Bette Midler Biography
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Bette Midler was
born on December 1, 1945 in Honolulu, Hawaii to
Fred and Ruth (Schindel) Midler. She has two
older sisters, Judith and Susan. Her mother was
a big movie buff and named all of her daughters
after movie stars: Bette Davis, Judy Garland and
Susan Hayward. She also has a younger brother,
Daniel.
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Her parents
introduced her to the world of entertainment
when she was a young child by bringing her to
movies, plays and musicals. This sparked her
interest in becoming a star. She appeared in her
school plays, and even competed in local talent
shows (she once won a $2 prize).
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After she graduated
Radford High School, she attended the University
of Hawaii (where she majored in drama), but
began thinking about pursuing a career as a
singer/actress. Her movie debut came in 1966,
when she got a small part in the movie Hawaii,
which was filming locally. However, she knew
that Hawaii, although beautiful, was not the
place for her to succeed, so she saved up all
her money (working many jobs, including as a
canner at a Pineapple factory) to buy a one-way
ticket to New York.
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In lat 1966, she
began to take on many different acting jobs
including a sales person and a go-go dancer.
[Note: she made many friends in the business,
including a life long friend, Barry Manillow) He
was in the chorus of the Broadway musical,
Fiddler on the Roof, but got a break
and eventually moved on to the role of Tizel.
However, three years later, her sister came to
visit her in New York. On her way to the play
she was hit and killed by a speeding taxi while
crossing the street. This had an impact on her
professionally, and decided that the constant
grind of working every night was too much, and
quit the lights of the Broadway stage in 1969.
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In 1970, she began
appearing at local clubs such as The Continental
Baths (frequented by gay men and transvestites).
She created an alter-ego, The Divine Miss M. and
would sing various songs, intertwined with humor
and whit. Lady luck came into the picture in
1971, when she was appearing at The Bitter End
(a club in New York City), Ahmet Ertugun, the
president of Atlantic Records, happened to be in
the audience. He loved her show, came back
stage afterwards, and offered her a record
contract.
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She released her
first album in 1972 entitled The Divine Miss
M, (produced by Barry Manillow) followed by
a whirlwind North American tour. Anyone seeing
Midler perform instantly became a fan. Her
album reached number 9 on the Billboard list.
For her work on this album, she won her first
Grammy Award for Best New Artist. During this
time, she also appeared at the Sahara with
Johnny Carson.
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In 1974, she
appeared in her second movie, The Thorn.
She also leant her voice to the animated film as
the Scarecrow in Scarecrow in the Garden of
Cucumbers (1972).
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Her second album,
self-titled album, Bette Midler, was
released in 1973. Although it broke the top ten
list in Billboard, it was trashed by critics. In
fact, Jon Landau’s criticism in Rolling Stone
caused her to go into a state of severe
depression, eventually going into a nervous
breakdown.
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Bette bounced back
in 1975, going back to Broadway, with her own
show Clams On the Half Shell Revue. The
show was a huge success. She used the high
spirits to record her third album, Songs For
the New Depression, titled as such from her
recent episode. However, the album did not due
as well as expected, and only reached number 27
on the Billboard album list. To promote sales,
she went out on tour, however, the album still
did not reach the commercial success she had
hoped for. As a consolation prize, the tour
spurned a cable television (HBO) special, O’l
Red Hair is Back, which won an Emmy Award
for Outstanding Comedy or Variety Special. She
also released a critically acclaimed live album.
Live at Last, recorded from her tour.
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Her next two
albums, Broken Blossom (1977) and
Thighs and Wispers (1979) were not big
sellers, however, Bette received a big break in
movies in 1979 when she was given the role as
Mary Rose Foster in The Rose. For this role, she
won Golden Globes for Best Actress in a Musical
or Comedy and Best Newcomer to Film. She was
also nominated for the Academy Award for Best
Actress. In addition, she also won her second
Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal
Performance for the soundtrack to The Rose.
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The following year,
she went back out on tour, aptly named the
Divine Madness Tour. The tour was a huge
success, and so was a live film based on the
tour, also called Divine Madness, in
which she was nominated for a Golden Globe for
Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy.
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She starred in her
next movie in 1982, entitled Jinxed. However,
the movie was not successful. So, she turned
back to music once again and began another tour
in 1983 while recording her next album, No
Frills, released later that year, which was
had some mild success. This brought her into
another state of depression and alcoholism.
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Bette found
happiness and love love in 1984 and married
singer Martin von Hasselberg. They began
planning their marriage after only knowing each
other for two year. She gave birth to their
daughter Sophie
Frederica Alohilani Von Haselberg in
November 1986.
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Now as a new mommy,
she signed a movie contract with Disney and
starred in fairly successful movies, such as
Ruthless People (1986) [awarded
American Comedy Award for Funniest Actress in a
Motion Picture], Outrageous Fortune (1987)
[won another American Comedy Award and nominated
for a Golden Globe], Down and Out in Beverly
Hills (1986) nominated for a Golden Globe],
and Beaches (1988). The movie Beaches
was a huge success and the soundtrack followed
suit. In fact, the song, “Wind Beneath My
Wings,” from the album won a Grammy Award for
Best Record of the Year.
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In 1987 she
received American Comedy Awards for Lifetime
Achievement in Comedy and Funniest Female
Performer of the Year. That same year she also
won the American
Cinematheque Award.
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In the midst of her
flourishing movie career, believe it or not, she
had time to release another album, Some People’s
Lives (1990), which went Platinum.
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She followed these
up with other movies, such as Stella
(1990), Scenes From the Mall (1991), and
For the Boys (1991). She won a Golden
Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actress
in a Motion Picture – Comeny/Musical for her
role in For the Boys. The soundtrack from
the movie For the Boys went gold.
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In 1993, she won a
Golden Globe award for Best Performance by an
Actress in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made
for TV for her role in Gypsy. She was
also nominated for an Emmy Award for this role.
This was also the same year that
Johnny Carson
said his final goodbye on the Tonight Show.
Bette Midler was his final guest and won two
Emmy Awards for her appearance: Outstanding
Individual Performance in a Variety or Music
Program and Funniest Female in a Television
Special. In ’93 she also appeared at the Radio
City Music Hall to the delight of critics and
fans, and released a well selling greatest hits
albums.
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In 1995, she
released her album Bette of Roses, which went
Platinum. In 1996, she was back on screen in
The First Wives Club, which did very well at
the box office and followed that up with Get
Shorty later that year. However, over the
next few years, she has not had resounding
success on the big screen, including the much
anticipated Stepford Wives in 2004.
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Her music career in
the late 1990’s and early 2000’s was more
successful than her screen career. In 1998 she
released Bathhouse Betty, and followed it up the
following year with the Divine Miss Millenium
Tour – both were successful.
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She was given her
own television show in 2000, called Bette,
and an album of the same name. Although she won
a People’s Choice Award for Favorite Female
Performer in a New Television Series, the TV
Guide Award for Actress of the Year in a New
Series and was nominated for a Golden Globe for
Best Performance by an Actress in a TV series –
Comedy/Musical, the show was cancelled in 2001.
Bette was actually happy, since working on the
series was too much work and did not allow her
to do other things. The album Bette broke
into the top 40 on Billboards album charts.
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In 2003, she
honored Rosemary Clooney, by recording her songs
(with the help of Barry Manillow) in an album
called Bette Midler Sings the Rosemary
Clooney Songbook. The album sold many
copies.
Biography by Ian Ripley,
PopStarsPlus.com, Sr. Staff Writer
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