Kylie Minogue reveals ‘triggering’ moment from Netflix documentary that might surprise you

Kylie Minogue hasn’t spent 40 years as one of the biggest pop stars that ever lived by playing it safe – behind that gentle smile is a rebel.

It’s a facet of Kylie that isn’t celebrated enough, but one which shines through in her three-part Netflix series reflecting on the life and career of one of the most resilient stars of the last century.

Ever since she topped the charts with her debut single I Should Be So Lucky in 1987, working with leading hitmakers Stock Aitken Waterman – one of the most successful songwriting partnerships of all time – playing it safe was never an option.

Despite being on track to become the most successful recording artist in the world, Kylie refused to be boxed in, abandoning the guaranteed success SAW could bring to go out on her own.

But in Kylie, we see how much of a price she paid for taking back control of her music, her voice and, most controversially, her image.

By the early 90s, no longer was she ’squeaky clean’ Kylie Minogue. Instead, she was a woman with perspective, ambition and a friendship with designer John Galliano, where together they created scandalous outfits that would shock the nation, as the former girl-next-door gyrated with topless men on stage before the world was ready for it.

The radio banned her music, the media was obsessed with labelling her ‘raunchy’, and there was a moment in time when Kylie’s career could well have been over.

But with the power of hindsight, more than 30 years later, the singer reveals what she thinks of that young woman – who she affectionately calls ‘Baby Kylie’ – now after watching the documentary back.

‘I’m really proud of her,’ she tells Metro. ‘But people go, “Well, how did you [get through that]?”

‘I wasn’t going.. “I’m gonna do this” I think when I was either being told no, or hearing no, or feeling no, and I go… but I haven’t got there yet.’

Still, she remains diplomatic. At only one point in the documentary do we see Kylie’s mask slip and her get angry at one of the countless journalists who confronted her with alarming inappropriateness. Otherwise, she is hounded with misogyny and vulgar questioning by men and takes it in her stride.

She reflects: ‘I totally understand criticism at any point in this career because what you do isn’t for everyone, and sometimes you don’t do it that well, and you’re putting yourself into that space, but in the early days I understand it, because I wasn’t formed.

‘I really didn’t know what I was doing, but as a person who likes to not be boxed in and likes to know that there’s opportunity, there’s possibly – if there’s a possibility, it’s not a known… actually maybe that’s the best way I could say it.’

Of course, Kylie isn’t a lone wolf when it comes to female pop stars being directed, judged, and mercilessly attacked for expressing their sexuality. Madonna paved the way for women to be proudly provocative, and right to this day, there are countless cases of pop princesses being cruelly scrutinised for daring to be anything other than PG.

I ask Kylie if she’s taken any artists under her wing when they’re enduring similarly unfair criticism in the public eye.

She recalls: ‘I won’t say who was in the room, but there was some pop girlies after my show on the Tension tour, and I was just saying how much I love self-recording.

‘I love being in the room with other people, but through lockdown I learnt to self-record, and it changed so much for me to have that control – I’m setting it up, I’m doing the takes, whether it’s three in the morning very often or eight in the morning – I realised that over all those years the microphone, which is the portal, was always someone else’s.

‘There’s some stuff that’s triggering for me to see in this documentary of being out in the recording room, and there’s guys — always guys in the control room – but to just to spend my time with my microphone in my space was unreal, so saying to these girls, “You might not need it, but I loved it.”’

Kylie is the latest series from producer John Battsek and director Michael Harte, who brought us the ‘be honest’ documentary Beckham.

John had spent years in conversation with Kylie to make her his next blockbuster project, but for one reason or another, the timing didn’t align until, somewhat unexpectedly, she had one of the biggest singles of her career in Padam Padam at a time when so-called ‘legacy artists’ rarely break through on radio and singles charts.

Clearly, there was yet another chapter of her story being written, with many more to go.

John brought Michael and Kylie together for dinner at the exclusive Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles, where they just hit it off and began to lay the foundations of a special miniseries.

Michael says: ‘I remember it was like Nick Cave describes her in episode two, she was like a beam of light when she walked in. There was an energy to her, and I was familiar enough with the story, but not that familiar. I could feel that if we could take that and put us into a documentary, it’d be electric.’

But Michael had a tough job on his hands. Kylie has uniquely managed to give the public enough of her to make us feel like we know her when, actually, we don’t know anything about her at all. She’s both open and a closed book, and it took time before she gave him her full trust.

In Kylie, she still has a guard up and, after how she’s been treated by the media for the last four decades, it’s no wonder.

But she’s still vulnerable, perhaps the most we’ve seen her before, particularly discussing her two-year relationship with the late INXS frontman Michael Hutchence, which has clearly had a hugely profound effect on her life ever since.

At one point, as tears begin to build, she even admits: ‘I’ve been looking for something like that ever since – and haven’t got it.’

‘That was the first time I really saw something that had emotionally stuck with her,’ says Michael.

‘This is a person who’s got a lot inside them that has a lot to say, and there’s a lot of feelings in there, and that she hasn’t really necessarily even talked that much to anybody else about this, and so that was the moment I thought, “Okay, we’re getting somewhere.”’

I ask John and Michael if this film would lay to rest any misconceptions the public might have about Kylie.

Michael tells me: ‘She’s incredibly hard working and dedicated, and I’m not just saying this, but she loves her fans, and that’s what drives her through all this. It’s not fame or any of that kind of stuff, it’s the connection she has with her fans.’

I put the same question to Kylie, who grins: ‘That you can contain me in a documentary, because you can’t – life is bigger than that.’

Kylie is available to stream on Netflix from May 20

Got a story?

If you’ve got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the Metro.co.uk entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@metro.co.uk, calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we’d love to hear from you.

Comments


Add as preferred source