In 1998, the Observer was seduced by uber-crooner and ‘world’s least likely sex symbol’, Barry Manilow. In his 10th month on tour, Manilow was living in hotels, but not particularly happily. ‘What you really miss is your bathroom and your own stuff and your dogs,’ he told Harriet Lane, receiving her in a ‘ridiculous’ presidential suite stuffed with lilies, oil paintings, a four-poster bed, extravagantly swagged curtains and the odd taco crumb.
Despite the ‘Manilow magic’ he delivered on stage (a blend of ‘divine comic timing’, perfectly teased coiffure and ‘schmaltzy, agreeable tunes’), the ‘accidental king of camp’ was a reluctant performer. Born Barry Pincus, he had dreamed of being a studio musician or songwriter while working in advertising; he later became an accompanist and wrote jingles for KFC and pimple cream. His first record deal led to the ‘inconvenient’ discovery he had ‘a horror of going onstage’ and an early TV appearance made him so nervous he ‘temporarily lost his sight’. Acting classes helped with nerves, though live performance was still ‘not where I would choose to be.’
Despite exuding an LA-sort of ‘peculiarly highly coloured ageless physical presence’, Manilow came across as funny, thoughtful self-deprecating and self-aware, if understandably tight-lipped about his relationship with Linda Allen, which ‘seems to segue from passion to friendship and back again’. ‘What can I tell you?’ he said, explaining it was ‘too personal, too private’ for him to write songs about (Manilow married his manager Garry Kief in 2014 and officially came out in 2017; he had been worried fans would be ‘disappointed’ he was gay, he explained then).
He had headed off an early ‘asshole period’ of his celebrity (spending too much time alone; getting angry at ‘small, silly things’), he explained, with therapy and was happy success had come when he was a fully fledged adult. ‘When this happens to someone who is 15, 16, 18, 20 – well, I don’t know how anyone gets through it… I say a prayer for them. Good luck baby, good luck.’
Emma Beddington
