[crowd cheering wildly]
Crowd: [chanting] Tina! Tina! Tina!
- Well, hi, everybody!
[crowd cheering]
Come on, give it to me. I said hi, everybody!
[wild cheering]
Let me hear you say "ow"!
Crowd: Ow!
["Ask Me How I Feel" playing]
[upbeat pop-rock song]
♪ ♪
- ♪ We're all waiting in the storm ♪
♪ Ask me how I feel ♪
♪ When things are going wrong ♪
♪ Ask me how I feel ♪
♪ The night is awful cold ♪
♪ Ask me how I feel ♪
♪ You're much too loose to hold ♪
♪ Ask me how I feel ♪
♪ You don't treat me tender ♪
♪ No matter what I do ♪
♪ I'm the great pretender ♪
♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh ♪
♪ Waiting in the storm ♪
♪ Ask me how I feel ♪
♪ Everything's going wrong ♪
♪ You gotta ask me how I feel ♪
- ♪ The night is awful cold ♪
- ♪ Ask me how I feel ♪
[fading] ♪ You know you're much too loose to hold ♪
♪ Come on, and ask me how I feel ♪
[soft dreamy music]
♪ ♪
- I wondered sometimes if anyone has approached you
to do the story of your life, which is indeed fantastic.
- [chuckles] Yes.
But I don't want to play the part.
I've done it.
- Who else could play the part of Tina Turner?
- We'll find someone. [both laugh]
I just really don't want to play the part,
you know what I mean?
No, you don't know what I mean,
'cause you'd have to know me to know.
It was just so unlike me, my life.
But I don't want anyone to know about it, I mean...
- You mean it'd be too painful or too...
- Ah, it wasn't... wasn't a good life.
It was in some areas,
but the goodness did not balance the bad.
So it's like not wanting to be reminded.
You don't like to pull out old clothes, you know?
It's like, old memories,
you want to just leave that in the past and done with
and all the things you don't really want to say,
but there comes a time when you do have to say it.
♪ ♪
- This is interview one, take one.
[clapboard clacks]
- In 1981, you did this interview
with "People" magazine,
where for the first time, really,
you spoke openly about your past with Ike.
- Yeah.
- And I'm curious if you can remember at all
any of the thoughts you had
around the decision to be public about that.
- About my past?
- About your past, but also, I guess,
about the abuse specifically.
- Yeah, that was quite nerve-racking.
Actually, I called my psychic, and I said,
"What's gonna happen?"
'Cause I was really apprehensive
about giving the story away because it was telling.
It was really telling.
And she said, "No, Tina.
"It's going to do just the opposite.
It's gonna break everything wide open."
- In the early '80s,
being in "People" magazine was the equivalent of going viral.
We had 30 million readers.
And if somebody wanted to reach a lot of people,
there was really no bigger place to go
than "People" magazine.
I was the music editor of "People" magazine
for many years,
and this is the December 7, 1981 issue,
when Tina decided to tell her story.
And it was the first time she told the story in public
to a journalist.
So this is the story.
I reported it and wrote it for "People" magazine.
This is the picture of Tina.
"Tina Turner remains rock's original Jagger,
"a primitive force who,
"glittering in sequins and a gold-chain miniskirt,
"typically assaults the stage in mid-scream
"with both legs pumping, hips grinding,
"long mane whirling,
"and her mouth wrapped around some of the sexiest sounds
"ever set to music.
"More than five years have passed
"since Tina's bitter break with Ike Turner,
"her longtime husband, sideman,
"and music collaborator on such classics
"as 'Proud Mary' and 'Come Together. '
"Only now is Tina able to discuss
"what she claims were the harrowing events
leading up to their split."
[dramatic music]
- I lived 16 years with a man that I knew
there was no way I could ever be happy with,
but I felt that I had to stay there.
- Mm-hmm.
- You have to believe me now when I tell you something.
My ex-husband was a physically violent man.
I went through basic torture.
- Torture? You would call it torture?
- To me, it was.
A lot of people don't know,
and your magazine will probably be the first
to make it publicly known.
I was living a life of death.
I didn't exist...
but I survived it.
And when I walked out, I walked.
And I didn't look back.
♪ ♪
- People choose to tell their story
for lots of different reasons.
I think she told me so much
because she wanted to just tell it
and then forget it.
It didn't quite work out that way,
because now, that story is a great mark of her life.
♪ ♪
- Ladies and gentlemen,
you've seen them live from coast to coast.
Now you're about to see them
all together for the very first time
on national television.
"Hollywood a Go Go" presents
the fantastic Ike & Tina Turner Revue!
[cheers and applause]
["Sweet Soul Music" playing]
[upbeat '60s rock]
♪ ♪
- When I was a teenager back in the '60s,
I knew of their record that they had out,
but I had never seen them.
And then they came on TV, and I saw her dancing,
and that's all I could look at.
I was just so amazed at this woman.
♪ ♪
- I remember standing there watching her
and saying, "Whatever that is,
I want some of that."
I got the spirit.
It's no different than being in a church
where you are moved and stirred
to the point where you can feel it inside yourself.
- ♪ Do you like good music? ♪
♪ Sweet soul music ♪
♪ Long as it's swinging ♪
♪ Yeah ♪
♪ Get out here on the floor, y'all ♪
♪ Dancing to a go-go ♪
♪ And dancing to the music ♪
♪ Yeah ♪
♪ Spotlight is on me, y'all ♪
♪ And I'm having a ball, y'all ♪
- Back then, you had the whole Motown revue.
You had Diana Ross,
Mary Wells.
- The Temptations in these Italian suits,
and we're putting forth an image of sophistication.
- And they were all... [hums softly]
That kind of stuff, and Tina was more, "Yeah!"
That kind of stuff.
- It's wild.
It's your sensuality, your sexuality,
and it's in your face.
- ♪ Dancing to a go-go and dancing to the music ♪
- Did you ever study dancing?
- No. - No?
And what about music?
You know, singing? - No, no music at all.
Everything is just natural for me.
I'm a performer, and I sing,
and Ike does the managing and producing.
- It was Ike's band.
But he knew that in order to be
a number one, he needed Tina,
'cause Tina was the shining star.
♪ ♪
[cheers and applause]
[indistinct chatter]
- ♪ Oh ♪
♪ Box top ♪
- ♪ Let's rock ♪
♪ Oh, let's rock ♪
- ♪ Bet bop ♪
- ♪ Oh, box top ♪
[guitar solo]
- ♪ He ♪
♪ Gave ♪
♪ Me a mother ♪
♪ And he gave me ♪
♪ A father, too ♪
♪ He gave ♪
♪ Yes, gave me everything ♪
♪ And then he gave ♪
♪ He gave me you ♪
♪ He gave ♪
♪ Yes, gave me everything ♪
- He was like her hero.
Like a big brother.
And he seen her like a little sister.
That relationship
was very beautiful.
It really was.
- ♪ ...me strength to love with ♪
I wasn't thinking of, "I'll go to St. Louis,
and I'll start singing, and I'll be a star."
I was young, naive,
just a country girl,
and everything just opened up to me.
♪ And most of all ♪
♪ He gave me you ♪
- Tina, you started your musical career
in a church choir in your hometown.
Do you consider your musical roots
to be Black gospel?
- Oh, yes. Certainly.
Black gospel, blues.
B.B. King's music was our radio during that time.
- Mm-hmm. What kind of songs were you singing
as a member of the church choir?
- [laughs]
Well, we call them...
well, it was a Baptist church,
and they were just spiritual songs.
Songs about, you know, love
and giving and...
and doing all of the right things
that make life good.
Those were good times, you know,
to remember all of the church singing
and the choir and all.
When you're in the South, there's nothing happening,
except the church, the piano, the preacher.
During that time, I didn't know
about anywhere else.
So seeing Lucille Ball
and Loretta Young
and all the beautiful ladies of Hollywood,
they were a role model
for a performer.
But I didn't think that I would actually achieve that,
because first, I wasn't pretty,
and I didn't have the clothes, I didn't have the means.
[soft music]
I remember the first "Vogue" magazine that I saw,
and I remember my first French poster...
Champs-Elysées,
the Eiffel Tower,
and the very, very French woman.
I was like, "Ah, that's what I want.
The world. That's where I want to go."
♪ ♪
- I got the impression from her,
she always felt a little bit out of time
or a little bit out of place.
I didn't think she ever felt like people understood her
or really liked her for who she was,
and the talent she had,
she finally learned that she had,
can win you a lot of people who recognize who you are
and will become like your real family...
or try to.
- Ike, first of all, if we can kind of go back a long way
to when you were a young man.
A lot of people credit you
with doing the first ever rock and roll record,
"Rocket 88."
