Gianni Versace swimming pool

 

Montgomery Clift, 1951

Prince Felix Felixovich Yusupov

 

Prince Felix Yusupov by Linse. The Yusupovs were the wealthiest family in Russia. They owned dozens of estates and palaces and Prince Felix Yusupov was married to the niece of Tsar Nicholas II, Irina Alexandrovna. The prince is best remembered for his involvement in the murder of the mad monk Rasputin in the Yusupov family’s palace in St Petersburg. He was able to escape to Paris in 1917, taking many fine family jewels.

The Moika Palace or Yusupov Palace  was once the primary residence in St. Petersburg, Russia of the House of Yusupov. The building was the site of Grigori Rasputin's murder in the early morning of December 17, 1916.

He was born in the Moika Palace in Saint Petersburg, the capital of the Russian Empire. His father was Count Felix Felixovich Sumarokov-Elston, the son of Count Felix Nikolaievich Sumarokov-Elston. Zinaida Yusupova, his mother, was the last of the Yusupov line, of Crimean Tatar origin, and very wealthy. For the Yusupov name not to die out, his father (5 October 1856, Saint Petersburg – 10 June 1928, Rome, Italy) was granted the title and the surname of his wife, Princess Zenaida Nikolaievna Yusupova (2 September 1861, Saint Petersburg – 24 November 1939, Paris) upon their marriage, on 4 April 1882 in Saint Petersburg.

Zinaida and Felix Yusupov at a ball "in traditional Russian costume", 1903.

The Yusupov family, richer than any of the Romanovs, had acquired their wealth generations earlier. It included four palaces in Petrograd (Saint Petersburg), three palaces in Moscow, 37 estates in different parts of Russia (Kursk, Voronezh and Poltava), coal and iron-ore mines, plants and factories, flour mills and oil fields on the Caspian Sea.

Portrait of Felix Yusupov (1903) by Valentin Serov

Felix led a flamboyant life. "At twelve he began wearing his mother's gowns. He describes in his autobiography often spending time with Gypsy bands and adopting female clothing. His older brother took him often to restaurants and cafés". Felix became one of the richest men in Russia after his older brother, Nikolai Felixovich, Count Sumarokov-Elston (1883-22 June 1908), had an affair with a married woman and was killed on Krestovsky Island in a duel by the jealous husband, Arvid Manteuffel, in the summer of 1908. From 1909 to 1913, he studied fine arts at University College, Oxford, where he was a member of the Bullingdon Club, established the Oxford University Russian Society. Yusupov was living on 14 King Edward Street, had a Russian cook, a French driver, an English valet, a housekeeper, and he spent much time partying. He owned three horses, a macaw and a bulldog called Punch. He smoked hashish, played polo and became friendly with Luigi Franchetti, a piano player, Jacques de Beistegui, who both moved in. At some time, Yusupov got acquainted with Albert Stopford and Oswald Rayner. He rented an apartment in Curzon Street, Mayfair, and met several times with the ballerina Anna Pavlova, who lived in Hampstead.

Princess Irina Alexandrovna of Russia with her fiance Prince Felix Yusupov, 1914

Back in Saint Petersburg, he married Princess Irina of Russia, the Tsar's only niece, in the Anichkov Palace on 22 February 1914. The bride was wearing a veil that had belonged to Marie Antoinette. The Yusupovs went on their honeymoon to Cairo, Jerusalem, London and Bad Kissingen, where his parents were staying.

In exile

One week after the February Revolution, Nicholas abdicated the throne on 2 March. Following the abdication, the Yusupovs returned to the Moika Palace before they went to Crimea. They later returned to the palace to retrieve jewels (containing the blue Sultan of Morocco Diamond, the Polar Star Diamond, and a pair of diamond earrings that once belonged to Marie-Antoinette) and two paintings by Rembrandt, the sale proceeds of which helped sustain the family in exile. The paintings were bought by Joseph E. Widener in 1921 and are now in the National Gallery in Washington, DC. In Crimea, the family boarded a British warship, HMS Marlborough, which took them from Yalta to Malta. On the ship, Felix enjoyed boasting about the murder of Rasputin. One of the British officers noted that Irina "appeared shy and retiring at first, but it was only necessary to take a little notice of her pretty, small daughter to break through her reserve and discover that she was also very charming and spoke fluent English." The Yusupovs founded a short-lived couture house Irfé, named after the first two letters of their first names. Irina modeled some of the dresses the pair and other designers at the firm created. They became renowned in the Russian émigré community for his financial generosity. Their philanthropy and their continued high living and poor financial management extinguished what remained of the family fortune. Felix's bad business sense and the Wall Street Crash of 1929 eventually forced the company to shut down.

