London, March 1 (IANS) Ted Turner, the 73-year-old billionaire founder of CNN, spends one week each month with a different girlfriend, The Telegraph reported Thursday.
He revealed that he has four girlfriends, with each of whom he spends one week a month.
Turner and his third wife Jane Fonda divorced in 2001, after 10 years of marriage.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the media mogul and philanthropist, who owns 28 homes, including 14 ranches, said a week per month for each girlfriend was “pretty much the general rule”.
He only named one of the women, novelist Elizabeth Dewberry, who was with him at the time in New York. Until five years ago, Dewberry was married to the Pulitzer Prize-winning author Robert Olen Butler.
When they separated, Butler wrote an email to friends, which was leaked to the media, in which he said: “She will not be Ted’s only girlfriend. Ted is permanently and avowedly non-monogamous. But though he has several girlfriends, it is a very small number, and he does not take them up lightly.”
Asked if the other three unnamed women in his life were happy to share him, Turner replied: “Sort of.” He still speaks to Fonda about once a month and, according to one friend, is “still in love with her”.
Turner himself told the magazine: “Jane said ‘I want two homes, a winter home and a summer home. I don’t want 10.’ And she couldn’t take the travel. Really, it’s much harder for a woman than a man.”
“What am I supposed to do, sit down and cry? I did for six months. And after that, you gotta go on.”
Turner, who donated $1 billion to the UN, has an estimated wealth of $2 billion and is America’s second largest private landowner. He has spent much of his recent time on environmental causes and owns more than 50,000 bison, The Telegraph said.
