Cilla? She was my nemesis, says Dionne Warwick
AS a much-loved entertainer, Cilla Black was rarely seen in a less than glowing light.
But the late star is being cast as the ‘nemesis’ in a biopic of American soul singer Dionne Warwick.
Announcing the cast of Dionne, which begins filming in October, Miss Warwick, 75, insisted that Miss Black ‘stole my songs’.
The five-time Grammy Award winner is one of the most successful singers of all time, best known for hits such as I Say a Little Prayer and Do You Know the Way to San Jose?
However, she has long held a grudge against the Liverpudlian star, claiming her British No.1 cover of Anyone Who Had A Heart in 1964 amounted to theft.
Miss Warwick told a press conference at the Cannes Film Festival yesterday that ‘[The film will show] what part she played in my career and why she became my nemesis’.
Asked why Cilla is being treated so harshly, she explained: ‘Well, she stole my music…From 1962, when I first met that woman… there was a confrontation.
‘She stole my songs and I was not a very happy camper about that.’
Neither Cilla nor her family were consulted over the film. When asked why, Miss Warwick said ‘it’s not really important’. She said she was ‘devastated’ by Cilla’s death at the age of 72 at her villa in Spain last year. She said she sent a letter of condolence to her family, even though the singers had not spoken in decades.
In her 2010 autobiography, My Life As I See It, Miss Warwick said she ‘never got over’ Cilla covering her song, claiming her performance was so similar it amounted to theft. She wrote: ‘Anyone Who Had A Heart, for example, was just flat out copied, note for note, word for word, and not very well, I might add, by the white British pop singer Cilla Black (whose real name is Cilla White; go figure)’.
When details of the film were first announced, it was claimed Lady Gaga was lined up to play the role of Cilla, but a spokesman for the star later told Variety magazine that she ‘will not appear in the project.’