With Valentine’s Day upon us …. a look at the celebrity crushes I have had, after the jump ….
I have three younger sisters, who all went through their Tiger Beat phases (with Bobby Sherman, Shaun Cassidy and Rick Springfield, respectively). By contrast, I had one crush in my teen years, then added one in adulthood (my early thirties) and one in middle age (my forties).
Yet it was only upon recent discussions with co-workers that I realized that each of my three crushes came only after (at least) a three-step process – that one may have fleeting infatuations, but it takes more to last. At the risk of sounding overly whimsical, let me explain ….
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As a child, I first heard of a certain rock singer by hearing her voice on the radio with her two hit songs of the late 1960’s. “Wow, that is some voice” was my thought. Secondly, I saw her photo on an album cover …. and my knees wobbled. Then again: at age 14 with the hormones starting to go into overdrive – well, it didn’t take much for that to happen.
Yet my heart wasn’t truly stolen until I read of all the outrageous things that Grace Slick did: singing Wooden Ships in Germany and emphasizing the line “Who won the war?!?” …. then bringing Abbie Hoffman to the White House for a college alumni gathering (that Tricia Nixon organized) just for starters. She became my boyhood crush then …. and although she retired from music twenty-five years ago: I still find her story a fascinating one. And yes, her singing on Somebody to Love and White Rabbit still amazes me, decades later.
The Chicagoland native’s family eventually settled in Palo Alto, California and in her memoirs wrote extensively about her early life.
She was able to talk her parents into sending her to the (now defunct) Finch College in New York: “a finishing school for girls who don’t have the grades to get into Vassar but their parents have money” as she put it. So did Tricia Nixon, which is why she received an invite along with other grads to the White House – under her family name, Grace Wing – but was turned down as a “security risk” upon arrival.
She became a model at the I. Magnin flagship department store, and in her memoirs you could see the dichotomy her life is. She was doing something quite traditional (modeling) and yet bristled upon receiving a suggestion: “No, I will not cream my elbows, thank you”. Then she saw the Jefferson Airplane perform and decided that (a) they were making more money than she was, and (b) were also … having a lot more fun.
Since leaving music in 1989, she has devoted herself to the art world – making numerous appearances at art shows, with some rock & roll portraits, and many other different styles. She is age 75 today and here are examples of her work that – I believe – were in her memoirs.
Fast forward to the late 80’s-early 90’s (when I was in my thirties). One show that I grew to love was the Vietnam medical drama China Beach – and especially nurse Colleen McMurphy, portrayed by Dana Delany. Dressed in Army fatigues, I was not drawn to the character so much for looks as it was the warmth that Nurse McMurphy emanated: if I was laid-up in a hospital (be it military or civilian) I would hope that I could have a caregiver like her to endure such circumstances. The role garnered two Emmy Awards for Dana Delany, and in fact she was feted by actual Vietnam nurses – grateful for (a) the attention that they never received during their time, and (b) portraying the role they played in such a sympathetic manner.
This was her breakthrough role, and afterwards one saw her on television entertainment news often – this time, not wearing Army fatigues. And yes, my heart did skip-a-beat …. okay, two. Then, the third piece of the puzzle came when I read a newspaper profile, indicating that we had several things in common: (1) we are the same age (with birthdays only a few weeks apart), (2) we grew-up on opposite sides of the Long Island Sound (her in Connecticut), and (3) we both have Irish-American last names which are frequently mis-spelled due to the letter “E” – her last name of Delany is missing a second “e” that everyone expects … and my last name of Tracey has a letter “e” … that nobody expects.
Of course, I came to appreciate her work over the years, appearing in numerous TV and film roles – in recent years, as a recurring character on Desperate Housewives and in an ABC series called Body of Proof – with her once again in a medical role (as a Philadelphia medical examiner). The show was also one of those rare TV shows with two female co-stars (with Jeri Ryan as an elected public official) and while in its short life the plotlines sometimes got too fantastic (too many way-out twists and turns) it did come as a shock to the show’s fans when ABC cancelled it despite (relatively) good ratings.
Next, it was nice to learn that she shares our political viewpoints. She became active in Bill Clinton’s 1992 campaign, is involved with both Planned Parenthood as well as NARAL Pro-Choice America and in 1999 joined the board of the Scleroderma Research Foundation – a degenerative skin disease (that disproportionately affects women of child-bearing age). She also attended a 2012 fundraiser to help the Elizabeth Warren victorious Senate campaign.
Finally, what I consider to be the role of her life was in a 1995 made-for-TV movie about the life of the nurse and birth control pioneer Margaret Sanger – dealing with her adversary Anthony Comstock (portrayed by the late Rod Steiger). The downside is that it wound up being shown on Lifetime TV – I say “downside” because this is a film that I believe every adult male should see (and likely may not, due to the network it appeared on). Sanger herself bore three children, and many women in her neighborhood suffered from being constant breeders (if you will) with no legal access to birth control. There have been some reviews of the film saying that it was over-dramatized, too sympathetic to her (than the facts warranted) and too polemic towards her opponents (than the facts warranted). That may be – but for everyone who wonders what the “War on Women” fuss is all about, this film would be an eye-opener.
She is scheduled to appear in a new series with Billy Crystal entitled The Comedians – which will be a different type of role for her at age 58. But one that I have little doubt she will be up to the challenge for.
By the time I reached age 40 and middle age, I was now listening primarily to jazz and blues music (plus a smattering of other styles) on the radio and in concerts. Around 1999, I began to hear on Vermont Public Radio’s (then) nightly jazz program from time-to-time a woman singing romantic, Great American Songbook ballads …. and within a piano-guitar-bass format, so her words could be heard quite clearly. After a few times, I recall thinking, “Hmmm, that’s a nice voice – now what’s this singer’s name again, Diana … Kohl(?)” …. yet it wasn’t until I saw a CD in a music shop that I first saw the photo of Diana Krall – and once again, history repeated itself. The third leg of the stool came in 2003 when she married Elvis Costello at Elton John’s castle outside of London – talk about a power couple.
It turned out that I first heard her music from her breakout album, 1998’s When I Look in Your Eyes that featured strings and romantic songs by the likes of Irving Berlin, Harold Arlen, George Gershwin and Cole Porter. It not only led to her first Grammy Award (for jazz album) but was also the first jazz album to be a Grammy nominee for Album of the Year in twenty-five years: earning her a spot on the sophomore 1998 Lilith Fair tour where – along with fellow Canadian Holly Cole – they may have been the only jazz performers.
All of a sudden, you saw a jazz performer in places not normally seen: such as Sesame Street in 2005, in a 2007 Lexus ad campaign, and as as a singer in several movies. One of which was 2004’s De-Lovely – the Cole Porter biopic with her singing Just one of Those Things – along with several noted others singers performing Cole Porter classics. She gave birth to twin boys in late 2006, a first-time mother at age 42 and just this month (as a 50 year-old) released the album Wallflower – with songs by Jim Croce, the Carpenters, Elton John, and the Eagles.
So there you have it: I think everyone should be allowed to have crushes independent of your significant other, and those are my three. And while my co-workers said that “Catherine Deneuve is acceptable, Brigitte Bardot is not” (and one girlfriend asked me years ago, “I hope you don’t like Christie Brinkley”) … mentioning these three names to female friends (both romantic and platonic) has not garnered any negative feedback. And the best part: they are all still active artists, whose work will hopefully continue for years to come.
Let’s close with a song from Diana Krall’s new album … a re-working of the 1975 hit I’m Not in Love by the British band 10cc.
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