Cher on Oprah 2002

chocolate many times over the years but she's never performed for us until today you're in for thrill because after four decades as a megastar she's still rocking out and now she's taking her show on the road and she says it is the last time our inspiring new CD is called living proof singing her monster hit if you be leaving you you if cher could turn back time she'd live her life as she always has large for nearly 40 years this performing powerhouse has been a megastar of the highest magnitude a television star an Academy Award winning actress a fashion icon and a Grammy winning singer above all shares in a league all her own making history as the only female recording artist to have a top-ten hit every decade for the past 40 years her amazing career started when she met Sonny Bono their timeless 60s classic the beat goes on launch their careers they followed that up with their signature hit I got you babe gypsies tramps and thieves and dark lady made her a superstar the 72 and Vav share not only rocked us with the hit if I could turn back time but she also fulfilled her childhood dream of becoming a movie actress her first major movie role won her an Academy Award nomination for her breakout performance as Meryl Streep's lesbian friend and Silkwood and in 1987 Sharon knocked us all out by taking home the Oscar for Best Actress with a brilliant and riveting role in moonstruck all in love with you and just when everybody thought they'd heard the last from Cher she surprised us with her biggest selling single of all time believed earned share her first Grammy and at 55 cher shows no sign of stopping although she says her voice isn't one of her favorite things fans and critics disagree her new CD living proof debuted on Billboard's Top 10 and she dedicated her latest single song for the lonely to new york see okay obviously share is here she's sitting here in the chair and one of the most interesting people in the world to talk to her new CD living proof is getting great reviews later she's going to perform her new hit single song which he dedicates to all the fine folks of New York you've enjoyed I you know when you hear that you've enjoyed four decades of hits yes yeah sounds like that rate about my mother decades of hit yeah yeah I've read that you don't like the sound of your own voice could that be true yeah how could that be true like what I'm singing I'm thinking oh I'm rock and I rock you know and then I hear back and think ah you know I mean if I want to hear a voice I'll listen to Celine Dion no I love doing it I must said I love performing but it's just not my favorite voice you know I mean but my kid you know you know what I think I think it's getting better I'm surprised I've been really working on it and I like improving it one thing I think and of course my mother says to me remember this is so many things but uh but you know honey it's so emotional and it might not be the best but it's really emotional makes people feel so I go okay well that's the whole deal anyway that's the whole point to let your voice make people feel now when you hear I think I was saying in that tape 55 yeah does it make peace all about to be 56 about to be 56 does that resonate with you any place at all or do you think gosh I wish they left that part out or you know or do you think what do you think I wish I'd left that part out design-wise I think I think it's I think they're talking about my mother I have a dog everything goes back to your mother right now but I think well who is that what are those years those years are like that's the number you stand it when you're really pissed off at the market when you're waiting for something and you get 56 oh and so as you're getting older yeah you don't feel like you're getting older do you some pop when I turned 40 I thought you know what rocks I know I thought this is a page is like just by passing me I'm here I was having a beer I was dancing I was at this place in New York that I love to go and I was looking around in the clock hit 12 and I went what do I look good then 45 comes and I'm thinking I still look you know I look good you know and then 47 starts to come and boy I'm running on the treadmill and it's just like get up there get up there you know and I'm starting to notice it you know a little backache little neck ache um little longer like Oh get that lipstick perfect you know so it's a lot more output for less gain and also also you know it's this is a terrible thing to say but it's just the truth I have lived so much of my life by I've gotten to do the things that I've gotten to do a lot by the way I've looked you know you get I mean there's like unbelievably talented people in our business who don't look a certain way so they don't get a certain part or they don't get you know it's like I was talking to somebody from MTV and they said well what do you think of it I said well now you look at music you don't listen to it and God help people that don't make great videos because you know you can sit easy all right you could never sing a note and if you can make a great video you could be you know a huge star so actually that is the truth yeah so you have to have to reach inside and sometimes I'm really good okay but your whole image has been based I'm to a great extent on look yeah and you have worked a girl yeah when you're working it like this new blonde thing you got going here that is that just like a mood it's a date you know what it's a mood it's a mood right it's impelling blonde yeah well yeah yeah you know it's good actually it's just for this it's just for this album that I just thought you know I want to do the blonde cover and everyone no no no that's not a good idea of course it always makes me want to do it and and I thought okay well for this for this album's length I'm just gonna have this and but I mean you know if anyone just to handle any hair color that's the interesting thing well I've just decided that I can mm-hm you know well I wasn't to be wild to adjust to it yeah yeah uh-huh now she's blonde okay okay but if you saw the old Sonny and Cher shows I was a different color every five seconds it went you know Lady Godiva Queen Elizabeth no sketch and we thought oh yeah but that's kind of where I got the you know because I have long black hair you know and that's the way it's always you do and I still do yeah you just have a very good week I have a very good wig maker you know also you