Socialite and silver screen icon Zsa Zsa Gabor dies aged 99

HOLLYWOOD star and celebrity socialite Zsa Zsa Gabor has died aged 99 at her Los Angeles home. 

The Hungarian-American, who hit the big time as a leading lady in 1952’s Moulin Rouge, slapped a police officer in 1989 and had nine husbands, died of a heart attack on Sunday December 18, having been on life support for five years.

Gabor was famed for her beauty, style and wit, once remarking “I am a marvelous housekeeper, every time I leave a man I keep his house”. She told the Observer in 1957 “I never hated a man enough to give him his diamonds back.”

Her last marriage did, however, stand the test of time. Her husband of 20 years Frederic von Anhalt, was the first to break the news of her death. 

“We tried everything, but her heart just stopped and that was it,” he said. “Even the ambulance tried very hard to get her back, but there was no way.”

Born in Budapest in 1917, Gabor was a stage actress in Vienna before voyaging across the Atlantic in 1941, at the height of the Second World War, to conquer America. 

She starred in dozens of films but will perhaps be best remembered for her larger than life character. She spent three days in jail in 1990 after slapping a police officer who had stopped her driving without a licence and with plenty of whiskey.