Kim

by Sean Smith

  After they started dating, when she was just 17, he gave Kris the perfect introduction to the world of celebrity, and took her to golf tournaments all over the world. His brother Carlos maintained that it was Cesar who provided Kris with the connections she was able to use throughout her life.

  Cesar installed his teenage girlfriend in his townhouse near the ocean in Mission Beach, an area of San Diego rather similar to Malibu or Santa Monica. Kris moved in, with her best friend from high school, Debbie Mungle, for company, as Cesar spent so much time on the road at golf tournaments. It wasn’t Beverly Hills, but it was a step in the right direction.

  Kris may not have enjoyed the privileged upbringing that plenty of money gave Robert Kardashian, but she was comfortably middle class. Her father, Robert Houghton, had a good job as an engineer with the now defunct aircraft company Convair in San Diego. Her grandparents ran a candle store called Candelabra in fashionable La Jolla and her mother, Mary Jo, was their part-time assistant. When she was old enough to be a help and not a hindrance, Kris worked in the back room too.

  Kris paid tribute to her grandmother in her autobiography Kris Jenner … and All Things Kardashian. She ‘taught me the value of hard work’, she explained. That ethic is very much in keeping with the philosophy of Robert Kardashian and one that they passed on to their children, especially Kim.

  Her childhood, however, was very different from Robert Kardashian’s. His parents were married for 70 years, but Kris’s parents split up when she was seven. It was a traumatic time for Kris and her four-year-old sister Karen. Mary Jo had to sell the family home and go out to work full time. Eventually, Kris’s mother met a reformed alcoholic called Harry Shannon, who gave up booze for life when they married. Kris loved Harry’s entrepreneurial spirit and thought he was a ‘great guy’.

  Mary Jo believed in bringing up her daughters to follow strict household rules, but that didn’t stop her from agreeing to let her eldest go to Hawaii with Debbie to watch a golf tournament, which is where she met Cesar. Robert Kardashian didn’t know at first that, while he was pursuing her, Kris had accepted her boyfriend’s proposal of marriage.

  Robert wasn’t the least put off by her initial refusal to give him her phone number. He promptly found it via a friend who worked for the telephone company and boldly rang her up. She explained to E! that despite her initial hesitation and annoyance at his perseverance, they eventually realised there was a spark between them.

  The path of true love didn’t run smoothly. On their very first date to the movies, they went back to the house she shared with Cesar, who was away playing in a golf tournament – or so she thought. Just as they were getting down to things in the bedroom, the door burst open and in charged Cesar. He made sure that Robert didn’t hang around to chat. Kris maintains they were still in their clothes. Cesar’s brother verified that they were discovered in the bedroom. He alleges that his brother was suspicious of Kris and had deliberately missed the cut in the tournament so that he would be home early. If that were the case, then his suspicions were confirmed, and it marked the beginning of the end of their relationship.

  As well as the problems in her love life, Kris had to deal with a family tragedy that year, 1975. Her father, with whom she had been enjoying a much better relationship in recent years, was killed in a road accident in Mexico at the age of 42. The evening before he planned to marry for the second time, he was driving his Porsche when he hit a truck head on. Kim never knew her maternal grandfather.

  Two decades later, Star magazine in the US ran a story that Bob Houghton had been an alcoholic and had been drinking margaritas on the night of the crash. A girlfriend after his divorce, Leslie Johnson Leech, claimed, ‘I broke up with him because of his drinking.’

  Kris and Cesar didn’t split immediately and technically remained engaged for a few more months. The end occurred with a counter allegation of cheating, which gave Kris the opportunity to leave her golfer once and for all. Cesar became a club professional in El Cajon, a suburb of San Diego, when he quit the main tour, but resumed tournament golf on the seniors’ circuit when he was over 50. He never spoke about Kris while he was alive, although his brother revealed some salacious details after his death in 2011. She has never responded, preferring her first serious lover to remain enigmatically as Anthony.

  She didn’t waste any time and rushed into the arms of Robert, who was living the high life in his swanky new home in Deep Canyon Drive. She was trading up. He was clearly besotted with Kris and proposed within three weeks of her finally ditching Cesar. After she turned down his first proposal, Kris decided she needed her independence and wanted to see more of the world, so she trained as a flight attendant with American Airlines.

