A singer, a statesman and a big sliding doors moment
In an alternate universe, Barbra Streisand could have been Mrs. Pierre Elliott Trudeau. And we’d likely never have heard of Margaret. And Justin would never have existed.
Sliding doors — altering the trajectory of future events.
I finally got around to cracking open Streisand’s memoir, “My Name is Barbra,” released late last year. In the 966-page tome — she had a lot to recount — the icon and legend devotes an entire chapter to her romance with the Canadian prime minister who’d pursued her with such persistence and panache.
They’d first met briefly when Trudeau came backstage after the London premiere of “Funny Girl” in 1969. Later that year, when Trudeau was in New York City to meet with then-UN secretary general U Thant — “I was very impressed” — he asked Streisand to dinner. In the car afterwards, he took hold of her hand. “Oh my God!”
He had her at hello … Dolly.
In the months that followed, Trudeau wined and dined the Broadway star, Oscar winner and most famous singer on the planet. They went to hideaway restaurants. She cooked for him at her Central Park West apartment. “He was so elegant, yet totally unpretentious and perpetually curious … Many women found him attractive, and so did I.” Trudeau invited Streisand to Ottawa, where they attended a ballet performance at the National Arts Centre. “I felt a little like Jackie Kennedy as I walked into the auditorium on the arm of this distinguished man, the leader of his country.”
Streisand wore a gorgeous white gown that night, trimmed in fur with a matching hat and muff, a Snow Queen tribute to Canada. When she’d come down the stairs at 24 Sussex Drive, as recalled by someone who was there, Trudeau’s “eyes bulged and his mouth dropped.”
He wore a red rose on his lapel. Of course he did.
She attended a session of Parliament and blushed when a member of the opposition said: “I should like to ask a question of the prime minister — if he can take his eyes and mind off the visitors’ gallery long enough to answer it.”
On a later visit, this time to the PM’s country resident at Harrington Lake, they enjoyed a sauna. She refused to jump in the water afterwards. “So I sat on a bench, shivering in my fur coat, and watched Pierre dive naked into the icy lake.”
Streisand doesn’t disclose prurient details in her autobiography about any of her lovers. But she describes one particular afternoon: “I was lying with my head on his lap, while he was reading official papers and I was reading a script. I thought to myself, ‘This is Bliss! ’”
Pierre was 50, Barbara was 27. She did fantasize about moving to Canada and marrying Trudeau, though the prospect also frightened her. “Frankly, I was a bit scared of the intensity of this relationship.” Instead, she fled to L.A., put some distance between them. But they stayed in touch for the next 30 years.
I was too young to have covered the Trudeaumania era. But I did meet him in 1976 when, as editor of the Ryersonian, I had to formally thank him from the auditorium stage after a speech. They made me give him a dopey scarf and toque in school colours. I was so nervous that I’d smoked a joint beforehand and then spontaneously pulled Trudeau into a bearhug. A photo of that moment, taken by the late, great Boris Spremo, appeared on the front page of the Toronto Star.
Fast forward a quarter-century. In the Star’s archives, I found the first story I’d ever written about Justin Trudeau: 2001. He was a teacher then, speaking at ideaCity, a gathering in Toronto of brainiacs and overachievers, though frankly, he was neither. The audience swooned over this handsome young man. So did I.
Forgive me for quoting myself here — actually, the writing is embarrassingly bad. “With his own image projected behind him, the presenter spoke extemporaneously and confidently with passion and humour, moving his hands expressively, pacing across the stage, with the innate instinct of a performer. As if it were in his genes.”
Already there was a yearning, certainly in the Liberal party, for Justin to follow in his father’s footsteps, dynastically.
Five years later, a Star poll asked the question: “Are you influenced by Justin Trudeau’s opinions about politics and nationalism?” Yes: 29.5 per cent. No: 70.5 per cent. Justin had recently taken out a Liberal party card and was pondering entering the political arena.
Critics claimed he was callow and shallow, all rhetoric and no record. Opinions were polarized. One reader’s response from the poll: “Justin Trudeau is undeniably eye candy but he is also an insufferable clot trying to massage his father’s reputation into a political career of his own without paying his dues.”
Well, we all know what has transpired since — almost nine years as PM and apparently committed to contesting another federal election. Every poll has him trailing disastrously.
Imagine if Barbra had married Pierre. Sliding doors.