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    • ‘I wanted to make it fair’
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    ‘I wanted to make it fair’

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    Cher’s life has been so extraordinary, so filled with zigzagging career moves and intense loves, that after more than 400 pages of her memoir, she has only scratched the surface of her detour from music to a critically acclaimed film career.

    “Cher: The Memoir, Part One” (out Nov. 19, Harper Collins, 413 pages, $36), contains intricate details about her troubled childhood (her mother was forced to keep Cher in a religious home for children while she worked); her early singing experiences with ‘force of nature’ Darlene Love and an unhinged Phil Spector; the emotional rollercoaster that was Sonny Bono; and her unwavering love for Gregg Allman.

    Fans hoping to hear her unique voice – writing and otherwise – delve into ‘Silkwood’, Gene Simmons, ‘Moonstruck’, Richie Sambora, ‘If I Could Turn Back Time’ video fishnets, Oscars, her incredible resurgence on the charts at age 52 with “Believe” and a Broadway musical about her life will have to exercise patience. Part 2 of Cher’s memoir will be released in 2025.

    “I haven’t even thought about part two yet,” Cher, 78, tells USA TODAY in a voice that is at once guttural, whimsical and serious. “I’m a last-minute type. I have to drag my feet and this process has been tough. Some days I would go, guys, I have to take a break and the publishing house is going, we need it yesterday. And eventually they gave up.”

    Cher “wanted to make it honest” when writing her memoir

    As expected from someone as divinely fearless as Cher, her memoir chronicles a troubled family life and frequent moves across California and New York. (In the audiobook, Cher opens each chapter — she says her dyslexia kept her from reading more — while Stephanie J. Block, who portrayed her on Broadway’s “The Cher Show,” did the rest.)

    Cher’s mother, Georgia (who died in 2022 at the age of 96), worked tirelessly to care for young Cherilyn and her half-sister Georganne (known to all as ‘Gee’) as stepfather John Southall flitted in and out of their lives.

    Cher forgives the shortcomings of her mother, from whom she developed her love of Dr Pepper, and shares countless poignant and humorous stories, such as the ‘drop-dead gorgeous’ lothario Warren Beatty asking her on a date when she was 15. Cher’s mother immediately dismissed the idea, unaware that it was Beatty who asked. When he called the house to ask Georgia for permission to date her daughter, who was almost a decade younger, mom “literally melted before my eyes” when she realized who she was talking to, Cher writes.

    But as even Cher has experienced, recalling memories is an emotionally taxing task.

    “At first I didn’t want to tell (my story),” she says. ‘But at some point I realized that if you don’t want to tell, you have to give people their money back. And then I decided that I needed to be a lot more honest and candid, and once I started, it really wasn’t bad.

    Cher says she worked with a ghostwriter early in the process, but decided, “I didn’t need people as much as I thought.” She notes in the book that her memories are based on memories, and now says that if she had trouble remembering, she would call Gee or Paulette Howell, her best friend of fifty years, for a reminder.

    “I wanted to make it honest, and I think in the end it is,” she says. “I didn’t give people any information. I gave them stories.”

    Cher still doesn’t understand her relationship with Sonny Bono

    Salvatore Bono entered Cher’s life as a protector and champion and addressed her as his boss, Phil Spector (or Phillip, as Cher refers to him throughout the book), which landed her backing vocalists on Spector-produced ’60s hits, including The Ronettes. ‘Be My Baby’ and ‘You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling of The Righteous Brothers.’

    Bono was “desperate for respect,” as Cher writes, but was also committed to promoting her solo career.

    By the early 1970s, when their CBS variety spectacular “The Sonny & Cher Show” treated viewers to a combination of spirited humor softened by appearances by high-profile musical guests and Bob Mackie outfits, Bono became more temperamental and disloyal. partly due to an addiction to Valium and prescription painkillers.

    “I don’t know if it was love/hate, but it was tough. It was really hard,” Cher says of her relationship with the man she will always be associated with in pop culture. “I didn’t understand him and I was hurt and angry, but it was even more hurt because I couldn’t understand, why would you do this? And finally, in that last year, I just thought, I don’t think I can do this much longer because it’s killing me.”

    The couple, Chastity’s parents, divorced in 1975, effectively ending their popular TV routine. (Chastity – or Chas as she was called – later transitioned from female to male, legally becoming Chaz Bono in 2010. With Chaz’s blessing, Cher calls him Chas, “the name he went by during the years covered in this book .’)

    Not long after her divorce, Cher returned to the screen with her own variety show, simply called “Cher.” Her written memories of the “sheer fear” she felt on opening night and her ability to succeed no matter what are just one example of the unyielding tenacity that has made her an icon.

    But despite the controlling nature of Bono, who died in 1998 after a skiing accident, Cher still has a place in her heart for the man who helped create her career.

    “Sonny and my relationship is hard to understand because it’s hard for me to understand. No matter how angry I got at him, there was a bond I couldn’t break. Even after he took all my money. There was that certain thing. It was hero worship. We both pursued it and we loved it so much. But he was a piece of work.”

    Cher recalls her enduring love for Gregg Allman

    Cher is much more sympathetic in her writing about Allman, whom she met when she attended his concert at the Troubadour in Los Angeles with Paulette. Cher wasn’t familiar with The Allman Brothers’ music, but Paulette was a fan, so she went along to the show. Allman saw her and sent his right-hand man, Chank Middleton, to give her a note that said, “Dear Enchanting Lady.”

    “Oh my God, I was so crazy about Gregory,” she says, the tone of her voice noticeably changing. “I loved him so much and he was so wonderful. He was a wonderful man who happened to be a heroin addict.” She pauses for a moment and then smiles ruefully. “I guess you can’t have everything.”

    But, Cher continues, Allman, who died of liver cancer in 2017, was “really wonderful and sweet,” but his drug use ended their marriage after three years and the birth of son Elijah Blue.

    Although both of her husbands were tortured by drug addiction, Cher never had an interest in illegal substances.

    “I didn’t see the fun in it. I remember calling my doctor once and asking, “Can you die from a hangover?” Drugs were boring to me. People who use coke want to talk your ear off and people who use heroin fall asleep,” she says. “Gregory was a pretty intelligent man, but drugs sometimes prevented him from getting things in order. He was beautiful. We used to lie in bed and he would play guitar.

    Cher prepares the ‘best songs’ she’s ever recorded

    As Cher enters another new era, she’s excited to share that she’s working on a new album with “some of the best songs I’ve ever had – and I don’t use that word lightly because I’m a snob when it comes to music.”

    Her current boyfriend, music manager Alexander Edwards, 38, helmed her 2023 Christmas album, “Christmas,” with longtime friends Cyndi Lauper and Darlene Love, as well as rapper Tyga and crooner Michael Bublé, and serves as her muse with her upcoming material.

    She was recently belatedly inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame (singing with “cute” Dua Lipa was a highlight, she says) and gave a speech that reinforced her “never give up” ethos. It’s an attitude she hopes will be part of her legacy.

    “Don’t pay attention to people. They sometimes don’t know what they are doing and have no vision. They don’t want to see what’s coming and if you have one with vision, you’re lucky,” she says.

    Cher also has an important message for women, saying she hopes young women in particular will read and learn from her memoir.

    “I want to remind them of what we have been through and what we can achieve,” she says. “It’s still uphill for women. And to the young women who are starting out, I say, you have to be balls to the wall.

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