Despite the happy exterior, however, the relationship began buckling under Sonny’s self-destructive impulses and need for total control. After discovering his many infidelities, prescription pill problem and misappropriation of money – treating Cher as an “employee” and leaving her without her own funds – she wanted out.
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It was advice from Lucille Ball, who left her own TV husband Desi Arnaz for his affairs, that galvanised Cher’s decision to leave Sonny: “F–k him, you’re the one with the talent,” Ball said. Fighting off thoughts of self-doubt and even suicide, Cher ended the relationship. (Paying it forward, Cher gave similar wisdom to Tina Turner.) Several successful solo hits, including Half-Breed and Dark Lady, alongside controversial couture helped Cher usher in a brash new solo image.
Cher with then husband Sonny at the 1973 Golden Globe AwardsCredit: Max B. Miller
But acting remained the elusive Holy Grail for the entertainer, who still wanted to break into the movies – a goal the memoir ends on. Rosalind Russell, of Auntie Mame fame, once gave Cher some powerful words of encouragement on her talents, while a fleeting encounter with Katharine Hepburn only spurred Cher’s late desire to become a serious actor.
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Cher’s life story, even if only covered in part here, is one of inspiring grit and resilience. Success may have first come from a partnership with Sonny, but Cher was left to survive as a single woman (with a child), made to tour to pay back Sonny’s debts and forced to reinvent in a merciless industry.
The memoir’s many asides – such as Cher acknowledging that she has long “compartmentalised sadness” or “found my own escape in music” – are where her tale of persistence and success prove the most gratifying. She pairs these potent, self-reflective thoughts with spirited stories on the dizzying pleasures that celebrity and wealth gave someone who grew up with shoes held together with rubber bands.
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“Becoming famous is hard, but making a comeback is almost impossible,” she writes. Not before modestly, adding: “I have done it so many times.” Cher is as much an unapologetic, electrifying account of the artist’s long refusal to relent, as it is a larger story of one woman finally emancipating herself. Men may have cast a long shadow over Cher’s life but she says that she always knew she would ultimately stand on her own.
After all, there has only ever been one Cher since.
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