默多克申請與鄧文迪離婚 補償或超10億美元

When Rupert Murdoch in 1998 announced his abrupt separation from Anna Murdoch, his wife of 31 years, almost nobody at the time, including Anna, had any idea, or could reasonably speculate, that Murdoch, then an old 67, might have a girlfriend.
But he did. And his divorce and remarriage, and the effect it had on his children, social life and executives, would shape the next generation of his company – a romance for our time, as it were.
With the curt, and blistering, announcement of his decision to file for divorce from Wendi Murdoch, the young woman he met when she was 28 and working for Star TV, his company in Hong Kong, another upheaval begins.
It was two summers ago that Wendi burst into the News and transformed her public self from harridan to heroine by, with lightening fast reflexes, blocking a pie attack on her frail-looking husband in the midst of a difficult testimony in Britain before a committee of parliament investigating the hacking scandal.
Murdoch had told his oldest son, Lachlan, that he'd concluded that marrying Wendi was a "mistake" – or so Lachlan, along with his siblings never a fan of his father's remarriage, was telling people. And during the many months that I was interviewing Murdoch in 2008 for my book about him, we would sometimes meet on weekend mornings at his apartment where it quite appeared he had not slept the night – but, rather, had arrived minutes before me with clothes bundled in his briefcase.
Indeed, if you imagined two opposite people, save only for their evident mutual ambition, it might be Rupert and Wendi.
Rupert, the cold, cryptic, scowling, impersonal, rock-hard conservative Australian aristocrat, with his four adult children unable to get over his marriage to the woman 39 years his junior. And Wendi, the energetic, ebullient, social creature, with natural liberal tendencies, whose first job in the US was at a Chinese restaurant and who had given him – "from the fridge", after his prostate cancer – two young Chinese children (and moved her parents to New York).
And yet, something seemed to work, too.
There was the orange hair die; the workout regimes; his protestations that he had finally learned how to be a good father; and his new friendship with, gasp, liberals. David Geffen, via Wendi, became one of Rupert's closest confidants.
Certainly, business seemed to energize them. I often heard them, like teenagers in love, talking on the phone – albeit about business deals and, more than not, from different cities. I even saw them holding hands.
But his children continued to dislike her. Even when they made every effort to tolerate her, it was with clenched teeth. And his mother, who died this past year, always refused to meet Wendi.
For her part, Wendi remained ever-furious with him for not standing up to his children – which included locking their children out of full participation in the trust that controls all the Murdoch assets.
She led a glamorous social life. In effect, she was the center of the jet set. It followed her: Hollywood, the art world, international super stars. She rejuvenated the jet set.
Rumors about their relationship dogged them. When the LA Times threatened to go public with a supposed story of infidelity, News Corp had lawyers debrief both husband and wife and convinced the paper to kill its story.
Robert Peston, the BBC's financial correspondent, who is said to be a close friend of Will Lewis, a key Murdoch lieutenant, tweeted that the real facts of the break-up are "jaw-dropping":
Am also told that undisclosed reasons for Murdoch divorcing Deng are jaw-dropping - & hate myself for wanting to know what they are
— Robert Peston (@Peston) June 13, 2013
We can only speculate about what he might mean. However, a year ago, she gave an interview to the New York Times suggesting that they were living independent lives. And Wendi's emails go through News Corp, so the company surely knows who she is talking to and what she is up to.
And yet, during the past year, what people have most noticed is their closeness. She had seemed to become his key adviser, close enough that there has been speculation she would go on the board of the newspaper company being split from the larger entertainment company.
She had also become, to his children's ever-greater consternation, his gatekeeper. Outsiders did not get to Rupert without going through Wendi.
But now the split is dramatic. As harsh as the split from Anna.
And in the fashion that Rupert does things – peremptorily, wrathfully, implacably – it would seem to leave Wendi far out in the cold. There is her 1999 pre-nup, and, to boot, two post-nups. What's more, it is a fearsome thing when News Corp and the Murdoch family close their ranks against you. Indeed, it is not that easy to hire a law firm not conflicted out by its work for News Corp, or the promise of work. Her PR aide, Steven Rubenstein, is on Rupert's payroll – so his help disappears.
Except, of course, that Wendi knows all Murdoch's secrets. All of them.

