fourth wife, former supermodel Jerry Hall, after six years. It didn’t take long for him to find true love again, announcing his engagement to Ann Lesley Smith—a retired dental hygienist—in March this year.
“I was very nervous,” Murdoch said at the time in an interview with the New York Post, one of the newspapers in his media empire. “I dreaded falling in love—but I knew this would be my last. It better be. I’m happy.” Two weeks later, the wedding was officially off, with a source close to Murdoch telling Variety that Murdoch had “had become increasingly uncomfortable with Smith’s outspoken evangelical views.”
According to Guardian Australia, Murdoch’s newfound relationship with Zhukova is “serious.” If reports of their Mediterranean escape lasting “several weeks” are accurate, then the couple’s first vacation together has already lasted longer than Murdoch’s most recent engagement. Serious indeed.