- Yeah, that was in 1951.
- Yeah. How did that thing happen?
- Well, I live in Clarksdale, Mississippi,
which is actually 61 miles from Memphis,
and B.B. King, my mother,
she practically raised him, you know,
and one night, we was coming from
Chambers, Mississippi, playing,
and B.B., I asked him, I said, "Man, can we play a song?"
And he said, "Yeah."
So he let my band play one number.
So, anyway, he said, "Man, you guys should be recording."
And, man, we didn't have any material,
so on the way up, we decided to write this song,
and that's when I wrote the song "Rocket 88," you know.
- ♪ You women have heard of jalopies ♪
♪ You've heard the noise they make ♪
♪ But let me introduce my new Rocket 88 ♪
♪ Yes, it's great ♪
♪ Just won't wait ♪
♪ Everybody likes my Rocket 88 ♪
♪ Baby, we'll ride in style ♪
♪ Moving all along ♪
- Ike Turner is a very important part
of R&B history.
Everybody relied on him 'cause he really knew music
and he scored a real hit record
with a song in 1951 called "Rocket 88."
People say it's the first rock and roll record.
And when it comes out, Chess has credited it
to Jackie Brenston & His Delta Cats.
Ike Turner did that song, you know?
He made everything about it happen,
and it's credited to one of his saxophone players.
Imagine how he feels about this.
And I think that's the story of his career.
I think he became paranoid about that.
He said, "People were always trying to rip me off."
- He's always obsessed on that.
"Everybody leaves me.
"I make 'em, you know, popular
"and get a hit record and everything on them,
and they all leave me."
- Ike had a problem of writing songs for people,
and they would leave,
and I promised him that I wouldn't leave him.
In those days, a promise is a promise.
- ♪ Oh ♪
♪ There's something on my mind ♪
♪ Won't somebody please ♪
♪ Please tell me what's wrong? ♪
- ♪ You're just a fool ♪
♪ You know you're in love ♪ - ♪ What's to say? ♪
- ♪ You've got to face it to live in this world ♪
- ♪ Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey ♪
- ♪ You take the good along with the bad ♪
- ♪ Yeah, hey, hey ♪
- ♪ Sometimes you're happy, and sometimes you're sad ♪
- ♪ One more time ♪ - ♪ You know you love him ♪
♪ You can't understand ♪
♪ Why he treats you like he do when he's such a good man ♪
- ♪ Listen... ♪
I finished school,
and I went in the recording studio,
and I did a demo,
and that's when the hit record came.
♪ Oh, now ♪
♪ I must be a fool ♪
♪ 'Cause I'll do anything he wants me to do ♪
♪ Now tell me, how come ♪
- ♪ You're just a fool, you know you're in love ♪
- ♪ Now one more time ♪
- ♪ You've got to face it to live in this world ♪
- ♪ Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey ♪
Ike came in, and he said,
"You know, the people in New York are very excited."
We got a hit record. He was very excited, you know.
And then there was... contracts started coming in.
[solemn music]
I was very ignorant to show business.
I didn't have any idea what it was about.
♪ ♪
- She really was young.
She never had no ambition
to be some kind of superstar,
but when she sang, she just had it.
And Ike exploited it.
He had to make sure he's gonna get his this time,
so he'd make sure that his name is on it.
- And that's when he put the whole show together,
the Ike & Tina Turner Revue
and gave her the name Tina Turner.
- "Sheena: Queen of the Jungle,"
it was a TV series.
Tina and Sheena, I guess it just sounded close to him,
and it sounded good, Ike & Tina Revue,
as a whole entity.
So he changed it. Didn't even ask her.
She didn't know anything about it.
♪ ♪
- Tina was the gold mine. He knew that.
He created this Frankenstein thing,
and he had to control it.
So he had to change that thing from being my little sister...
"No, no, you got to be my wife now."
Fwoom.
♪ ♪
- You'd never know from one minute to the next.
Ike could be having a good time,
and everybody was having a good time,
and it could just flip in a second.
And I think with women,
I think, you know, he figured he had the upper hand.
And especially, like, with Tina, you know,
that was, like...
I think, him instilling in her,
"You better be good, or, you know,
I'm gonna beat the shit out of you."
And did on many occasions, you know, I mean,
and for no reason a lot of times.
It was just...
I really don't know.
I don't think he knows a lot of the time.
♪ ♪
- I felt obligated to stay there,
and I was afraid.
And I stayed. That is just how it was.
I felt very loyal to Ike, and I didn't want to hurt him.
I mean, sometimes, like, after he beat me up,
I'd end up feeling sorry for him.
And, "Why am I feeling sorry?"
I'm sitting here all bruised and torn,
and all of a sudden, I'm feeling sorry for him.
You know, little things like that.
I was 23 years old or something, you know.
I mean, early 20s.
I was just all... how do you call it
when someone brainwashes you, I guess?
- Brainwashed. - Maybe I was brainwashed.
Yeah. I was afraid of him. [pounds table]
And I cared what happened to him,
and I knew that if I left, there was no one to sing.
So I was caught up in guilt and fear.
Yeah, those are the two worst qualities,
I think, for a young girl to be caught up into.
♪ ♪
[cheers and applause]
- And now let's go with Ike and Tina Turner!
[high-energy rock music]
♪ ♪
- ♪ And listen while I talk to you ♪
♪ I tell you what I'm gonna do ♪
♪ There's a new dance that's going around ♪
♪ I want to tell you what they're putting down ♪
♪ Just move your body all around ♪
♪ Shake ♪
♪ Aw, baby... ♪
- In those early days,
you'd play three shows a night.
Two shows this place, two shows that place,
and two shows at the after-hours place.
It was hard work.
- I can remember working as many as four shows a night,
and every night and every show...
was packed, was packed.
- Right now I'm gonna tell you
a little something about my man.
["My Man, He's a Lovin' Man"]
[cheers and applause]
♪ Ha ♪
♪ My man... ♪
- He rehearsed constantly.
Even sometimes we'd be driving to the next show,
he'd be playing the guitar in the back
and having Tina sing.
I mean, it was 24-7.
- The show has to be perfect.
Every single part of it has to be perfect.
He was one of those guys who would turn around onstage
and point at somebody, and they know
they're getting a $10 fine 'cause they just blew a note.
- ♪ He's a one-woman man ♪
♪ And my man... ♪
- She didn't have the glam team,
someone doing the hair and the makeup
and the stylist getting the wardrobe.
They did it all themselves.
- ♪ My man ♪ - ♪ Your man ♪
♪ Your man, your man ♪
- ♪ You know, he's really all right ♪
- ♪ Your man, your man, your man ♪
- ♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah, he treats me... ♪
The only freedom I had was
when the Ikettes and I got the dancing ready
and I got the dresses ready.
And we'd get everything,
except we didn't even know what song was coming up.
He would... ♪ Da dum ♪
Do it with the guitar, you know?
♪ He ran home, and my man... ♪
It was awful in a way, but it was a lesson.
Now that I look back, I see it as a training.
You adjust to what is given,
and that is what was given at the time.
[solemn music]
♪ ♪
- He controlled the music, and she had to...
it was always his music, and it was...
which is very same-y
if you listen to it all the time.
A lot of it is just brilliant. I love those records.
But it's of a type. It's one thing.
It's Ike Turner's stuff.
And she... I think she had broader tastes than that.
She must've felt there was more you could do
with music than this.
I think she probably had a bigger dream than...
without knowing it, than he did.
♪ ♪
- People started to see that there was more to Tina
than what Ike had to offer her...
especially after
the "River Deep - Mountain High" album,
you know, with Phil Spector.
- Phil Spector was the greatest
pop record producer of that period.
He played the studio like an instrument, you know,
and he found all these singers,
and he made these wonderful records.
And when Phil Spector wanted to make
"River Deep - Mountain High,"
Ike's presence was not necessary.
Just bring Tina in because she's the star.
[tape clicks]
- Spector didn't want Ike nowhere near the studio.
So he paid Ike X amount of dollars
to get him... taken care of, so to speak,
so that he wouldn't interfere with Tina.
And that was the first time they gave Tina
her chance to sing differently.
- ♪ Bah, bah, bah-bah, bah ♪
- I remember
starting to sing with Phil
that style of singing, but which Ike had been singing...
♪ When I was ♪ - One more time.
- And he said, "No, no, no, no, no.
Just sing the melody."
And I liked that.
That was a freedom that I didn't have...
you know, like a bird that gets out of a cage.
I was excited about singing a different type of song.
I was excited about getting out of the studio on my own.
It was a freedom to do something different.
