The Most Expensive Celebrity Divorces of All Time
When news of a big celebrity marriage makes headlines, many tabloid readers anxiously await the even juicier headlines that could come — those that chronicle the divorce and the financial fallout. The limelight is both a blessing and a curse for the rich and famous, and when their marriages fail, the drama plays out in public for all to see. (Look no further than Johnny Depp and Amber Heard's defamation trial, which aired seemingly every drunken rant and argument the two shared during their whirlwind marriage.) Here are some of the most costly celebrity divorces to really turn our heads.
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Filled with plotlines of betrayal, abuse, domestic violence, restraining orders, and addiction, the divorce of Johnny Depp and Amber Heard was scandalous even by the standards of Hollywood tabloid breakups. The actors were married for only 15 months after tying the knot in 2015, and when the divorce was finalized, Depp agreed to pay Heard $7 million to walk away — funds that Heard said she would pledge to charity. But the drama didn't end when the divorce was finalized. The exes found themselves back in court in a highly publicized battle over a defamation lawsuit — Heard wrote an essay about being a domestic abuse victim in 2018, and though she didn’t mention Depp's name, he claims the article cost him his reputation and a handful of acting jobs. Depp sued Heard for $50 million, while she countersued for $100 million — in the end, the jury found that both actors were guilty of defamation in some facet, resulting in a verdict that determined Depp would pay Heard $2 million, while she would pay him $10 million. Left with the responsibility of paying her ex $8 million, the "Aquaman" actress just sold her desert mansion for $1.1 million, after her lawyer revealed that Heard can't afford to pay what she owes Depp.
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Recently, NFL legend Michael Strahan was still embroiled in an ugly and headline-grabbing custody battle stemming from his divorce in 2006. His wife Jean Muggli won $15.3 million plus $18,000 a month in child support, though that was reduced to $13,000 when Strahan left the NFL two years later. It didn't end there, however, as Muggli demanded more money and Strahan counterpunched with a custody claim for their twin teen daughters, claiming his ex-wife physically abused them.
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When NBC fired long-time "Today" show host Matt Lauer in the wake of a string of sexual misconduct accusations, it represented a watershed moment for the #MeToo movement. It was also the beginning of the end of Lauer's two-decade marriage to Annette Roque. The disgraced host agreed to pay Roque $20 million and Lauer quickly moved to sell a $44 million home in the Hamptons that the couple bought from Richard Gere.
In chronological order of President Trump's wives, Melania Trump is the "third lady." Trump was married to his first wife, Ivana, from 1977-1992, although she recently claimed that the marriage had ended in her mind in 1989 when she realized the future president was having an affair with Marla Maples, according to the Independent. That affair, and the endless drama of the Donald/Ivana divorce, sent the New York tabloid press into a feeding frenzy. Ivana Trump walked away with a $20 million settlement and Donald Trump married Marla Maples soon after before they, too, spiraled into a highly contentious and public divorce.
Famously private television comedy god Johnny Carson married model Joanna Holland in secret in 1972. Their divorce 13 years later was anything but hush-hush — the tabloids followed it relentlessly, likely to the chagrin of Carson. Holland was awarded $20 million as part of the settlement. Adjusted for inflation, that's about $48.3 million today.
After allegations of infidelity emerged, wrestling superstar Hulk Hogan's wife Linda Claridge filed for divorce in 2007 — but it took four years of legal wrangling to finally reach a settlement. When they did, she walked away with not half of the Hulk's fortune, but 70% of the couple's liquid assets and 40% ownership of the Hulk's companies.
The long, drawn out, and intensely public divorce between Paul McCartney and Heather Mills finally came to a close in 2008 when a judge decided the terms after the couple couldn't come to an agreement. The former Beatle offered about $32 million but Mills was holding out for about $251 million.
In 2008, Reuters reported that Madonna had paid her ex-husband Guy Ritchie "up to" $92 million to settle the couple's divorce. The pop icon and film director announced they were splitting after eight years of marriage. Their combined fortune had been estimated at $525 million, but most of that was attributed to Madonna's long and legendary career.
Though the late Melissa Mathison might not be a household name like her longtime husband, Harrison Ford, she wrote the screenplay for "E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial," including the famous line "E.T. phone home." She and Ford married in 1983 and divorced in 2004. As part of the settlement, she walked away with $85 million. Mathison died from cancer at age 65 in 2015.
Steven Spielberg is known for being a perfectionist behind the camera, but his meticulous nature does not, apparently, carry over into his personal life. When the famed director and his wife of four years, Amy Irving, divorced in 1989, she argued in court that she didn’t have legal representation when the couple informally sketched out a prenup on a scrap of paper, according to Forbes. The court sided with Irving, who was granted $100 million — half of Spielberg's fortune and nearly $210 million in 2020 dollars. That kind of money would grab tabloid headlines today, but back then, nine-figure settlements were almost unheard of.