  Robert responded to her rejection by dating Priscilla Presley, the ex-wife of ‘The King’, who was still alive and the biggest star in the world. He didn’t just phone her up and ask her out. Her best friend, Joan Esposito, was dating and would eventually marry his brother Tommy, so it wasn’t too surprising when Robert and Priscilla got together.

  Joan was a former Miss Missouri who had been married to Joe Esposito, the larger-than-life road manager for Elvis. She forged a bond with Priscilla when they were both part of the mad Elvis world in the mid-sixties. Joanie, as she was known in those days, was a Vegas showgirl called Joan Roberts when she married Joe. As a couple, they went everywhere with Elvis and Priscilla. Joe was best man when the Presleys married at the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas and Joanie was matron of honour. Both women settled in Los Angeles in the early seventies after their marriages ended.

  The Kardashians were very popular. Susan Stafford, the original host of the game show Wheel of Fortune, described her friends Tommy and Joan as ‘decent and terrific people’. More interestingly, Susan had no idea that Robert Kardashian, fun and sociable, would eventually become famous in his own right. She observed, ‘The longer you are in Hollywood, you find yourself rubbing shoulders with people who become headline news.’ That would be particularly true of Kim Kardashian and her extraordinary family. Hollywood is indeed a very small world.

  Fortunately for the history of the Kardashian clan, Robert’s dalliance with Priscilla was short-lived, although he did move into her house on Summit Drive for a short time. When it ended, Robert resumed his pursuit of the woman with whom he was clearly very much in love.

  After completing her training, Kris was based in New York, but flew the route to Los Angeles every week. Robert, always dapper and expensively dressed, would meet her at LAX in his Rolls-Royce and whisk her back to the house, where they would play tennis or relax by the pool. He kept two Rollers in the garage now: one black and one white (and a convertible Mercedes for sunny days).

  Robert could easily have continued living the life of the Hollywood playboy, but he was determined to marry Kris. He introduced her proudly to his close-knit family and friends, like O. J. Simpson and Al Cowlings.

  Kris tells an amusing story of how she and Robert joined O. J. and the Bond actress Maud Adams on a trip to the Montreal Olympics in 1976. By now O. J. was even more famous, thanks to a blossoming movie career, with roles in The Klansman and the blockbuster The Towering Inferno. Everybody recognised him wherever he went, but nobody, including Kris, had a clue who Bruce Jenner was … until he won the decathlon gold medal.

  Eventually Robert and Kris married at the Westwood United Methodist Church on Wilshire Boulevard in July 1978, five years after their encounter at the racetrack. It was a big, opulent wedding with a reception for 300 at the Bel-Air Country Club. Tommy was best man, O. J. was the principal usher and the massive Al Cowlings, known as A. C., was ring-bearer. Her younger sister Karen was the maid of honour.

  Kris returned from an idyllic honeymoon in Europe, free from her job as an air hostess, happy and pregnant. She would later observe, ‘The Armenian women watched and counted the weeks until I gave birth to make sure I wasn’t pregnant before I got married.’

  To the relief of the matrons, she wasn’t, and gave bir
th to her first child, Kourtney Mary, on 18 April 1979. She was 23. At 24, she had her second. She had conceived again on a skiing trip to the fashionable resort of Aspen, Colorado, with O. J. and his new beautiful blonde girlfriend, Nicole Brown.

  Kimberly Noel Kardashian was born in Los Angeles on 21 October 1980.

  It was time for the growing family of four to move to a house of their own. With perfect timing, in 1979, Robert pulled off his biggest business deal to date, when Radio & Records was sold for an estimated $12.5 million. He was thought to have made about $3 million on the deal – a sum worth $10.5 million in today’s money. Unsurprisingly, he stopped working as an attorney and relinquished his licence to practise law.

  As a result of his windfall, he was able to buy a dream home four miles away. Tower Lane is a cul de sac that is so private it contains only three massive, luxurious mansions. 9920 Tower Lane would be the house where Kim and her siblings would enjoy an idyllic childhood. All three properties were behind massive iron gates to avoid the prying eyes of star-hungry sightseers.

