As SuBo heads Down Under, the 60 Minutes reporter finds a surprising side to the gifted Scottish songbird.
Even before I met her, I suspected Susan Boyle would be hard work.
An unworldly, ordinary looking woman … pushing 50 and suddenly famous.
“A Scottish spinster” as the British tabloids like to call her, curiously implying that never having sex is just as salacious has having too much of it.
But of more concern to me as an interviewer were the stories of her temper tantrums, a nervous breakdown and, even darker, hints of an intellectual disability.
One of Susan’s team of PR people told 60 Minutes quite firmly, “You can’t ask her about the disability or her state of mind. Just understand that she doesn’t process information in quite the same way you and I would. She can’t be introspective. But it will be all right if you just ask simple and direct questions.”
Well, that’s never bad advice in journalism anyway.
Whatever personal problems Susan might have, it seems to me anyone in her position would find it hard to cope. I tell her as much.
“Susan, I’ve never actually met anyone who has become such a big star so soon.”
“Oh, probably” she agrees. “There’s a lot of changes that involve the fact that you’ve got to accept your new life ... People recognise you more in the street. So at the beginning, I couldn’t go out on my own.”
For the interview see this week's Woman's Day, on sale April 5, 2010.
