Olivia and Rona head for the top
Double Success Of The Newton-John Girls
OLIVIA Newton-John is a most unlikely name for a pop singer. Sounds too serious. But the sounds that come from Miss Newton-John are taking her right to the top in the vocal field (in fact, one chart has already placed her only a few notes, in second place behind Cilla Black).
She is also very easy on the eye. My personal vote places her in No. 1 spot in the pop singers beauty stakes.
Maybe, one might think, Newton-hyphenated-John is just a gimmick to make people remember the name. It’s not. Olivia has stuck to her family name (….?).
Rona was first
So has her sister, Rona, and the Newton-John really suits her better than it does Olivia because she is a straight actress. At the moment, because of Olivia’s success, Rona is perhaps rather over-shadowed by Olivia, but she is certainly just as attractive.
Rather unfairly, there is a tendency for people to believe when seeing her name on the credit titles that she has jumped on her sister’s bandwagon but Rona was, in fact, the first to enter show business.
That was in Australia.
Their father is a professor. His daughters and son (who is a doctor) were born in Cambridge and taken to Australia when Professor Newton-John accepted the post of Vice Chancellor at the Newcastle New South Wales university.
Rona has played all sorts of parts. One of her best was with Tommy Steele in the film “Where’s Jack?”
Another break was with Peter O’Toole in the big movie “Country Dance,” in which she was the very attractive leader of the Young Conservatives. She’s been in the horror film “Trog” and on TV has been seen in “U.F.O.” “The Gold Brothers” and in a lot of sketches with Benny Hill, most of which she found somewhat embarrassing.
Only once together
Meanwhile, Olivia had decided to concentrate on singing, became a member of the “Tomorrow” pop group, then went solo and broke into the charts with “If Not With You” and “The Banks of the Ohio.”
She appeared with Sacha Distel and first began to attract TV attention with Cliff Richard. Now, of course, she is familiar to most viewers.
The sisters have only once appeared together and that was when Rona joined Olivia in one of the Cliff Richard shows.
Do they look alike? It’s hard to say. Some people think they do others don’t see any resemblance.
“Which is a bit puzzling” Rona exclaimed. “Personally I think there is quite a resemblance. We’ve got exactly the same build. I think the real difference is that Olivia’s eyes are bigger than mine.”
Anyway, they’re both lovely girls.