Why I'm not afraid to turn 50
It hasn’t been easy for Olivia Newton-John in recent years. She’s faced breast cancer, divorce and life as a single mum. But rather than it aging her, she turns 50 looking stronger and more beautiful than ever.
This year the ultimate icon of girlish perfection and wholesome-ness will hit 50. Not that Olivia Newton-John is afraid of growing old.
She admits that she was once. But these days, the singer who won the hearts of teenagers everywhere when she played Sandy in Grease, is embracing middle-age with gusto. Olivia was already 30 when she was chosen to play the fresh-faced teenager opposite John Travolta all those years ago.
Now, just months away from a new decade, she barely looks 35.
Although her skin is flaw-less and her image still squeaky clean, life in recent years has been a virtual rollercoaster for the world’s favourite girl-next-door.
She has been plagued by tragedy and heartache. But she has ridden the peaks and troughs and in the end emerged triumphant.
“I feel like I’m really through to the other side of a very difficult period of my life”, Olivia says. “I’m in a really positive spot right now. I used to be afraid to get old; now I’m grateful. It’s all a matter of how you choose to look at it. I’m turning 50 this year and I think it’s going to be a totally new beginning, a new era.”
They are powerful words from a brave woman who has beaten breast cancer, is returning home for a national tour and who has found herself single at an age when many are planing their retirement.
Olivia smiles a great deal, and her eyes sparkle as she speaks.
Her girlish good looks have gained strength from a few character lines. Wearing T-shirt and jeans, she looks as petite and youthful as ever.
Nothing fazes her any-more. Neither cancer, nor divorce, nor the difficulty of adjusting to life as a single mum. Nor the recent rumours linking her romantically with country singer Vince Gill.
“We sang a duet together at a charity event Nashville, nothing more,” she laughs.
“Before I was married, I was linked with everybody. Now that I’m divorced it’ll probably start up again. It makes me laugh. But my private life is not something I like discussing.”
That Olivia acknowledges coming to terms with being single again wasn’t easy.
“You’re used to doing things as a couple,” she says. “You have to learn to make decisions and do things alone once more.”
But the experience has not entirely put her off marriage and she says she’ll do it again - if she find the right person.
“It makes you very cautious, but I was cautious before,” she says.”‘I don’t have the fear I used to have, because once you’ve actually faced the fear and gone through it, it’s not as bad as in your imagination.”
“It was such a big thing for me, the thought of getting divorced. But, the reality is never as bad. I mean, it was a horrible thing to go through, but you do get through it and life does go on.”
She and former husband Matt Lattanzi have made a point of maintaining a close relationship since their divorce three years ago after 10 years of marriage. This is because top priority for both of them is the happiness of their daughter Chloe, now 12.
“Chloe comes first. When you have children, you have to find a way to become friends,” says Olivia.
“Unless there is a really, really early start, I always drive Chloe to school. And I arrange my day so that I pick her up, too. The best time to talk to kids is when you pick them up from school, because their day is fresh in their minds. If you ask “How was school?” an hour after you’ve got home, they’ll just say “Fine”, because by then they’re distracted. But ask them on the way home and they’ll tell you.”
Photographs of Chloe adorn every pinboard and mantelpiece around the luxurious cliff-top home built by the couple in Malibu.
Feeding the menagerie of pets three dogs, three cats and two cockatiels is Chloe’s job. And although the house, with its spectacular ocean views, is everything a luxurious home should be, this one also has the special warmth only a child can bring Olivia admits it hasn’t been easy juggling her career and raising a child as a single mum. “I’m very fortunate in that I have a really wonderful support group,” she says.
“My best friend and her husband live in the guest house on the property and they take over from me when I’m not here.”
“There’s a housekeeper and my assistant and a caretaker, so Chloe’s got a family unit who just slip in when I’m not here. But I try to make any trips away very short.”
She will bring Chloe with her when she comes to tour Australia this month, a guest of her old friend Cliff Richard. It was Cliff’s invitation to sing on his show 27 years ago that gave Olivia a helping hand to stardom.
Clearly, Olivia is excited by the prospect of the forthcoming tour. But it is just one of the projects she has lined up for the near future.
She is planning a new album of country songs - her first record in four years - and later this year will attend the premiere of the re-release of the movie Grease, celebrating its 20th anniversary.
More importantly, she is also celebrating five years of being clear of breast cancer.
Just three weeks ago, Olivia was presented with an award for raising public awareness of the disease that could easily have claimed her life.
She keeps a keen interest in breast cancer issues, often advising others on how to cope with the disease. She has also helped set up and run several cancer foundations.
“I talk about breast cancer because I want the women who are still going through it to be able to say, “Oh look, she’s five years down the road,” she says.
I remember going into a ladies room in Australia and it had just come out in the papers that I had cancer. This woman walked up to me and told me that she’d had breast cancer 18 years before. I remember thinking. “Wow, you can survive that long” That was really important for me.”
Olivia is now in ‘remission’ a phrase she doesn’t like because it implies the cancer could come back.
Beating the disease has been hard for her, involving reconstructive surgery eight months of and chemotherapy.
“As far as I am concerned, it’s gone and I’m healthy. It’s five years and that’s a big milestone. I feel very lucky,” says Olivia.
“One of the gifts that cancer gave me was to focus less on “Oh my God, what if…?” and just being happy that I’m here right now, in the moment. Thinking positively rather than living in fear, which I did a lot before.”
To other women who find themselves in the same situation, she says: “Don’t freak-out at the word cancer, it’s not necessarily a death sentence. I think everyone is frightened of the word it’s scary. But if they catch it early enough, you really have a good chance.”
“Find yourself a specialist and a support group of others who have been through it.”
“I also found an alternative healer. I did acupuncture, yoga and meditation. It’s very important to talk to your inner-self. I had an Irish setter which was my very special dog. I used to visualise her running through my body, eating up the cancer cells.”
“These kind of things are really important. It’s combining Eastern and Western medicine. You must also remember to laugh. Laughter is a great healer.”
Looking back on her career, there is little Olivia has not achieved. But is there any-thing she would still like to do?
“I’ve been so lucky”, she says. “I’ve been in a hit movie one of the biggest movies in history! I’ve had a wonderful recording career.”
“It would be nice to have another hit album, but there’s nothing else, really. I’d love someone else to record one of the songs I’ve written.”
Naming her greatest achievement, however, is easy: “The birth of my daughter has been my biggest accomplishment and my biggest joy.”
And what does she envisage as the perfect final chapter to her fairytale life?
“I’d like to be a healthy grey-haired old lady with lots of dogs and cats,” Olivia says. “I can just see this darling little house with lots of roses and a fireplace and having lots of friends come over for cups of tea and scones and eating all the cakes and junk I don’t eat now!”
“I don’t know where this place is. It could be in Australia. It could be my farm in Byron Bay, because I love it there so much.”
“And I’ll have lots of grandchildren. Chloe will drop the kids off. That will be my ideal…”
By Lucy Norland. Pictures: Michelle Day