Down Under To The Top Of The Bill
Olivia’s singing career began six years ago in Australia when she unexpectedly won first prize in a talent contest. But since then, says Syd Gillingham, this gifted young entertainer has gone on to become one of Britain’s top stars.
OUTSIDE, London was at its greyest and murkiest. Inside, there was more than a hint of sunshine in the beautifully-tanned features of Olivia Newton-John.
We were talking in the West End offices of her manager and she was telling me that, yes, she was a sunshine lady and, yes, just show her the sun and she’d soak it up like a shot!
Olivia Newton-John was eighteen when she came to this country six years ago, the first prize winner of a talent contest held in Melbourne, Australia.
She had been singing folk songs purely for the fun of it since the age of fifteen. Then someone suggested that she should enter the talent contest. Much to her surprise, she won. Since then, there has been a film, a number of hit records, a cabaret season at London’s swish Savoy Hotel and a variety of trips abroad to such faraway places as Japan.
I wanted to know if she had taken kindly to all the success.
“Oh, yes,” she told me. “I’m knocked out by it all. You see, I never expected this success. I never expected to win the talent contest in the first place.”
“My career is pretty important to me now. It wasn’t so important until I started to have some success. Then I wanted to improve and I became more conscientious.”
“The turning point, of course,” she went on, “was the first hit record, If Not For You. I was hoping to have a hit record. That’s the big dream. It’s after you’ve made the record that you find out just how hard it is to get a hit.”
Olivia, who is known as “Livvy” to all her chums, was born in this country - in Cambridge. She went with her parents to Australia when she was five. Her father is a professor of languages and she has an older brother and sister.
Her brother, Hugh, is a doctor and living in Australia. Her sister, Rona, is an actress and lives here.
“I could have been good at school,” Olivia said, “but I didn’t concentrate. I wanted to be a vet because I love animals but I wasn’t very good at science or maths so I gave up the idea.”
“What did your parents think of your choice of show business as a career?” I asked.
“Well, they were worried about it at first,” she replied. “They wanted to know, like most parents would, I suppose, what was going to happen if it didn’t work out. But they were much happier about it when it became successful for me.”
When she first came to this country Olivia Newton-John worked in a double act with Pat Carroll, who is now married to her record producer, John Farrar.
Then came two years with a group called “Toomorrow.” And the film, “Toomorrow,” which featured the group.”T hey were interesting years,” Olivia said, “because, besides the film there was a trip to the States.”
“Do you like all the travelling you have to do?” I asked.
“I love travelling, but I’m frightened of flying. But you can’t really travel without flying. At least, you can’t in the business I’m in.
“I usually read on the aircraft. Or chat to people. I’ve found that people tend to pour out their life stories to you because they think you’ll never meet again, anyway.
“But a flight from New York to London put me off flying for a long time,” she continued. “I was flying home with Rona, my sister, and it was Friday the 13th. An hour out of New York the chap sitting next to me suddenly said, “We’re going down!”
“What do you mean, we’re going down? I said.
“Look out of the curtains,’ he said. And I was just beginning to feel nervous when the co-pilot announced that we had some hydraulic trouble and were returning to New York!
“I really got the shakes, but the members of the crew were fantastic, serving us drinks and food. There was snow on the runway and the fire engines and ambulances were standing by.
But we landed safely and there were cheers and applause all round.
“It’s horrifying because you really think you’ve had it. For a long time after that, if the numbers in a flight number added up to thirteen I wouldn’t fly on it. Now I’ve stopped adding up the figures. And I’ve flown since on the 13th. But I would never fly again on Friday the 13th.”
“I’m superstitious about little things. Silly things. If there was a ladder in my way and I could walk round it, I would. But, then, I played my first game of roulette a few weeks ago and I won on thirteen, so it can’t be true all the time!”
Had there been other occasions in her life when she had been frightened, I asked Olivia. She didn’t hesitate. It happened at Batley Variety Club, in Yorkshire, on the night she opened in cabaret as a solo performer.
“It’s funny to look back on now,” she told me, “but it certainly wasn’t funny at the time. Everything went wrong. The band didn’t hear me start and they didn’t hear me ask them to stop.”
“I got so nervous that I forgot the words of a song. It was absolute disaster.”
She paused and smiled. “I’m not really a worrier, at least not about my job,” she went on. “Little, personal things worry me. I try to stop worrying, but you can’t really stop it.”
“I think I’m fairly easy to get along with. I have my ups and downs, and I’m both an optimist and a pessimist.”
“I think my worst fault is indecision. For example, what clothes I’m going to wear or what time I’m going to get up.”
Perhaps that was one of the reasons she was taking her time in choosing the items for her new home, a two-bedroomed flat, in North-West London?
“I suppose it could be, but really I want to live in the flat for a while because only then will I know how I want it to look. I’ve already had some carpeting laid. And, as far as colours are concerned, I like browns and greens and beiges.”
I wondered if there were any regrets in Olivia’s twenty-four years.
“Not really,” she said. “I’m a pretty happy person. When I’m not working I’m lazy and sit about. Or I catch up on seeing people. Or I listen to records.”
“I’ve got a lot of books and I used to read a lot. But I’ve got a bad habit of starting a book, getting bored and putting it down. So when I want to read it once more, I have to start from the beginning again.”
“I hate rudeness and tactlessness, which I suppose we’re all guilty of at some time or other,” she continued. “I don’t like to see people embarrassed and I hate cruelty to either people or animals.”
“I used to have a couple of dogs but then I was living out of town. It’s difficult to own a dog when you’re living in a flat in London.”
“I suppose I am a little extravagant when it comes to buying clothes, but only because there were so many years when I couldn’t afford them. Now it’s nice to be able to!”
So what does the future hold for Olivia Newton-John?
“I’d like to do more cabaret in the States. And make some records there. And I’d love to do a good musical film.”
“If I wasn’t doing what I am, I’d probably be working with animals in some way or the other,” she ended. “Perhaps as a vet’s assistant. There is one consolation. If I ever go broke, I can always muck out a stable or something!”