當1998年魯伯特·默多克突然宣佈與31歲的妻子安娜·默多克（ Anna Murdoch）離婚時，幾乎沒有人（包括安娜在內）會想到，或推斷出，那時已67歲高齡的默多克會交上一個女朋友。
但是他交到了。他的離婚、再婚，及其對他孩子、社交生活及高級主管的影響，都會塑造默多克公司的下一代——可以說成是我們這個時代的羅曼史。
默多克草率快速地聲明向鄧文迪提出離婚申請，當時兩人相遇時，鄧文迪年僅28歲，在默多克的香港公司星空衛視工作。這一舉動又激起千層浪。
兩年前的夏天，鄧文迪闖入人們的視野，將她的公共形象由老潑婦轉變成女中豪傑。當時，她文弱的丈夫正在英國爲竊聽醜聞案進行艱難的作證，她以迅雷不及掩耳之勢阻止了一次蛋糕派的攻擊。
默多克曾告訴過他的長子拉克倫（Lachlan），他認爲自己和鄧文迪的婚姻是個“錯誤”——又或者是拉克倫是這樣告訴人們的，他和其他兄弟姐妹一樣從不喜歡父親再婚。2008年，我在採訪默多克的大多數時間裏，那時我在寫一本關於他的書，我們有時會在週末的早晨在他的公寓裏見面，他看上去明顯一夜沒睡——但是，他會比我早到幾分鐘，公文包裏還塞着衣服。
實際上，你可以想象兩個完全相反的人，兩人相同的只有彼此共同的明顯野心，這兩個人就是魯伯特和鄧文迪。
魯伯特是一名冷淡、神祕、愁眉不展、不帶人情味、堅硬如石的保守派澳大利亞貴族，他的四個孩子不可能會對他與比他小39歲妻子的婚姻釋懷。而鄧文迪積極、熱情、熱愛社交，她有着天生的自由傾向，她在美國的第一份工作是在一家中國餐館打工，她在他得了前列腺癌後，從“冰庫裏”爲他生了兩個中國小孩（並把她的父母帶到了紐約）。
可是，他們之間有些東西似乎也行得通。
他說自己終於學會了如何做一個好父親；而他與自由主義派結下了新的友誼。通過鄧文迪，大衛·格芬（David Geffen）成爲了魯伯特最親密的知己之一。
當然，生意似乎點燃了他們的熱情。我經常聽見他們像熱戀的青年人一樣打電話——雖然電話的內容是關於生意，而且更多的時候，兩人身處不同的城市。我從未見過他們牽手。
但他的孩子一直不喜歡她。即使他們用盡了努力去容忍她，但也十分艱難。他去年去世的母親從未願意見過鄧文迪。
另一方面，鄧文迪對魯伯特不敢與孩子們抗爭的行爲很是生氣——她不讓他們參與掌控默多克全部資產的信託基金。
她有着美妙迷人的社交生活。實際上，她是上流社會的中心。它們跟隨着她的腳步：好萊塢、藝術界、國際巨星。她爲上流社會注入了活力。
關於他們關係的謠言尾隨而來。當洛杉磯時報（LA Times）威脅要將一則不忠的猜測消息公佈於衆的時候，新聞集團（News Corp）的律師盤問了兩人，並勸說洛杉磯時報斃了這條消息。
英國廣播公司的金融記者羅伯特·派森（Robert Peston）據說是默多克重要助理威爾??劉易斯（Will Lewis）的密友，他在推特上發帖說到，二人離婚的真相讓人“瞠目結舌”：
我也被告知了，默多克和鄧文迪離婚的原因讓人瞠目結舌- 我之前還等着想知道他們的本來面目，我真討厭自己
—羅伯特·派森（@ Peston）2013.06.13
我們只能猜測他的意思。但是，一年前，她在接受《紐約時報》（New York Times）的採訪時曾暗示二人各過各的生活。而鄧文迪的此番發言是新聞集團經手的，所以公司一定知道她在說什麼，也知道她想要幹什麼。
而去年，人們大部分注意到的是他們之間的親密。她似乎變成了他的主要顧問，他們之間很是親密，親密到有人猜測她會成爲從默多克大娛樂公司分離出來的新聞公司董事會成員。
她也變成了他的看守人，這是他的孩子們最擔心恐懼的事。外人要想接近魯伯特必須先通過鄧文迪這一關。
但是現在的分手消息着實充滿了戲劇性。就像他和安娜分手時一樣的刺耳。
按照魯伯特做事的風格來說——獨斷、憤怒、執拗——鄧文迪似乎頗受苦楚。她在1999年簽訂了婚前協議，婚後還有兩份。而且，新聞集團和默多克家族把你踢出門外是件很可怕的事情。實際上，要僱請一家不和新聞集團利益沾邊的法律事務所不是件易事。她的公關助理史蒂文·魯賓斯坦（Steven Rubenstein）是靠魯伯特發工資的，所以他是不會幫忙了。
當然，只是鄧文迪知道默多克的所有祕密。所有。