guys just see me for a hundred years now and it gets boring I get bored so you keep reinventing yourself in different ways no it's not a real it's really not a reinvention it's a soup it's like changing your socks or changed you know it's like you change your hand what my grandma used to change your handbag her ear bobs yeah you know guys labs and and and so I just changed my hair to have lots of hairs yes you name them sometimes yes I do you couldn't know that that's why cher says that Sunny's death was the most devastating loss of her life back in 1971 and now it's 30 years later 31 years later she is better than ever and her fantastic new CD is called living proof and she is living proof that any dream is possible take a look she was born sherilyn sarkeesian to a 17 year old mother and a truck-driving father who abandoned their family when cher was barely a few months old she was sent to a Catholic home and raised there until her mother could save enough money to support her share and her younger sister grew up around Hollywood while their mother a struggling actress looked for work and it wasn't until cher was 11 years old that she finally met her father for the first time by the time she was 16 Sharon Madden fell in love with 28-year old producer songwriter Sonny Bono they married two years later and literally made beautiful music together their number-one single I got you babe became a smash hit and it wasn't long before the whole country was in love with them and their music their Sonny and Cher TV show was a huge success establishing cher as both a comedic actress and a singing sensation their daughter chastity soon got in on the act but while Sonny and Cher's careers soared into the stratosphere their relationship crashed and burned ending in divorce after 11 years of marriage though they went their separate ways they remained close friends throughout the years cher says the worst day of her life was the day Sonny died sudden in a skiing accident when I was young there was this section of the Reader's Digest and it was called the most unforgettable character I've ever met and for me that person is Sonny Bono and no matter how long I live or I meet in my life that person who will always be from you okay okay and you say and have said that losing Sonny was for you the first real loss yeah toughest thing I'd read in your book that you'd said that leaving him you thought was a yacht always was I was the hardest but losing him turned out to be yes yeah and so still now hard to is it is it like I hear this from people who've lost loved ones they say sometimes you just you want to call them or you want to you know you forget that they're not here or has the realization you know what's so weird I have like I was talking to chess the other day and we have dreams about him I had one dream after right after he died and it was I've never had a dream like this at all I was um in my dream I saw him it was like sitting here seeing you and he didn't talk though and I would kept talking to him and he wouldn't talk back to me that all of a sudden he turned and he smiled and it was like it was like the most real thing that has ever happened in a dream and then he smiled I thought ok well it's fine and then the dream was over and he walked away from it or got up from it he's not completely different after that dream I just felt different about he's passing yeah uh-huh cuz I was never I've never been close to anyone since then or other than him rather than him other than him was as close as you'd ever been yeah I mean I've had relatives die my father died it wasn't the same thing mm-hmm and you know I always think that the passing of another person really and we all experienced this during September 11 um teaches you about your own life or it strengthen something in your own life or I think some forces you to look at your own life differently did it do that well I think it I think that sometimes that happens I've been able to do that like with my grandfather and with my father and this I I didn't make such a peace with this because you know I just expected that he would be there he'd always been there I thought you know we would just go on arguing forever and then that would be that would be you know and that would be great uh-huh and then you realize it could be gone in in a moment I was just insane you know I just picked up the phone and you know it's like hi oh hi Chaz I'm just getting ready go to work and then Glenn cling-clang cling-clang gone even though you know what I remember talking to you years before you said that basically your years ago that the relationship was non-existent that you all had kind of gone your separate ways you said things oh god we said the worst things uh the thing is like he's the only person like he was at one point he took me to court trying to get chasse away from me proving that I was an unfit mother and he just said the most ridiculous things and he lost the case and as we were coming out on the steps he grabbed me and stuck his tongue down my throat and BAM me backwards and I mean we I could never no matter what he did I could never really stay angry we had this kind of father son daughter mother brothers sister thing that was mild of any role it was much more important than the marriage and we were partners too you know so so and he was the only person that could get around me I could not stay angry I mean look he's in there saying she takes her to Hugh Hefner's house and there's nude fornication and he's crying and I'm looking and I think why was me better at he'd be an oscar-winning actor if he was better when he does he was you know doing The Love Boat you know why wasn't he better and and and then he loses and he goes well guy finally lost well mmm like that I mean that was just that was him you know so and then he was gone and I thought I was I had to sew together okay I understand this chastity I feel really bad for you sweetheart it's okay I'll be home the next thing I knew I was on my knees and so now you think that you allowed that to teach you what or caused you to live your life in what kind of way that's different knowing that it could be gone like that not that we all didn't already know that we all know that you know what I you just didn't expect you know I think that the truth is I didn't the only thing I learned about that and this is gonna be sound like awful but the only thing I learned about that is that loss sucks I don't