in the spotlight: Kirkorov’s ever-expanding brood

By Anna Malpas

Published: July 11, 2012 (Issue # 1717)

In December, flamboyant pop star Filipp Kirkorov announced that he had become a father, with a daughter born from a surrogate mother. Last week, he said that he now has a son as well — from a different surrogate mother.

Kirkorov revealed the news at a concert in Bulgaria, just a tiny bit upstaged by Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes’ announcing their divorce the same day.

He also gave some details to television host Andrei Malakhov, the godfather of his daughter Alla-Viktoria. Kirkorov told him he had seen the baby via Skype and that he did not have a name yet but it would have to begin with M because that was the will of pop diva Alla Pugachyova, his ex-wife.

Writing in the StarHit magazine he edits, Malakhov explained that Pugachyova is fond of men’s names beginning with M because of her grandfather Mikhail, another ex-husband Mikolas and her current husband Maxim Galkin. Evidently, she does not feel the same about ex-husbands whose names begin with F, but Kirkorov seems blissfully unaware of the snub. The new baby will be curled up in the nursery next to his sister named after Pugachyova and Kirkorov’s late mother.

Malakhov excitedly pointed out that Kirkorov has evened the score with Latin pop star Ricky Martin, another celebrity single dad, with two kids each. In case Martin was keeping score.

Express Gazeta even reported that Kirkorov was going to name the son after Martin — with an M. He may be called Martin-Kristo, it reported, citing Bulgarian media, with Kristo being a Bulgarian name, reflecting Kirkorov’s roots as the son of a Bulgarian singer.

Sadly, there have been few further details — maybe because Kirkorov has been reticent on Twitter lately after his bust-up with rapper Timati in which he tried to teach the young upstart some manners.

This Friday will be Ksenia Sobchak’s last episode as co-host of Dom-2 reality show on TNT, something of an end of an era, even if she has been phoning in her appearances for some time now.

She always reflects the times, and it seems that celebrities have become rather austere lately, busily signing protest letters and saying daring things about Vladimir Putin.

But there are exceptions, such as one of the singers in the VIA Gra girl group, Albina Dzhanabayeva, who is suing Malakhov’s StarHit magazine for making insinuations about her breasts.

Rapsi legal news agency reported dryly that Dzhanabayeva was asking for 6 million rubles in compensation after the magazine “unlawfully interfered in her personal life and also made insulting statements about her.”

LifeNews.ru filled in the blanks, saying that Dzhanabayeva was offended by the magazine alleging that “at the dawn of her career in VIA Gra her bust was not voluptuous enough and she used push-up bras to hide this.”

The magazine went onto hint that in its opinion, she had since gone up two sizes with breast implants, LifeNews.ru wrote.

It also cited Malakhov as saying: “Let Albina try to prove that she didn’t have cosmetic surgery. You need only to compare her photographs before her career in VIA Gra and after her career began.” And no doubt lawyers are poring over them as we speak.

Russian-born Dzhanabayeva joined the Ukrainian group VIA Gra in 2004, making her a veteran on its ever-changing lineup with the only constants being long hair, long legs and come hither looks. She previously worked as a back-up singer for pop star Valery Meladze, whose brother Konstantin is VIA Gra’s producer.