  Nobody knew who the Kardashians were at this point, of course, although they soon became renowned for throwing the best parties in the neighbourhood. The mansion had a large swimming pool, a tennis court, a Jacuzzi and a bar by the pool. To buy it in 2015 would cost something like $6 million. There was nothing a thousand other homes in the gilded nirvana of Beverly Hills didn’t enjoy. A housekeeper took care of the shopping and the washing, allowing Kim’s mother the time to go out to lunch with her friends. Uncle O. J. would stop by every week to play tennis, and there would always be a big barbecue for friends and family at weekends.

  As there were so few houses in their little enclave, they decided to call theirs Tower Lane, the same name as the street, so Kim was brought up in Tower Lane, Tower Lane, which must have confused the postman. Anybody who found themselves wandering up Tower Lane would have been looking for a glimpse of either Madonna or Bruce Springsteen, who occupied the other houses during the 1980s. Bruce made it his permanent home, while Madonna was just renting for a short time. This is Los Angeles, however, so you would never walk, even to chat to a neighbour like the famous talk show host Jay Leno, who lived in the next road. The drive at the Kardashian house was almost too long to walk in any case.

  It was a paradise for the little girls, and their early lives were recorded on video by a doting father keen not to miss a second of his children growing up. He called his second daughter Kimbo, or by the pet name of Joge, although she never knew why. In Armenian, the word means ‘imagine’. Kim was a very sweet and pretty child, as the countless home movies show. She and her elder sister Kourtney were so close together in age that they tended to wear the same outfits and often resembled twins. Even though there was plenty of space, the two sisters shared a bedroom, which meant that they forged a special bond and became a clique of two.

  There were cats and dogs, rabbits and birds, and lots of dressing up. The two cats were called Coco and Chanel, an amusing tribute to the queen of French fashion, Coco Chanel. Among the pack of dogs was Valentina, a little Bichon Frisé who, the sisters recalled in Kardashian Konfidential, died after eating some poison. Kourtney and Kim cried their eyes out.

  Having two babies by the age of 24 didn’t stop Kris from having two more by the time she was 30. Khloé Alexandra was born on 27 June 1984, and a longed-for son arrived on 17 March 1987. In the best Armenian tradition, he was called Robert Arthur, after his father and grandfather respectively. Just as Kourtney and Kim were particularly close growing up, Khloé and Robert Jr likewise played together – although the youngest daughter was regarded as a personal plaything by her two elder sisters.

  If the children tired of their wonderland at home, there were always the annual vacations to look forward to: a spring break at Robert’s parents’ holiday home in Indian Wells, skiing in Colorado every autumn to celebrate Thanksgiving and, in between, a trip to Mexico or, if they were very lucky, to Hawaii.

  One of the most important aspects of Robert Kardashian was the strength of his religious beliefs, a product of his Armenian Christian roots. He would meticulously say his prayers every morning by his bedside. He would also say grace before meals in their sumptuous dining room and often carried a Bible with him. Traditional bedtime stories for kids would be mixed with the occasional tale from his Bible. He was very keen for his family to follow his beliefs. The importance of worship, a strong spiritual bond and the belief that marriage was sacred would come to be supremely ironic in a family culture in which adultery and broken marriages became the rule rather than the exception.

  The leading light in the religious community that Robert and Kris were drawn to was the famous fifties singer Pat Boone, who would host weekly Bible studies for like-minded neighbours, including Doris Day, Priscilla Presley and the Kardashians, at his luxurious mansion. Boone was well known for baptising some 250 people in his swimming pool.

  They didn’t go in for any of that in the Kardashian pool, although friends were always welcome to drop in for a swimming lesson. That circle of friends widened naturally when Kourtney and Kim went to school, first to the Beverly Hills Presbyterian Preschool in Rodeo Drive, and then to the ultra exclusive Buckley School in Sherman Oaks, where today it would cost between $33,000 and $39,000 a year to send your child.

