Cher (10 page)

In February of 1966 clothing stores in America began selling a Sonny & Cher line of clothing. The line included bell-bottoms and blouses for girls and unisex bobcat vests. Suddenly Sarkisian and Bono were trend-setting fashion gurus.

Sonny & Cher began working on the feature film
Good Times
in March of 1966. The same month, a reissue of their song “What Now My Love” on Reprise Records entered the Top 20 on both sides of the Atlantic, peaking at Number 16 in America and at Number 13 in England.

On March 4, 1966, Sonny & Cher appeared on the NBC-TV pop music series
Hullaballoo
, with guest host Sammy Davis Jr., along with the Supremes and the Lovin’ Spoonful. The show featured a great production number, with Sammy Davis Jr. singing and dancing with all of his musical guests, holding hands with Mary Wilson of the Supremes and Cher. Mary wore a pantsuit with a bell-sleeved top and “flats” on her feet. Cher was wearing a lace-covered pair of bell-bottomed pants, her trademark long, dark-brown hair hanging beyond her shoulders. It was the swinging sixties, and Sonny & Cher were an indelible part of it.

At the time they were pop music’s number one couple. Magazines were filled with photo spreads of the Sonny & Cher mansion, Sonny and Cher modeling clothes from their outlandish closets, and Sonny and Cher on their expensive matching motorcycles or their George Barris–designed customized Mustang convertibles. They were America’s hip-dressing, cool-acting young married couple—or so it seemed. Of course the reality was that the house cost them so much that they couldn’t afford to furnish it properly, and they really weren’t married at all but were just living together. However, in the eyes of their fans, and the press, they could do no wrong.

It was a time of
Hit Parader
and
Sixteen
magazines,
Hullaballoo
, and
Shindig
, and the “hip” and “cool” Bonos were very “in.” Without a doubt, Sonny & Cher’s fans truly loved them. It was an era in which the media
helped to create teen idols like the Supremes, the Monkees, the Dave Clark Five, the Beatles, Martha & the Vandellas, and the Rolling Stones. When they landed at Kennedy Airport on their return from their initial trip to England, there was a mob of thousands of screaming fans waiting for their arrival. No one was more surprised than Cher. When the duo had left on that first trip to England, no one in America seemed to have any idea who they were. Now, they were suddenly front-page news. There was a era in which they couldn’t leave a concert without being mobbed by their adoring fans, who would want to grab them or touch them or verbally let them know they were adored. One night fans got ahold of one of Sonny and Cher’s car doors, and bent it on its hinges to the point where it couldn’t be shut as they drove off. Their fans would also shower them with gifts, cards, and notes.

When Sonny & Cher’s second album on ATCO Records,
The Wondrous World of Sonny & Cher
, was released in April of 1966, it included a reproduction of a signed “thank you” note from the number one “married” couple in pop music. It lovingly ended with

There are so many things to thank you for, so many different things, that we would have to go on forever naming them—cakes that fans have baked for us, dolls that they have given us, poems, rings, or anything that they feel is close to them and that they want us to have. This is the only way we can tell you we appreciate you for your kindness.

This is our second album and we hope you like it as well as the first.

Love,

Sonny + Cher (44)

On April 2, 1966, Sonny & Cher costarred along with the Mamas & the Papas, Jan & Dean, the Turtles, Donovan, Otis Redding, and Bob Lind at the Hollywood Bowl. It was Lind who wrote the songs “Elusive Butterfly” and “Come to Your Window,” which Cher recorded on her
Sonny Side of Cher
album. The proceeds from that evening’s box-office profits went to the Braille Institute.

Sonny & Cher were so big at this point that they even started receiving death threats from crazy stalkers. One crazed woman wrote threatening letters to Cher. In the past they had been dismissed, but for some reason Sonny & Cher’s managers took a threat received the night of the Hollywood Bowl concert very seriously. To ensure Cher and Sonny’s safety, the duo had to be brought to the gig in an armored Brinks truck. In spite of
that potential danger, Cher recalls it as being “one of the highlights of the ’60’s for Son and me—headlining in at the Hollywood Bowl” (25).

