Section:GDN 12 PaGe:10 Edition Date:190807 Edition:01 Zone: Sent at 6/8/2019 18:21 cYanmaGentaYellowbla

• The Guardian
  10 Wednesday 7 August 2019
  Arts

From Audrey Hepburn

to the Beatles, Frank Sinatra and

Elton John, there aren’t many pop

cultural icons Terry O’Neill hasn’t

photographed. One of his subjects,

Hollywood actress Faye Dunaway –

who he famously captured hungover,

surrounded by newspapers the

morning after winning an Oscar in

1977 – became his wife, even if the

memory now frustrates him. He

agrees that a photographer falling

in love with one of their subjects is

rarely a good idea: “That was a waste

of 12 years of my life!”

Yet the photographer insists none

of the se stars compared to David

Bowie. “He was my creative muse,”

O’Neill tells me over the phone. “He

was so charming and warm, and one

of the few people [other than Faye]

I really felt friendly towards.”

Currently suff ering from prostate

cancer, O’Neill is confi ned to bed

and admits that he’s severely lacking

in energy. But the mention of Bowie

will occasionally cause the 81-year-

old’s hoarse cockney drawl to soften

and lighten up with enthusiasm.

“I treated David like a

Shakespear ean actor as you never

knew who was going to show up,”

he says aff ectionately. “He could

look alien-like or female-like; it was

always so exciting as everything he

did was so unpredictable.”

‘Bowie never

needed

coaxing’

Shocked by the

fl ash ... from

the shoot for

Diamond Dogs

‘I’m bringing

someone special’

... Bowie with

William

Burroughs

Over a 20-year period, O’Neill

captured Bowie’s shapeshifting

artistry better than just about

anybody else, standing behind the

camera as the Space Oddity singer

transformed into glam avatar Ziggy

Stardust , then morphed into the

coke-addled Thin White Duke , who

in 1976 told Rolling Stone’s Cameron

Crowe : “I think I might have been a

bloody good Hitler. I’d be an excellent

dictator.” Although, O’Neill claims:

“I don’t remember him saying that .”

His last magazine shoot with

Bowie in 1992 was shot like a

sentimental happy ending, with

O’Neill’s warm closeups giving off

the impression he was delighted the

star had managed to make it out of

the 1970s alive. “It felt like we had

come full circle,” he agrees.

O’Neill’s photographs have left

such a lasting impression because

he was able to demystify some of the

20th century’s biggest icons and cut

to the core of their personalities. His

photographs of Audrey Hepburn, for

example, went beyond the cliches of

her delicate beauty and prioritised

her goofy side , as she pulled silly

faces while relaxing by the pool.

The imperious strength of

Winston Churchill, meanwhile, is

something O’Neill ripped to pieces.

Instead, we saw a frail old man who

was admirably trying to keep up

the illusion of the cigar-munching

British Bulldog despite the fact he

was so weak he had to be carried

around in a chair by minders. “It was

1962 and I was going home from the

offi ce and saw this crowd forming,”

he recalls. “I burst my way through

it to take a photograph and it was

Churchill leaving the hospital. I

didn’t really know his whole story

so I just shot what was in front of me.

The fact I didn’t have any emotional

baggage maybe helped.”

Three years earlier, O’Neill had

started working at the Daily Sketch,

becoming one of the youngest

photographers in Fleet Street.

“I wanted to be just like W Eugene

Smith , who was such a great

photojournalist. His images were full

of truth.” One of the fi rst gigs he took

on was Laurence Olivier dressed as

a woman for a performance at the

London variety show The Night of a

Hundred Stars; perfect training for the

gender fl uidity of Bowie that would

await him. “There was a 12-year-

age gap between me and the next

youngest photographer,” he recalls.

According to O’Neill, nobody in

Fleet Street wanted to interact with

the youth scene and its emerging

‘He was my

muse’ ...

Zigg y Stardust’s

last outing

in 1973

Terry O’Neill

photographed

the biggest stars

on Earth – but

David Bowie was

his favourite. He

recalls his charm,

his crazy outfi ts

and his druggiest

shoot with

Thomas Hobbs

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