For 70 years, Rupert Murdoch hid from confrontation. He fired his mentor by letter, divorced a wife by email, and used one child to fire another. But in a sterile Nevada courtroom in September 2024, the 93-year-old mogul’s money and power couldn’t protect him any longer. He would finally face his estranged children under oath. In early December 2023, Rupert unilaterally altered the irrevocable family trust to install his son Lachlan as his successor. Murdoch’s other adult children from his first two marriages—Prudence, Elisabeth, and James—sued to block the change. The lawsuit set up the final courtroom battle in a long-waged war to decide, once and for all, who would control his empire following his death. Discovery had been like an autopsy of a family’s slow death. Depositions became an arena of psychological abuse. In one, Rupert’s lawyer fired humiliating questions at James as Rupert looked on: Have you ever done anything successful on your own? Why were you too busy to say “Happy birthday” to your father when he turned 90? Does it strike …