Crossover king Garth Brooks and his college sweetheart Sandy Mahl had been married for 15 years when the couple divorced in 2001. Brooks would go on to marry fellow country star Trisha Yearwood in 2005, but he parted ways with Mahl with a nine-figure hole in his vast fortune. His divorce settlement included a $125 million payment to Mahl.
Neil Diamond was married to former TV producer Marcia Murphey before they divorced in 1994. When they split, the settlement gave her $150 million, about half the music star's fortune. Today, that's about $263 million. Diamond later said Murphey was "worth every penny."
Juanita Vanoy filed for divorce from the most famous celebrity athlete in history in 2002, but she and Michael Jordan reconciled once before splitting for good a few years later. Their divorce was finalized in 2007 and Vanoy moved on $168 million richer in what at the time was one of the biggest divorce settlements in history.
In 2017, Mel Gibson's girlfriend Rosalind Ross gave birth to Gibson's ninth child. He had his eighth child eight years earlier in 2009 with Russian pianist Oksana Grigorieva, who conceived while Gibson was still married to Robyn Moore, his wife of 31 years and the mother of his first seven children. In 2012, their long, public, and bitter divorce — which coincided with a string of ugly and racially charged Gibson meltdowns — was finalized. Moore, a former dental nurse, was awarded half of Gibson's $850 million fortune. She also received half of all Gibson's future movie royalties.
In 2009, Tiger Woods' world — and unimpeachable integrity that drove his public persona — began to unravel. One night that year, the world learned Woods crashed his Escalade into a fire hydrant while trying to escape his wife, who attacked his vehicle with a golf club. The ensuing months revealed a slow, steady drip of salacious revelations of infidelity and dysfunction that belied the squeaky-clean image the PGA superstar had spent so many years cultivating. Sponsors fled, Woods' career spiraled downward, and Swedish-born model Elin Nordegren walked away with full custody of the couples' children and a then-record-setting $750 million settlement.
Philanthropist, socialite, and powerbroker Elaine Wynn is known unofficially as the "queen of Las Vegas." After helping her celebrity businessman husband Steve Wynn build a casino empire, the couple's divorced was finalized in 2011 and Elaine Wynn parted with stock valued at more than $955 million. That, of course, made her a very rich woman — but her power goes far beyond her bank account. After the divorce, Steve Wynn was consumed by a flurry of sexual misconduct accusations and sordid tales of sexual assault and hush money payments to allgeged victims. Elaine Wynn seized the moment, asserted herself, leveraged her vast wealth to work the legal system, and muscled her former husband's backers to reassert control of the Wynn empire back to herself.
Media mogul Rupert Murdoch married Anna Maria Torv, a young journalist working for one of his papers, in 1967. That's the same year he divorced his first wife, whom he married in 1956 and later had a child with. In 1999 he divorced Torv, and just 17 days later, he married fellow media mogul Wendy Deng. They divorced in 2013, and in 2016, Murdoch, now in his late 80s, married actress Jerry Hall. The terms of his divorce with Deng weren’t disclosed, but Torv walked away with $1.7 billion in 1999, or $2.65 billion in 2020 dollars.
When socialite Jocelyn Wildenstein won $2.5 billion and $100 million a year for 13 years as part of her 1999 divorce settlement, the judge stipulated that she couldn't use any of the money for plastic surgery. Known as "Catwoman" for the unfortunate results of decades of excessive cosmetic alterations, Wildenstein spent 20 years married to Alec Wildenstein, a celebrity art dealer and race horse owner. Her million-dollar-a-month spending habits and her massive, debt-incurring real estate portfolio eventually ate their way to the bottom of even that seemingly endless pile of cash. In 2018, she claimed to have nothing in her checking account and that she was living off of Social Security when she declared bankruptcy that year.
Jeff Bezos had a net worth of roughly $150 billion before his astonishing eight-figure divorce from MacKenzie Scott was finalized in 2019. She walked away with 25% of the Amazon founder's company stock, which was worth about $38 billion, instantly making her one of the richest women on Earth. Bezos rebounded nicely, as well. In 2020, Forbes reported that he held the distinction of becoming the first person in history to accumulate a fortune worth $200 billion.
Bill and Melinda Gates announced last year that they were divorcing after 27 years of marriage. At the time, Bill Gates had a net worth of more than $130 billion. Melinda Gates had a reported net worth of about $70 billion. The couple said in a statement on Twitter: "Over the last 27 years, we have raised three incredible children and built a foundation that works all over the world to enable all people to lead healthy, productive lives. We … will continue our work together at the foundation, but we no longer believe we can grow together as a couple in this next phase of our lives."
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