David Geffen is mired in a messy divorce that now threatens both his $9 billion fortune and the legacy he spent decades cultivating, according to a report.
In explosive legal filings, Donovan Michaels— the 82-year-old music mogul’s estranged husband who is 50 years his junior — claims their marriage was a twisted power play built on sex, money and control.
Michaels, who did not sign a prenuptial agreement before tying the knot with Geffen in March 2023, alleges their first encounter wasn’t a chance meeting but a $10,000 sexual transaction arranged through SeekingArrangements.
He says Geffen, who launched careers from Joni Mitchell to the Eagles, insisted on sexual dominance, dictated his appearance with painful surgeries and laser treatments and berated him over minor flaws like ingrown hairs, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Michaels portrays Geffen as casting him in a “theater of virtue,” turning his modest background into a kind of moral currency.
According to his complaint, Geffen demanded an extreme sex life, one in which he “gained satisfaction from causing pain” and sought “total dominion” over the younger black man he had taken in.
Michaels says Geffen went so far as to direct his appearance, funding dental operations and laser treatments to preserve a youthful look.
Even “the existence of an ingrown hair was enough to raise Geffen’s ire and trigger a flurry of instructions to correct the imperfection,” the filing states.
Michaels further claims he was molded into a kept companion, prevented from pursuing a career of his own, and relegated to managing Geffen’s properties as a glorified “house husband.”
When he got sober and began asserting independence, he alleges, Geffen couldn’t handle the shift in power, the Journal reported.
“[Geffen] wanted to be the savior, the white knight, and the ‘top’,” according to legal papers cited by the Journal.
Geffen’s side paints a starkly different picture. His attorneys accuse Michaels—who once worked in gay porn under the name “Brandon Foster”—of exploiting Geffen’s generosity with wild shopping sprees, lavish trips, OnlyFans subscriptions and prostitutes.
They insist the couple rarely lived together, noting Michaels often stayed in a Manhattan apartment Geffen had originally purchased for his housekeeper.
Far from being controlled, Geffen’s camp argues, Michaels was spoiled—and reckless, the Journal reported.
The battle has been intensified by a startling revelation: the couple had no prenuptial agreement.
While much of Geffen’s fortune is shielded under California law because it predates the marriage, Michaels has filed a breach-of-contract suit, insisting Geffen verbally promised to take care of him for life.
For Geffen, now 82, the scandal has upended what was supposed to be a tranquil final act.
Friends say the famously ruthless dealmaker—dubbed Hollywood’s “merciless Macbeth”—was once uncharacteristically smitten, introducing Michaels to his A-list circle and eventually marrying him in 2023.
Their short-lived romance saw them dining with Kris Jenner, sitting courtside at NBA games with Elon Musk and hosting Mariah Carey aboard Geffen’s $400 million superyacht “Rising Sun.”
The marriage unraveled quickly. Geffen filed for divorce this summer, sparking a war of words and filings that have left Hollywood buzzing.
Michaels’s allies describe him as a wronged young man promised the world, while Geffen’s circle sees a “Talented Mr. Ripley” figure—an opportunist trying to blackmail one of the world’s richest men with salacious claims.
Even a modest settlement could run into the hundreds of millions, according to the Journal.
Yet friends say Geffen has no intention of capitulating, even though just 1% of his fortune—about $90 million—would change Michaels’s life forever.
“He’s not going to write a check just to make someone go away,” one associate told the Journal.
