The Rolling Stone interviews

by edited by Jann S. Wenner

  Who was the Ike Turner whom you knew?

  Ike was the son of a preacher and a seamstress. He didn’t like school, so he wasn’t an educated person. I don’t think he even finished grade school. He had a complex about how he spoke. A lot of his fight came because he was embarrassed about his manners and not being educated. So Ike had a built-in anger. And the drugs just magnified that.

  I always knew that Ike had talent and was a great musician. He was not a great songwriter, though, because all of his songs were about pain or women—that was his life dilemma. I hated those songs. I knew he was writing about other women. Psychologically, you have to try and make yourself think you like a song when you sing it. When he sensed I was delivering it poorly, he blamed me for not getting involved in the work. He said he couldn’t make hit records because of my lack of involvement. All the blame was put on me. It was all this suppressed anger he had.

  Did Ike have lots of other women?

  He always did; he never stopped that. I didn’t like it, but I was trapped. We had a hit record [“A Fool in Love,” 1960], and I was the star, so he just grabbed on because he was afraid of losing me. The success and the fear came almost hand in hand. When I finally went to tell him that I didn’t want to go on . . . that’s when he got the shoe stretcher.

  And beat you for the first time?

  Yeah. I said, “I cannot travel with you, I cannot sing these songs.” So he said, “Okay, we’ll make some allowances, give you a certain amount of money,” and I said okay. That was the trick. So we started traveling, and that’s when I got involved. I didn’t plan it, because he said he was going to pay me, and when he didn’t, I was afraid to ask for the money because I was living with him. I got involved before I knew what to do about it.

  That, of course, began sixteen years of beatings. You were a battered wife, controlled by fear.

  It was a thoroughly unhappy situation I was in, but I was too far gone. I was trapped into really caring about Ike. If I left him, what was he going to do? Go back to St. Louis? I didn’t want to let him down. As horrible as he treated me, I still felt responsible for letting him down. That was a mental problem I had at the time. And I was afraid to leave. I knew I had no place to hide, because he knew where my people were. My mother was actually living in Ike’s house in St. Louis. My sister was living in an apartment basically rented by Ike.

  It’s hard to explain. This man was beating me—I always had a black eye or something, and he had women all over the place, and he wouldn’t give me any money—and yet, I didn’t leave. I felt sorry for him.

  There were many terrible things that Ike did to you, but none more incomprehensible than beating you and then making you have sex with him afterward.

  He acted as if that was a normal part of a relationship. But the part that was really torture were the wire hangers. I am so embarrassed that people know that’s what I had to go through. I didn’t want an ugly life, and I got myself trapped into one. I never stopped praying . . . that was my tool. Psychologically, I was protecting myself, which is why I didn’t do drugs and didn’t drink. I had to stay in control. So I just kept searching, spiritually, for the answer.

  Did you ever actually try to leave him?

  Yeah, a few times, but he always caught me before I left. And that scared me. I knew if I got caught, I was going to get the hanger. The first time he used the hanger I had run off. I borrowed money from the people around me—they always helped me because they knew what was going on—and I took a bus. I fell asleep, and when I woke up, I looked right into his face. “Get off, you motherfucker,” he said. It scared the shit out of me. Ike got to my destination before I did.

  He had a gun at the time. He always made me feel that at any moment he might put it to my head. Anyway, we went back to the hotel, and he kept playing with the gun. He knew what he was doing. There was a hanger lying there, and suddenly he grabbed it and started turning it in his hand. I couldn’t believe what was happening. He had such control of it, he must have used it on somebody else before.

  It finally got so bad that you attempted suicide by taking an overdose of Valium.

  Because I didn’t know how to get out. You’ve got to think, you’ve got to use your head, and when I started chanting is when I started using my head. I started thinking, “I’m not going to kill myself, there’s nothing here for me. This person doesn’t realize that I am helping him, that I have tried to be good and kind.” So that’s when I actually went to the spiritual side of myself for help. And I got it.

  When you left him, in July 1976, you left with no money, right?

  I had nothing. I didn’t even know how to get money. I had a girl working for me who had worked for Ike, because she knew about ways of getting money. I didn’t know how to do any of that stuff. Ike didn’t think I’d be able to find a house, but I did. He sent over the kids, and money for my first rent, because he thought I’d have to come back when that ran out. We slept on the floor the first night. I rented furniture. I had some Blue Chip stamps that I had the kids bring, and I got dishes. Then my sister helped me with food. We also used food stamps—yeah, food stamps. I was doing Hollywood Squares and some of these television shows.

  When was the last time you saw lke?

  I haven’t seen him since my divorce. It was in court.

  Where is he now?

  In California someplace. He still sends telegrams asking for money.

  How do you feel about men today? Did your experience with Ike embitter you?

