The Brawling Mdivanis: A Glamourous and Tragic Family Tale

The Mdivanis—whose name was claimed to be derived from the Persian phrase for "sitting on a divan," which was an apt description of their goals—weren't typical immigrant aspirers. They were born in Georgia, a Russian state where the family claimed to be royalty, referring to themselves as princes and princesses. Their father, Zakhari, a military commander, was Czar Nicholas II's aide-de-camp, while their mother, a Pole, became one of Rasputin's confidantes. 

After the Soviet invasion of Georgia in 1921, the five siblings escaped to Paris and became known as the "Marrying Mdivanis," since they all married into fame and fortune, which they skillfully drained. "An awful group of vulgar, selfish, and good-for-nothing beggars whose only skill is to leech off wealthy people," they were once described.

Nina Mdivani

Nina Mdivani and Denis Conan Doyle

Nina and Denis posing for a photograph, 1936

Nina Mdivani (1901–1987) was married to Stanford professor and lawyer Charles Henry Huberich from 15 July 1925 until their divorce on 19 May 1936, and then wedded Denis Conan Doyle, the son of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes, on August 18, 1936. Following Denis's death on March 9, 1955, she married Anthony Harwood, Denis Conan Doyle's secretary.

Serge Mdivani

Serge Mdivani and his first wife, Polish actress Pola Negri

Serge and his third and last wife, Louise Astor Van Alen, in 1936,
a year before her tragic death

Serge Mdivani (1903–1936) moved to Massachusetts with his brother David in 1921, with the help of Marshall Crane of the Crane Currency paper empire. By 1923, the brothers had left and found work in Edward L. Doheny's Oklahoma oil fields. Serge then relocated to Los Angeles, met and married actress Pola Negri in 1927, but when she lost her fortune in the 1929 Stock Market Crash, he abandoned her and married opera singer Mary McCormic, who divorced him in a high-profile trial. In 1936, he married his ex-sister-in-law, Louise Astor Van Alen Mdivani, but she died later that year in a polo accident. He was laid to rest in St. Columba's Episcopal Chapel in Middletown, Rhode Island.

David Mdivani

David Mdivani and Mae Murray, dubbed "The Girl with
the Bee-Stung Lips"

David and Mae on their wedding day, 1926

David Mdivani (1904–1984) was the first of his siblings to marry "well". Marshall Crane helped him and his brother Serge immigrate to the United States. When the two brothers fell out of favor with Crane, they relocated to New York, where David worked for a radio repair shop owned by a fellow Georgian refuge on Vesey Street. 

The brothers moved to Oklahoma, where David and Serge worked in the Edward L. Doheny oil fields for $25 per week until 1926, just months before David married actress Mae Murray; they had a son, Koran David. She divorced him in 1933 after he bankrupted her, and they engaged in a bitter custody battle over their child. He also had a relationship with Arletty, a French actress. In 1944, David married Virginia Sinclair (daughter of Harry Ford Sinclair), a Sinclair Oil heiress, and they had a son, Michael.

Alexis Mdivani

Wedding of heiress Barbara Hutton with Alexis Mdivani, Paris,
June 20th 1933

Alexis and Barbara after their wedding, 1933

Alexis Mdivani (1905–1935) married Louise Astor Van Alen (an Astor family member) in 1931, but divorced her in order to marry Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton, one of the world's wealthiest women at the time. He was killed in a vehicle accident in Albons, Catalonia (Spain), while traveling with Baroness Maud Thyssen, a beautiful, married German woman of twenty-three years.

Isabelle Mdivani

Isabelle with ballet dancer Serge Lifar, posing for a sculpture

Isabelle and fashion designer Coco Chanel on a boat, circa 1935

Nicknamed Roussie or Roussy, Isabelle Roussadana Mdivani (1906–1938) was a sculptor who married Josep Maria Sert, a Spanish painter, in 1928, succeeding the legendary Misia Sert as his wife, but died in 1938.