know that I live my life any better mmm you know I don't think Oh every moments precious I have to remember it I mean like I try to oh every moments precious and then ten moments later I'm thinking oh la dee da what did I say ten moments before you know but I mean I keep trying to reaffirm that every moment is precious but the only thing I really got out of that is and you know in in one second someone that you should have had the telephone conversation with right before saying you know all those horrible things I said about you I never meant them you know all that stuff but but losses loss and loss of someone is greater than loss of anything you know a lot of you know loss of that that one kind of special relationship and and we didn't even have it then you know it was just it was years and years I mean I was 16 when I met him Wow yeah I know that you know I know that but really 16 like girl looking up to the sky yeah I mean I just thought that he you know I just thought he was the coolest funniest he made me laugh when we come back a sneak peek at Cher's cameo role and the season finale of Will & Grace later a private tour of Cher's new house overlooking the ocean and oh my goodness now you're there in Oliver please stop staring yes its share you know dude it is a little weird that you're talking to my dog I don't think I need a drag queen to define normal behavior but I will say this the look whoo working the attitude okay you're good I've had a lot of practice hey you're not that great mister sister all right I do better share than you you think so actually it's you think so ho are you kidding me with this okay the hand is perfect but it's more are you kidding me with this hole get a life I'm calm will and grace with her friend actor Sean Hayes have you always had a sense of humor about yourself and so you don't mind you know I think it's great really yeah in fact there are a lot of impersonators of you you know that and you think that's great yeah and the better they are the better yeah oh yeah I actually I was watching a daytime show anywhere I'm a mall and they had people coming up and doing you know creative things and this guy got up and did me I got him on the telephone and he was in my act within about a month really yeah he was that good he was brilliant and we would be on stage together and I would look over at him and it was just freaky because there'd be both of us up there and doing no yeah it was great well Cher's appearance on Will & Grace was so popular the producers asked her back for the upcoming season finale here's a look at a little bit of that episode where the character jack has a near-death experience when he gets to heaven he finds out that God is really don't ever stop dancing show business needs you but if it needs me how come I keep getting rejected you know don't talk to me about rejection okay wait look how many times I've gone down in flames remember I lost the Oscar for moonstruck but you won the Oscar for moonstruck and don't you forget it you have such a huge you know following and a particularly huge egg popular gay following like gay men just started coming to your concert you know what it is with you and gay men well guys yeah ah we've always we've always just had this kind of a relationship I mean the first gay men I knew I was about nine ten years old my mother had these two hairdresser friends that for for me have it we were having they were had more fun than anyone I knew and I thought it was just a hairdresser ages and and and as I got older it started to you know happen more and more in a magazine article I just did the woman asked me and I said you know what ask somebody because I don't know that article yeah and so they broke it down into into you know percentage it was like 33 or 39 percent said because you're a survivor yeah yeah that's a good thing yeah well we hit the streets of Chicago in search of the answer and we asked all kinds of people I think shares agate iPhone because she is genuine and she doesn't want to be judged just the same as gay people don't want to judge share is an icon to many of us because she's a survivor she reminded with Phoenix a lot of people will describe her as a cat having nine lives it's one of those things where out of the ashes she rises up once again to give you something bigger and better when she did the show with the troops and she had on like a little thong and like her butt was showing I mean that takes guts like to have that much confidence in your body and in yourself to practically prance around naked in front of like thousands of people that's awesome she's an icon for so many gay men because they want to wear those Claude Mackie outfits and moonstruck when she transforms herself because I think every gay man wants to transform himself into something wonderful in their life he swept off their feet by Nicolas Cage that is the power that is able to transcend all generations many generations genders all of it you know I also and this is my personal idea of it is that um gay men and I'm sure all gay gay women as well but somehow gay men and I have got this little bond that we have and I think it's because they feel like they're a little bit outside they're a little bit Outsiders and I am in my entire life I'm a little bit of an outsider no matter what I conquer or what I get good at or whatever I just always feel like the odd one out and I think that's a message that we can feel you know you just you look at someone and you and you just and you just know you know you have the outsider though do you feel ever feel um like pure happiness I mean I was just sitting here and you know I did a lot of those voice tracks and preparing for you to come here day I was thinking when you've been a legend for as long as you have you know the past four decades and I hit in every decade are you able to wrap your brain around what that is no because I never it just it takes you saying to me do you realize so-and-so and me sitting here going whoa yeah I don't even remember that horn that was a long time ago I you all I know is I put every day I get up I put one foot in front of the other and I do my work and I think that it's like when I do my work I listed gonna sound nuts to everybody when I do my work I feel it's some sort of ministry that I stand up and I the thing that I know how to do is I know how to touch people in a strange way when I go onstage and I've got 30,000 people out there I feel like