  Kim would forge some long-standing friendships with schoolmates, who included Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, fashion designer Nikki Lund, Kimberly Stewart, the daughter of Rod Stewart and Alana Hamilton, and T. J. Jackson, the nephew of Michael Jackson. Her best friend, however, is Allison Azoff, who has never sought fame outside her privileged world.

  Allison is the daughter of Irving Azoff, one of the biggest names in American music. In 2012, he was named the most powerful person in the music business by Billboard magazine. While best known as the boss of Live Nation, Azoff has also managed the affairs of a string of famous artists, including The Eagles, Christina Aguilera, Maroon 5 and, most aptly, as far as Kim is concerned, Kanye West. Irving and Kanye were brought together by Kris, who has been best friends with Irving’s wife Shelli for more than 30 years.

  The Azoffs and the Kardashians lived near each other in Beverly Hills, so it seemed natural that their children would grow up together, spending time at each other’s houses. Kim used to enjoy exploring Shelli’s wardrobe and jewellery box, in particular, and trying on her diamond rings for size.

  Kim has always been respectful of Allison’s desire to keep a low profile and the pair are seldom pictured together, even though they still speak all the time. Kim often says that she and Allison ‘met the day I was born’ and leaves it at that. Other friendships with equally famous people may receive far more publicity, but Allison is her oldest and dearest.

  This rarefied upbringing relied on Robert continuing to make plenty of money without having to go back to the meat-packing business. Not all of his investments went as well as Radio & Records. Irving Azoff observed, ‘Some have and some haven’t been successful. But he’s real dependable and honest and quite an entrepreneur.’

  The Kardashian family were firmly entrenched in Beverly Hills society. They were established in the pool and party circuit, with four lovely children and all the trappings that success could bring. This happiness didn’t last. In 1990, the Kardashians’ world fell apart.

  3

  A Complicated Affair

  The Kardashian family always ate dinner together, even when the children were young. After prayers, Robert would go round the table for ‘The Peak and the Pit’. Everyone in turn had to declare the highlight and lowlight of their day. When Kim revealed on television that they used to do this, it was copied in homes around the country.

  On one particular day in 1990, there were no peaks. That was when Robert and Kris sat them down and explained quietly that they were getting a divorce. Robert Jr was only two, so he wasn’t involved, but the three girls were in floods of tears. Their parents tried hard not to reveal the true extent of their own anguish.

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bsp; They wanted to cause as little disruption as possible to their children’s lives, having vowed that their welfare would remain the most important consideration and they would try to act as normally as possibly. That was easier said than done: divorce papers would later make clear just how upset Kim had been by the course of events.

  Robert was completely devastated. Kris had been having a tempestuous two-year affair with a younger man called Todd Waterman, a very fit and handsome footballer with a soccer team called LA Heat. She was 33 and he was 10 years her junior.

  He had spotted her first in a photo at a friend’s house in Beverly Hills and liked what he saw. She evidently felt the same way when they got together during a night out with friends. Their versions of events are different. She says they kissed for the first time in the hall closet of her friend’s house. He says they had sex for the first time in said closet, adding, gallantly, that it was ‘magical’.

  They both agree that they subsequently had a lot of sex. In her memoir, Kris, who once again gives her former lover a false name – this time Ryan – recalls less coyly that they had ‘wild’ sex in almost every imaginable location: tennis court, pool house, garage, back seat of the car and up and down the stairs. ‘Sex everywhere, all the time,’ she added.

  Todd confirms that the sex was adventurous, both outdoors and indoors. ‘We were pretty prolific,’ he remembered with understatement. His memory failed him when he was asked if they had made love in the marital bed at Tower Lane. He did say he was sure they’d had sex in the house, but he didn’t recall anything specific.

  They were clearly very much in love and, as sometimes happens in those circumstances, they became foolhardy and indiscreet. Todd was like a trophy boyfriend, always on Kris’s arm at celebrity parties and barbecues. She was behaving like a woman obsessed. She was seeing so much of Todd, even taking a skiing holiday with him, that his mother Ilza thought Kris and Robert were already separated: ‘She wouldn’t talk about her husband with me. If she did, I would have said, “What are you doing coming after my young son, with all these kids?”’