The Intimate Sex Lives of Famous People

by David Wallechinsky

  Approximately 15 celebrities, including Chaplin and producer Thomas Ince, were aboard Hearst’s yacht Oneida on Nov. 18, 1924, for an impromptu party. Within a few days, Hollywood was mourning Ince’s death. Most experts contended that Ince died from heart failure brought on by acute indigestion. However, stories surfaced that during the celebration Ince slipped off with Marion and tried to seduce her. Hearst, pistol in hand, discovered them in a dimly lit cabin below deck, mistook Ince for Chaplin, and unloaded a bullet in Ince’s head. The scandalous story was denied by those on board, Ince’s body was cremated, and Hearst, it was said, provided Ince’s widow, Nell, with a trust fund.

  Acutely jealous of his winsome blond beauty, on numerous occasions Hearst hired detectives to spy on her. A thinly veiled reconstruction of their 36-year-affair served as the story line for the 1941 cinema classic Citizen Kane. Hearst and Davies were outraged by the depiction of their romance, but all attempts to purchase and destroy the prints of the Orson Welles film failed.

  Several times Hearst attempted to secure a divorce from Millicent. Once he even hired a detective in the hope of catching her in an adulterous affair. Millicent responded to his pleas for a divorce by purchasing a pearl necklace priced in six figures from Tiffany’s and ordering the clerk to “send the bill to my husband’s office.” Hearst and Marion resigned themselves to a lifetime affair. Though Hearst could never give Marion a wedding ring, he lavished jewels and money on her, which she parlayed into a vast fortune in real estate. Hearst, who spent half a billion dollars in his lifetime, once had to borrow a million dollars from his mistress.

  During his last four years, after the onset of illness, Hearst lived with Marion in her Beverly Hills mansion. Two months after Hearst died, on Oct. 31, 1951, Marion ran off to Las Vegas and married merchant marine Capt. Horace Brown, a man who bore an uncanny resemblance to the younger-day Hearst. It was Marion’s first marriage. Ten years later, at the age of 64, Marion succumbed to cancer.

  QUIRKS: Hearst loved to see Marion in costumes. Once, after a long separation, she received this message from an exuberant, randy Hearst: “Patient is on the blink … [bring] your nurse’s uniform.”

  —A.K. and V.S.

  The Sex Investor

  HOWARD HUGHES (Dec. 24, 1905-Apr. 5, 1976)

  HIS FAME: American billionaire Howard Hughes gained fame as a business entrepreneur, Hollywood film mogul, pioneer airplane designer, and record-breaking experimental aviator. Later in life, he achieved notoriety as a recluse who lived in near isolation for more than one and a half decades.

  HIS PERSON: The son of a millionaire who manufactured oil-drilling equipment, Howard Hughes was born in Houston, Tex. An only child, he was spoiled by both of his parents but especially by his mother Allene, who worried and fretted over the young Hughes constantly. Allene instilled in her son her own phobias, including a profound fear of germs, which years later would dominate Hughes’ life. During his childhood, Hughes had only one close friend and rarely took part in any group activities at school. A loner even as an adolescent, the thing he liked most was to ride his horse around the countryside.

  Hughes with Ava Gardner

  As a teenager, Hughes was a poor student who appeared to have little ambition or direction. But after his mother died suddenly when he was 16 and his father died two years later, the orphaned Hughes revealed a strong-willed personality. He had a court declare him legally an adult, bought out his relatives’ shares of the Hughes Tool Company, and thus took over total control of the family business. A millionaire at the age of 19, he moved to Hollywood, where he directed and produced films, including the WWI aerial epic Hell’s Angels.

  By the early 1930s Hughes had a new passion—aviation. He founded the Hughes Aircraft Company, bought control of Trans World Airlines (TWA), and personally designed new, experimental aircraft. Serving as his own test pilot, he set a new airspeed record in 1935, and within three years broke the transcontinental and transworld records. He also crashed three times, suffering serious injuries.

