How Faye Dunaway helped to save Jagger from drug binge that ‘turned him blue’
ROLLING STONES singer Sir Mick Jagger came close to death from a drugs overdose at the height of the band’s success, a new book reveals.
Jagger ‘turned blue’ before being rescued by the Oscar- winning actress Faye Dunaway and her husband, singer Peter Wolf.
The episode is detailed in a new book about the iconic American music publication Rolling Stone, exclusive extracts of which feature in today’s Event magazine.
In one incident, Dianne Chess, the wife of the influential rock publicist Marshall Chess, recalls a t raumatic afternoon in t he mid-1970s when she and her husband found themselves battling to save Jagger’s life in their New York apartment.
‘I was upstairs in the bedroom when I heard this slapping and Marshall yelling, “Mick! Mick!” enough times for me to go see what was going on,’ she wrote. ‘He was blue, lips purple.’
Her husband then had to resort to giving the singer ‘ mouth to mouth’ to try to revive him. Jagger’s life was effectively saved when Dunaway, Wolf and Atlantic Records’ then president Ahmet Ertegun brought order to the ‘ chaotic scene’ and ensured Jagger was rushed to hospital. The incident was kept out of the press at the time.
The new book, Sticky Fingers: The Life And Times Of Jann Wenner And Rolling Stone Magazine, explores the often fraught relationship between Sir Mick and Jann Wenner, who founded the magazine in 1967. Jagger was initially furious that Rolling Stone had taken his band’s name and threatened legal action. But he and Wenner subsequently struck up a mutually beneficial relationship. Chess said Wenner fawned over Jagger like a groupie and put the singer on the cover of the magazine 31 times – more than any other pop star. Their close friendship also led to unsubstantiated speculation that the two men were lovers.