After decades of whispers and winks, Barry Diller has finally spoken up — and in the chicest way possible: a memoir. In an excerpt from Who Knew, published this week, the media mogul pulls back the velvet curtain on his complicated relationship with sexuality, love, and his iconic marriage to fashion powerhouse Diane von Furstenberg.
“I liked guys,” Diller says plainly in the book. But that didn’t conflict with his decades-long passion for Diane, whom he married in 2001 after a rollercoaster romance that began in the glitter-drenched heyday of Studio 54. His revelation is less a confession and more a shrug — not an apology, not an identity crisis, just a truth calmly stated by a man who’s long stopped caring what the tabloids say.
Their story, he says, began with sparks at a dinner party and moved quickly to makeouts on a couch. “I hadn’t done that with a female since I was 16,” he writes — and that teenage giddiness never really faded. For years, the world speculated: Was it a marriage of friendship? A strategic power move? Just PR? Diller answers with a firm no: “We weren’t just friends. We aren’t just friends.”
Not a Label in Sight
What’s most striking is what Diller doesn’t say. He doesn’t label himself gay. Or bisexual. He doesn’t need to. Instead, he praises the “fluidity” of modern sexuality and gives a knowing nod to Europe’s more nuanced understanding of love and attraction.
“I vowed I wouldn’t do a single thing to make anyone believe I was living a heterosexual life,” he writes, referring to his earlier years in the closet. But when he met Diane, everything shifted. Not in a tortured, identity-rattling way — just in a deeply human way. He describes their bond as an “explosion of passion,” not some emotional loophole.
And yes, he confirms, there was a Richard Gere-shaped bump in the road (Diane had an affair with the Hollywood star), but the couple found their way back to each other and married a decade later.
A Love That Defied Expectations
Diller doesn’t care if people are confused. He’s heard it all — “We thought he liked only men,” or “They’re just best friends” — and he’s over it. “What others think sometimes irritates but mostly amuses us,” he writes. “We know, our family knows, and our friends know. The rest is blather.”
In an era still obsessed with categorizing love, Diller’s story is refreshingly real: it’s messy, unboxed, and authentically his. It’s not about a coming-out moment or a PR stunt. It’s about two people who found something extraordinary — and didn’t feel the need to explain it to anyone but each other.
And let’s be honest — that’s pretty fabulous.