  As early as 1944, Hughes suffered his first nervous breakdown. While his economic empire grew over the next two decades, Hughes’ mental condition deteriorated dramatically. Surrounded by aides who never suggested he seek psychiatric help, Hughes withdrew into bedrooms in mansions and penthouses where he used box after box of Kleenex—spreading the tissues over everything he came in contact with—in his obsessive war against germs. For at least the last decade of his life he was a chronic paranoid, addicted to codeine and Valium. Weighing less than 100 lb., with long shaggy hair, Hughes died at the age of 70 while en route from Acapulco, Mexico, to a hospital in Houston, Tex. He left an estate valued at $2.3 billion.

  SEX LIFE: A very shy teenager, Hughes had few if any dates and little experience with women. After his father’s death he decided to marry, choosing Ella Rice, a young Houston socialite. A vivacious extrovert, Ella turned down his proposal. However, Hughes had his aunt, who had married into the Rice family, intervene on his behalf. Finally Ella’s mother agreed that Hughes would be an asset to the family and arranged the marriage.

  After the wedding Hughes and his bride moved to Los Angeles, where the marriage proved to be a disaster. Intoxicated with the excitement of Hollywood, Hughes paid little attention to his new wife, while spending an increasing amount of time in the company of people involved in the film industry. After three years Ella left for Houston and sued for divorce. (This was but the first of many times that Hughes proved himself incapable of maintaining an intimate, permanent relationship with a woman.) Hughes’ reaction to Ella’s rejection set a pattern for the future; feeling betrayed, he never saw or spoke to her again.

  After Ella’s departure Hughes began a pursuit of Hollywood film stars which was to continue for 30 years. Actress Billie Dove was his first conquest, but Hughes did not want their affair publicized. When he learned that Dell Publications had printed a one-shot “magazine” featuring himself and Billie on the cover, Hughes bought the entire printing before it could be distributed. Billie Dove was genuinely in love with the 6-ft. 4-in., dark-skinned, lanky young Texan. This was unfortunate, since he dropped her for no apparent reason after a short affair and never spoke to her again. Katharine Hepburn was another love. When she went on the road with a show, Hughes followed her across the country in his private plane. In the end, Hepburn terminated the romance after explaining to a friend that Hughes bored her.

  Ginger Rogers was also linked with Hughes. But their relationship ended when she found Hughes in bed with another actress. One actress widely assumed to have been romantically involved with Hughes was Jane Russell. Although they had a close relationship for a number of years, they never made love. Hughes was particularly concerned, however, with Jane Russell’s breasts and how they appeared on screen. After viewing rushes of the film Macao starring Russell, Hughes wrote a three-page memo describing in detail the kind of brassiere she should wear to enhance her assets. “What we really need is a brassiere of a very thin material…. This brassiere should hold her breasts upward but should be so thin that it takes the natural shape of her breasts.” Other movie actresses associated with Hughes included Marian Marsh, Hedy Lamarr, Jean Harlow, Ida Lupino, Ava Gardner, Lana Turner, Terry Moore, Yvonne Schubert, and Carole Lombard.

  Probably no other person in history invested as much money in his sex life as did Howard Hughes, who obsessively searched for the woman with the perfect face, body, and especially breasts. For besides his heavily publicized affairs with well-known actresses, Hughes established another outlet for his sexual urges. Over the years he developed a system for procuring young women for what was to become a veritable harem. Hughes operatives across the country were told of their boss’ need for new faces and bodies. These agents found likely candidates, promised them screen tests and movie careers, and then shipped them off to Los Angeles. At one time Hughes owned or leased five houses in different areas of Los Angeles. Each one was occupied by a hopeful starlet or show girl, who was kept on sala
ry. Thus, whichever neighborhood Hughes found himself in, he would have privacy and a girl.

