How Hoyt Richards went from ’80s male supermodel to cult survivor, and what he’s been up to in the years since.

Where is Hoyt Richards now? All about the model and cult survivor from HBO’s Bring Me the Beauties

How Hoyt Richards went from '80s male supermodel to cult survivor, and what he's been up to in the years since.

June 2, 2026 11:44 a.m. ET

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Hoyt Richards in the HBO docuseries 'Bring Me the Beauties: A Model Cult'. Credit:

- HBO's new docuseries *Bring Me the Beauties: A Model Cult *explores an '80s doomsday alien cult led by a charismatic New York socialite.

- Model and cult survivor Hoyt Richards is prominently featured in the series.

- Richards has had a fascinating life and career as a model and actor.

Based on the first episode of HBO's new docuseries *Bring Me the Beauties: A Model Cult*, we're in for a wild ride.

The latest docuseries from director Chris Smith (*Tiger King*) travels back to the '80s, when a charismatic New York City socialite who believed himself to be an alien recruited several members of the high-fashion modeling industry into a doomsday cult. Multiple survivors of Frederick von Mierers' Eternal Values cult are featured in the docuseries, though none more prominently than Hoyt Richards, a former model who used his fame and success to help bankroll von Mierers' enterprise before eventually escaping his clutches.

We'll have to wait until HBO airs the remaining episodes of the three-part docuseries to find out how Richards and the other survivors managed to get out. In the meantime, here's a primer on Richards, his successful modeling career, and what he's been up to since leaving von Mierers' cult behind.

Hoyt Richards was 16 when he met Frederick von Mierers

Hoyt Richards in his youth, as featured on 'Bring Me the Beauties: A Model Cult'.

Courtesy of HBO

Richards met von Mierers in 1978, when the former was working a summer job as a house painter in Nantucket, Mass. As Richards described in a 2018 interview with the BBC's *Outlook* podcast, it wasn't "the place you would think you're gonna meet your potential cult leader." Richards, who was 16 at the time, had heard about von Mierers from friends, who described the older man as being "into all this Eastern philosophy and zen-speak."

According to Richards, von Mierers immediately "dove right into this philosophical conversation that at 16 I wasn't used to having." But the teen was "impressed" by von Mierers, and liked that he assumed Richards was capable of engaging in such "high-minded" conversation.

Von Mierers, who Richards guessed was probably in his thirties back then, was "known for having parties," and Richards often brought friends around to hang out, which he did several times that first summer. After graduating from high school, Richards spent a year at school in England before returning to the U.S. to attend Princeton, where he planned to play football. The summer before he was meant to start at Princeton, he ran into von Mierers, who extended an "open invitation" to visit his place in New York. Von Mierers offered to get Richards and his friends into nightclubs, including Studio 54.

An injury sidelined Richards' football career, and that's when von Mierers "got his hooks in."

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Hoyt Richards became a successful model in the ’80s

Hoyt Richards in 1990 for Polo by Ralph Lauren.

John Aquino/Penske Media via Getty

An actor enmeshed with von Mierers told Richards he should just sit in the lobby at a commercial agency and wait to get noticed. He was right — Richards signed with the renowned Ford Models and landed a gig posing for acclaimed photographer Bruce Weber just three weeks into his tenure. Richards was on what he described as a "very accelerated" career track that saw him traveling between New York and Europe for modeling gigs.

In the '80s, Richards was among a handful of very successful male models that included John Pearson and Fabio Lanzoni, the Italian-American model who became a fixture on the covers of romance novels. Richards modeled for fashion clients including Gianni Versace, Ralph Lauren, and Donna Karan. Though professional success drew Richards' attention away from school, he managed to graduate from Princeton in 1985, after which he threw himself into modeling full-time. And that's when his relationship with von Mierers began to change.

"In the beginning, [von Mierers] was incredibly generous," Richards said on *Outlook*, recalling how von Mierers let him stay in his one-bedroom New York apartment, which he described as a "mini ashram." Richards was among multiple guests crashing at the apartment and sleeping on mats in the living and dining room areas. Even after Richards began making serious money, he said that he continued to sleep on a mat in von Mierers' apartment.

"As I started making more money, it was very clear that I had to attribute my success to Frederick's introduction to the business and that there were obviously things that needed to be paid for to expand our business," explained Richards, who said he was "happy to contribute."

Richards would take what he needed from each paycheck, "enough just to pay the bills," and give everything else to von Mierers. And there was plenty of cash to spare — as Richards explains in *Bring Me the Beauties*, he was making enough money that he could afford to pay for his final year at Princeton out of his own pocket.

As he told *Outlook*, Richards even spent "a couple hundred thousand dollars" on precious gems that von Mierers said were necessary for his followers to enhance their "spiritual being."

After leaving Eternal Values, Richards continued modeling — and acting

Fabio and Hoyt Richards in 'The Exorcist III'.

20th Century Fox

There's much more to von Mierers' story, most of which will be explored in new episodes of *Bring Me the Beauties*. But Richards' life after von Mierers and Eternal Values is also interesting.

In addition to modeling — which he still does to this day — Richards began working as an actor in the late '90s. Though he made a brief uncredited appearance alongside Fabio in *The Exorcist III* (1990), his first proper role was in the 1998 rom-com *Six Days, Seven Nights*, in which he (unsurprisingly) played an unnamed model opposite Anne Heche and Harrison Ford. He appeared in a 2002 episode of the short-lived sitcom *Three Sisters*, starring future *The Pitt* favorite Katherine LaNasa, and in a 2007 episode of *CSI: Miami*.

Richards branched out into screenwriting and producing. He served as a cowriter, producer, and star on the 2014 comedy *Dumbbells*, which co-starred his old modeling pal Fabio (as himself), Tom Arnold, and, most interestingly, *Family Matters* star Jaleel White as a cult leader.

In more recent years, Richards has appeared in numerous independent and short films.

Where can I watch Bring Me the Beauties: A Model Cult?

*Bring Me the Beauties: A Model Cult* airs Monday nights on HBO and streams on HBO Max.

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Source: “EW Documentary”