The LONELINESS of LULU
Getting older and waking in the night worrying about being a burden... the most revealing – and saddest – interview Lulu has ever given...
LULU pops the last of a cream confection into her mouth, savours the sweet delight and then glances down at her cleavage ruefully. ‘My boobs have got bigger,’ she sighs, ‘and they were already way too large for someone my height. I’m only five foot one. I’ve always wanted a smaller bust, but what can you do?’
But while the pint-sized singer, who has become a British national treasure after five decades at the top of the entertainment tree, is clearly happy to indulge her sweet tooth, she clearly isn’t oblivious to its contribution to her ever-soslightly thickening girth. ‘I’ve put on weight as well, all around the middle,’ she grimaces. ‘ That’s something that creeps up on you when you get older too.’
Though the impish grin and pixie looks are little changed, Glaswegian Lulu, who first strutted her stuff in a skimpy mini, belting out her hit Shout in the 1960s, will turn 66 this November. And finally, it seems, she is making some concessions, albeit reluctantly, to the passing of time.
‘Oh, I still look forward with hope,’ she says brightly.
‘But that’s something I’ve only been able to say recently. I was struggling with getting older. I was up and down about it.
‘And then there’s that feeling when you wake up in the middle of the night and you worry about the day when you won’t be able to look after yourself. Of being a burden. Of feeling lonely.’
A solitary existence is not what one would naturally associate with the bright and bubbly Lulu, whose infectious good spirits and joie-devivre have been her trademark.
But, in her most revealing interview yet, the twice-married singer wants to talk candidly, if wistfully, about her increasing reliance on self-help books, her difficulty in coming to terms with the relentlessness of the ageing process, the loneliness of a single existence and how she is preparing to discuss her plans for euthanasia – should she develop a debilitating illness – with her only son, Jordan.
Lulu was married briefly to Bee Gee Maurice Gibb, from 1969 to 1973, and admits she felt a failure when the relationship ended.
‘But the failure of my second marriage 22 years ago [to celebrity hairdresser John Frieda, Jordan’s father] was even more disappointing,’ she says softly. They wed in 1977 and divorced in 1992.
Then, correcting herself sternly, she adds: ‘No, it was heart-breaking. But it did give me a much-needed dose of humility.’
Clearly, the experience has made her contemplate her own mortality and the reality of growing older. But another marriage, she confesses, would not necessarily solve her solitude.
‘Marriage isn’t the answer to my so-called problems,’ she says. ‘I do admit that I sometimes feel, “Oh, if I had somebody to do this with, it would be easier”. Sometimes, having a partner makes it easier for getting through life.
‘Somebody once said, “I have plenty of people to do things with. But nobody to do nothing with”. And I know what that means. After all, you can’t cuddle up to a round of applause.’
She adds: ‘I know this might sound startling coming from someone who’s always depicted as Mrs Positive. And I am. Just not always. I can also be Mrs Grumpy.
‘I’ve discovered that there is no single answer to help you over your problems. It’s like a recipe and there are lots of ingredients. Sometimes, it’s to do with feeling lonely. Other times, it’s about being tired.
‘I’ve been working on myself for a long, long time. I think of myself as a work in progress, which is why I can say I’m hopeful.
‘It hasn’t been easy, I still need to find out how to stay forward-looking. But I’ve finally learned how to calm myself down. As you get older, it is more and more important to take stock.’
That said, the memory of her utter despair when her second marriage
‘You can’t cuddle up to a round of applause’
ended remains vivid. ‘ I’ve never known such excruciating pain,’ she says, wincing visibly. ‘But it was probably one of the greatest lessons of my life, even though I didn’t realise it at the time.
‘After painstakingly looking at the part I played in these failed relationships, I realised it wasn’t only everybody else’s fault. The definition of insanity is repeating the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.
‘That said, the marriage seems like another lifetime,’ she adds. ‘But, hey, I’m not a woman for regrets. That’s not a practice of mine. But I have to be careful. When I’m tired or hungry, I go negative. And that’s not productive or healthy. I have a lot of experience now of either asking for help or reading how to help myself.’
There has been someone else recently, in a relationship that lasted for some considerable time. But sadly that also came to an end and the break-up is something that has clearly contributed to her reflective mood.
‘I have a T-shirt at home with one word printed across the front of it: Single-ish,’ she says playfully.
‘Something happened with that relationship, not long ago. And though I don’t want to go into the details, its ending was painful. It was disappointing. But it wasn’t quite as devastating as it would have been in the past.