[energetic '60s R&B]
♪ ♪
♪ When I was a little girl ♪
♪ I had a rag doll ♪
♪ Only doll I've ever owned ♪
- ♪ Doo, doo, doo-doo ♪
- ♪ Now I love you just the way ♪
♪ I loved that rag doll ♪
♪ But only now my love has grown ♪
♪ And it gets stronger ♪
♪ In every way ♪
♪ And it gets deeper ♪
♪ Let me say ♪
♪ And it gets higher ♪
♪ Day by day ♪
♪ And do I love you? ♪
♪ My, oh, my ♪
♪ Yeah, river deep ♪
♪ Mountain high, yeah, yeah, yeah ♪
♪ And if I lost you ♪
♪ Would I cry? ♪
♪ Oh, how I love you, baby ♪
♪ Baby, baby, baby ♪
It was so big,
and my voice sounded so different
standing on top of all that music.
♪ I love you, baby ♪
♪ Like a flower loves the spring... ♪
- People started to see
Tina was capable of so much more.
She had wings, man.
- ♪ And I love you, baby ♪
♪ Like a schoolboy loves his pet ♪
- This is such an overpowering orchestration.
It's so complex.
This record, it just blows out walls.
- ♪ Ah ♪
- ♪ Baby ♪
♪ Baby ♪
♪ Oh, baby ♪
♪ Yow! ♪
♪ Oh ♪
- It just died in the United States.
Died. Nobody wanted to hear it.
And you listen to this record, and you think,
"What's the matter with this country," you know?
"I'm so ashamed to be an American."
[chuckles] You know, it's like, what's wrong?
So that was a big blow to Spector's career,
and, you know, maybe Ike probably was thinking,
you know, "Well, see?
He's not so great." [chuckles]
"You should stick with me."
- Like any Black artist in America that do any tune,
it has to go, like, top ten on the R&B charts
before the top 40 stations will touch it.
And "River Deep" was not a Black record, you know,
and so it wouldn't make the top ten on the R&B charts,
and so, therefore, the top 40 radio stations
wouldn't play it.
Over in England, they listen to the record,
and if the record is a R&B record, it's R&B.
You know, if it's rhythm and blues,
it's rhythm and blues, and if it's pop, it's pop,
you know, and so it got played over here.
It never got played in America.
The Black jockeys say it's too white.
The white jockeys say it's too Black.
["Contact High"]
[upbeat rock music]
- ♪ I was at this party ♪
♪ That had the doors all closed ♪
♪ ♪
♪ All this funny smoke kept going up my nose ♪
♪ ♪
♪ They had this joint that they was passing around ♪
♪ ♪
♪ And when they got to me, I turned it down ♪
♪ ♪
- You live in LA? - Yes.
- What sort of life do you have?
- Well, my life is sort of based around my four sons.
I have a housekeeper that takes care of them
when I travel.
Being a wife and being Tina at the same time
is almost like a split person.
But I'm able to separate the two,
so everything is fine... the whole thing is sane.
♪ ♪
♪ But everybody got tired of blowing that grass ♪
♪ ♪
♪ I told 'em at first... ♪
- Ike Jr. and Michael were Ike's kids
by Lorraine, his previous wife.
Tina had Craig
when she was with the saxophone player,
Raymond Hill,
and then she had Ronnie, you know, with Ike.
They were, like, all together by the time I met Tina.
- ♪ Like laid ♪
Michael, don't stand underneath that door.
Don't lean on that door like that.
I made myself a family.
I totally psyched myself out, and I made a home,
and I found some pleasure in that home
every now and then.
Birthdays with children and dinners,
Thanksgiving dinners, periodically,
but at least I had some sense of a life
of what I had always wanted.
♪ I was just too stoned to take that drive ♪
[playing piano]
♪ ♪
- Where my trophy at?
Give me my trophy.
That's a water boy trophy. - It's not.
- It's Mother's new trophy.
- She was gone most of the time.
Over a period of eight years,
everything was basically the same.
Eight months on the road, four months back,
eight months on the road, four months back.
She was very, very strict,
particularly when she was home.
We couldn't have company
unless we finished our homework.
We had to do our chores.
We had to eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner
at the same time.
She really took to raising us personally
because, basically, that was her happiness,
to a certain extent.
- Everybody was happy around my mother.
And she was always sad.
She never had friends.
She never had anybody she could really confide in.
So, basically, her happiness was with us
and her time alone in her room.
And there was nothing she can do
about her circumstances.
He had to know where she was at all the time.
She was on allowance. She didn't have her own money.
My mother really had a non-existent life
other than the studio and the house.
- When I first interviewed her,
one of the questions she kept on asking was,
"Why did I stay? Why did I stay?
People want to know why I stayed."
And for me, it was interesting
to think about the violence that happened before Ike,
'cause I think a lot of people don't know
that she grew up watching violence in her own home.
[bluesy rock music]
Right now...
[applause]
I think you might like to hear something from us...
- ♪ Left a good job ♪ - Nice and easy.
- ♪ Down in the city ♪ [cheers and applause]
♪ Working for the man ♪
- Well, now... - ♪ Every night and day ♪
- I'd like to do that for you,
but there's just one thing, you see.
We never, ever do nothing
nice and easy.
[chuckles]
We always do it nice and rough.
♪ ♪
Now, we're gonna take the beginning of this song,
and we're gonna do it...
- ♪ And we rolling ♪ - Easy.
Both: ♪ Rolling ♪
♪ Rolling on the river ♪
- ♪ My, my ♪ - Listen.
♪ I left a good job ♪
♪ In the city... ♪ - ♪ Down in the city... ♪
- ♪ Proud Mary keep on burning ♪
♪ And we're rolling... ♪
I was truly a friend to Ike.
I had promised that I would help him.
♪ Rolling on the river ♪
So I was still trying to help him
to get a hit record.
All: ♪ ...river ♪
- Two, three, four!
[energetic R&B music, cheers and applause]
♪ ♪
- ♪ Now, I left a good job in the city ♪
♪ Working for the man every night and day ♪
♪ And I never lost one minute of sleeping ♪
♪ Worried 'bout the way things might have been ♪
♪ Big wheel keep on turning ♪ singers: ♪ Turning ♪
- ♪ Proud Mary keep on burning ♪
singers: ♪ Burning ♪ all: ♪ Rolling ♪
- ♪ Yeah ♪ all: ♪ Rolling ♪
- ♪ Rolling ♪ all: ♪ Rolling on the river ♪
- ♪ I said we're rolling ♪ - ♪ Rolling ♪
all: ♪ Rolling ♪ - ♪ Yeah ♪
all: ♪ Rolling on the river ♪
♪ River, do, do, do, do, do, do, do ♪
♪ Do, do, do ♪
♪ ♪
- "Proud Mary" became a hit.
We were all over America.
♪ And I pumped a lot of 'tane down in New Orleans ♪
♪ But I never saw the good side of the city ♪
♪ Till I hitched a ride on the riverboat queen... ♪
- That's just fabulous. That's fabulous.
- Who settles an argument if you...
- Ah.
Things are not always the way they look, you know.
- No. Ike's kind of quiet.
- Yeah, he's... Ike is very bashful
when the lights are on, and...
[laughter]
But on the other hand,
when he's in the recording studio,
Ike's the one that does all of the ruling around,
the talking, he's the whole thing.
- But in public, he's like this.
- Yeah, 'cause he can't get it together.
Takes him... [laughter]
♪ You better do it, we're rolling... ♪
♪ Rolling ♪ - ♪ Rolling ♪
all: ♪ Rolling on the river ♪
- ♪ Go ahead, ah... ♪
[singing indistinctly]
♪ Hey ♪
[music fades]
[singing indistinctly]
- I swear you're behind me. Y'all behind me.
These are all...
I'm on a speed above where y'all feeling at.
- You're saying on him, too? - Y'all hear me?
I'm just saying, like, you're telling her that,
and she's not getting there.
I'm just trying to give her an example...
of how to sing.
- Okay. Turn it off.
[solemn music]
- In the later part of their career,
when, you know, the hits weren't coming
and a lot of the money wasn't coming in,
he started placing the blame elsewhere.
You know, he took a lot of his anger out on her.
♪ ♪
Most of the time, when Ike would come home,
he would take her back in the room
and then close the door,
and there'd be the screams.
And we were so petrified, we were in bed
with the, you know, covers over our heads.
And then I remember one time, he was...
[sighs, clears throat]
[voice breaking] He was striking my mother.
And I was young.
And he had thrown
some scalding hot coffee on her.
And I went and banged on the door,
and I said, "Mother."
And then it stopped, and then she said,
"Craig, I'm okay."
He came to apologize,
and he apologized for the third-degree burn
but didn't apologize
for throwing the coffee on her.
