![]() She was essentially a pop singer, but Welch and Farrar felt that her ability to deliver songs with sweet pathos could be used to good effect on country-oriented tracks. Bruce Welch and John Farrar, members of Richard’s backing band the Shadows, were taken by her girlishly beguiling voice and invited her to record demos in their studio. Her fortunes changed in 1971, when she met Cliff Richard, then hosting his own TV variety show, and was invited to become a regular guest singer. She was recruited for a Monkees-inspired pop group called Toomorrow, who got as far as releasing a flop 1970 “space musical” film and two singles. ![]() Two years later, her debut single, Till You Say You’ll be Mine, failed to reach the chart, and her next venture, a singing duo formed with a fellow Australian, Pat Carroll, was also unsuccessful. The prize was a trip to London, where she arrived in 1964. Regular spots under the name Lovely Livvy followed on Australian radio and television, and at 16 she won a TV talent show. Olivia wanted to be a vet, but doubted her ability to pass the science exams, and turned instead to her other interest, performing. Her maternal grandfather was the physicist Max Born, a Nobel laureate. Bound by the Official Secrets Act, he kept his children in the dark about his earlier career – it was not until Olivia was an adult that she discovered that during the second world war her father had been an MI5 officer assigned to the Enigma codebreaking unit at Bletchley Park. The family moved from Britain to Australia in 1954 when Brinley, a teacher, accepted a post at the University of Melbourne. She was the youngest of three children born to Irene (nee Born) and Brinley Newton-John. Olivia Newton-John and her husband John Easterling at a 2017 event to promote the Olivia Newton-John cancer research centre. In Travolta’s opinion: “Olivia is basically sweet and lovely.” For the rest of her life, during which she also campaigned for animal rights and founded the Olivia Newton-John Cancer Wellness and Research Centre in Melbourne, she was defined by her emollience. That kind of deference made her enormously popular with conservative audiences in the US, where she had her greatest success, but it did not do much for her credibility. ![]() She had wanted trousers, but when the public were polled about it they voted for the dress, and she was unwilling to disappoint. It was not until years later that she felt able to admit that she had hated not just the deplorably bouncy song – Long Live Love, which came fourth, the top spot going to Abba with Waterloo – but the frothy dress she had worn. ![]() A telling example involved her appearance in the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest, in which she represented Britain. More likely, she was just eager to please. For millions of teenage girls she was a formative influence, and boring she was not. The 1970s adolescents who were intoxicated by her as Sandy disagreed. Continuing to foster the notion that she was pop’s safe pair of hands, she commented: “People don’t want to hear that you’re nice, but that’s what I am. ![]() Her career duly rocketed, with Physical spending 10 weeks at the top of the US chart, but Newton-John never seemed entirely comfortable as a vamp. Olivia Newton-John representing Britain at the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest. Meanwhile, her wanton screen chemistry with her Grease co-star John Travolta was exploited to produce two No 1 singles, Summer Nights and You’re the One That I Want. Let me hear your body talk,” it implored). The reinvention was mightily helped along by her performance as Sandy, the good-girl-gone-baddish in Grease, and the pot was stirred further by the 1981 hit Physical (“I want to get physical. Her winsome denim wardrobe was replaced with black leather, and breezy album sleeves (often shot in meadows, playing up her girl-next-door freshness) with dark-toned, come-hither shots. However, in the late 70s, after a decade of soft-pop hits, she orchestrated one of the music industry’s most unexpected makeovers. She was once described by Rolling Stone magazine as “a sweet, innocent, 70s version of Doris Day”. Olivia Newton-John's most memorable moments – video obituaryĭuring the early 1970s in particular, she was one of the few young stars who were more popular with parents than with their children. ![]()
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