I was seven or eight when my aunt took me to see Grease at the local movie theatre.
I remember literally skipping out of the cinema, any sexual innuendo completely going over my head. I was just so exhilarated by the whole thing - the songs, the energy of the dancing, the positivity, and, of course, Olivia Newton-John. Always radiant Sandy. Our Olivia. She was my girl crush from then on. And the same for many of my contemporaries, as today we shared memories and mourned her loss on Facebook. She was perfection.
After Xanadu, what girl, down at the local roller skating rink, in between doing the Monte Carlo, didn't pretend they were Livvy, all flowing dresses and blown-back hair? And in the 1980s, dreamt of visiting her Koala Blue store in LA, all big jumpers and earrings and Ken Done designs? I know I did.
Some 25 years later after watching Grease, I got to meet Newton-John and write a story about her concert at the Royal Theatre in Canberra in 2003.
She was gracious and bubbly and ever nice. Just nice.
Lots of mums and daughters were at that Canberra concert nearly 20 years ago. Newton-John's then 16-year-old daughter Chloe even joined her on stage singing Somewhere Over the Rainbow. Her music was loved across the generations. Marji Curran, of Downer, was in that audience with her mum Roz Munday, of Lyneham. "My mum took me to see Grease at the drive-in when I was 12 and I've loved her ever since," Ms Curran said, at the time.
But the best story of that night back in 2003 was that of John and Di Kelly, of Monash, who first met when they appeared in a production of Grease in Cootamundra. Yes, he was Danny to her Sandy.
Newton-John's songs were the soundtrack to our 1980s lives. She sold more than 100 million albums and had 10 number one singles, including Xanadu (1980) and the no-longer-the-nice-girl hit Physical (1981). It's easy to forget those incredible numbers.
Livvy wasn't pretentious. She never lost her Aussie accent despite years in the US. And she never wallowed in her own health problems. She was just a beacon of light and hope. And now she's gone. Another reminder of our own mortality. A piece of your childhood removed.
A tweet by entertainment guru Peter Ford this week was prophetic.
On Saturday night, following news that The Seekers' singer Judith Durham had passed away, Ford wrote: "Can honestly say in all my years covering celebrities there are only two people who get a universal 'I like her/him - they seem nice'. One is ONJ and the other Judith Durham".
Can honestly say in all my years covering celebrities there are only two people who get a universal ‘I like her/him - they seem nice’. One is ONJ and the other Judith Durham. Every other person,literally every single one, there will someone who says ‘I can’t stand them’
— Peter Ford (@mrpford) August 6, 2022
Three days later, we were waking to the news that Olivia Newton-John had passed away at the age of 73 at her ranch in southern California. Ford must have sensed something.
He was right. How could you not like her? She was pure sunshine.
Newton-John was most recently in Canberra in 2020 to talk to politicians about her cancer centre.
Reportedly, even then, suffering from stage-four breast cancer, Newton-John visited Parliament House. She sat in the public gallery during question time and smiled and laughed alongside her husband John Easterling, whom she had credited with introducing her to the benefits of pain relief from medicinal cannabis.
Newton-John also met with then health minister Greg Hunt and then opposition leader Anthony Albanese, talking about the success of rare cancer clinical trials being delivered at the Olivia Newton-John Cancer Research Institute.
She was just shy of 71 then. She could have been spending her final years enjoying herself. But always, always she was advocating for cancer patients and cancer research and treatment.
During that Parliament House visit, Newton-John did stop in the Marble Foyer to speak to some UNICEF volunteers who happened to be there and posed for some photographs with them but her minders did not allow any questions, saying "No interviews". Newton-John looked very apologetic. Genuinely.
She was nice then. Nice forever. And nice is a quality that's always underrated and one that shouldn't be discounted.
And as a tribute, following the passing of Judith Durham and Olivia Newton-John, the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra will be bringing out from its collection for display a painting of The Seekers and a 1978 photograph of Newton-John taken by Gary Heery. (A portrait of the late Archie Roach is also currently out, in Gallery 3.)
Sydney-born Heery took the photograph of Newton-John in 1978, the year Grease was released. Newton-John, even though she played a teenager in the movie, was then 29. She looked as youthful as ever in Heery's photograph, wearing pigtails, jeans and sneakers. She was beautiful then, she was beautiful until her final days.
RIP ONJ