At that point in time, I hated that man
for the rest of my life.
And I'll never forget that.
Never.
♪ ♪
I had began to not really care.
♪ ♪
And I was there alone.
How can I tell you what alone meant?
♪ ♪
- [indistinct singing] - [laughs]
All: ♪ Tell me, have you seen him? ♪
- [laughs]
♪ ♪
- We got to the hospital. They pumped her stomach.
And I think Ike was out talking to the doctor
or something,
and I was in there, just her and I,
and I was scared shitless, and I thought,
"Tina, you can't die. I mean, come on, now."
It just really scared me
'cause I didn't know what had ha... you know,
if she was gonna pull through or not.
♪ ♪
- These are some difficult questions now,
and there was a time where she was unhappy,
and there was a suicide attempt.
Can you talk about her unhappiness
and how that made you feel?
- Well, I can't really say how I felt
because I never knew how she felt.
I didn't know why she attempted suicide,
because I thought maybe that it was a...
Well...
let me start this again.
At first, Tina attempting suicide
two or three times,
I think that this was some form of attention.
She was unhappy about the things that I was doing,
me being a womanizer,
being with all these women and stuff like this,
and I think that
the real truth is that
she was trying to be something that she wasn't.
She was... wait a minute. I want to clarify this.
She was trying to be
what she thought I wanted...
not what she really was.
She was trying to please me.
And so, therefore, she was going through a lot of hurt,
and I think she had a very unhappy life
because of that.
I think we were living a lie,
and if I had done used my head any at all,
I would've known better.
And so this is what led to our downfall.
[soft music]
♪ ♪
[bell chimes]
- Buddhism was a way out.
And it changed your attitude
towards the situation that you're in.
The more you chant, the more, you know,
you become liberated mentally.
[chanting]
[cheers and applause]
[chanting]
[cheers and applause]
[laughter]
- ♪ Yo ♪
Hey!
Crowd: ♪ Yo ♪
- [groans oddly]
[singing a chant]
Hey!
[crowd sings]
[chanting]
- ♪ Every woman ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- ♪ Hey, hey, every move, girl ♪
♪ You've got to have a little respect ♪
singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- Ike had recognized it, too,
that he couldn't control her anymore,
because she just wasn't putting up with any of that.
- Right now...
I'm gonna talk about respect...
because, you see,
respect is what I want.
I think it's what most of us want.
But, you know, we don't always get what we want,
especially us women.
[cheers and applause]
Tonight I'm gonna speak for us women, you see,
because, somehow,
the men always manage to get
what they want.
That's right.
They do what they want to do
whenever they want to do it.
And you know what?
They do it with whoever they want to do it with.
Now, fellas, you've started us women to thinking.
Yeah, we can think, too.
We think that whatever's out there in the streets
must be good...
'cause you mens been out there a long time.
Now us women wants to go out there and get us some, too.
[chuckles]
But I want you to...
♪ To get together ♪
♪ I want you to try to feel it ♪
♪ Try to feel it ♪
♪ And I want everybody ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- ♪ To do a soul clap ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- ♪ Clap your hands ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- ♪ Everybody ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- ♪ Clap, clap, clap your hands, everybody ♪
[frenetic R&B music]
♪ ♪
♪ Ow! ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- ♪ A little respect ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- ♪ Oh ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
♪ Just a little bit ♪ - Sock it to me.
♪ Now get on ♪
♪ Child ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- ♪ Hey ♪ singers: ♪ Just a little bit ♪
- ♪ Clap your hands ♪
♪ Now, come on ♪
♪ Clap your hands ♪
♪ That's what I mean ♪
♪ Oh, yeah ♪ [crowd roaring]
♪ Oh, yeah ♪
- Okay, okay.
[airplane engine roars]
[tense music]
♪ ♪
The memory of that was horrendous, of course,
because I was practically run over by a truck.
I didn't... I didn't...
well, I wasn't thinking clearly, of course.
And so I thought at that point was a time when I could cross,
but, you know, I had felt like I was moving slow,
and there was that big truck,
really one of the big ones coming,
and the horn blew.
"Rah," right? [horn blares]
And what I mostly remember
is flashing lights.
[horns blaring]
[triumphant music]
♪ ♪
[chanting]
♪ ♪
[soft music]
♪ ♪
The next day, it was the Fourth of July,
and I said, "Of course, the Fourth of July."
But I'll remember every time, "Oh, the Fourth of July.
It's when I got my freedom."
♪ ♪
[fireworks crackling]
♪ ♪
The divorce was clean-cut.
I got nothing.
No money, no house, no car.
That is when I realized that I could use Tina
to become...
a business.
And so I said, "I'll just take my name."
Ike fought a little bit
because he knew what I would do with it.
And it was through court that I got it.
Tina.
- To keep it is to reclaim it,
reshape it, refine it.
Also a kind of, like, "fuck you" to Ike.
"Yeah, you gave me this name,
but watch what I build with it."
["Root Toot Undisputable Rock 'n' Roller"]
[funky rock music]
♪ ♪
- ♪ When you walk into the bar ♪
♪ I'm the first one you're gonna see ♪
♪ Business and pleasure just don't mix ♪
♪ So can I take your order, please? ♪
♪ You fellas know I don't take no mess ♪
♪ It's a whole lotta woman ♪
♪ In this dress ♪
♪ Oh, they call me ♪
♪ A root, toot ♪
♪ Undisputable rock and roller ♪
singers: ♪ Roller ♪
- ♪ I got a fine fanny ♪
♪ But a rough-talking Annie ♪
♪ Rock and roller ♪
♪ Oh! ♪
I realized I had to go to work.
I mean, I couldn't just stay there
and wait for what?
I had to work.
- After Tina left Ike,
somebody had to pay for the dates they blew
and Tina wound up with all the bills,
none of the money.
She would go do Vegas.
She'd go do, like, McDonald's conventions.
She'd play anywhere
just to make the money to get by.
- ♪ Everybody knows to keep it cool... ♪
- Ike wasn't paying anything at that point.
So she's got to support herself and the kids.
So that's when I started booking television shows.
I mean, we were doing everything
from "The Brady Bunch"...
- ♪ Too many nights ♪
- To "Hollywood Squares"...
- In "The Hollywood Squares."
- Whatever TV shows we could get her on,
because that was the only source of income at that point.
- Ike and Tina. Where's Ike?
[laughs] - I don't know.
[laughter]
- So nice to have you on the show, Tina.
- Thank you.
- What I remember is, there was always the shadow
of Ike Turner.
It was really hard for her, you know.
- Is it all right for me to ask you
if you and Ike are together or separated
or divorced or...
- Separated and divorced. [laughs]
- Separated and divorced?
- Yeah. We are divorced.
- Yeah, it took a while...
- Oh, yes. - For you to decide?
- Well, yes. It was... I mean, we're family.
We'd been together for, like, 16 years.
- Ike and Tina Turner, that was a unit.
- People still call me Ike and Tina.
- Ike and Tina? - Yeah, they do.
- He triggered a lot of trauma...
just the thought of him,
you know, 'cause there was a lot.
But she's a professional.
She'd get onstage, you'd never know
anything was up...
ever.
- All right, five, six, seven, eight.
♪ Bop, hey ♪
♪ I hear music in the ♪
all: ♪ I hear music ♪
- ♪ Then let me know ♪
♪ There's a party going down ♪
♪ Da-nah-nah-nah ♪
[singing percussion]
I was becoming stagnant.
I knew that there was something else.
And I realized I wasn't going anywhere.
I'd be in Las Vegas all my life.
Five, six, seven, eight.
Take two, two, three, four...
I was ready to get out there.
This is fine, what you got so far,
but it's not good enough.
Well, then the next question is,
but you'd have to get someone to organize that.
That is when Roger came into picture.
All: ♪ Somebody's gonna hurt someone ♪
♪ Before the night is through ♪
♪ ♪
- Well, I was working with Olivia Newton-John,
and we were doing a television special
called "Hollywood Nights,"
and Olivia had this desire to have
really strong female singers back her
in one or two songs.
- ♪ If it takes all night ♪
- We had a list of people we asked.
Toni Tennille, Captain and Tennille,
I think Peaches was in it,
Tina Turner.
And that's when I first met Tina.
All: ♪ There's gonna be a heartache tonight ♪
♪ A heartache tonight, I know ♪
- ♪ Yes, I know ♪
all: ♪ There's gonna be a heartache tonight... ♪
- I remember when I walked in to Roger's office,
he looked at me.
I will never forget that look.
It was in wonder.
Like, "How old is she?
What can I do with her?" All of that.
And then I said, "I simply want a manager.
"I don't know what to do. I need to work.
I want to work."