That night Cher was truly in her “flower child” phase. She wore one of her trademark bell-bottomed pantsuits. On the top was stitched a huge colorful daisy, and the bells of her pants were covered in daisy appliques as well. Not to be outdone, Sonny wore a colorful flowered shirt, with its collar lapels over the laced-up vest that matched his stove-pipe trousers. It was a triumphant evening for Cher, especially since her mother and grandfather were in the audience that night. She was only nineteen years old, and she was headlining the famous Hollywood Bowl. In her eyes, and everyone else’s who was there that evening, Sonny & Cher had truly made it. It was an evening that she would always fondly remember.

Also in April of 1966, Cher scored her first million-selling solo hit, the Sonny composition “Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down).” With exotic-sounding Gypsy violins and a dramatic vocal delivery, this was to become Cher’s first big solo trademark number. Backed with a wall-like vocal chorus, once timid Cher has a strength and intensity in her vocals on this cut that she had never before displayed. Released as a single, in America it hit Number 2, and in England Number 3, making it her highest-scoring solo hit of the 1960s.

At the same time, Cher was hot on the charts with her second album for Imperial,
The Sonny Side of Cher
. The album featured her current hit, “Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down),” which propelled it up the LP charts to Number 26 in America and to Number 11 in England. Just as controversial in nature, the song “A Young Girl (Une Enfante),” which was written by Charles Aznavour, received Cher’s effectively haunting interpretation. On this album she also covered a number of other people’s hits, including Astrud Gilberto’s “The Girl from Ipanema,” Tom Jones’s “It’s Not Unusual,” and Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone.”

On May 20, 1966, Cher turned twenty years old, and as a birthday present Sonny bought her a twenty-karat, diamond and sapphire ring. The ring consisted of a nine-karat sapphire, encircled in eleven karats of teardrop and marquis-cut diamonds, in a platinum setting. Up until then, the couple’s only conspicuous jewelry was confined to a gold band with the word “Cher” on it, which Sonny wore on the ring finger of his left hand, and the matching “Sonny” ring, which Cher wore. In many of their publicity photos from this era, Cher is seen with this very large and expensive ring on her right forefinger. The ring was in fact so large that one would assume it was an elaborate piece of costume jewelry worn by
a bell-bottomed hippie girl. In reality it was worth tens of thousands of dollars.

Cher’s next solo single was one that was literally fought over on the record charts, by three different singers. The song was “Alfie,” from the 1966 film of the same name, which starred Michael Caine and Shelley Winters. In England, where the film originated, Cilla Black, a singer managed by Beatles manager Brian Epstein, was heard over the film’s credits. However, when Cher covered the Burt Bacharach and Hal David composition, it was added to the credits of the American version of the film. Cher’s interpretation of “Alfie” hit Number 32 in America. Cher’s recording was such a hit in America that Dionne Warwick recorded the song on one of her albums. Dionne was to take her version of “Alfie” to Number 15 in America in 1967, but it was actually Cher who had the first stateside version of the popular song.

Just as big things were beginning to happen for Sonny & Cher, Cher’s heroin-addict father, John Sarkisian, was released from prison following one of his several drug-related incarcerations. He threatened to sell his story to the press, so he was paid off to keep his mouth shut. The idea that he would do such a thing truly enraged Cher.

According to Charlie Greene, “John Sarkisian was just out of prison, and he started coming around looking for money. He was trying to blackmail her, and we did pay off—about $500 a week. It was worth it to keep the stories out of the papers” (43).

On August 26, 1966, Sonny & Cher made their British concert debut, at the Astoria Theatre, Finsbury Park, London. And on September 14, the duo had a special private audience with Pope Paul VI, in Rome, Italy.

After the notoriety that Sonny & Cher were receiving, it seemed like a natural progression to make a movie starring the two of them. Elvis Presley was at the time making the bulk of his income from his many films, which by 1967 encompassed twenty-five movies, including
Jailhouse Rock
(1957),
Blue Hawaii
(1961),
Fun in Acapulco
(1963), and
Viva Las Vegas
(1964). And the Beatles had successfully done it with A
Hard Day’s Night
(1964) and
Help!
(1965). So Sonny & Cher began work on their own musical fantasy epic, which was ultimately to be entitled
Good Times
.