  Hughes, himself, was constantly looking for talent in magazines, on television, and on the streets. He set up his own detective agency to research and contact these prospects. One friend, studio executive William Fadiman, was sent to check out the star of the Ballet de Paris, Zizi Jeanmaire, after Hughes saw a picture of her. When Fadiman heartily approved of what he saw, Hughes bought the entire ballet company and installed it on the second floor of the RKO Writers Building. He hired a writer to do a screenplay for the company and set about to seduce Jeanmaire. After two years of failure, Hughes abruptly dropped the ballet and the planned film project.

  Another victim of Hughes’ obsessional desire was Italian actress Gina Lollobrigida. When she was approached by a Hughes agent and asked to go to Hollywood to act, she was thrilled. But when she arrived, she was whisked off to the Town House Hotel, where she was kept a virtual prisoner; she had a 24-hour guard and was permitted to see no one. Happily married to a dentist in Italy, she wanted no part of Hughes’ advances. Lollobrigida finally escaped and returned to Italy, commenting, “I was not free in the time I spent there.”

  Beauty contests were always a good source for Hughes’ reconnaissance missions. In 1960, after viewing the Miss Universe pageant on television, Hughes ordered his detectives to contact seven of the finalists, who were subsequently registered in Los Angeles hotels. The operation failed, however, when the seven became suspicious of the promises of stardom and bolted for home. At one point during the 1950s, a Hughes aide claimed there were 108 active files on various candidates for Hughes’ bedroom. After reading the files and looking over the photographs of these women, Hughes decided which were to be contacted—his favorites being teenage brunettes with large breasts.

  The case of one Riverside, Calif., 15-year-old who won a local beauty contest was typical. She was investigated, contacted, moved to Los Angeles, and given a house in Coldwater Canyon. Chauffeured by Hughes’ drivers, she was given singing, voice, acting, and dancing lessons. At the same time, she was cut off from old friends, especially men. Forced to live a life of seclusion, she became lonely. Hughes waited for that vulnerable moment, stepped into her life, and began taking her to dinner. Soon they were lovers. But the girl from Riverside realized that, although she lived in luxury, her movie career was still nonexistent. It took her five more years to realize that Hughes had never intended to make her a star.

  At least one of these operations at seduction backfired. A 16-year-old blond with a 40-in. bust was brought to Hollywood from North Carolina. Her mother, who had also gone west, suggested a trip to Palm Springs, Calif., for her daughter, herself, and Hughes. He readily agreed and once there took the girl to bed. In the middle of their lovemaking, the mother burst into the room, claiming her daughter had been ruined. To avoid statutory rape charges, Hughes was forced to settle out of court for $250,000.

  In 1957, at the age of 51, Hughes married 31-year-old movie star Jean Peters, whom he had dated off and on for 11 years. He would not allow her to shave her body hair, because he liked hair on women. (When Peters posed in bathing suits for fan magazines, her legs and thighs had to be retouched.) Why the couple married remains a mystery. Hughes was already mentally unbalanced, and Peters had to give up her career and live in seclusion with him. Sometime during the early 1960s, Hughes’ sex life ended when his overwhelming fear of germs precluded physical contact with another person. Sex was replaced by drugs and his around-the-clock viewing of movies and television. Finally, in 1970, Jean filed for divorce, not having seen Hughes for over three years.

  MEDICAL REPORT: In the early 1940s Hughes had a big chow named Chang. One morning Chang got into a fight with another dog. When Hughes tried to separate them, the other dog bit him on the penis. It took six stitches to sew up the wound. Although he was temporarily disabled, the injury didn’t seem to have any lasting effect. However, Hughes never owned another pet.

  —R.J.F.

  The Golden Greek

  ARISTOTLE ONASSIS (Jan. 20, 1906-Mar. 15, 1975)

  HIS FAME: Upon his controversial marriage to Jacqueline Kennedy, Aristotle Socrates Onassis—the richest and most flamboyant of the “golden” Greek shipowners—became one of the most publicized figures of the 20th century. A friend of such eminent men as Winston Churchill, he mingled smoothly with world leaders, royalty, and the very well-to-do.

