I inhaled it. Thanks to whoever recommended it on this thread! I didn't find it too grubby, I guess because it dives a multidimensional view of the people involved e.g. the nanny who only wants to do right by the girls, Paula being a loving caring mum and losing it all, and herself, over an obsession, Bob as domineering yet broken hearted, and Michael, dreamy, caring, and an appalling influence.I’ve just started reading Gerry Agar’s Paula, Michael and Bob. Fascinating but I do feel grubby and guilty!
So far, Gerry has been flattering of Paula but some friend, writing an expose...
I googled the age at which Paula died out of interest (41 years old) and read that she died on Pixie’s 10th birthday!!
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Yes I think I said earlier I thought it was good. It set up a scenario and made you think you understood everyone, but then it sort of changed your perceptions especially around Bob. How his boorish standoffish attitude at times to Paula was a desparate attempt to keep her, yet have to put up with her affairs and flirtations. And pick up the pieces when they went wrong.
I can't remember but was the implication he thought the affair with Michael would fizzle out? Until they had the baby.
Omg thinking about that breaks my heart. I have a child the age Phaedra was when Peaches died. If I fell unconscious or unresponsive while taking care of my daughter, she would be frantic.
I remember an interview with Paula when shed left Bob and she said his personal hygiene was bad in that he didnt clean his teeth nor bath.
I think she was over him so threw herself into MH.
I’ve just finished reading Paula, Michael and Bob by Gerry Agar. Wow! What a dysfunctional lot.
It’s clear that Anita, the nanny, was the backbone of the family and without her creativity, rules and routines, commitment and constant labour, Paula would not have been the “fantastic mother” she was said to be in the Geldof girls’ earlier years.
I feel for all the girls but perhaps most of all, Tiger. Her early years sounded very bleak - a father that flitted in and out of her life and had substance abuse issues, and a mother who was also addicted and either holed up in a room off her face on drink/drugs or in rehab again or off having a fling, leaving Tiger with friends. Then 4 year old Tiger was alone with Paula when she died of an accidental heroin overdose and was understandably distressed that she couldn’t wake her - which is tragically reminiscent of Peaches’ death.
It’s clear that Anita, the nanny, was the backbone of the family and without her creativity, rules and routines, commitment and constant labour, Paula would not have been the “fantastic mother” she was said to be in the Geldof girls’ earlier years.
I feel for all the girls but perhaps most of all, Tiger. Her early years sounded very bleak - a father that flitted in and out of her life and had substance abuse issues, and a mother who was also addicted and either holed up in a room off her face on drink/drugs or in rehab again or off having a fling, leaving Tiger with friends. Then 4 year old Tiger was alone with Paula when she died of an accidental heroin overdose and was understandably distressed that she couldn’t wake her - which is tragically reminiscent of Peaches’ death.
sorry if it’s been mentioned elsewhere but it never seems to come up as part of this sad saga,I've gone down a hole as I googled Belinda and her and Paula's statements after MH death were one of the first things that popped up. I don't know much about Paula but this sounds beyond messy. Also I thought interesting that Paula calls herself his de-facto wife and says they were planning more children. Also interesting that his last phone call was to his first girlfriend, she sounds like she was a very calming influence.
https://www.angelfire.com/music5/archives/hutchstatements.html
Michael Hutchence's first girlfriend. INXS star's 1st love
Michael Hutchence's forgotten girlfriend, Michele Bennett, who spent seven years with the rock band front man and was one of the last people he spoke to before his tragic suicide, is now an Australian film producerwww.dailymail.co.uk
Michael Hutchence had suffered a significant brain injury which, IIRC, his then-girlfriend Helena Christensen said changed his personality.
In 1992, while bicycling in Denmark with Helena, Hutchence collided with a taxi and the driver assaulted him. Hutchence's skull was fractured and his brain bruised leaving him with substantial loss of the sense of smell and partial loss of taste.
Paula herself was a troubled character. Seems as though she got into a relationship with Bob very young.
Paula and Michael met in the mid 80s and Paula was very attracted to Michael from the start. I’ve read rumours that they slept together much earlier than when they were publicly in a relationship and before the big breakfast interview, hence rumours of Pixie being biologically michael’s daughter.
apparently Paula pursued Michael, as opposed to it being a mutual thing. He was in a bad place because of the brain injury, and I think Paula perhaps felt like an easy crutch amidst a deteriorating relationship with Helena, deteriorating physical and mental health and problems with his career.
people have also since come out to say that he intended to leave Paula. It’s pretty telling that he called his ex girlfriend before he died.