  It’s very hard to say what I think about guys. I’m not biased about men. And I am looking for a great relationship when it comes, but I’m not foolish enough to jump onto every Tom, Dick and Harry simply because I don’t, now, have a man in my life. All men are not violent. All men don’t fight. The point is, you’ve got to find your equal.

  You are an exquisite-looking woman. Do you think you’re beautiful?

  I’m nowhere near beautiful. Ethiopian women are beautiful: their sculptured faces, their noses, their hairline. And Scandinavian women are beautiful. I love that complete blond hairline. They almost glisten, they’re so white. I don’t have a great figure, but I know how to dress my body. My legs are nice, and I know the right shoes to wear to make my legs look pretty. I know how to make myself look good, but I’m not a pretty woman. I’m in the class with folks who are “all right.”

  You do understand that a lot of men might be put off or intimidated by the Tina Turner they see onstage—that sexy, smoldering, leather-clad woman in net stockings and miniskirt.

  That’s so funny, because everything I’ve done for my act has really been so practical. I started wearing net stockings because the other stockings ran. I didn’t stop to think whether guys would like them or not. I don’t feel that I dress for men. The short dresses work for me onstage because I’ve got a short torso and because there’s a lot of dancing and sweating. My legs are nice, but you see so much of them because my body is short. It’s not as if I put them out there on display because I’m trying to advertise. I never advertise myself for men. I always work to the women, because if you’ve got the girls on your side, you’ve got the guys. Black women can very easily become jealous. And I didn’t want them to dislike me onstage, so I started working to them years ago. I knew I had the image of being sexy. I didn’t want the guys to think that I was performing for them, so I looked at the women, because I felt less embarrassed. A woman knows I’m having fun and not trying to catch a guy. I’m there for a performance. The leather came because I was looking for a material that didn’t show perspiration. I get drenched onstage, and if I wore regular jeans, the perspiration would show. Dirt doesn’t show on leather, and it’s good for traveling. It doesn’t wrinkle, and it’s durable. When I wore it, I didn’t think people were going to think I was hot or tough.

  Also, onstage, you never see me grouch. I smile. My songs are a little bit of everybody’s lives who are watching me. You gotta sing what they can relate to. And there are some raunchy peo
ple out there. The world is not perfect. And all of that is in my performance; I play with it. That’s why I prefer acting to singing, because with acting you are forgiven for playing a certain role. When you play that same role every night, people think that you are it. They don’t think you’re acting.

  That is the scar of what I’ve given myself with my career. And I’ve accepted that. I don’t hate myself anymore. I used to hate my work, hated that sexy image, hated those pictures of me onstage, hated that big raunchy person. Onstage, I’m acting the whole time I’m there. As soon as I get out of those songs, I’m Tina again.

  ROBIN WILLIAMS

  by Bill Zehme

  February 25, 1988

  Do you recognize this guy? [Hands Williams a Mork doll.]

  [In a geriatric warble] Oh, look, from the old days! Here, let me check the nose to see if there’s anything up his nostrils! [Inspects doll] This way we’ll know if it’s authentic. This is amazing. This is the doll that had the bad voice backpack where you pull the string and hear garbled sentences. Some people sued because some dolls in the Midwest actually said, “Go fuck yourself.”

  Strangely enough, its body is dated 1973 and the head 1979.

  Oh, that’s scary. Then the body is obviously from an old G.I. Joe or maybe a Ken or a Barbie. Yes, it’s probably from a Barbie doll. “Mommy, look, Mork has tits!” It’s very strange to see this again. It was also strange to see them dismembered after the show was canceled. You’d see ’em hanging out of garbage cans, burned. It’s so weird.

  I don’t know whether I’m experiencing nostalgia or nausea looking at this. It’s like a combination of both. But that’s a great way to start an interview. “I handed him a Mork doll.” Well. Let’s put this away for now, shall we?

  All right. Do you think Mork complicated your progress in Hollywood?

  Hardly. You can’t say that something that took you from zero to a hundred was damaging your progress. It certainly wasn’t a hindrance economically, either. And no matter what happened on the TV series, I always had the other image: the nightclub comedian. If I’d just done Mork and nothing else, it might’ve been dangerous. But I always had a total other outlet beyond that character. I thank God for cable TV. Without it, I think it would be death for comedians.

  Did you ever find the transition from TV to films unwieldy? It seemed in some ways like bringing a Tasmanian devil into captivity.

  Some of the reviews have indicated that. I’ve had an odd habit of choosing projects that were the opposite of me, sometimes to the detriment. People are now saying about Good Morning, Vietnam, “This film is basically you and what you do best. So why did you wait eight years?” Well, I made other choices. I wanted to go against what I was doing on TV—not just with Mork & Mindy but the cable stuff as well. I was saying, in effect, “I’ll act. I’ll show you I can act.”

  The real Adrian Cronauer wasn’t exactly the radio desperado you portrayed him as in ‘Good Morning, Vietnam.’

