As a screen siren of the 1960s, she had many admirers and tied the knot four times, but Raquel Welch’s husbands apparently didn’t like the fact that when they went out together as a couple, all the attention was on her. And she certainly didn’t need a man to be happy.

In an interview with The Irish Mirror in November 2015, the late Welch—who passed away at age 82 on February 15, 2023—said of her suitors: “They were swanning around being married to Raquel Welch. I never did get it right. And a lot of men don’t like the fact that when we go somewhere I am the one who gets focused on.” She continued: “I don’t regret the marriages. I had real feelings for all of them. At the time I thought it was love and we could make a great life, but it wasn’t in the cards.” Welch rose to stardom in the 1966 film One Million Years B.C. as a Pleistocene-era cave woman; famed for “wearing mankind’s first bikini.”

In an interview with The Guardian (shared within her obituary), she said of her sex symbol status: “I have exploited being a sex symbol and I have been exploited as one. I wasn’t unhappy with the sex goddess label. I was unhappy with the way some people tried to diminish, demean and trivialize anything I did professionally. But I didn’t feel that from the public.” Here’s what to know about Raquel Welch’s four husbands.

Raquel Welch’s husbands

Raquel Welch was married four times. Here’s what we know about her husbands.

Richard “Richie” Palmer: 1999 – 2008

Raquel Welch, Richard Palmer. Photo by Ron Galella/Getty Images

Richard “Richie” Palmer was Raquel Welch’s most recent husband before her death in 2023. He’s an actor best known for Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (2000) and was a film producer as well as a former restauranter. In 2015, Welch told Piers Morgan on Life Stories that she didn’t need a man, although she liked the companionship they provided. “I’m too set in my ways. I like what I do, I actually enjoy being me and I make a very good living at it and I’m happy. I don’t have to have a man,” she said. Palmer, for his part, seemed to enjoy all the perks of being married to an icon. In an interview with the New York Post in 2000, he said: “My wife is a living legend. I get great seats at the fights. You go wherever you want to go. It’s great.”

André Weinfeld: 1980 – 1990

Andre Weinfeld, Raquel Welch. Photo by Ron Galella/Getty Images

Welch’s third husband, André Weinfeld is a French and American film and television producer, director, screenwriter, cinematographer, photographer, and journalist. He met Welch in 1977 and agreed to move to Hollywood to join her. They married in 1980 and divorced 10 years later in 1990 with what sounded like an amicable split. “We had a very happy marriage,” Weinfeld said in 2015 in an interview with Closer Weekly. “Today, Hollywood marriages last three months and that’s considered long,” he added. He also noted that their long-distance living is what ended their marriage “She moved back to La La Land and I stayed in New York and Paris,” he said.

Patrick Curtis: 1967 – 1972

Raquel Welch, Patrick Curtis. Photo by Fotos International/Getty Images

Raquel Welch worked with the man who would be her second husband, Patrick Curtis, on the 1965 film A Swingin’ Summer. He was an associate producer at the time. They married two years later, tying to knot at Paris’ City Hall and split in 1972. He died at age 83 in November 2022.

James “Jim” Welch: 1959 – 1964

Raquel Welch. Photo by Michael Montfort/Getty Images)

Her first husband, James “Jim” Welch was Raquel’s high school sweetheart. They married in 1959 and had two children together, son Damon born in 1959 and daughter Latanne “Tahnee” born in 1961. Tahnee followed in her mother’s footsteps somewhat, gracing the cover of Vogue and British GQ. she also posed for Playboy in 1995.

In an interview with the Irish Mirror newspaper, Welch recalled: “I know that often I look back and think of all four [marriages], and the lovers in between, and I say the one with the best character and the one I was most devoted to was Jim. That will never change. I told Jim I was going to go to Hollywood. He said he wouldn’t go to that town, it’s such a phoney town. I suddenly thought, ‘Oh my gosh, I always thought he knew who I was’.” She continued: “I suddenly realized I couldn’t make him go, he doesn’t do what he doesn’t want to do. It was an epiphany. Do I not go because he doesn’t want to go? It was hard but I felt I’d resent him all my life if I didn’t go.”

Who has Raquel Welch dated?

Not only was she married four times but Raquel Welch had many romantic interests. During the shooting of the film 100 Rifles in Spain in 1968, Welch allegedly had an affair with Spanish actor Sancho Gracia, who had a small role in the film. When he found out about it, Welch’s husband at the time, Curtis, chased Gracia at gunpoint through the hotel where they were staying in Aguadulce (according to La Vanguardia). In the film, she starred alongside Burt Reynolds: “I did four movies with him and loved him. When he moved he was like an animal, so hot. He had a girlfriend, I had a husband, so that was that,” she told The Irish Mirror.

Racquel Beyond the Cleavage by Raquel Welch

Courtesy of Hachette Books

Buy: ‘Racquel Beyond the Cleavage’ by Raquel Welch $11.30

In her book, Beyond the Cleavage, Raquel Welch invites readers to look back on her life, from her childhood dominated by a volatile father; her first love, marriage, and divorce; her early struggles as a single working mother in Hollywood; her battles for roles and respect as an actress; and her daring decision never to lie about her age. Looking forward, she offers women a compass to guide them at every crossroad of life, from menopause through the empty-nest years, to dating younger men and beyond.

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Source: Stylecaster.com