TV

The new bio-pic “Olivia Newton-John: Hopelessly Devoted to You” celebrates the Aussie lass who made it big in country music before making it even bigger in the hit 1978 musical “Grease.” Delta Goodrem stars. Followed by the new special “Biography Presents: The Olivia Newton-John Story.” 8 and 10 p.m. Lifetime

 / La nouvelle biographie  "Olivia Newton-John: Hopelessly Devoted To You" rend hommage à la jeune fille australienne qui est devenue une star de la musique country avant de connaitre un succès fulgurant grâce et dans la comédie musicale "Grease" en 1978.  Delta Goodrem tient le rôle principal de ce biopic.

Suivi de ... la nouvelle émission spéciale «Biography présente: L'histoire d'Olivia Newton-John»

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/museums/la-ca-st-0210-tvhighlights-20190210-story.html

One more week until #HopelesslyDevotedToYou premieres on @lifetimetv! ✨🌟✨ Cannot wait for my US tribe to see it #OliviaNewtonJohnMovie pic.twitter.com/imXxhtSw4o

— Delta Goodrem (@DeltaGoodrem) 9 février 2019

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Olivia Newton-John: Hopelessly Devoted to You
Lifetime movie profiles Australian actress/singer

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
10 Feb 2019

Delta Goodrem

According to information gleaned from the website OliviaNewton-John.com, actress and singer Olivia Newton-John was born in Cambridge, England, in 1948, but her family moved to Australia when she was 5. She is the youngest child of professor Brin and Irene Newton-John. Her mother is the daughter of Nobel Prize-winning physicist Max Born.

Her first big break was winning a talent contest on the TV show Sing, Sing, Sing.
In 1963 at age 15, she formed a girl group, Sol 4, and was soon making appearances on daytime TV shows and pop music programs in Australia. She went on to create a double act, Pat & Olivia, with her friend Pat Carroll, and the duo toured army bases and clubs throughout Europe and the United Kingdom.

Newton-John cut her first single in 1966, and has since sold more than 100 million albums, won four Grammy Awards as well as Country Music, American Music and People’s Choice awards.
In 1978 she co-starred with John Travolta in the very successful musical Grease, and has gone on to star in less notable movies that include Two of a Kind, Xanadu, It’s My Party, Score: A Hockey Musical and A Few Best Men.
Along the way Newton-John battled breast cancer and has been an advocate for promoting public awareness of early detection for more than 25 years.
To find out more, check out the Lifetime made-for-TV movie Olivia Newton-John: Hopelessly Devoted to You, which airs at 7 p.m. Saturday. Covering five decades, the movie delves into her public persona as well as the private woman behind the scenes.

Australian singer, songwriter and actress Delta Goodrem (House Husbands) stars as Newton-John, and Richard Brancatisano (Chasing Life) plays Matt Lattanzi, the star’s first husband. Morgan Griffin (San Andreas) plays a young Olivia, and Georgia Flood (American Princess) stars as her singing partner, Pat.
— Rosemary Boggs

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A friend depicts Olivia Newton-John’s life

The Idaho Statesman (Sunday)
10 Feb 2019

Being a friend of Olivia NewtonJohn made it more comfortable for another Australia-raised singer-actress to play the superstar on Lifetime.
Delta Goodrem has her own career – extending to headlining concert tours and being a coach on her continent’s version of “The Voice” – but her strongest U.S. identification to date may come from her starring role in “Olivia Newton-John: Hopelessly Devoted to You” Saturday, Feb.
16. Familiar songs re-recorded by Goodrem are used to mark chapters of Newton-John’s story, encompassing the latter’s bouts with cancer and the disappearance of her then-boyfriend Patrick McDermott (played in the film by Anthony Brandon Wong).
“My first interaction with her was when I was about seven years old, by chance,” the pleasant Goodrem says of Newton-John. “My family was on holiday, and my mom and I were having a hot chocolate in New York, and she walked in. And I said, ‘There’s Sandy! There’s Sandy!’ (referencing Newton-John’s ‘Grease’ movie character). She heard my Australian accent and came over and spoke to my mom and I, and I remember how amazing that was.”
The women continued to cross paths, and Goodrem recalls that when she received her own Hodgkin’s lymphoma diagnosis at age 18, “Olivia sent me a beautiful letter, and she became my mentor as well as my friend. We talk a lot about the kindred nature of our friendship, and we’ve written songs about it. And it’s full-circle to have this moment now. It’s very special.”
Insisting she wouldn’t have accepted the role of Newton-John “without Olivia’s blessing,” Goodrem explains, “I’d just come off a tour, and we had to make the decision quickly. I said to her on the phone, ‘Olivia, it would break my heart not to do everything to make this a wonderful thing for you, so you have to say you really want me to do it.’ She said, ’All right,’ and I said, ‘OK. I’m doing it.”’
Having had a recent hit herself with “Think About You,” Goodrem performed with Newton-John – who isn’t involved in the project otherwise – on a soundtrack for the film, which was acquired from Australia’s Channel Seven. Goodrem remembers “finding that joy that I had growing up with the music” in covering the best-known tunes, “and I discovered moments that I had no idea about, so that was really fascinating.”
While lending her own technique to Newton-John’s songs, Goodrem was determined not to stray too far. “I would never want to dance all over them musically,” she notes. “I went into this with an open heart of staying true to the classics, but also appreciating the fact that technology has come so far that we can really enjoy their sound.”