Who knew Lionel Richie was so cool with an amazing sense of humour?
Thanks to Piers Morgan and his ITV show Life Stories, we got to know more about the superstar crooner who has amassed a £100 million fortune during his career.
We fell in love with the man who wrote those classic love songs we still hum today. And here are some of the highlights from his candid interview.
1. On experiencing racism for the first time
One particular outing with his father as a nine-year-old became a moment that stuck with him for the rest of his life.
“We were in Montgomery and I couldn’t read a sign that said ‘White Only’,” he recalled. “I ran up to the water fountain, and as I came back from the fountain there were these four white guys who were harassing my dad.
“I kept thinking, ‘These guys better calm down because my dad is going to kick their ass. Dad’s a military guy – he takes no medicine’.
“But Dad didn’t say a word and it bothered me from nine years old until I was 21. Then I remember saying to my dad one day, ‘Why didn’t you kick their ass? You turned and cowardly walked away’.
“He had the greatest line ever. He said to me, ‘I had a choice that day of either being a man or your father. I knew if I fought them they would kill me, and I chose to be your dad.’”
2. On adopting his bandmate’s daughter
Lionel took young Nicole under his wing when she was just a toddler. He said it took a year to fall in love with her but described her as ‘a little button’.
“OK here is what we are going to do, you’re going to make everyone wish that they had adopted you,” he told his daughter.
“You are going to make everyone in your family wish they actually had a chance to get you back.”
That’s when he adopted Nicole and the rest of course, is history.
3. On being a grandfather
So he’s meant to be the cool famous grandpa we wish we had. But for someone who gets on stage in what he describes as ‘tight pants’, being addressed as ‘grandpa’ by Nicole’s children Harlow, seven, and Sparrow, five, felt weird for him.
“It scared me to death,” he said. “All of a sudden the word ‘sexy’ goes out of your life, right quick.”
Now they call him “Pop-Pop”.
4. On being the best dad on the planet
During her battle with drugs, Nicole, who was arrested for possession of heroin in 2003, turned to father for help. And like any good father, Lionel put his children first.
“I said, ‘I am with you’ and I cancelled the tour,” Lionel told Piers. “I said, ‘Me and your mother’, who didn’t get along that well, ‘Me and your mother are checking into rehab with you.”
5. On a gibberish line in All Night Long
When Piers asks him whether “Oh jambali Tom bo li d, say de moi ya,” and “Jambo jumbo” in the famous hit All Night Long meant anything, Richie had only one answer – it’s gibberish.
6. On cheating on his first wife
Lionel was married to his childhood sweetheart Brenda for several years before meeting his second wife Diane Alexander.
When asked about how he felt cheating on his wife with Diane, he said: “I fell in love. I remember sitting there one day thinking, ‘This is the best and worst thing I have ever felt in my whole life’.
“When you are a young, foolish, crazy, out of control, hopeless romantic and you write love songs for a living, you fall in love at a whim. I didn’t have a chance.”
7. On his legacy
He’s sold over a hundred million albums, but the iconic crooner wants to be remembered as a hopeless romantic.
“That I was absolutely a minister of love and a hopeless romantic,” he tells Piers.
“And if I did nothing else in the world but bring a melody to the joys of the world and around the world that’s all I’m here for.”
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