I think the saddest part of this story for me is that it wasn’t a great love story. It’s just a story of a group of privileged, troubled people who bounced off each other and dragged each other down.
Tiger Lily seems to have broken the mould, living a quiet life out of the press. Fifi and Pixie less so, but they still seem to be in a better place than the previous generation. I hope the girls and Peaches’ sons break the mould of this sad, unhappy group of people.
New to the forum, thank you for the fascinating thread. Addiction is a complex thing and depends on the person, the substance and the support they have. I am an alcoholic but in between binges I function; I wouldn’t like to be left alone with children though. My partner wants kids and so I’m trying to get sober now for that reason. A child left alone with someone on heroin is a heartbreaking thought, what happened to Paula and Peaches could have been doubly tragic in each case had things gone another way.
There was a post above about whether Paula was sober / teetotal and I remember for some reason the distinct detail that shortly before her death she was buying mini bottles of alcohol several times a day from her local shop (as per the shopkeeper):
It comes to something when local shopkeepers have reason to observe your alcohol-buying habits, believe me… there are such a lot of sad details in this story. Wishing the rest of the family happy and well after the losses they have been through.
There was a post above about whether Paula was sober / teetotal and I remember for some reason the distinct detail that shortly before her death she was buying mini bottles of alcohol several times a day from her local shop (as per the shopkeeper):
It comes to something when local shopkeepers have reason to observe your alcohol-buying habits, believe me… there are such a lot of sad details in this story. Wishing the rest of the family happy and well after the losses they have been through.
I’m sorry you’re addicted to alcohol - I hope you recover and live the life you want to live!
Gerry Agar’s book refers to Paula’s decline and the miniatures she would buy every day towards the end. It’s so strange that she reportedly never touched alcohol or drugs until she got with Michael, despite her history of hanging out with rockstars and being ‘on the scene’.
The book infers she would do anything to keep Michael’s interest, including taking sedative drugs to numb herself during extreme sex acts. In the book, he seems to have great affection and attraction for Paula but has multiple flings throughout their relationship and clearly loved women in general - she probably tried to act like she could handle this but her desire to possess him suggests she would have struggled. She reportedly was very jealous of Helena.
She lied constantly that they were getting married - even telling her daughters to pick out bridesmaid dresses and informing Michael’s mother of the supposed plans - but Michael never proposed and quashed the rumours.
When Michael was gone, she seemed to lose her reason for living - she was desperately obsessed with him. Her plots to pin him down (arranging set ups with the press, lying about Bob’s intentions and having a baby with him) all seemed to push him further away and ultimately to his death - he couldn’t handle the press invasion and mistruths or the way that he perceived Bob was preventing him from living in Australia with his family).
Thank you for the further detail. I’ve seen the book mentioned here and it sounds interesting, I may give it a try. And thanks, doing my best with kicking the booze!! I’ll keep trying.
I’m not surprised at the detail about Paula doing anything, to the point of sedatives for sexual activity with Michael. It’s clear that she was obsessed with him — perhaps the kindest way to put it is besotted, as for much of their time together, Michael did clearly have feelings for her. But I think together, they were a dangerous combination of personalities that weren’t good for each other at all. Paula’s decline is so sad to read about in retrospect when you know how it ended, and hear more about all the things that happened along the way. As well as losing Michael, it sounds like she was very thrown by the revelation of her true parentage and the arguments with BG and everything else got on top of her. I don’t think she meant to die, but to me she was in that mode where you feel too much, and yet you are unfazed by the serious & real risks of what you’re doing. I was struck by the fact I read here that PY was only 41 (by coincidence, my own age now); having been a feature of TV for so long and with four kids and a lot of life lived, it was easy for me at least, to forget she was barely middle-aged when she died.
It’s truly upsetting to think Peaches was even younger than that. The world is a different place after your mother dies (or it was for me), she was only a child when she lost hers so suddenly and that will have had its impact. 25 is a strange age in my view— you are out in the world, and you think you know what you’re doing, but when I look back, I’m not sure I really did know, and I understand the world and myself better now (still figuring it out of course, as we all are). How sad that the mistakes Peaches made at that kind of age included one she couldn’t come back from.