And then he said, "I need to see what you do."
And so I said, "Well, I'm opening in San Francisco."
♪ Now you've heard my story ♪
♪ You heard every word I sang ♪
- They were doing a two-week residency
at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco,
two shows a night.
- ♪ Fahrenheit or centigrade ♪
♪ They give us fever ♪
[cheers and applause]
- The first show was supper.
You know, everyone eating dinner,
and I'm, like, going, "Christ," you know...
- ♪ Fever ♪
- It was very cabaret,
and they did a lot of cover versions.
I didn't react that excited... [laughs]
'Cause I didn't think I could do anything with her.
- ♪ ...lovely way to burn ♪
♪ Oh, what a lovely way to burn ♪
[energetic rock music]
[cheers and applause]
♪ ♪
♪ Burn, baby, burn ♪
♪ Choo! ♪
♪ Burn, baby, burn... ♪
- Anyway, we stayed for the second show,
and the second show being, like, a 9:00 show,
it was people had some drinks, they were standing on tables,
and Tina was just working the audience,
and I went, "Wow.
What a great live performance."
- ♪ People getting loose now ♪
♪ Getting down on the roof ♪
♪ I was screaming ♪
♪ Out of control ♪
[soft dreamy music]
♪ ♪
- You know when you meet an artist
if they have got something that grabs you,
and, obviously, it did to me,
and she was also incredibly determined.
- Roger said to me, "What do you want?"
I had a dream.
My dream is to be the first Black rock and roll singer
to pack places like the Stones
or those people that are packing
those kind of places, you know?
- "I want to fill the rock stadiums, Rog
like Mick and Keith."
I said, "Yep, that's what we're gonna do."
I had no idea if we were gonna do it,
'cause there weren't any female rock artists
in the world selling out football stadiums.
[cheers and applause]
- Tina's problem, after leaving the Ike orbit,
was now she's on her own.
She's just Tina Turner, but who is that?
♪ ♪
She is, by this point,
older than your average pop star.
She's a middle-aged woman.
Is she R&B? Was it disco?
Wasn't she doing that recently?
It was very unclear. Her image was unclear.
- When Tina said, "I'd like you to manage me,"
I immediately thought,
"Well, I've got to get her a record deal,
"we've got to change the image
"so people at record companies know
"that you're not just a Vegas cabaret act.
We're gonna make it current."
I said, "We're gonna have to make a rock show."
[opening rock notes]
[crowd cheering]
♪ ♪
- I was ready for change. I was ready for that.
[crowd cheering]
But first of all, the long hair
was a look that I used for Ike and Tina,
so I cut the hair.
That was a change immediately.
Then the Bob Mackie clothes went.
♪ ♪
Pulled out some of my rock and roll dresses,
the shorter ones.
And I went to work. - Five, six, seven, eight...
["Foolish Behavior (Kill His Wife)" playing]
- Ladies and gentlemen...
Tina Turner!
[cheers and applause]
♪ ♪
- ♪ Can I introduce myself? ♪
♪ I'm a gal of financial wealth ♪
♪ Sound in mind, body, soul, and health ♪
♪ Oh, and I want to kill his wife ♪
♪ I have this urge to take her life... ♪
- We hired a young band.
We didn't really have any money.
So Tina, who always knew
what she wanted them to look like,
said, "We'll put them in black karate suits."
The band hated it. [laughs]
The musicians were like, "Why do we have to wear this?"
I said, "You know, you each get a different color belt."
- ♪ She'll escape down into Mexico... ♪
- We looked a little bit shabby,
but that's what rock and roll is... it's shabby.
- She wanted two girls
to get away, I think, from that Ikette thing.
- ♪ Should I act quite cold and deliberate? ♪
- She was reinventing herself as Tina Turner.
- ♪ And they'll all say suicide ♪
♪ They won't know who done it... ♪
That was the beginning of me taking control
of my performance.
I was my own boss.
♪ I really want to take her life ♪
- ♪ She'll escape down into Mexico ♪
- ♪ Baby, into Mexico ♪
- ♪ Sell the house ♪
♪ And find a nice young beau ♪
- ♪ Find a nice young beau ♪
- ♪ With long black hair ♪
- ♪ And I won't work no more ♪
♪ Ha ♪
♪ Ha ha ha ha ha ♪
♪ Ooh ooh ooh ♪
♪ Ya ya ya ya ♪
[cheers and applause]
So immediately we changed the show.
Reviews were great. Everything was going well.
And then we started working to try to get a record deal.
Nobody would touch Tina Turner.
- When I first started
trying to look for a deal with Tina,
the general feeling was "Is she still with that guy Ike?"
No one had any idea.
Tina needed to be exposed as... she's a solo artist.
She's not associated with Ike.
- Roger came to me,
asking me if I would be willing to give the story
to the press,
and I was afraid to...
put it out because of...
what I might receive from Ike.
- I didn't really know too much about
the backstory, and nobody knew
about the traumas that she went through.
You know, I just was looking for a simple comeback story.
Little did I know, you know,
there was this whole legend that came about.
- I didn't know what to expect.
[camera shutter clicking]
I wanted to stop people from...
thinking that Ike and Tina was so positive.
I mean, it was... it was...
that we were such a love team or a great team,
and it wasn't like that.
So I thought, if nothing else,
at least people would know.
- Tina Turner is a legend,
a major influence on rock stars like Rod Stewart
and Mick Jagger.
Once, she was teamed with her husband Ike.
Now she's on her own,
trying to establish herself as a star once again.
- My life with Ike
was one that a lot of, maybe, people are familiar with...
husbands that...
that practice brutality. [laughs]
- Yeah? - Yeah.
- Nobody talked about sexual abuse,
physical abuse, domestic abuse.
Abuse, period.
Our generation is the generation
that started to break the silence.
[stirring music]
- Tina... she couldn't voice her own opinion.
Everything that she did was Ike.
- The idea of Tina as a presence on her own
and having escaped... people loved that story.
They wanted to... you know, here was somebody to root for.
- Once the word was out,
we met a guy called Carter,
John Carter, at Capitol, who believed in her.
- I had always been interested in artists
that no one else was interested in.
Once a star, always a threat,
and that's the way I felt about Tina.
- So you play that thing, you're playing that,
and you're playing that strum under me,
and we move downstage with that.
Let's just get that right. That's exactly what...
- Carter basically gave us
a development deal.
We tried probably eight or ten tracks,
still trying to find our way.
We never got quite there.
- Stay under me there, but just come down.
Keep the pulse under me. Don't lose the...
- We record a few things,
and as much as Roger and I would get enthusiastic
about a song here and a song there,
it was never really the body of work that we needed.
- And then one day, Carter rang me up,
beside himself, because there'd been a change of management
at Capitol Records.
And they'd been in a meeting, and they'd been going through
the roster of artists, I guess, and...
the new management didn't want Tina on the label.
- The new regime comes in... - Mm-hmm.
- And like any new regime,
they got their own idea about what they want to do.
- Right. - So I flip out.
I go downstairs, and I said, "Hey, this is my act,"
and the classic quote is,
"Carter, you signed this old nigger douchebag?"
- Whoa. Whoa. - "Yeah.
"Yeah, I did, and I'm really happy about it.
Now, pick up the phone and call Roger Davies."
- Wow. - He said, "No fuckin' way."
And I get on my knees, and I said,
"I'm now gonna beg you,
and I'm not gonna get up until you pick up the phone."
[chuckles]And there was a long stare-down,
and he picks up the phone. - Wow.
- Well, he says, "Okay, back on the roster."
- Mm-hmm. - "You finish your record.
"But you understand that we're gonna do nothing!
That's all there is."
[somber music]
♪ ♪
[laughing]
[somber music]
♪ ♪
I was held back
for a very long time...
but I didn't suffer from those things,
and it's not necessary to suffer about that
because what can you do about it, you know?
So I didn't think about those things.
♪ ♪
- She always had a belief it was gonna be okay.
And I think you have to have that belief to keep going.
♪ ♪
Radio, as you know, in America
was very categorized, and there's pop,
and there's R&B, there's urban, and there's hot AC,
and she wanted to sing rock.
And that wasn't really what they thought would work.
And that's when we knew that it had to be England,
'cause England and Europe got her.
[airplane engine roars]
[light music]
♪ ♪
- It was London.
It was another whole experience
from America.
You know, it felt like home.
It felt so comfortable
that I could have been there all my life.
♪ ♪
Well, I didn't have that many friends in America
because, of course, Ike.
And then when I left Ike,
immediately I went to work.
♪ ♪
My sons were at home. They were fine.
My oldest was 28.
My youngest was moving well into his middle 20s.
So not really kids anymore.
I left everything and everybody behind.