I can stand there and I am touching and knowing everybody in the group and so I give them they give me this huge amount of energy and I can get inside them and give them something from my work and that's all that's for me that's all my work has ever been about and so is that part but you were saying earlier that so much of so much of it is also based upon this image this whole you know the look but because it's like it's it's the package I have to bring it in for them I mean and when I do my internet package get 65 we just mail it to another place there's this kind of gap that you've got to wait to before you can be Maggie Smith you've got to you know you got to do something between those years those you know like 20 whatever years or 15 years it's actually getting shorter every day but so so that you can you can get that kind of other status where you can be grandmother's and you know and you can be like the cool crazy grandmother or something like that you can't be the cool crazy chick anymore because the guys that were older than you are now playing with girls that are young enough to be their daughters so you kind of slip into this grey period you know this Greg thing when you were speaking grandmother's when you here with chastity a few years ago uh you were still coming to terms actually with her homosexuality yes and has it gotten easier for you now to embrace it yeah yeah that's where I mean it took me it took me I would say a real month and I think a lot of it was because I was the last one to know I was hurt and I was pissed he know everybody oh not for me yeah uh I asked my I asked everybody my sister did you know yes did she tell you yes Sonny she did she tell you yes my secretary did she tell you yes I got the gardener did she tell you you know and then and so I was the only one but she was smart because I wasn't the right I wasn't the same yeah cuz I read in that same article that people tell who they feel comfortable yeah telling and she was smart yeah cuz they thought she thought you would have the reaction that I did yeah and now it's over so you don't think about being a grandmother or I'm hoping still that you know one of them in my son who knows when I mean that's gonna happen probably any second and he you know mhm and how it'll come I don't know but it was chaste I mean cuz I really she has a girlfriend now that it just kills me she's hysterical and I hope they stay together because they're great they're great couple and I would love it if you know if someone would produce if someone would produce someone for me to play with that's the private - it shares new house in Malibu we'll be right back that shares late a single called a different kind of love song off of her new CD living proof a few years ago we did a show with Cher at her home in Aspen so I know she loves to bill big beautiful homes her latest one is a gorgeous house overlooking the ocean in Malibu and she's going to take us through a private tour one of the things you just said what did you say to make creating items as I said I build houses because I I want to create the best me and I so I create the perfect me in the house like this is when I look at this house I see myself and so I will never be this perfect so I create these beautiful places and also for me my house is the only place I can have any privacy so it's really really important cuz once I go out you know I am stopped screwed yeah so tell us about this house okay well this house is a Venetian house I don't know if it's on oh yeah that's I think that's going in to look this way let's address the front door and we don't means bleep yeah and that's these are things I picked up for years and years and years and we're going into the living room and of course the Sun is setting I mean it is on that side so that's why it's got a black back flare you know that's the swim pool out the other way and that's the ocean that's the swimming pool the song echoes infinity pool boy you can't tell my one stops together that way and that's my bedroom in my office and that's my elephant and that's my bad now did you build it wasn't there so you built it from spatch oh there wasn't even there was just dirt that's my bedroom it looks out at the ocean you can't see it really well not even large you live in here and that's my that thing is gonna be in the show actually in the in the next show cuz I'm gonna come out of the ceiling in it that's my bathroom and that's where all my friends gather and I don't know how we all get here but we've gotten ten girls there we look out at the ocean Wow and that's my office that I love but I'm gonna redo it cuz I decided to better went ant would be more fun that's all my arty things that I just keep buying for a hundred years and that's where my Oscar used to sit but someone moved it or stole it and this is I just spent nine days cleaning out my closet this is my back closet I've got more more like it I just cleaned out all my shoes but this is not my shoe closet so you've got four more like this yeah that's okay you share well thank you for letting us in your house I know that Architectural Digest has been there and they're doing you can see many more exclusive photos of shares spectacular house that's in the August issue of Architectural Digest which hits newsstands on July 3rd well we'll look for you on the cover ok ok you'll know what Cher's house goes maybe share on there ok we'll be right back Jerez here and your new CD living proof is some of her best work yet it includes her new single song for the lonely it was written before September 11 but cher says the words have taken on new meaning in it and she sings when heroes fall in love or war they live forever and she dedicated to the people of New York here's cher singing song for the lonely Oh Oh you don't have to look no more you Oh you zooni is called moving food and it's available right now she's going on tour this summer she says it's get your final tour well yeah no I really you know I'm getting old you guys I think you make 56 look so good you 56 look like the place to be you really do you have to be someplace so keep an eye out for dates in your city all across America or check out oprah.com for more details we'll have the entire share living proof schedule on oprah.com thank you for sharing for you a coconut

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Length: 40min 57sec (2457 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 08 2013