• September 04, 1995
• Vol. 44
• No. 10

Last Tango

The Music Stops for Robert Duvall and His Dance-Instructor Wife

FOR THE RESIDENTS OF MIDDLEBURG, an affluent town in Virginia's horse country, there was rich irony in the title of Robert Duvall's latest film, Something to Talk About. For several months, the 64-year-old Oscar-winning actor, owner of the 200-acre estate known as Byrnley Farm, had been the topic of ongoing gossip. Last summer, Duvall and his wife, Sharon Brophy, a dance instructor some 30 years her husband's junior, hired Jeffrey Harmon Gable, the handsome 38-year-old owner of Hunt Country Pools, to install a swimming pool on their property. Soon Gable was a regular at Brophy's weekly dance classes, held in a barn on the couple's farm. When Duvall was away, the two were sometimes spotted having breakfast at a local restaurant.

Duvall reacted by borrowing a page from Something's script. In the movie, Duvall is thrown out of his house by his wife (Gena Rowlands) when she learns of his philandering. Earlier this month a process server showed up at Byrnley, and Brophy was ordered off the premises. Then the twice-divorced actor, who has two grown daughters, filed in a Virginia circuit court for the dissolution of his four-year marriage, charging Brophy with adultery, which she denies.

The couple had met at a tango class in New York City in 1986. Brophy was in Broadway's Tango Argentino, and Duvall was taking tango lessons. Until recently, Duvall sometimes dropped in at Brophy's classes. On the dance floor, says a student, "they looked great together."

For now, none of the parties is commenting publicly, but all are still dancing. Brophy has moved her dance studio to a tavern, and Gable remains an attentive student. Locals say Duvall is headed to Argentina, where he has gone a half-dozen times in recent years to brush up on his tango.