I needed every minute of my brains
to map my life together.
Fellas, do you know what we're doing today?
- It's almost like she had a coming of age
at 40 years old...
the fact that she has this voice,
this incredible, incredible voice,
I would say the industry didn't even really know
what to do with.
- Roger could see what could be done
when other people couldn't imagine
what it could become.
So there's this new
kind of production technique in England.
There are these new people that are getting new sounds,
and you should be part of that.
♪ ♪
- I was collecting songs.
I used to carry around this leather bag
full of cassettes and asking a bunch of people
and, you know, Terry Britten,
he was a bit of a hero of mine,
and he had songs I think might work for Tina.
- Roger's tea.
[opening notes of "What's Love Got To Do With It?" play]
- "What's Love" is probably the worst demo
I've ever done to this date.
I mean, there's no, uh...
bee-doo-bee-doo... none of that stuff.
Very white, very pop,
and nothing remotely would say "Tina Turner."
Originally, it did go
to an English band called Bucks Fizz,
who were really popular at the time,
and I think they actually recorded it.
- ♪ Oh, oh, oh, what's love ♪
♪ Got to do, got to do with it? ♪
♪ What's love but a second-hand emotion? ♪
- I was convinced. I thought "What's Love" was...
It could be a big song.
Tina never really liked it.
- [laughs] It was terrible. It was awful.
It was...
I was rock and roll.
I was not...
That was a pop song.
So Roger says, "All right, all right, all right.
"Just one thing... you got to meet Terry Britten.
"You got to meet him, 'cause he's a great writer,
and maybe he can make some adjustments or whatever,"
and I went, "All right."
♪ ♪
We walked in, and I didn't know what to expect.
And Terry was like a little leprechaun.
I mean, he's very short.
He was sitting there, and his legs were hanging.
[laughs] Something about his legs hanging
that I remember.
- She came in, and immediately she said,
"Well, you know I don't like that song,
"and I don't want to do that song.
It's Roger that wants me to do it."
I said, "Well, you know, if it doesn't work out,
you won't use it, so let's give it a go."
[opening notes of "What's Love Got To Do With it" playing]
- I had to find a way to sing the song, so he would say,
"Tina, sing this how you would sing it."
So, okay.
Then I applied my heavy voice to it, and...
♪ Makes my pulse react ♪
- She was trying to get her head around it,
how's this little... doop-dih-dih-dih work
sort of thing,
and I said to her, "Tina, this is a jog."
And we both stood and jogged.
And she was singing loud, and I went, "Quieter, quiet..."
She said, "If I go any quieter, I'll be whispering."
I said, "Yeah, that's it," and we start to jog on this.
Suddenly she went, "I got it, I got it, I got it."
- ♪ Oh, oh, oh, what's love ♪
♪ Got to do, got to do with it? ♪
♪ What's love but a second-hand emotion? ♪
♪ What's love got to do ♪
♪ Got to do with it? ♪
♪ Who needs a heart ♪
♪ When a heart can be broken? ♪
- I was stunned afterwards, after the session.
- They weren't used to a strong voice
standing on top of music.
But I converted it and made it my own.
♪ If I tend to look dazed, I read it some place ♪
♪ I've got cause to be ♪
♪ There's a name for it ♪
- She said, "You know what? People are gonna say,
"'This is a Tina Turner song.
"'It's not Tina doing a cover.
This is Tina Turner's song."'
- ♪ But whatever the reason, you do it for me ♪
♪ Oh, oh, oh, what's love ♪
♪ Got to do, got to do with it? ♪
I knocked that album out in two weeks in the studio.
Done. Finished.
- We just went from studio to studio,
and, literally, two or three weeks, the album was done.
We turned up with an album that sold 20 million copies.
- ♪ ...can be broken? ♪
- When the album was out and we were in New York
at Tower Records doing a record signing,
and I got the call from our record company
that "What's Love" had gone to number one on "Billboard."
- In Tower Record? - This was in Tower Records.
And I just jumped up, and I said to everybody,
"It's number one," and they all started cheering.
It was wonderful. - You know when you said that,
I honestly have to tell you... I know it's gonna
sound real corny, but I mean it... when I saw you say that
last night that this went number one today,
I just, like, burst into tears,
because to me, it was like,
there is some justice after all.
I don't know if you feel that way about it,
but it was very moving. - Oh, number one.
♪ Oh, oh, oh, what's love ♪
♪ Got to do, got to do with it? ♪
♪ What's love ♪
♪ But a second-hand emotion? ♪
♪ What's love got to do ♪
♪ Got to do with it? ♪
♪ Who needs a heart ♪
♪ When a heart can be broken? ♪
Crowd: ♪ What's love got to do ♪
- ♪ Ooh, ooh ♪ - And the record of the year
is, "What's Love Got To Do With It"... Tina Turner!
[cheers and applause]
- My goodness, this has been a wonderful evening.
I'd like to take this award
and give it to someone that's been
wonderful to me as a friend
and in business and in many ways...
my manager, Roger Davies.
It's been a wonderful year. [applause]
- [mouthing words]
- My "Private Dancer" album...
no, I don't consider it a comeback album.
Tina had never arrived.
It was Tina's debut for the first time,
and this was my first album.
- Tina Turner!
[uplifting music]
- They'd reached a stage where,
after "Private Dancer," it was unbelievably big.
It was a runaway train.
- When you're hot, you're hot, and this lady is the hottest.
Here's... - Tina Turner!
[cheers and applause]
- I had my boyfriend standing in line
since 3 in the morning to get these tickets.
I says, "That's it, the relationship's over
unless you get me these tickets."
- And if she isn't sexy, I don't know who is.
- [speaking Italian] Tina Turner.
- Stupenda, stupenda.
[speaking Italian]
- [speaking German] Tina Turner.
- On "Private Dancer," I think we ended up doing
150 concerts.
[stirring music]
And then we went on to break every rule.
On that album, we did the biggest tour we've ever done.
We played 230 shows in 18 months
everywhere in the world.
♪ ♪
This 50-year-old woman playing stadiums
throughout Europe and having an audience
ranging from about 15 to 60 was pretty amazing.
- She makes you feel young.
She's alive. She's bouncing.
I can't wait for them to come back.
- When I'm onstage and it's, like, 20,000 people,
then you know that it's all worthwhile, you know?
But it's really a lot that goes on behind the scenes
when... I've never been this big before,
you know what I mean? And you...
Ah, it's just incredible.
- We didn't stop.
We played the small holes. We played the clubs.
We did all the TVs. We got to arenas.
We eventually fulfilled her dream
and filled the stadiums.
That concert in Rio,
there was 186,000 people there.
[cheers and applause]
Crowd: Tina, Tina, Tina, Tina, Tina, Tina!
- Hello, Rio!
[cheers and applause]
Give it to me!
Hello, Rio!
[cheers and applause]
Mwah! Mwah! Mwah!
You can't imagine what it was like for me
to finally stand there in front of all of those people.
It's a feeling of like, "I did it,"
and it's really genuine.
It's almost like magic, because you're standing there
and they're really giving you love.
Are you ready?
[crowd cheers] - Are you ready for me?
[crowd cheers]
I'm ready for you. Hello!
["I Can't Stand the Rain" playing]
♪ ♪
♪ I ♪
♪ I can't stand the rain ♪
♪ Against my window ♪
♪ Bringing back sweet memories ♪
♪ I can't stand the rain ♪
♪ Do you remember ♪
♪ Uh-huh ♪
♪ How sweet it used to be? ♪
♪ ♪
♪ When we were together ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Everything was so grand ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Now that we've parted ♪
♪ There's the one sound ♪ - ♪ One sound ♪
- ♪ Just can't stand ♪
♪ Can't stand the rain ♪
♪ Against my window ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Bringing back sweet memories ♪
♪ I can't stand the rain ♪
♪ Against my window ♪
♪ ♪
♪ If he ain't here with me ♪
♪ Well ♪
♪ When we were younger ♪
- ♪ We were younger ♪
- ♪ Everything was so grand ♪
- ♪ Oh ♪
- ♪ Ah ♪
♪ Bringing back them sweet memories ♪
♪ One sound ♪ - ♪ One sound ♪
- ♪ I just can't stand ♪
♪ Rain ♪ - ♪ Rain ♪
- ♪ Rain ♪
- ♪ Whoo-hoo ♪
- [shouts] [song ends]
[cheers and applause]
Thank you!
[cheers and applause fades]
[engine revving]
- In 1985, she signed on to do the third "Mad Max" movie,
"Beyond Thunderdome."
"Rolling Stone" sent me in to cover this.
I said, "Great, I'd love to cover this."
She was the biggest pop star in the world.