  HIS PERSON: Onassis was the son of a prosperous Greek tobacco merchant in Smyrna, Turkey. A likable but rebellious youth, he was suspended from several schools, once for administering a firm pinch to the backside of a woman teacher. In 1922, when the Turks launched brutal attacks on the resident Greek population, the 16-year-old Onassis and members of his family fied to Athens. Although he hoped to immigrate to the U.S., he was discouraged by a potential wait of several years and instead set sail for Argentina. He arrived in Buenos Aires with only a few hundred dollars in his pockets. By means of personal daring and astute business acumen, he first established himself in the tobacco business and then branched out to his real love, shipping. He became a millionaire by age 25, and through investments in shipping—especially oil tankers—he amassed one of the great personal fortunes of the postwar era, if not of all time.

  Onassis with his wife, Jacqueline

  LOVE LIFE: As a youngster Onassis was sexually precocious. He had to be restrained from seducing the family laundress at the age of 11. A few years later he received his initiation from his 25-year-old French teacher, whose scanty dress, owing to the scorching weather, fired his lust. “Mademoiselle, you are arousing me against my will … nothing can stop me from violating you!” was his winning approach. Needless to say Onassis proved to be a most ardent student. The women of Argentina found him, with his astonishingly intense black eyes, irresistible. Later, as a young man-about-town, he savored New York City nightlife during the 1940s in the company of his tall blond mistress, Ingeborg Dedichen. Ingeborg was an aristocrat who helped advance Onassis’ career as well as smooth his rough social edges. Of this period Ingeborg has written: “He would lick me between the toes…. He would embrace every part of my body and cover me with kisses.” Yet as passionate as it was, this affair descended into a series of beatings administered by the jealous Onassis and an attempted suicide by Ingeborg.

  Following a brief Hollywood fling with a number of screen stars, Onassis finally married for the first time at 40. Tina Livanos, the petite 17-year-old daughter of a rival shipowner, was to bear his two children, Alexander and Christina. But this idyllic existence was shattered by the appearance of the greatest love of his life, opera singer Maria Callas. For Callas and Onassis, it was love at first sight. Their affair was conducted openly, and they understood each other emotionally, intellectually, and sexually. Although opera bored him, Onassis deeply enjoyed the worldwide success and fame of his fiery theatrical lover. Their relationship never led to marriage, but they remained close until the day of Onassis’ death.

  On Oct. 20, 1968, Onassis (who had been divorced from Tina for some years) stunned the world by wedding the beautiful widow of a beloved, slain president of the U.S. That widow, of course, was Jacqueline Kennedy. Onassis had known her casually for some time, but Kennedy-watchers around the world thought he was “too short, too old, too dark, and too coarse” to be a suitable successor to John F. Kennedy. The eyes of the world were focused on the isle of Skorpios, the site of the wedding, and from that moment on, this May-December couple (Jackie was a generation younger than Ari) found itself bathed in an unending glare of publicity. One portion of the marriage that particularly intrigued everyone was the famous prenuptial contract, which quickly became one of the most discussed and speculated-about financial and legal documents of our time. The text allegedly contained over 100 clauses and covered everything from money to sleeping arrangements. Christian Cafarakis, a steward formerly employed by Onassis, claimed that the contract provided for separate bedrooms for the couple at all times and released
Jackie from any obligation to bear Onassis’ children. Onassis offered affection and the protection of wealth to a woman who had been shattered by the violent death not only of her husband but of her brother-in-law, Sen. Robert Kennedy, as well. In return, Jackie offered Ari warmth and the companionship of one of the most glamorous of women. But their carefully constructed relationship was soon shattered by the death of Onassis’ only son. Thrown into a deep depression, Onassis grew irritated by Jackie’s extravagant and capricious ways. He turned to Callas for comfort and contemplated a divorce. However, death in the form of myasthenia gravis put an end to his plans.