According to Brian Stone, the idea actually came from Elvis Presley’s shrewd manager, the controversial Colonel Tom Parker.

Parker told us how much he liked Sonny & Cher and then said, “I’m going to give you some advice—for free. How much are they getting per night?” We told him maybe $2,500 a show. “From now on,” he said, “don’t take less than $15,000 a night. And have the kids do a movie. Do it fast and do it cheap. Nothing artsy-craftsy.” So, we put together a musical called
Good Times
. We hired a relatively unknown director named William Friedkin, who went on to do
The Exorcist
. Unfortunately, we also had Sonny, who started to think he was a filmmaker, and that was the end of us with Sonny & Cher (43).

In October of 1966 Cher’s single version of Bobby Hebb’s hit “Sunny” reached Number 32 in England. Her third solo album,
Cher
, made it to Number 66 in America. Naturally, the song that Hebb wrote and sang referred to a “sunny”-dispositioned girl. When Cher sang it, it was heard as “Sonny,” referring to her other half. Also included on the
Cher
album were her versions of Donovan’s “Catch the Wind,” the Shirelles’ “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow,” Buffy Sainte-Marie’s “Until It’s Time for You to Go,” Peter, Paul & Mary’s “Cruel War,” and Simon & Garfunkel’s “Homeward Bound.” Naturally, it also contained one of Sonny’s originals, in this instance the controversial “Magic in the Air,” which is about pregnancy out of wedlock. In Europe, it is credited as “I Feel Something in the Air.” It only charted in the United Kingdom, peaking at Number 43.

By late 1966, Cher’s solo singles weren’t hitting the upper end of the recording charts either. Her single “Behind the Door” had an exotic Oriental sound, but the song only made it up to Number 97. The “B” side of the single, “Mama (When My Dollies Have Babies),” received some airplay, but never charted.

When things suddenly cooled off for them, no one was more surprised than Sonny. They needed a hit, and Sonny knew it. After a slight lull on the record charts, Sonny & Cher turned around and delivered one of the biggest hits of their career, “The Beat Goes On.” Said Sonny,

We were real hot for awhile but we started cooling off as fast as we got hot. And I was looking for something, desperately. Psychedelic was in and everybody was going “psychedelic, psychedelic, psychedelic!” So I was looking for something that had kind of a psychedelic thing to it, but I didn’t know how to write psychedelic. I just didn’t understand it ’cause a lot of it was drug influenced. I didn’t think in terms of what they did. Then I started fooling with this song, “The Beat Goes On.” I thought, “great title.” Then I called Billy Friedkin because we were shooting a movie,
Good Times
. And I sang it to him over the phone. Billy is vicious about his critiques. If he doesn’t like something, you’re real sorry you ever asked him. But if he likes it, you’re real glad you asked him. So, he just flipped over “The Beat Goes On.” So I got a lot of inspiration from him being so excited, and I finished all the choruses of it ’cause he loved it. That was an instant hit. We put that out and people were going “Wow! Psychedelic” (45).

Their hold on their audience peaked around the time of the release of “The Beat Goes On.” On December 11, 1966, Sonny & Cher made headlines by joining a picket line on Hollywood Boulevard. As part of a crowd of five hundred, they protested an enforced curfew. This certainly endeared them to their teenaged fans.

While Sonny and Bill Friedkin were working on the script for
Good Times
, they found the need to hire a secretary to help them with their various drafts of shooting scripts. They would work until late at night at Sonny and Cher’s house, and Cher usually went to bed around 10 o’clock. One night Cher woke up in the middle of the night, and came downstairs, only to discover Sonny and his latest secretary having sex. According to Sonny, “Cher didn’t scream; she just glared at me and walked out of the room. I got the cold shoulder treatment for the rest of the week, but that was it” (35). Sonny and Cher’s relationship was an odd one, even then.

Things began to become strained between Sonny and his and Cher’s managers. According to Charlie Greene, “Sonny began calling us at three in the morning, asking for writers’ conferences. He didn’t like the plot, or he didn’t like the script. He thought he was a big hotshot producer or director. His ego was taking over” (46).