Survivor: Russell Watson considered suicide at his lowest point during cancer treatment but the thought of his family drew him back
Tenor Russell Watson has been invited to sing in the Royal Variety Show, at the London Palladium next month.
For him it is the icing on the cake in a year which is seeing him making a triumphant comeback after a long struggle back to good health.
Two devastating brain tumours had threatened to bring an end to a successful career which had seen him sell seven million records, win two Classical Brit awards and sing for The Queen, the Pope and President Bush.
Life-saving surgery, weeks of radiotherapy and a long spell of depression left him convinced he might never sing again. At one point he even considered suicide.
But the standing ovations he received for his starring role in the new musical Kristina, written by Abba’s Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson, at London’s Royal Albert Hall earlier this year, helped restore his confidence.
A lucrative record contract with the Epic label, who are releasing his new album, La Voce, next week, and a nationwide comeback tour set for next year, went the rest of the way to convincing him that he was at last back on the road to the top.
‘It’s been a long, hard struggle’, he says, ‘and I’ve shed a lot of tears along the way. But now I’m filled with new hope.’
We meet in a luxury hotel overlooking London’s Kensington Gardens. He is wearing a well-cut three-piece suit, with silk tie and crisp white shirt and looks every inch the superstar he is — but thought he never would be again.
‘I believe I’ve survived for a reason’, he says. ‘What happened to me was ordained. I don’t know why I was put through so much illness and pain, but I do know that I’ve come out of it a better person.
'I nearly died twice, and that has to shake you up and make you see and feel things in a different way. I feel closer to God and I thank him for giving me another chance’.
When his first brain tumour, the size of two golf balls, was diagnosed in 2006 he kept the news to himself, but on the night before surgery he decided to tell his daughters Rebecca, and Hannah what was happening.
He says: ‘They live with their mother, Helen, from whom I’m divorced, but I see them a lot and here they were, bouncing around, so happy and full of life, yet I was nursing this awful secret.
New beginnings: Russell with new love Louise Harris, 21
'It was tough and afterwards I rushed to the bathroom, buried my head in a towel and cried. Then I took a grip on myself — “Right, Watson, let’s get on with it.”’
Fortunately, the tumour was benign, but then a year later a second — more aggressive — growth was discovered.
‘I was convinced I wouldn’t pull through. This one was pressing on my optic nerve and I was warned I could go blind if it got worse. The pain was horrendous and the medication made me aggressive.
'I’d fly off the handle at everything, but poor Rebecca and Hannah took it in their stride. And now I can see it has brought us closer’.
Looking back on how the tumours affected him, he says he took his temper out on quite a few telephones and doors, and once even a boiler. ‘It wouldn’t stop clanking, so I gave it what for. I was a seriously messed up human being — high in the sky one minute, down and dark the next’.
The pain, though, gave him his worst days. ‘I remember standing on a hotel balcony in Los Angeles thinking that the suffering had brought me to rock bottom. My vision was going, but although I could see the sprawling landscape of Hollywood, my head was aching so much that it was making me cry. I was thinking: “I’ve had enough,”
‘For one fleeting moment, I considered ending it all. Then I thought about my kids and my friends, and that stopped me.’
After the operations, a long course of radiotherapy and strong steroids took their toll.
‘I’d put on 2st and I looked like Friar Tuck. Not only was I fat, but I was almost bald because my hair had fallen out in clumps. The turning point came when I was driving home from the hospital after my 25th, and final, radiotherapy treatment. I stopped the car, jumped out and punched the air, shouting: “Yes, it’s all done.”
Family man: Russell with daughters Rebecca and Hannah
‘Next day I booked into a gym to lose the weight, went on a strict diet and I’ve never looked back. And, if there’s a bonus, it is that the operations have opened up my nasal cavity and cleared my sinuses, which has had a beneficial effect on my voice.’
It’s not just his career that is back on track for 43-year-old Watson. His private life is more settled, too, for he has fallen in love with 21-year-old office worker Louise Harris, who has moved into his £1.2 million Cheshire mansion.
They met in a smart restaurant called Panacea in Alderley Edge, not far from his home. ‘I saw her across a crowded room and thought she looked incredibly nice.
I’d been single for more than four years. There was my divorce from Helen after 13 years, then I was with Roxanne Valerio for four years, then my illness made me lose faith in myself.’
That night in Panacea changed everything. ‘I took it slowly at first, because I still wasn’t sure I was ready, but the more I got to know Louise the more certain I became.
And she gets on incredibly well with my daughters. Rebecca’s 15 now and Hannah is eight, so at 21 Louise is almost like a big sister to them, and they’ve really bonded.
‘Louise wasn’t a fan when I met her. She knew of my work, but that’s all. But she was never afraid to say what she thinks, and I like that — I like people who are absolutely genuine, and she is.’
He says it’s too early to talk of marriage, but he sees his future with her. What about the age gap though?
Hard times: Russell leaves hospital after life-saving surgery in 2007
‘It feels right. I thought about it and asked myself, who cares? God, after two brain ops, the radiotherapy and all the medication I still take . . . aren’t I due some happiness?’
His resilience, he believes, comes from his tough background. His father Tim was a welder in a steelworks and his mother, Nola, worked in Woolworth’s.
Both encouraged him to sing from the age of six. Young Watson left school early with no qualifications and got a £29.50 a week job in a factory making nuts and bolts.
In 1990 he was signed by an agent after he won a radio talent contest and gave in his notice at the factory. ‘See you back here next week’, said his boss sarcastically as Watson left.
His career floundered and times were hard. He owed thousands and there were days when all he could afford to eat was beans on toast. But gradually things improved and in 2001 he released his first album, quickly followed by four others before illness halted his career.
The early days of his new-found fame, he says, were not his finest. ‘I was arrogant, a bit of a t****r, and I upset a lot of people. I put it down to immaturity and inexperience.’
He had plenty of time to reflect on his past behaviour while he was ill. ‘I knew it was going to be tough to regain the place I’d had. But I was never frightened of hard work.’
He only began to see light at the end of the tunnel when approached to take the male lead in Kristina, a musical about a family who emigrate to America in the 1850s.
(Abba’s Bjorn and Benny told me they had waited for him to get better before they offered him the part. ‘He is a fantastic tenor — powerful, sensitive and emotional’, said Bjorn. ‘We didn’t audition anyone else because we only wanted him.’)
He sees his new album, on which he sings evergreen Italian songs, as completion of the rebirth process.
‘During the dark days, one of my friends predicted it wouldn’t be long before I would be performing at the Royal Variety Show.
‘So you can imagine how thrilled I was to ring him the other night and tell him I’d just got my invitation!’
■ Russell Watson’s La Voce album (Epic Records) is out on Monday. The Russell Watson UK Tour Spring 2011 starts Sunday, March 27.
Source:Dailymail
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