Is it Vanessa and Hayley? - Australian Women's Weekly

Rona Newton-John is often mistaken for Vanessa Redgrave. Her sister, Olivia, is the spitting image of Hayley Mills. The sisters started their careers in Melbourne, and both are going places in London in television and films.

By CAMILLA BEACH, in London

It was the 13th day of the month, and singer Olivia Newton-John didn't want to fly. She had just received bonus of good fortune: being signed by film producer Harry Saltzman and Monkees-inventor Don Kirshner to star in the film Tomorrow. She didn't want to chance her luck any further. But her elder sister, Rona, laughed off Olivia's superstition and together they boarded London-bound jet in New York.

After an hour in flight, a man sitting beside Olivia announced, We're going down, you know.

Olivia left her seat to complain to the hostess that her neighbor was trying to scare her. Instead, she found the co-pilot just leaving the cockpit.

It's all right, he said. I was just going to announce that we are turning back. The undercarriage is stuck down and the fuselage is becoming caked with ice.

Rona heard the announcement from her seat, and when Olivia did not return she went in search of her.

I found her huddled in a corner with the hostesses, sipping a tall glass of straight brandy, crying her eyes out, and shaking like a leaf, Rona said.

Fuel was jettisoned, and the plane finally got back to New York.

Some hours later they were both transferred to another plane. Olivia spent most of the flight nervously querying every flashing light for fear it would another emergency.

These two flights were both in a day's work for 27-year-old Rona, who often takes time off from her own acting career to chaperon her sister.

Olivia is 21 and a member of the pop group Toomorrow, which promoters Saltzman and Kirshner believe will be the most successful quartet to be formed since the Monkees made their big splash three years ago. With drummer Karl umbers, pianist-organist Vic Cooper, and guitarist-singer Ben Thomas, Olivia has had several engagements on both sides of the Atlantic during the past year.

She likes her fiance, former Shadows guitarist Bruce Welch, to accompany her. But Bruce runs a management agency with his former manager, Peter Gormley, in London, and cannot always get away.

So Rona is called in as a substitute chaperon. Blonde, gay, and wildly attractive, it is hard to imagine Rona in such a role. But, she says, she can manage, though, at times, Olivia has to do the chaperoning.

Two with an umbrella in the streets of New York is better than one on her own, said Rona.

Rona didn't always have this protective instinct toward her younger sister. She and her brother Hugh, now a doctor in Australia, were very close when they were young and resented Olivia when she was born because she was the most beautiful little baby.

When Olivia was five, the family moved from England to Melbourne, where their father, Professor Brinley Newton-John, became master of Ormond College.

When our parents went out at night, Rona and my brother Hugh used to lock me in cupboards, Olivia said. I was terrified of the dark, and they'd shut me in my room with the lights out and sit laughing next door, calling out Electricity costs money, you know.

Family affection increased with age, and when Olivia was 15 she began singing casually in the Melbourne coffee lounge owned by Rona's first husband, Brian Goldsmith. (Last August Rona married Graeme Hall, an arranger.)

After winning a contest on the Johnny O'Keefe Show, Olivia made television and personal appearances in Melbourne and Sydney. Rona went along as chaperon on the Sydney trips.

Nobody ever approached me to take drugs, said Olivia, but when I was working clubs men thought I was easy game because I was a singer. They could never believe it when I turned them down, Rona intervened.

The sisters came to England in 1966 within months of each other. Olivia teamed with Melbourne singer Pat Carroll and they got together a good singing act. This ended when Pat's work permit expired.

Rona worked on television and has appeared in three films: Where's Jack? with Stanley Baker, in which she plays a countess; The Same Skin, in which she plays Peter O'Toole's partner at a dance; and Trogg, with Joan Crawford, in which she plays a newspaper reporter.

Tomorrow is Olivia's first overseas film, made last year under the direction of Val Guest in England in utmost secrecy. For almost a year the script was kept hush-hush.

Now revealed, the story tells of four London the students, members of a pop group (played by Toomorrow group), who make contact with Alphoid visitors from outer space. Roy Dotrice, Britain's most one of celebrated actors, plays the Alphoids' leader. Those in supporting roles include starlet Imogen Hasall and a former Miss Great Britain, Jenny Lewis.

Yellow outfits

Leading British designer Ronald Paterson did the costumes for the film. Ben, Karl, and Vic wear smart yellow outfits, Olivia's yellow mini-dress is trimmed with blue, fuchsia, and lilac stripes.

Olivia has made three visits to New York in connection with the film: meeting people, being launched, and recording song tracks for the film, which has its premiere in in London in June.

On each visit Rona has gone along, twice relieving Bruce Welch of his chaperon duties. On one of these trips to New York, she sat next to a man who quite mistook her identity.

He asked what film my sister was doing, said he liked her last film. He also liked mine and asked how my father was. It turned out he thought I was Juliet Mills, that Olivia was Hayley ley Mills, and, of course, that Daddy was John Mills.

The comparison of Olivia with Hayley Mills surprised neither sister. When she was 12, Olivia won a Melbourne contest to find the Australian girl who looked most like Hayley.

Rona is more frequently mistaken for film stars Vanessa Redgrave and Virginia McKenna.

In New York, Rona's job as chaperon has never been demanding. Apart very from getting Olivia dressed and ready for conferences, the only use I really am is protecting her from the strange characters in the streets. And sometimes she has to be protected from American reporters, who can be every rude. They don't realise that she is so young and sensitive, and that tactless remarks can offend her.

On a holiday in Florida, both girls, wearing no make-up, mini-skirted, and with pigtails, were frequently asked to leave bars because the management were sure they were under 21.

Pretty blondes

And at one party, in Fort Lauderdale, Rona completely took leave of her matronly, chaperon facade. We were wandering round the gardens of this enormous house, looking at sculptures about 60ft. high, made from crashed aeroplanes, that surrounded the swimming-pool. Suddenly Olivia screamed when she saw a cockroach. And I jumped, spilling gin all over my dress. I had to spend about an hour running round the garden trying to dry off.

But most times when the sisters attract attention it's not over spilt gin or because they are mistaken for celebrities. It's just because they are very pretty blondes.

When we were staying with a friend in Florida, he flew two men friends over from California for the weekend, said Rona. Just to get a glimpse of us and to hear our funny accents, chimed in Olivia. Hardly the sort of thing one expects to happen to a chaperon and her charge.