My mum was an alcoholic and sadly it got the better of her in the end. But you have recognised that you have a problem and you want to do something about it - my mum never achieved that so you are already on the road to recovery!
I also thought Paula was older when she died and was surprised to see she was a similar age to me.
You’re right that there appeared to be several factors to her death - money was one of them. She apparently lived far beyond her means after she left Bob and consequently was regularly over £100,000 debt, missing mortgage payments, dodging bailiffs and doing tacky interviews to raise funds. She didn’t want Michael to know about her financial situation at first but eventually he was providing her with a lot of support.
During her divorce from Bob, she was sending the kids to school in taxis because she couldn’t afford her own car - and she got in tons of debt with the cab company. Then her and Gerry (who had PR contacts) arranged for the press to photograph Paula walking the girls to school to try and turn public favour against Bob for financially neglecting them. But around the corner, away from the cameras, was a taxi for the girls to pile into and take them to school.
You write so eloquently.
I’m 41 too. For some reason I thought Paula was older when she died. She really did pack a lot into her relatively short life.
How awful must Hutchence have been that he was inflicting such pain during sex that Paula needed sedatives? How awful for her that she was so besotted that she felt the need to do that
Are you saying MH was a sadist?
I don't know, just wondering why his intimate partner needed sedatives to cope with having sex with him and why he thought that was ok
I’d call someone a sadist if they wanted to perform sexual acts that caused their partner such physical pain they had to take sedatives yeah.
I interpreted that differently from that Gerry Agar book. I took the implication being that she got into drugs more to share that with him, and also due to the stress of the whole situation and him having other partners. Could be wrong of course!
I've not read the book, I was just thinking about a pp comment. I think they were highly toxic to one another though
It's so sad, it really pulls on my heart strings this one, when I was a young naive lass wanting to work in the music industry Paula was an example of a woman who wrote, managed kids, worked a vintage look, was rebellious and witty and had a rock n roll career, all the things I thought I wanted to be.
I think that finding out her father wasn't her father would of been a huge and unsettling situation for her combined with the loss of steady old Bob even if she did choose that path. I found out the same thing about my parentage and it threw my world upside down. Also my Mum tried to die when I was a toddler and alone in the house with her. I was 2. I don't remember it happening but I do remember things that happened in the weeks after.
And so, I watch the stories of this family unfold with horror and recognition and understanding and thank my lucky stars my only addictions are to tea, nicotine and snogging. Fortunately my child and their's are settled, healthy and happy. Life really does throw awful curveballs at the worst of times, some of which you can never come back from. I was always determined not to be my Mum, as sad as that seems, it helped me provide a stable upbringing for my own.
I was going to post a couple of weird links I found regarding mention of Roth getting pissed and telling a couple of girlfriends what really happened to Peaches as well as some really weird arsed story about the time she was photographed naked and high by someone claiming it was at the celeb scientology centre but right now, I think I shall I shall make a sweet cuppa and think on Paula, Peaches and my Mum for a mo and count my lucky, normal, suburban stars.
I think that finding out her father wasn't her father would of been a huge and unsettling situation for her combined with the loss of steady old Bob even if she did choose that path. I found out the same thing about my parentage and it threw my world upside down. Also my Mum tried to die when I was a toddler and alone in the house with her. I was 2. I don't remember it happening but I do remember things that happened in the weeks after.
And so, I watch the stories of this family unfold with horror and recognition and understanding and thank my lucky stars my only addictions are to tea, nicotine and snogging. Fortunately my child and their's are settled, healthy and happy. Life really does throw awful curveballs at the worst of times, some of which you can never come back from. I was always determined not to be my Mum, as sad as that seems, it helped me provide a stable upbringing for my own.
I was going to post a couple of weird links I found regarding mention of Roth getting pissed and telling a couple of girlfriends what really happened to Peaches as well as some really weird arsed story about the time she was photographed naked and high by someone claiming it was at the celeb scientology centre but right now, I think I shall I shall make a sweet cuppa and think on Paula, Peaches and my Mum for a mo and count my lucky, normal, suburban stars.
I’m sorry to hear of your sad experiences, I bet you are a amazing mum.
You could do that as well as post the links?
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