  No, he’s a very straight guy. He looks like Judge Bork. In real life he never did anything outrageous. He did witness a bombing in Saigon. He wanted to report it—he was overruled, but he said okay. He didn’t want to buck the system, because you can get court-martialed for that shit. So, yes, we took some dramatic license.

  But he did play rock & roll, he did do characters to introduce standard army announcements, and “Goooood morning, Vietnam” really was his signature line. He says he learned whenever soldiers in the field heard his sign-on line, they’d shout back at their radios, “Gehhhhht fucked, Cronauer!”

  I heard you improvised several characters on mike that we never saw in the movie. Do you remember any?

  We left out a lot of stuff because the jokes just took too long to set up. Some other stuff might have been too rough. I was trying a riff on booby traps and said [as black GI], “Now, if it was a pussy trap, people would line up to get in.” Armed Forces Radio used to give out winning bingo numbers, so I tried this: “Our lucky bingo winners are 14, 12 and 35. If you’ve been with any of these girls, call your medic immediately!”

  Do you think Bob Hope approved of you moving in on his territory? It looked like he gave you the cold shoulder on the Carson show a few weeks ago.

  [As Hope] “Yeah, wiiiiild, isn’t he?” I don’t know. Certainly, there’s that line about him in the film: “Bob Hope doesn’t play police actions. Bob likes a big room.” I think Hope knew about that, because he leaned over to me at one point and said, “You know, I was there in ’65, but they didn’t want to get all the guys in one place.” At one point he was talking about the Persian Gulf, and I said, “I’ll go if you like.” He said, “Yeah, right.” Translated: “I’d no sooner have you there than a third testicle.”

  For the first time ever you’re seeing a therapist. People around you are saying you’re saner than ever.

  [Grinning] Yeah, they bought it.

  Has inner peace been difficult to achieve?

  Oh, I don’t have inner peace. I don’t think I’ll ever be the type that goes, “I am now at one with myself.” Then you’re fucking dead, okay? You’re out of your body. I do feel much calmer. And therapy helps a little. . . . I mean, it helps a lot. It makes you reexamine everything: your life, how you relate to people, how far you can push the “like me” desire before there’s nothing left of you to like. It makes you face your limitations, what I can and can’t do.

  Sounds like Robin Williams has grown up.

  [Facetiously] Yeah, right. [As Freudian analyst] “But you still talk about your dick a lot, though, don’t you?” It’s been a tough year with the death of my father, the separation from my wife, dealing with life, with business, with myself. Someone said I should send out Buddhist thank-you cards, since Buddhists believe that anything that challenges you makes you pull yourself together.

  You used to refer to your father as Lord Posh—he was an uncommonly elegant man, a powerful automobile executive. Did you see him any differently at the end?

  I got to know another side of him in the last few years. I saw that he was funkier, that he had a darker side that made the other side work. He was much older than me; he died at eighty-one. Up until four or five years ago, I kept distance out of respect. Then we made a connection. It’s a wonderful feeling when your father becomes not a god but a man to you—when he comes down from the mountain and you see he’s this man with weaknesses. And you live him as a whole being, not a figurehead.

  Were you with him when he died?

  I was here in San Francisco, and he died at home, out in Tiburon [a nearby suburb]. So I was close. He’d had operations and chemotherapy. It’s weird. Everyone always thinks of their dad as invincible, and in the end, here’s this little, tiny creature, almost all bone. You have to say goodbye to him as this very frail being.

  At least he was home and died very peacefully in his sleep. My mother thought he was still asleep. She came downstairs and kept trying to shake him. She called me that morning and said [calmly and evenly], “Robin, your father’s dead.” She was a little in shock, but she sounded happy in a certain way, if only because he went without pain.

  Is it true that you scattered his ashes?

  [Chuckles] Yeah, it was amazing. It was sad but also cathartic and wonderful in the sense that it brought my two half brothers and me together. It kind of melded us closer as a family than we’ve ever been before. We’ve always been very separate.

  That day we gathered right on the sea in front of where my parents live. It was funny. At one point I had poured the ashes out, and they’re floating off into this mist, seagulls flying overhead. A truly serene moment. Then I looked into the urn and said to my brother, “There’s still some ashes left, Todd. What do I do?” He said, “It’s Dad—he’s holding on!” I thought, “Yeah, you’re right, he’s hanging on.” He was an amazing man who had the courage not to impose limitations upon his sons, to literally say, “I see you have something you want to do—do it.”

  What has fatherhood taught
you about yourself?

  That most of your actions have consequences with the child. And I’ve learned to have the security not to worry that he will love me—as long as I keep the connection strong enough. I’ve learned not to try to force the love. You can’t. All you can do is try to set up a world for him that’s safe and stable enough to make him happy. I want to protect him and shield him from public sight. I want him to have his own life.