On September 27, 1967, Prince Felix Youssoupoff passed away in his modest Paris home.

Irina and Felix enjoyed a happy and successful marriage for more than 50 years. When Felix died in 1967, Irina was stricken by grief and died three years later He was buried in Sainte-Geneviève-des-Bois Russian Cemetery, in the southern suburbs of Paris. Yusupov's private papers and a number of family artifacts and paintings are now owned by Víctor Contreras, a Mexican sculptor who, as a young art student in the 1960s, met Yusupov and lived with the family for five years in Paris. It seems that Felix had never abandoned his pursuit for men.

Classic Bodybuilder Helmut Riedmeier

Helmut Riedmeier (born May 14, 1944 in Munich ) is a German former bodybuilder . He was Mr. Europe five times and Mr. Universe twice .

2001 International British Master Champion

1997 United Kingdom Championship (over 50) – 1st place

1996 NABBA Masters Mr Britain - 1st place

1995 NABBA Masters Mr Britain - 1st place

1983 IFBB European Mens Championships - 5th place

1974 NABBA Professional Mr. Universe - 1st place

1972 Mr Europe - 1st place

1972 IFBB European Mens Championships - 1st place

1971 IFBB European Mens Championships - 2nd place

1971 FFCPAS Mr.Europe - 2nd place

1971 IFBB Mr. Universe - 1st place

1971 NABBA Professional Mr. United Kingdom - 1st place

1970 IFBB European Mens Championships - 1st place

1970 NABBA Mr. Universe - 2nd place

1970 Mr Europe - 1st place

1969 IFBB Mr World - 5th place

1968 NABBA Mr. Universe - 2nd place

1966 NABBA Mr. Universe - 5th place

1966 Mr Europe - 2nd place

1965 Mr Europe - 1st place

1965 Mr. Germany - 1st place

1964 Junior Mr. Germany - 1st place

Daniel Carmago - Stuttgart Ballet

Daniel Camargo (born September 1991) is a Brazilian ballet dancer. He joined the Stuttgart Ballet in 2009, and was promoted to principal dancer in 2013. In 2016, he left to join the Dutch National Ballet, before leaving in 2019 to pursue a freelance career. In 2022, he joined the American Ballet Theatre.

Christopher Isherwood by George Platt Lynes, 1948

Anthony Perkins, 1959.

Gary Cooper

Gary Cooper on a Beach

Gary Cooper and Fredric March

 

a young Alan Bates

Bates was married to actress Victoria Ward from 1970 until her death in 1992, although they had separated many years earlier. They had twin sons, born in November 1970, the actors Benedick Bates and Tristan Bates. Tristan died following an asthma attack in Tokyo in 1990.

Bates had numerous gay relationships, including those with actor Nickolas Grace and Olympic skater John Curry as detailed in Donald Spoto's authorised biography Otherwise Engaged: The Life of Alan Bates. Spoto characterised Bates's sexuality as ambiguous, and said, "he loved women but enjoyed his closest relationships with men". Even after homosexuality was partially decriminalised in Britain in 1967, Bates rigorously avoided interviews and questions about his personal life, and even denied to his male lovers that there was a homosexual component in his nature.While throughout his life Bates sought to be regarded as a ladies' man or at least as a man who, as an actor, could appear attractive to and attracted by women, he also chose many roles with an aspect of homosexuality or bisexuality, including the role of Rupert in the 1969 film Women in Love and the role of Frank in the 1988 film We Think the World of You.

In the later years of his life, Bates had a relationship with the Welsh actress Angharad Rees and in the last years, his companion was his longtime friend, actress Joanna Pettet, his co-star in the 1964 Broadway play Poor Richard. They divided their time between New York and London.

Bates died of pancreatic cancer in December 2003 after going into a coma. He is buried at All Saints' Church, Bradbourne in Derbyshire.

Shirtless Boris Karloff posing for sculptor Ivan Simpson, photo by Ray Jones