What Olivia did for love
By Cliff Harrington
Olivia Newton-John faced a whole nation defending her love.... and won them over!
A check for twenty-thousand dollars, a brand-new record album and a movie that she doesn’t like to talk about. These were all on the mind of superstar Olivia Newton-John when we sat down with her for a frank interview in Tokyo. The most important thing that concerned the lively lady, however, was dolphins. And, at the moment, they had put her in a lot of hot water.
Never before in her fabulous career had Olivia been the center of so much controversy. Now, though, she was in the eye of a journalistic hurricane because the jolly “flippers” of the deep had led her to shock people the length and breadth of Japan.
The whole big flap began when Olivia, along with her good friend Helen Reddy, became a crusader in the campaign to save dolphins from extermination. She had been scheduled to make a concert tour of Japan, but had cancelled out when she learned that fishermen were killing dolphins. The press had a field day and there were misunderstandings flying back and forth across the Pacific Ocean. The Japanese at large, many of them her most ardent fans, took the cancellation as a direct attack on them and became very upset.
Now, Olivia was back in Japan to perform and win back the people who had misunderstood her words and actions. And to get the story from the lady herself, I joined my friend, a Japanese reporter from the country’s largest newspaper, in the only private interview she gave during her stay.
“It was an emotional decision,” the star admitted. “I didn’t do any research into it. I just heard about the killing of the dolphins and was very upset. I decided I would show my concern by not coming”.
Subsequently,” she said, “I discovered that the people took this as a personal attack from me which upset me greatly because I am very fond of the Japanese, I have been here many times and the people have always been very nice.”
As my newspaper friend took notes, I had to admire the star’s courage. This was more than “Meet the Press.” It was “Face the Nation,” because her words would be read by the eight million or more of his readers.
Imagine yourself in her place. One person talking to a whole nation. Would you have the courage to speak out for what you thought was right?
Olivia told us that she now knew more about the situation. She said that she realized that the people needed the fish that the dolphins were taking and so she bent her efforts on research that would divert them from the fishing grounds. It was then that she revealed that she had just given a whopping twenty-thousand dollar check to a biological institute to further dolphin research. “I thought I should put my money where my mouth is,” she said with a hopeful smile.
She added, “I was told that they were developing a new machine that will emit sound waves that will alert the dolphins and they will leave.”
I had to admire her even more when she told us, “This is the first stand I have ever taken on any-thing in my whole life. I know it upset people, but I was thinking on the side of the dolphins.”
“Now, something is being done,” she said with a sense of accomplishment. “And that’s why I am here.”
My Japanese friend, as a spokesman for his countrymen, decided that it was time to reassure the lovely singer that when the people read his report they would understand her feelings and her motives and accept her again.
Olivia smiled widely at his warm remarks and relaxed, and she went on to tell us about her love for all living creatures. “Animals are the one thing in my life that really count,” she said with a winning grin. “When I was a little girl I wanted to be a veterinarian and my best friend was a Labrador retriever. Now, I have six horses, six dogs and two cats.”
But above all, she has a special feeling for dolphins.
“They are amazingly human creatures,” she told us. “I think that they can teach us a lot and once we break down the language barrier there are untold things that we will learn from them.” Recent research, she said, indicated that this is a distinct possibility. And she went even further in a bold prediction.
“I think that we will be able to communicate directly,” she said. You can imagine our thoughts as we considered the idea of talking to dolphins.
She summed up her feelings by saying, “They are happy creatures and seem to be only good. I just love them.”
Olivia was happy to tell us that she had just finished the recording of her new album, “Totally Hot.”
“I’m very excited about it,” she said, “because it’s a very new sound for me and a new direction. I’m mainly known for mellow ballads, but this is much more up (tempo).”
We asked her to pick her favorites from the list of songs in the album, but after scanning it she seemed defeated. “I like them all,” she chuckled. We could see, however, that she had high hopes for one in particular, “Borrowed Time.” “I wrote both the music and lyrics for that one,” she said almost shyly.
“I haven’t made an album in two years,” she reminded us, “and in that time music has changed a lot. My ideas in music have changed much more.” We were delighted to learn that the dynamic entertainer likes to grow with the times. We wanted also to hear her thoughts about John Travolta and she was delighted to oblige.
“He’s a very gentle, nice, sensitive person,” she said. “He was wonderful during the filming of “Grease”.
I pressed her to cite an example.
“Well, he was reading lines to me one day and half way through my take, he made a mistake and said, ‘Cut,” she said. “I didn’t quite understand it because he wasn’t even on camera. But he told me afterwards that he thought I could do better, so he stopped. That’s very generous. You don’t get that sort of treatment usually.”
We told her how much we enjoyed the singing on the soundtrack album of “Grease” and asked her to name her favorite song.
“You’re the One That I Want, is very special to me,” she replied, “because it was so much fun to do in the film.” The song also reflected the new up-tempo in her singing.
“What will your next movie be?” I asked. The answer surprised me. Unlike other persons, who rush headlong into a follow-up picture, Olivia is taking time to consider her options carefully. The flocks of offers have been culled to approximately ten that she is seriously thinking about. And she wants to make very certain that she has just the right role. Then she let us in on a secret. “Grease is not my first movie,” she told us. “I did one before but I don’t count that one.”
We did some behind-the-scenes checking and found that she made a picture in England titled, “Toomorrow.” It was the name of a rock group that was featured. We did not go further, however. We decided that if she wanted to let “Toomorrow” slip into the past, we would respect her wishes.
We drew a big laugh from the star when we mentioned that her horoscope for the day predicted that she “might meet new people.” “It’s probably true,” she joked. And, indeed, it was, for big press reception had been arranged for a day or two later by Kyodo Tokyo, her tour promoter, Toshiba-EMI, her local record company, and CIC Films, the distributor of “Grease”. It was there that she would meet a horde of reporters.
In the few minutes left to us, we learned that she is developing two new talents to go with her already considerable accomplishments.
“I paint,” she informed us shyly and in almost the same breath confessed, “but I’m not very good at it. I’ve just started and it’s a mess, but it’s in oil.”
She fares much better in another department, cooking. “I can do English roasts, spaghetti, stew and a chicken thing with cream sauces,” she told us with just a touch of pride.
We asked her finally how it felt to be on top of both the music and movie worlds. She admitted that it felt just great, and then she grew serious for a moment. “It is harder to stay on top, than to get there,” she noted.
“Why it happens nobody knows,” she said. “I thought with all my musical success I couldn’t gain any more. Then when ‘Grease’ came out a whole new spectrum opened up in my career.”
“It took a lot of years,” she said to me for you TEEN BAG readers. “It looks much more glamorous on the outside, but there’s an awful lot of hard work involved.”
The beautiful, talented star summed it all up by saying, “I have been extremely fortunate.”
And then she expressed her thanks to all of you out there who helped make her so.