Petula Clark:
Boxing Day (Monday)
BBC1 Colour
Petula Clark, who makes, music with some friends in a television special, talks to Russell Miller
'THE
TOGETHERNESS
I DISCOVER
AT CHRISTMAS'
PETULA CLARK and her husband/manager Claude Wolff
live in a spacious house over-
looking the lake at Geneva in
Switzerland. It has 20 rooms,
a music room in the basement and a beautiful garden
with a swimming pool.
Despite this, Mr and Mrs Wolff
lead amazingly ordinary lives.
She has never been cast in
the mould of the flamboyant
show-biz star lady ` and still
isn't. He is a cheerful, handsome, tousle-haired Frenchman
who provides the business
acumen as her manager as well
as being a devoted husband
and father.
They're nuts about each
other and crazy about their
daughters (Katie, eight and
Barbara, ten) who go to the International School in Geneva
There's no cook, no
nurse, no one else at all,
I send them all home'
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'Christmas evening is really great. We go out and play in the snow'
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and are consequently completely bilingual.
At Christmas it's just me,
Claude and the kids,' says
Petula. `There's no cook, no
nurse, no one else at all. I send
them all home and take over
everything myself, including
the cooking.
We open our presents after
lunch, then we clear up all the
mess and drive up to Megeve,
a ski resort just over the bor-
der in France.
We stay in a very small
hotel, which is by no means
smart but is just a groovyplace to stay. There is always
a mixture of ordinary families and a show-business crowd staying there, but it
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works and
always has.
`Christmas evening is really
great. We go and play in the
snow and it is very gay. The show-business sort of crowd
mix in with the family crowd
and it all gets very wild.
`Boxing Day we start skiing - if we are capable - and
we normally stay up there until
New Year's Eve when we come
home and have a big party.'
She smiles at the prospect,
then switches back to children
and schools.
`Actually a very important
part of Christmas for me now
is not all that, but the party at
the
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children's school before they break for the holidays
'Because of the United
Nations, there are children from all over the world, and of all colours, at the school.
On the last day before Christ-
mas they put on a little show.
There are no lights in the room
and all the children, dressed
in white, come in carrying
candles. Then they sit round
and tell stories about their dif-
ferent countries and sing in
dozens of different languages.
`It's quite incredible, the
feeling of brotherhood and to-
getherness you get there. That
is what Christmas should be.' |
RADIO TIMES DATED 16/23 DECEMBER 1971
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