LOS ANGELES, United States — Olivia Newton-John, who gained worldwide fame as high school sweetheart Sandy
in the hit musical movie “Grease,” died on Monday after a 30-year battle with
cancer. She was 73.
اضافة اعلان
Newton-John “passed away peacefully at her ranch in
Southern California this morning, surrounded by family and friends,” said a
statement from her husband John Easterling posted on her official social media
accounts.
The multiple Grammy-winning entertainer, whose
career spanned more than five decades, including chart-topping songs such as
“Physical,” devoted much of her time in later years to charities after first
being diagnosed with breast cancer in 1992.
The British-born and Australian-raised star
dedicated a number of albums and concerts to raise funds for research and early
detection of the disease, including the construction of a health center named
after her in her adopted home Melbourne.
“I don’t like to say ‘battled,’” a defiant
Newton-John told Australia’s Channel Seven TV in September 2018 after revealing
she had been diagnosed with cancer for a third time.
“I like to say ‘win over,’ because ‘battled’ sets up
this anger and inflammation that you don’t want.”
No cause of death was given in the family’s
statement.
‘Sandy and Danny’
Newton-John was best known
for starring in the 1978 musical “Grease” alongside John Travolta as the
girl-next-door Sandy, who trades her ankle-length skirt and prim and proper
hair for skin-tight black pants and a perm.
The high school sweetheart-turned-bad girl resonated
with audiences worldwide, and continues to capture hearts decades after the
movie was released.
“Making it was fun but you never know with movies if
audiences are going to go with it or not, even if you love it,” she said in a
Forbes interview in 2018.
“It is incredible that it is still going but it’s
not even just that, it’s showing no signs of stopping. You say ‘Sandy and
Danny’ and people instantly know what you’re talking about.”
Grease remained the highest-grossing musical for
three decades, with Newton-John and Travolta maintaining a close relationship
long after the film was made.
“My dearest Olivia, you made all of our lives so
much better. Your impact was incredible. I love you so much,” wrote Travolta,
in an Instagram post Monday signed “Your Danny, your John!”
Travolta has previously said meeting and working
with Newton-John “was my favorite thing about doing Grease.”
There was no one else “in the universe” who could
play Sandy, he said of Newton-John, who turned 29 during the making of Grease
and later revealed she had to be convinced by Travolta to take up the role
after self-doubts that she was too old to play a teenager.
Born in Cambridge, England in 1948, Newton-John was
the youngest of three children.
The granddaughter of Nobel Prize-winning physicist
Max Born, she immigrated to Melbourne, Australia with her family when she was
five.
A passion for music saw her perform in several
Australian TV shows as a teenager, before moving to England in the 1960s where
she teamed up with fellow Australian performer Pat Carroll on the UK pub and
club circuit.
From the 1970s, she would go on to top international
charts for decades with songs that stretched into folk, country, and pop,
earning four Grammys from 12 career nominations.
The 1981 hit song
“Physical,” which saw Newton-John don a headband and spandex amid an 80s
fitness culture boom, demonstrated the dexterity of a performer able to reinvent
herself amid cultural change.
Despite her multiple cancer diagnoses, she performed
into her late 60s, including a two-year residency in Vegas, a 2015 tour with
Australian music legend John Farnham, and even recording a Club Dance track at
67 with her daughter Chloe Lattanzi.
Her philanthropy and passion for cancer research
came to the forefront, championing natural therapies including medicinal
cannabis in the treatment of cancer.
“I have done everything, and the icing on the cake
as well,” she said, reflecting on her career.
“So I feel grateful for anything that happens now.”
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