Yul Borisovich
Yul Borisovich was noted for his deep, rich voice and for his shaven head, which he kept as a personal trademark after adopting it in his role in The King and I.
He claimed to be a quarter Romany and in 1983 was elected to the position of Honorary President of the Roma, an office that he kept until he died. He also infrequently referred to himself as Julius Briner. In addition to his work as a performer, Brynner was an ardent photographer, and wrote two books.
After Boris Brynner abandoned his family, his mother took Yul and his sister, Vera Bryner (Russian: Вера Бринер), to Harbin, China, where they attended a school run by the YMCA, and in 1934 she took them to Paris.
He and his first wife, actress Virginia Gilmore (1944–1960), had one child, Yul Brynner II, who was born on December 23, 1946. His father nicknamed him “Rock” when he was six in honor of boxer Rocky Graziano, who won the middleweight title in 1947. Rock is a historian, novelist and university history lecturer at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, NY, and Western Connecticut State University in Danbury, CT. In 2006, Rock wrote a book about his father and his family history titled Empire and Odyssey: The Brynners in Far East Russia and Beyond.
Brynner reportedly had an affair with Marlene Dietrich in the early 1950s and, allegedly, another with Judy Garland in the mid-1950s. His daughter Lark Brynner (born 1958) was born out of wedlock and raised by his mother(according to an article at answers.com).
Brynner’s second wife, Doris Kleiner (1960–1967), was a Chilean model, whom he married on the set during shooting of The Magnificent Seven in 1960. They had one child, Victoria Brynner (born November 1962), whose godmother was Audrey Hepburn.
His third wife, Jacqueline Thion de la Chaume (1971-1981), was a French socialite, the widow of Philippe de Croisset (son of French playwright Francis de Croisset), a publishing executive, the victim of a car accident. Brynner and Jacqueline adopted two Vietnamese children: Mia (1974), and Melody (1975). The first house that he ever owned was the Manoir de Cricqueboeuf, a sixteenth-century manor house that he bought with Jacqueline.
He married his fourth wife, Kathy Lee, when she was 24. She is a ballerina from a small town in Malaysia, and met Brynner in The King and I broadway roadshows, playing one of the dancers in the Uncle Tom Cabin play. The marriage lasted for 2 years (1983-1985) until Brynner died.
