Billionaire Barry Diller - married to Diane von Fürstenberg - comes out in new memoir
Who Knew
Barry Diller
Simon and Schuster, $59.99
Public figures still sometimes save weighty admissions about their lives for their autobiographies. Barry Diller, the billionaire media mogul and chairman of Expedia, has used his to do just that: come out of the closet.
A former CEO of Paramount Pictures, Diller hid his sexual orientation for decades, despite persistent rumours to the contrary. A high-profile marriage to fashion designer Diane von Fürstenberg helped quell some speculation but the threat of being outed was still like an 'anvil hanging … over my head'.
In Who Knew, the 83-year-old publicly acknowledges his sexuality for the first time. Diller admits that he has long known that he is gay but hid the truth to preserve his career ambitions and avoid public shaming. As for wife von Fürstenberg, she remains a rare romantic outlier and the lasting 'bedrock of my life'.
The memoir now reveals this hidden personal history and also shares his business acumen with other aspiring entrepreneurs.
Diller was born of privilege but suffered a dysfunctional family life, one where his mother would dispense sleeping tablets and a heroin-addicted brother beat him. The basement of talent agency William Morris was a sanctuary where its cabinets of archived correspondence were a way to 'read … through the history of show business'.
Good fortune, as it happens, was often looking out for the eager student of Hollywood's history. First, a lucrative posting at the television network ABC to help program films for the small screen. An enterprising thinker, Diller believed networks should make films for the tube too, soon transforming the station's profile thanks to his successful made-for-TV movies.
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