Set The Record Straight

On hearing new rumours their marriage is over, Olivia Newton-John and Matt Lattanzi phoned New Weekly to set the story straight. Their message: our love is stronger than ever.

Olivia Newton-John and husband Matt Lattanzi have had enough. They're sick and tired of the cruel rumours that claim their marriage is a sham and that they're on the brink of splitting up. They're upset about eight-year-old daughter Chloe hearing the rumours and coming home from school in tears. They're also bored by the fact that, yet again, scuttlebutt about their separation seems to be gaining ground. But most of all, they're angry.

Speaking exclusively from the couple's Malibu hideaway only days ago, Matt says: We've been hurt by this once too often. I just don't know how these stories get around; they always seem to start in Australia and then they travel the world.

We heard from someone here that rumours were flying again. In the past, we've let them go. This time we want you to help us put the record straight. Livvy and I are fine, we're together and we're tired of this bullshit. You hear that? An unmistakable sound echoes down the long-distance line from Los Angeles, accompanied by muffled laughter. They're kisses. Livvy and I are sitting here, kissing each other in our Malibu retreat, because we're in love.

And a happy Olivia agrees: We're definitely living together, there's no doubt about it! We've just moved into the house that Matt built for us here in Malibu and it's wonderful. It's like a holiday. Recently, we have spent a lot of time apart. Matt was away in New Zealand for two months filming his TV adventure documentary series. Chloe and I were in Canada together, making the CBS telemovie, A Christmas Romance.

It wasn't from choice, but that's the nature of our work; it stops us from seeing each other, sometimes for weeks on end. Over the next little while, I'll be promoting my new album Gaia in America and Europe and Matt's going to be filming his next adventure in Mexico. But we'll all be back in Australia in March. We're really trying to arrange our lives so we can be together more not less.

Tongues started wagging from the moment Olivia and Matt first met and fell in love on the Xanadu film set in 1979. She was at the peak of her stardom, having just finished Grease, the most successful musical of all time. He was just starting out in show business as a dancer. She was a professor's daughter, born in Britain and raised in Australia. He was an Oregon maintenance foreman's son, one of 10 unruly children. And then there was the age gap. When they first moved in together, Olivia was 33, to Matt's 21. Of course, he was promptly dubbed her toy boy and doom sayers predicted the relationship would never last.

Today, the sceptics are still at it. The latest rumours allege Olivia and Matt, battered by the strain of Olivia's cancer treatment, are about to announce an amicable separation and that Matt has moved away from their Malibu mansion to a bachelor apartment in Westwood, LA.

In fact, say the couple, Olivia's illness brought them even closer together. All these stories are absolute rubbish, says Matt. Olivia and I have never been closer. I love my wife. You could never live with a more wonderful person. Thank you darling, Olivia says softly. I just can't imagine how such stories get started, she adds. We are still very much together and it will take more than lies to destroy our love for each other.