I mean, it was already clear there were gonna be people
doing these quickie bios of Tina Turner,
which I thought was really tacky.
So I got over there, I talked to Roger,
I said, "You know, maybe you should have someone
"do a book, you know, do an actual biography.
And could be me. I mean, could be anybody."
You know? I don't want to be pushy.
- You pitched that? - Oh, yeah.
Well, I brought up the possibility of doing something
to forestall all these bad books that would be coming out.
- When she became successful,
the past came up, and it got a lot of press,
'cause she was also hugely popular.
People continued to ask about Ike.
Even after she had had huge solo success,
they'd bring up the same old stuff
over and over in every interview.
We couldn't stop it.
- Ike was arrested
on some cocaine charges in Pasadena.
- Oh. - Yeah, for possession
and conspiracy, possibly for dealing.
Any reaction to that?
- You know, I'd like to hear all positive things.
I'd love to hear that Ike had a record deal
and he was producing an album on himself.
- Right.
Yeah.
- I think, as she said at the time,
"I can do this and not have to talk about it again."
"Everybody's talking about it.
"Everybody has this idea about it, it's this or that.
"I know what happened. I'll say what happened,
and I won't have to address it again."
- A long line of fans waited outside
a Barnes & Noble bookstore for Tina.
The soulful singer is now also an author,
and she was in town, anxious and willing
to autograph a few hundred copies.
- It was worth getting sweaty, going up there,
pushing people, getting them out the way,
seeing Tina Turner... I love her.
What's love got to do with it?
- Tina's book, by the way, tracing her rise
and fall and rise again is titled "I, Tina."
- It was a top ten "New York Times" bestseller
strictly because of Tina Turner.
I mean, they could put an empty book out
with her picture on the cover. That book would have sold.
- She just felt maybe it'll put it to bed
once and for all,
which, of course, it didn't.
It just made it bigger.
- Albuquerque, New Mexico. Hello.
- I read your book,
and it's totally changed my life.
I love you. I thank you.
- That story reached so many people
who felt like they had to kind of keep their secrets
locked away deep down.
But then I wonder, I think of, like...
It's like a Pandora's Box situation, right?
Like, "Damn, I got to tell the story again?"
[stirring music]
- And then the film came out
and just kind of brought more attention to her name
for people to see what happened and everything.
- What'd you say? - Don't start with me.
I ain't in the mood today, all right?
- It's tangible in a sense. You're watching it.
- I'll give up all that other stuff
but only if I get to keep my name.
I worked too hard for it, Your Honor.
- And it just changed everything for her.
- That role changed my life.
I mean, I'm not Tina,
and I've got so much love
from others... men, women... who've come up and say,
"You playing her in that story changed my life."
[soft music]
- The story goes out into people's houses,
and then it becomes a part of their life as well.
- It's Tina Day!
[cheers and applause] Whoo!
♪ ♪
- It's hard to wrap your mind around
that your life has been an inspiration...
maybe the worst parts of your life
has been an inspiration.
- We have 50,000 letters downstairs from women
who have also been through it and survived.
Tina did it. So can you.
Let's celebrate.
[cheers and applause]
- She's no longer in control of that story.
That's what happens to icons.
Anna Mae Bullock has her own life.
Tina Turner belongs to the world.
[fireworks popping]
[stirring music]
♪ ♪
[applause]
- Ms. Turner, welcome to Venice.
Can you give me your views on the film?
- Well, I haven't as yet seen the film.
[clears throat]
Well...
I'm not so thrilled about thinking about the past
and how I lived my life.
It was made a story.
The story was actually written
so that I would no longer have to discuss the issue.
I don't love that it's always talked about, you see?
I made a point of just putting the news out to stop the thing
so that I could go on with my life.
And this constant reminder is not so good, you know.
I'm not so happy about it.
So do I want to sit and screen
and watch the violence and all the brutality?
No. That's why I haven't seen it.
[applause]
- You know, when you talk to journalists
over and over for 20 or 30 or 40 years,
memories come back.
She has partly dreams about it.
They're not pleasant.
So I think these are these things
that come back to her when she opens that book.
It's like when soldiers come back from the war.
It's not a easy time to...
to have this in your memory, and they try to forget.
I see it a little bit like that.
- Tina today is a world superstar.
But there was a point where you had to become
the comeback kid.
How did you get the strength
to get out of that situation with Ike?
- Oh, we are gonna talk about him, aren't we?
[laughs] - [speaks indistinctly]
- Okay. I need my fan now. I just had a flush.
[laughing]
How did I get out of that situation?
Let me figure out how I can talk about that
in two seconds. - [speaks indistinctly]
- No, no, I know how to get out of it.
I'm just gonna say something.
Give me two seconds here.
You don't want to think about those times, you know.
You want it to just go away.
But if you're gonna keep bringing it up...
the brain is saying, "Oh, you want to remember that."
That scene comes back.
You're dreaming. The real picture is there.
It's like a curse.
[somber music]
- You raised a son by him, a son by another man,
and two of Ike's kids by other women.
There were always other women on the scene.
What was that like for you?
- When you were married to Ike,
what was the absolutely worst moment?
- What do you think attracts women to bad men?
- Is there a real low,
like something you'd love to forget?
- And, of course, the book and the movie features
your allegations about his bashings.
Tell me about that.
- I'm past it.
It's been 16 years since I haven't been with Ike,
and the movie and the book is bringing me back
to the past of something that was really awful.
My life is wonderful at the moment.
I'm a happy person now,
and I don't dwell on unhappiness.
[soft, moody music]
♪ ♪
- The trauma's still so deep
that to go back there makes you feel
like you're actually going back.
If you don't address the wounds of your past,
you continue to bleed.
♪ ♪
- You know, she just... she always had the feeling
that she wasn't loved...
she wasn't... you know, she wasn't a wanted child.
♪ ♪
I think with her mom, I think that's still
the dramatization of being left as a child
that never left.
♪ ♪
- Ma was...
not kind.
When I became a star,
of course, like, then she was happy
because I bought her a house.
I did all kinds of things for her.
She was my mother.
You know, I was trying to make her comfortable
because she didn't have a husband.
She was alone.
But she still didn't like me.
Even after I became Tina,
Ma still was a little bit, "Who did that?"
Or, "Who did this?"
And I said, "I did it, Ma."
You know, I was happy to show my mother what I did.
I had a house, I had gotten a car,
and she said, "I don't believe it.
You're my daughter. I know you didn't..."
Something to this effect.
Yeah, she... [exhales sharply]
She didn't want... she didn't want me,
she didn't want to be around me,
even though she wanted my success.
But I did for her...
as if she loved me.
- She's had a few kind of ups and downs in her life
as well, it hasn't been all happy.
- Right. - Um...
when she's unhappy,
how does she deal with it?
- I would say she...
She did a great job of dealing with it because...
she would figure out the problem
and how to handle it.
- Would she kind of come running home to you crying?
- No, no, no.
No, she figured that out on her own.
- Have you had any particularly...
any particular moments that you were really proud of?
- Well, I've been proud of her ever since she started singing.
But it's, like...
a person... some people's
afraid to climb a ladder
unless someone's holding it.
But she's not.
Once she make that first step on that ladder,
she keep climbing up, up, up, up.
She's not afraid.
She'll try.
She's not afraid to try anything.
- Do you think... do you think that now after all the...
I mean, you've risen to the top of the entertainment field
but you've maybe sacrificed love...
- Rising... - This is what readers
will say... she has no love in her life.
- Oh, Kurt, we're gonna get really heavy now,
because I'm drinking.
- [laughing] Oh, good. - You're gonna find out.
I have not received love almost ever in my life.
I did not have it with my mother
and my father from the beginning of birth,
and I survived. - Yeah.
- Why did I get so far without love, Kurt?
I never had it.
And if I cry here, it doesn't mean that I pity myself.
It means that tears come
with certain memories. - No, tears are not bad.
- I have had not one love affair
that was genuine and sustained itself.
Not one.
Kurt, I've been through...
[pounds table] Fucking tons of heartbreak!
I've analyzed it.
I said, "What's wrong with me?"
I've looked in the mirror with myself
stripped of makeup and without hair.
Why can someone see the beauty in the woman it is that I am?
Not a goddamn person that found it.
