THE VERY PRIVATE LIFE OF BARBRA STREISAND
Woman's Own magazine 1975
Barbra, star of Funny Lady, the film chosen by the Queen this year, refuses to see journalists these days. She’s living in her own private paradise with Jon Peters, the former hairdresser she's grooming for stardom in his own right. Does he have the talent or is she just dazzled by love? Roy Moseley, the only reporter she would see, flew to California to find out.
The exit sign over a door at the far end of the room suddenly lit up and Barbra Streisand emerged, her newly-washed hair still dripping, her face scrubbed of make-up and smiling a welcome. She looks more beautiful than any of her movie star images, with the glow of a woman who has awakened to find she’s in love.
The man in her life is Jon Peters, the highly successful California hair designer-entrepreneur. He's obviously part of the happiness that shows in every look of Streisand the superstar and woman. His is the talent, to which she willingly entrusted the production of her new album, Butterfly, which has already become a golden disc. He’s the partner who will be totally involved in the making of her next film.
“When I went to Jon’s house, before we had this home, it was exactly like this but smaller, a combination of rough barnwood, offset with bevelled glass and mirrors and antiques—a kind of crude elegance,” she recalled, showing how deeply confident she is of his judgment as she showed me around their house.
“Life is as good as it was when I was 18”
She smiled happily, her porcelain blue eyes settling on some of her most precious bits and pieces. “It's so good having the things that I love around me again. It's funny, but my life now is almost as if I’d taken it up where I left off when I was 17 or 18,” she said, looking at her collection of antique fans, beaded bags and feather boas.
The last time they were on show was when Barbra was 18 years old and still waiting for her big break as an actress. She had a small apartment in Manhattan above a fish store and her precious bags were pinned to a screen to brighten her room—and her hopes.
“Then, when I got more famous or whatever, I put them away and got into Louis XV and XVI furniture and Dior clothes.” She laughed at the memory of at all.
When Barbra's big break did come along, it was as a singer, not as the actress she badly wanted to be. But times were hard and she couldn’t afford to be fussy. “I used to wear my antique clothes when I sang because first of all I didn't have any fancy clothes and second of all I thought they were so beautiful, such works of art, that they should be seen by all the world.” Her generous lips took on an amused smile as she recalled: “On my second night at the Bon Soir, a little night club in Greenwich Village, I wore my 1890 combing jacket, the same one I wore 12 years later in the movie, For Pete’s Sake. My mother came and said, ‘Why are you singing in your night gown ?’ I never went to nightclubs or anything, and I didn’t know what you were supposed to do or wear,” Barbra continued. “I’d seen advertisements in the paper with those chic, beaded gowns, but I thought, ‘Well, that’s not what I’m going to do—I don’t like that.’ So I wore my antique clothes.
“I'd never seen a live performance until I performed on stage myself,” said Barbra, the memory of it still as clear as her own crystal voice.
She felt nervous then, and still does when she is performing. “But nervousness is great. It shows you are alive. It makes your adrenalin flow and your sensitivity higher. It even makes your voice higher—when you’re frightened your voice can soar. It’s just a matter of using the fear. It would be unnatural not to have it.”
Just then Esther, her housekeeper, arrived with a huge tray of goodies. “I thought you might like an English tea with scones and jam,” beamed Barbra, obviously enjoying her little surprise. “I like England very much,” she said. So I chose that moment to be the first to tell her that her film, Funny Lady, has been picked for the Royal Film Performance of 1975, and is perhaps the first film to be chosen because of the star and by the Queen herself.
“Does the Queen know who I am?” Barbra asked, eyes wide with delight. Barbra adores our Royal Family, especially Prince Charles. She also remembered meeting Princess Margaret a few years ago when she made her last live appearance in England as the star of Funny Girl.
“Jon and I make a great team”
“The whole performance was shot to hell because everyone was aware that the Princess was there and they were watching her reaction instead of the stage.” So when Barbra was presented to Princess Margaret after the show she told her: “You should be here on a night when you’re not here!”
Suddenly into the room burst a worried little fellow with striking good looks and patched jeans. He headed straight for Barbra. Jason, her son by her marriage to Elliott Gould, was upset. His pal Christopher had been hurt in the eye. (Christopher is Jon’s son by his actress wife Lesley Ann Warren.)
