Petula Clark Ready for Her Close-up

by Michael Conciello
Echo Magazine (Phoenix, Arizona)

August 195, 1999

      She's a two time Grammy Award-winning recording artist with more hit records than any other solo British singer in history.
      In fact, with 30 million records sold worldwide, she's second only to Madonna in career record sales for a female performer. Still, Petula Clark was surprised to have been included in this year's VH1's 100 Greatest Women in Rock and Roll, alongside Aretha Franklin, Tina Turner, Stevie Nicks, Debbie Harry and Madonna.
      "I'm honored of course, but I'm also sort of half surprised," Clark said during an interview to promote her current project, bringing to life Norma Desmond in the Broadway smash musical, Sunset Boulevard, which comes Sept. 7 to Arizona State University's Gammage Auditorium.
      "I never really thought of myself as a rock singer ... or anything for that matter," Clark said. 'My image of a rock singer is someone like oh, I don't know."
      Someone like Janis Joplin, I prompted?
      "Yes, someone like Janis Joplin," Clark answered, her voice soft and decidedly British, even though she's spent the last few decades dividing her time between Switzerland and France.
      "Even when I won the Grammy Awards I was surprised (to be in the rock category)."
      Clark won her first Grammys in 1964 for Best Rock & Roll Record of the Year for her signature tune, "Downtown." The following year, she was awarded Best Female Vocal Performance for "I Know a Place." Speaking of her twin Grammys, I had to ask if she had her twins with her on the road?
      "You are kidding?" She laughed. "I hope you're kidding," sounding embarrassed at the implication that she would covet her awards.
      "Heck no," I said. "I'd be wearing the pair as earrings."
      But Clark said laughing that her luggage is hard enough to manage. It should be. She has packed enough to take her through the beginning of next year, which is how long she's scheduled to tour with the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. "I signed for a year, in a moment of sheer madness," Clark said.
      The current production is based on Billy Wilder's 1950 classic film, starring Gloria Swanson as the one-time star who is desperate to reclaim her place in the spotlight.
      The role of Norma Desmond is old hat (or turban) for Clark, who has inhabited the character longer than any other actress to date. "At first I didn't want to do it," Clark said. "[Andrew Lloyd Webber and Trevor Nunn] called and asked if I would do the show in London and I said no. I had seen Glenn Close on Broadway and how do I say this? I was impressed, but I was not moved."
      Nunn eventually convinced her to sign on by saying she had what he was looking for to breathe new life into the classic character. "He said I'd bring vulnerability and humor to Norma, which surprised me," Clark said.
      It must have also surprised the critics. USA Today wrote: "Clark is so remarkable at every turn, one can only attribute her performance to the maturation of a largely undetected talent. No other actress has gotten so far under Norma's gold lamé turban. Norma has never seemed so real."
     Clark takes the praise in stride. After all, she's been at this game a long time. "I don't think about it, really," she said. "I've been acting for longer than I've been a singer. I made 25 movies while I was a kid."
      Clark, who was born in Epsom, England, made her stage debut at 12. She went on to star alongside Peter Ustinov, Sir Alec Guiness, Peter O'Toole and the legendary Fred Astaire. "I recently flipped on the TV and there I was, dancing with Fred Astaire," Clark said. "I remember the first time he took me in his arms. I was so scared. He made me look like I was born to dance."
      Clark calls adolescence the toughest time for her. "I was under contract with people who wanted me to remain in ankle socks forever," she recalled. "I was 17 and ready to be an adult."
      Unlike many child star casualties, Clark made the transition with grace. But she insists, she never really had a career plan. "I am totally unambitious," she said with a laugh. "I didn't go out seeking Sunset Boulevard. I've turned down more work than I've accepted."
      The work she has accepted pushed her career further and further along: movies, television and then music. "Acting was my first love, but the singing just took over," she said. In the late '50s, Clark began recording and touring and became a pop star in Europe.
      Her early '60s German and French language recordings of "Monsieur" and "Chariot" sold a million plus copies each. Then in 1964, she released "Downtown," which took her across the Atlantic to the top of the U.S. pop charts, securing her place in music history. She became the first British female to hit No. 1 in the U.S.
      While her singing career was going great guns, Clark continued to make movies and to tour. She also started a family with her record company executive husband, Claude Wolff. "I was having a family and was the number one singer in France," she remembered. "It's not easy if you want to do it all well. I used to think it was possible to do it all brilliantly, but somewhere I made comprises. But all my kids are doing well."
      Her 32-year-old daughter, Kate, lives in Paris; her 25-year-old son, Patrick, lives close to mom and dad in Geneva; and 37-year-old Bara lives in New York City. "My daughter in New York just had a beautiful baby boy which I guess makes me a grandmother," she laughed.
      While raising her kids in Switzerland, Clark was befriended by a real tramp, Charlie Chaplin, who lived across the lake. "I'd visit him in his lovely home and he'd play piano and sing," she recalled. "He wrote (she sings) "Smile," "I'll be Loving You Eternally" and many other songs."
      Including, rumor has it, a song especially for Clark, "'This Is My Song' was a huge hit for me, but I'm not sure he wrote it for me," she said modestly. "I guess maybe he did."
      It was in 1981 that Clark's career took a new direction. She was cast as Maria in the London revival of The Sound of Music. She won raves, including a stamp of approval from the real Maria Von Trapp who reportedly said, "I will remember Petula's as the greatest performance of Maria."
      She landed on Broadway, in 1992's Blood Brothers, with Shawn and David Cassidy. Clark stayed with the show through its yearlong run, then she toured with the show for a year. In 1995, she got the Sunset Boulevard call. Clark played Norma in London until April 1997. Now she's back on the road with the show, and she couldn't be happier. "This show gives me the chance to sing and act," she explained. "When I first did the show (in London) I was worried about making the costume changes and not getting run over by the sets. Now I've done this so long I don't even think about the accent, it just comes out. I have an American accent and I'm loud and unpleasant," her soft British voice drops to a mid-Western nasal drawl.
      Clark said she likes being on the road. "I'm an Englishwoman touring America. I'm not just going to sit in my hotel room."
      She believes being on tour can enhance a show's quality and the level of individual performances. "When a show has a long run on Broadway or the West End, it can get lazy," Clark explained. "The first night in a new city is like the first night of a show, and that can really give an edge to it."
      A touring show differs from the London and Broadway productions, however. And for Clark that's also a good thing. "We don't have the hydraulic set, but the set is beautiful. Norma's environment must be beautiful," Clark said. "The look is very much like a movie with cross fades between scenes."
      One gets the impression that if Clark wasn't having fun or if the production wasn't up to snuff, she'd go home to Geneva at the end of her contract. Instead she has extended her run through the beginning of next year. "This show is running at 110 percent," she said. "I wouldn't be involved with anything less."
      Clark suddenly switched gears. "Oh before I forget, my new CD (Here For You) will be sold at the show. I know it sounds like an awful plug but there are three songs from Sunset Boulevard on the CD that won't be on the CD you'll find in stores," she said. "It's the only place you can get it."
      And, before we forget, Queen Elizabeth has just named Clark to the Commander of the Order of the British Empire for bringing so much joy to people for so many years.
      Clark doesn't know what to say about that. She walks a fine line, proud of her accomplishments but not letting it go to her head. That may be the secret to her happy, full life.