‘When I was younger, I’d never entertain the idea of changing my mind. I was adamant and rigid. Now, I’m not so sure. That’s the lovely thing about growing older. All things are possible. So I am more philosophical.’
It was more than a fleeting fancy, she admits, and it lasted two years. ‘It was very upsetting when it ended but it wasn’t as hard as the break-up of my two marriages.’
And though she isn’t ruling out another relationship, she is realistic about the possibilities.
She says: ‘The longer you are on your own, the more you get used to it. I like my own company, my own way of doing things. If someone came along though, and he fitted into my life, then fine. It wouldn’t be because he was handsome or we liked the same music or were on the same ambitious journey. It would be about companionable silence, the very opposite of hard work.
‘I hope people might empathise with me. I wouldn’t like to think they felt sorry for me.
‘I can feel sorry for myself and I have good friends. I can cry on their shoulders if I’m feeling down.’
Though Lulu has always shied away from the cosmetic surgeon’s knife (‘You can look behind my ears, you won’t find any scars,’ she laughs), she admits making use of Botox. But it has been banished from her beauty regime for quite some time.
‘It must be years now,’ she says. ‘It’s not a good look any more. The face gets very shiny, almost waxy, when you’ve had too many fillers.
‘And anyway, I’ve come to realise it’s not too bad to have a few lines. It’s
when they turn into dried-up crevices you have to start to worry.’ Which brings us neatly to Lulu’s latest launch: that of her new Time Bomb skin care range, which will be on sale from July 14 at Selfridges in both London and Birmingham.
‘Eat your heart out, Jeremy Piven,’ she shrieks with obvious delight, referring to the star of the ITV drama Mr Selfridge, about the famous London department store. ‘I am Mrs Selfridge!’
On July 20, she will be on the QVC channel peddling her wares. Her range encompasses all age groups and, for someone who celebrates 50 years in the entertainment world next year, this expansion into the business world is all the more laudable.
But Lulu reveals that her selfconfidence has suffered as her career has levelled out.
‘It’s not as though people are clamouring for me to perform all over the world,’ she admits. ‘I do gigs, but I’m not the Rolling Stones.’ Keeping her self-assurance on an even keel has been as hard as coming to terms with ageing.
‘I’ve read more self-help books down the years than I can count,’ she says. ‘They are a tremendous crutch to me. The same is true of meditation [she meditates for 20 minutes a day] and I’ve been working with my guru, Gurumayi Chidvilasananda, a great medication master, since 1984. For me, it is very important to have a spiritual path.
‘I’ve just read the book A Return To Love by Marianne Williamson, which is like a lot of things I’ve read about self-improvement, but it’s good to get a refresher course every now and then. Learning to be conscious, to be in the moment, is the key to a lot of things. And you can let that slip. We are all a little like computers. We need a reboot now and again.
‘But mostly life is also about acceptance of your lot. I feel I have struggled with myself for a lot of my life. But look, we’re all going to die. The trick is not to be frightened by that.’
As she leans back in her seat and momentarily gazes off into the middle-distance, it is clear that it has not just been ageing and the loneliness it imparts that have been exercising Lulu’s mind.
While she delights in having family in her life – son Jordan, who is now 37, and his wife Alanna have two children, Bella, who is almost five, and Teddy, who will be two next month – Lulu is keenly conscious that, in her autumn years, she must address her future. ‘I’m not ready to go yet, not by any manner of means,’ she says anxiously. ‘And until then I would like to be agile, mentally and physically.’
It is now that she starts to talk about her fears of debilitating illness – and about how she sympathises with those who choose their own solution.
She says: ‘I think that committing suicide is selfish. But on the other hand, if you are seriously ill and there is no way you are going to get better, if you are going to become a vegetable, then yes, I can see the point of getting on that plane and going to Switzerland for a final visit to Dignitas.
‘I certainly wouldn’t sit in judgment on anyone who decided to take that route. This is all hypothetical but, for
‘I’m not the Stones, no one clamours for me’
those who want to do it, I wouldn’t criticise them.’
Though she has yet to broach the subject with son Jordan, the time is fast approaching. ‘It’s a conversation that I should have soon,’ she says thoughtfully. ‘I wouldn’t want to speak for my son, but Jordan is very reasonable. I’m sure he’d support me if I made the decision to opt for euthanasia.
‘He’s a very intelligent person and, as an intelligent person, wouldn’t say I couldn’t do it if I wanted to.
‘I have my beliefs, but I’m not a religious person in the sense that assisted suicide would go against my church’s teaching.
‘But that is all, hopefully, a long way in the future.’