Gently Barbra pulled Jason close to her and asked: “Is he all right?” Jason nodded. Barbra looked relieved. “That’s okay, then,” she smiled, giving him a push towards the door. “We're all going to play jacks in a minute,” she called as Jason raced back to his friend. Almost as soon as he disappeared we heard shrieks and splashing sounds from outside.
“Did you see the jacuzzi when you arrived?” Barbra asked. From somewhere in the back of my mind I remembered a jacuzzi is a kind of whirlpool bath, and then I linked it to the large redwood water container at the back of the house. But before I had time to answer, she explained: “It was made from an old wine vat. It’s fabulous for the kids. They spray hoses on each other and just jump in with their clothes on.” The jacuzzi was Jon’s idea, part of a lot of work he’s done to the house.
“As Jon says, he deals with the structure and I come along with the detail. We make a great team that way. He built me a shelf, for example, and I put a shell collection on it.” She promised to show me that later.
“You can buy my records but you can't buy me”
Meanwhile, I took a closer look at the enormous room around me. There’s a huge floor lounger with panelled sides, cosily topped with lots of pillows and fur rugs. While you are relaxing here you can flick the stereo controls or let someone else dial you a record from any part of the house. So I asked what I would dial for Streisand.
“I don't think I'm on it,” she laughed. Then more seriously, “I don’t like to listen to myself. You see, when you put so much work into doing something, you can’t really enjoy it for a while. The only thing I don't like about cooking is having to eat it. You know every ingredient that’s in it and it’s no fun.”
Barbra feels the same about her films. “I used to love to go to the movies. I still do, really. But some of the joy has been taken away because now I look at it all so technically. And with my records I have to put them away for a few years before I can listen to them again.”
Luckily, it isn't like that for the fans. They adore what they see and hear of Streisand. In fact, they sometimes want too much.
“Sometimes if you don't sign an autograph or something, they turn on you. I've had people do that to me. They just say, ‘I'm not going to buy your records again.’ They don’t understand I’m not theirs. You can only buy my services if you buy my records or a ticket to a movie, but you can't buy me.”
Happily, this doesn’t happen in England. “The people there are nice. They're appreciative of your talent but respectful of your privacy." And fortunately not all of her American fans give her a hard time. “I do have some lovely letters from people about the kind of joy that they get from my work. And those people don't ask for anything, either—just my talent.”
Barbra’s one big grumble about the film world is the lack of material for her to get her teeth into. “I wish some of the film scripts that were written for Bette Davis could be written for me today,” she remarked.
Luckily, Funny Lady did give her a really strong story to work with. As in Funny Girl, for which she won an Oscar, she plays Fanny Brice. “But in Funny Lady the story begins where she is trapped in the midst of the Depression and continues until she is 50 years old,” she explained.
She settled back and ran a hand over a quilted cushion. “Do you know that I bought beautiful patchwork quilts when they were only $10. Now they're $400 or $500 and it’s no fun. I have to be realistic. It's so beautiful to think that someone in 1845 sewed this quilt with pieces of velvet and satin. Today things are getting so mass-produced and these crafts are just dying out.”
But there is nothing mass-produced about Streisand, or the home she has made with Jon. Everything is individual, even to the bevelled glass in the hallway. “That came from the set of On A Clear Day. ‘I’ll work a half a day for it,’ I said. ‘Don’t pay me, just give me the glass.’ And they did. It's more fun working for something beautiful rather than money.”
Now Barbra has everything and everyone she loves around her. And their closeness has given her a new, quiet confidence.
The way Barbra sees herself today
After she saw this interview, Miss Streisand was very anxious to sum it up in the following words:
Barbra has a renewed joy in her art. She is giving herself new choices and taking on new responsibilities. One gets the clear sense that she is very much the captain of her ship as she has always been. But her decisions are no longer just career decisions; they are life decisions. She is in harmony with her world. She has struck a balance with the demands of superstardom. Once she was concerned with things; now she is concerned with people, especially her family. She has found the time to rest and enjoy the life she worked so hard to accomplish.
For her, work is a pragmatic art, but now it's conducted as a pleasure with the same professional results. While her critics exploit the sensationalism of her relationship with Jon, it is evident that he, too, represents a choice she has made. Jon is a catalyst very much orientated to dealing with life and people. Streisand has always controlled Streisand. She is her own Svengali making herself into whatever she wants to be.
End.
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