[quiet music]
♪ ♪
[cheers and applause]
["Help!" playing]
♪ ♪
♪ When I was younger ♪
♪ So much younger than today ♪
♪ Never needed anybody's ♪
♪ Help in any way ♪
♪ Now those days are gone ♪
♪ I'm not so self-assured ♪
♪ Now I find I've changed my mind ♪
♪ I've opened up the doors ♪
♪ So help me if you can ♪
♪ I'm feelin' down ♪
[crowd cheering] ♪ And I do ♪
♪ Appreciate you ♪
♪ Bein' round ♪
♪ Oh, help me get my feet back on the ground ♪
- ♪ Ooh ♪
- ♪ Won't you please, please ♪
♪ Help me? ♪
♪ ♪
♪ And now my life has changed ♪
♪ In, oh, so many ways ♪
♪ And my independence ♪
♪ Seems to vanish in the haze ♪
- ♪ Oh, yeah-ea-eah ♪
- ♪ Every now and then ♪
♪ I feel so insecure ♪
♪ I know that I just need you ♪
♪ Like I never did before ♪
♪ Help me if you can ♪
♪ I'm feelin' down ♪
[crowd cheering]
♪ I do appreciate you ♪
♪ Bein' round ♪
- ♪ Oh ♪
- ♪ Help me get my feet ♪
♪ Back on the ground ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Won't you please ♪
♪ Please ♪ - ♪ Please ♪
- ♪ Help me? ♪
♪ Won't you please ♪
♪ Please ♪ - ♪ Please ♪
- ♪ Help me? ♪
♪ Oh, yeah, yeah ♪
♪ Oh, please ♪
♪ Please ♪ - ♪ Please ♪
[crowd cheering]
♪ Mmm, won't you ♪
♪ Please help me? ♪
- ♪ Help ♪
- ♪ Oh ♪
- ♪ Help ♪
- ♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh ♪
- ♪ Help ♪
♪ Help ♪
♪ ♪
- ♪ Oh ♪
[cheers and applause]
[music fades]
The man that I'm looking for actually has to be
a very strong man,
to wear, actually, the trousers,
but yet not to dominate me.
And that's fair.
[crowd clamoring]
- We met at Cologne Airport.
Actually, it was at Dusseldorf Airport.
And her manager, Roger,
asked me to pick up Tina.
- He was younger.
He was 30 years old at the time.
The prettiest face. I mean, you cannot...
It was like saying,
"Where did he come from?"
He was really so good-looking.
My heart went ba-boom-ba-ba!
And it means that a soul has met.
And my hands were shaking.
So Roger said to me, "Tina, you ride with Erwin."
And I wanted to go, "Yay!" [laughing]
[soft music]
- We enjoyed the ride.
I enjoyed driving the artist.
Actually, a superstar for us
where you're normally a little nervous, you know.
But I wasn't nervous either.
I was just doing the job.
- When he found out that I liked him,
he came to America.
We were in Nashville, I think it was.
And I said to him,
"When you come to LA, I want you to make love to me."
But I thought that I could say that
'cause I was a free woman... I didn't have a boyfriend.
I liked him. There was nothing wrong with it.
It was just sex.
And he looked at me as if he doesn't...
[laughing] Didn't believe
what he was hearing!
[laughing] I laugh now at the moment,
because I sometimes get that look
when I do certain things.
He was...
just so, so different.
So laid-back, so comfortable, so unpretentious.
And that was the beginning of our relationship.
[uplifting music]
♪ ♪
I really needed love.
I just needed to love a person.
How many years later, darling, we got married?
- 27.
[applause]
It's love. It's something...
we both have for each other.
I always refer to it as an electrical charge.
I still have it.
I still have it, and even though when I left her
two hours ago, three hours ago this morning,
I still have that feeling.
That feeling is still with me and is in my heart.
I feel very warm about this.
[soft, moving music]
♪ ♪
[music slows, fades]
- First a minute to remember
one of the fathers of rock and roll.
Ike Turner died today at age 76.
Back in 1951, Turner helped record
what is one of the first rock and roll records,
"Rocket 88," with his band the Kings of Rhythm.
He may be best known
as the abusive ex-husband of Tina Turner,
with whom he performed for many years.
After their separation,
Ike Turner continued to make music.
In 1991, he was inducted
into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame,
and earlier this year, his record "Risin' with the Blues"
won a Grammy for traditional blues album.
- For a long time, I did hate Ike.
I have to say that.
But then after he died,
I really realized that he was a sick person.
He was an ill person in his soul.
He did get me started,
and he was good to me in the beginning.
So I have some good thoughts.
Maybe it was a good thing that I met him.
That I don't know.
[soft music]
♪ ♪
It hurts to have to remember those times.
♪ ♪
But at a certain stage, forgiveness takes over.
♪ ♪
Forgiving means not to hold on.
You let it go, because it only hurts you.
Not forgiving, you suffer,
'cause you think about it over and over again.
And for what?
[uplifting music]
I had an abusive life.
There's no other way to tell the story.
It's a reality. It's a truth.
That's what you've got.
So you have to accept it.
[stirring piano notes]
♪ ♪
[car horns honk, indistinct chatter]
♪ ♪
[camera shutters clicking]
♪ ♪
- Working it.
Working it, as always. - Why, thank you, honey.
- Can you tell us what Tina means to you?
♪ ♪
- The money shot is coming.
♪ ♪
- Some people say the life that I lived
and the performances that I gave...
The appreciation is lasting with the people.
And, yeah, I should be proud of that.
I am.
But when do you stop being proud?
I mean, when do you...
How do you bow out slowly, just go away?
[sighs]
- She said, "I'm going to America.
"I'm gonna say goodbye to my American fans,
and I'll wrap it up."
And I think this documentary here and the play...
this is it.
It's a closure.
A closure.
Crowd: Tina, Tina, Tina, Tina!
[cheers and applause]
Tina, Tina, Tina, Tina!
[cheers and applause]
♪ ♪
- What I gleaned from her life was love...
love of self, love of her family,
love of her talent,
love of audiences,
of music, of freedom.
[sweeping instrumentals]
♪ ♪
There's a part of her, I guess,
that we've all laid claim to,
we've all embraced across the world.
And I hope she knows that, you know,
how beloved, how loved she is.
She is absolutely adored.
[music rises]
[cheers and applause]
♪ ♪
[loud cheers and applause]
♪ ♪
[music ends]
[cheers and applause]
["The Best" playing]
♪ ♪
- ♪ I'll call you when I need you ♪
♪ My heart's on fire ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Come to me, come to me ♪
♪ Wild and wired ♪
♪ ♪
♪ You come to me ♪
♪ Give me everything I need ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Give me a lifetime of promises ♪
♪ And a world of dreams ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Speak the language of love ♪
♪ Like you know what it means ♪
♪ ♪
♪ And it can't be wrong ♪
♪ Take my heart and make it strong, baby ♪
♪ You're simply the best ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Better than all the rest ♪
♪ Better than anyone ♪
♪ Than anyone I've ever met ♪
♪ I'm stuck on your heart, babe ♪
♪ And I hang on every word you say ♪
♪ Tear us apart ♪
♪ Oh, no ♪
♪ Baby, I would rather be dead ♪
♪ In your heart, I see the start ♪
♪ Of every night and every day ♪
- ♪ Oh, yeah ♪
♪ ♪
- ♪ In your eyes, I get lost ♪
♪ I get washed away ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Just as long as I'm here in your arms ♪
♪ I could be in no better place ♪
♪ Oh, you're simply the best ♪
Whoo!
♪ Better than all the rest ♪
Whoo!
♪ Better than anyone ♪
♪ Than anyone I've ever met ♪
♪ Ooh, I'm stuck on your heart ♪
♪ ♪
♪ And I hang on every word you say ♪
♪ Don't tear us apart ♪
♪ Oh, no ♪
♪ Baby, I would rather be dead ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Each time you leave me I start losing control ♪
♪ You're walkin' away with my heart and my soul ♪
♪ I can feel you even when I'm alone ♪
♪ Oh, baby ♪
♪ Don't let go ♪
Whoo!
♪ ♪
♪ Oh! ♪
Both: ♪ Oh! Oh! Oh! ♪
- ♪ You're the best ♪ Sing it, everybody!
♪ You're better than all the rest ♪
♪ Better than anyone ♪
♪ Than anyone I've ever met ♪
♪ Ooh, I'm stuck on your heart, baby ♪
♪ And I hang on every word you say ♪
♪ Don't tear us apart ♪
♪ No, no ♪
♪ Baby, I would rather be dead ♪
♪ Oh, you're the best ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Yeah, simply the best, yeah ♪
♪ Oh ♪
♪ You're better than all the rest ♪
♪ Better than anyone ♪
♪ Than anyone I ever met ♪
♪ I'm stuck on your heart, baby ♪
♪ And I hang on every word you say ♪
♪ Don't tear us apart, no, no ♪
♪ Baby, I would rather be dead ♪
♪ Oh, you're the best ♪
[cheers and applause]
♪ ♪
[end chords]
[cheers and applause]
Thank you!
[cheers and applause fade]