Top photo, Michael Douglas and wife Diandra in Mallorca. Bottom,
Dame Margot Fonteyn at the Covent Garden.
Abbreviated GUIDEPOST Reprint
by Jean Allen
15 June 1990
Actor/Director, Michael Douglas and wife Diandra, in Mallorca to oversee work on their recently acquired “dream house” situated on a cliff surrounded by mammoth pines and overlooking the Mediterranean between Valdemosa and Deia. The 70,000 sq. meter chalet “Possesio de E’Esataca” was the former home of the Archduke Luis Salvador of Austria. Mrs. Douglas, who was born on the Island, speaks fluent Mallorquin having spent her childhood there with her British parents – her mother still lives in Deia. The Douglases make their home with son Cameron in Mahattan. N.Y. but plan to use their new acquisition for a “get away” retreat and hope to spend several months at a time there when the actor’s work permits [. . .]
Spanish tenor, Placido Domingo opening the glittering homage to Dame Magot Fonteyn at London’s Covent Garden with an aria from “La Ballet. Dame Margot, who makes her home in Panama where she married to Panamanian Diplomat, Roberto ‘Tito’ Arias (who died last year), greeted royalty, friends and fans in a multi-colored sequin sheath – still slender and vibrant at age 72 years. Sharing some of the limelight was her one-time partner, Rudolph Nureyev, some 20 years her junior who has been touring with the musical “The King and I”. Enthusiastic in their applause were Diana, the Princess of Wales, and the Queen’s sister, Princess Margaret, President of the Royal Balle[. . .]
Francisco Rabaneola (better known as Paco Rabanne) presenting his latest collection (for which he won the coveted “Golden Thimble” award) at Madrid’s fashionable “Joy Eslava”. Among the many on hand to greet and congratulate the designer were Manolo Santana, looking happy in spite of his first wife Maria Fernanda Dopeso (from whom he has been separated for 10 years) suing him for non-payment of alimony, and his third wife, Otti; Elena de Borbon looking elegant in a Gianni Versace creation; young Manolo March who brought along Maria Suelves and her sister’s mother in law, the Marquesa de Villaverde; lovely Spanish model Paloma Lago and her fiancé, Javier Obregon (brother of Ana Garcia Obregon), who have set their wedding date for October 4th this year [. . .]
Placido Domingo greeting Princess Margaret and the Princess of Wales at the gala reception given for Dame Margot Fonteyn at London’s Covent Garden.
Spain’s Infanta Cristina celebrating her 25th birthday in New York where she is doing post graduate work at NYU and missing her uncle’s (ex King Constantine of Greece) 50th Birthday party in London where he resides with his wife, Ana Maria, and their children. Some 600 guests attended the celebration, including the heads of most of the European royal houses such as Queen Elizabeth II of England and her husband, Prince Phillip; the Prince and princess of Wales; and Constantine’s sister and brother-in-law, Queen Sofia and King Juan Carlos I, and their elder daughter Infanta Elena [. . .]
Charlton Heston and wife Lydia, along with son Fraser’s wife Marilyn, in Madrid to promote the actor’s latest movie, “Treasure Island”. In the movie, written, produced and directed by his son Fraser, Heston plays the colourful Long John Silver. The actor’s last visit to Spain was in 1961 when he starred “El Cid” [. . .]
Cristobal Martinez Bordiu (a Franco grandson) and his wife, Spanish model Maria Jose Toledo, celebrating the birth of their first child, a boy, Daniel, born in Madrid at the Ruber Clinic [. . .]
Ed’s Update
>> Michael Douglas and Diandra were divorced in 2000. In the same year, Douglas married Scottish actress Catherine Zeta-Jones. The Mallorca “dream house” is on the market. Asking price as of June 2019: $32 million.
>> Placido Domingo: well, you know all about the Spanish superstar tenor’s fall from grace. It has been making headlines since August. The latest fallout of the scandal arising from the alleged multiple sexual-harassment is Domingo’s resignation as General Director of the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra.
>> Dame Margot Fonteyn, Rudolph Nureyev, Diana Princess of Wales, and Princess Margaret passed on in February 1991, January 1993, August 1997, and February 2002 respectively.
>> Paco Rabanne is now 85 years old. He has retired as a fashion designer but the Paco Rabanne fashion house, his perfumes and cosmetics still pack a wallop in the industry. Versatile, Rabanne has turned artist and author in his later years.
>> Infanta Cristina, sister of the reigning King of Spain, Felipe VI, is afflicted by grievous family problems. Her husband, Iñaki Urdangarin, once the golden boy of the Spanish royal family, is in jail for embezzlement, fraud, influence peddling and tax crimes.
>> Infanta Elena married Spanish aristocrat Jaime de Marichalar in March 1995. They were divorced in December 2009. Their lovely daughter, Victoria Federica, fifth in the line of succession to the Spanish throne after her older brother, Felipe Juan Froilan, is fast turning into the darling of high society’s millennial generation. And Froilan? Ho-hum.
>> King Juan Carlos I, father of the Infantas Elena and Cristina, and Felipe VI, abdicated in June 2014. His popular wife, Queen Sofia, remains active officially but takes a back seat to Felipe’s wife, Queen Consort Letizia.
>> His exile over, 79-year old deposed King Constantine II of Greece, sister of Spain’s Queen Sofia, née Princess of Greece and Denmark, can now come and go to his old kingdom but as a commoner carrying a Danish diplomatic passport. He is rumored to enjoy vast financial resources but, like most mortals, suffers from old age ailments. He is still happily married to Princess Anne-Marie of Denmark, his beautiful third cousin. Three years after their fairy-tale wedding in Athens, in 1964, a military coup marked the downfall of Constantine as king.
>> Charlton Heston‘s marriage to Lydia Clarke on 17 March 1944 lasted 64 years, until his death on 5 April 2008. Lydia died in 2018.
>> As a grandson of Spanish dictator Francisco Franco, and like the other family members, Cristobal Martinez Bordiu is vehemently opposed to the Spanish Supreme Court ruling on the exhumation of Franco in the state mausoleum of the Valle de Los Caidos (Valley of theFallen) and the reburial of his remains in the public cemetery of Mingorrubio in the outskirts of Madrid. The court decision came down last September. As to his marriage with model and TV presenter Maria Jose Toledo, it ended in 2017.
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