IT training readers digest UK TruePDF april 2019

COVER PHOTOGRAPH © RICCARDO GHILARDI/CONTRIBUTOR/GETTY IMAGESAPRIL 2019 • 1 16 IT’S A MANN’S WORLD Olly Mann rediscovers the joys to be had in Britain’s libraries with help from his youn

COVER PHOTOGRAPH © RICCARDO GHILARDI/CONTRIBUTOR/GETTY IMAGES

APRIL 2019 • 1

16 IT’S A MANN’S WORLD

Olly Mann rediscovers the joys

to be had in Britain’s libraries

with help from his young son

ENTERTAINMENT

20 INTERVIEW:

RALPH FIENNES

Our chat with the elusive

actor turned director unearthed

more mysteries than it solved

30 “I REMEMBER”:

CHRIS STEIN

One half of the legendary new

wave band Blondie looks back

on his incredible career

40 EVERY ARTHRITIS

QUESTION ANSWERED

This painful joint disease is

actually a collection of ailments

Here’s what you need to know

INSPIRE

60 BEST OF BRITISH:

WILDLIFE

We round up the best spots

in Britain to dust off your

binoculars this bank holiday

Features

72 DANCING WITH DEATH

Exploring the surprising new movement demystifying dying

TRAVEL & ADVENTURE

82 VAN GOGH IN LONDON

Did you know that Vincent van Gogh spent three years living in London? We went on the trail of the legendary artist

Each month Reader’s Digest navigate the woes and wonders of modern life, weighing in with

leading experts on the everyday tools we need to survive and thrive in 2019

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APRIL 2019 • 3

8 Over to You

12 See the World Differently

50 Advice: Susannah Hickling

54 Column: Dr Max Pemberton

102 Column: Andy Webb

FOOD & DRINK

106 Tasty recipes and ideas

from Rachel Walker

HOME & GARDEN

110 Column: Cassie Pryce

FASHION & BEAUTY

114 Column: Lisa Lennkh on how to look your best

127 Books That Changed

My Life: Michelle Paver TECHNOLOGY

128 Column: Olly Mann FUN & GAMES

130 You Couldn’t Make It Up

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Dear Readers,

As we move into spring it’s time to start planning some exciting dates for your diary this Easter and beyond Why not treat the whole family and join your favourite childhood characters in the musical spectacular

WHERE IS PETER RABBIT? Based on the original tales by Beatrix Potter, with all your favourite, this

heart-warming production makes its West End premiere at the Theatre Royal Haymarket this April With voices

provided by Griff Rhys Jones and Miriam Margolyes.

If you’re looking for something a bit different, why not book tickets to the 2019 season in the stunning surroundings

of Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre? Playing this year are EVITA, A MIDSUMMERS NIGHT’S DREAM,

HANSEL AND GRETEL and OUR TOWN – perfect for all the family!

If you’re a big fan of musicals then THE BEST OF…ROCK MUSICALS is for you! Featuring a star-studded

cast of West End and Broadway performers and musicians, you’ll hear all your favourite songs from hit musicals including Miss Siagon, Wicked, Chess, Rent, The Lion King and We Will Rock You, for one night only this May!

Finally, returning to London from July is JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR, the multi award-winning production

by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber Playing just 60 performances at the Barbican following two

sell-out seasons at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre in 2017, this gorgeous, thrilling, heavenly musical is an almighty revelation.

Whatever you want to experience this season, we have a whole range of shows and days out just for you Browse through our range of musicals, plays, attractions, river cruises, afternoon teas, exhibitions and more at

tickets.readersdigest.co.uk or call 020 7400 1238.

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APRIL 2019 • 7

In This Issue…

Like so many youngsters before me, I grew up wanting

to be Debbie Harry Watching and rewatching clips of

Blondie performing “Sunday Girl” on Top of the Pops,

I was as transfixed by her androgynous suit and huge peroxide blow-out as I was by the cool character stood slightly behind her on guitar, with the skinny tie and the shock of black hair My younger self would hardly believe that one day I’d interview Chris Stein

in the flesh (if you’ll pardon the pun), and that he’d

be just as hip and humble as I’d hoped Turn to p30 for his memories

of being one half of the coolest band on the planet, as well as his

recollections of 9/11, growing up in Brooklyn and the best live

concert he ever saw—Bob Marley in Texas, does it get any cooler?

Death is a natural part of the life cycle, so why are so

many of us afraid of it? Are we scared of the unknown or

is it just down to our unwillingness to accept that the

world will go on without us after we’re gone? But to live

your life in death anxiety is to waste your precious time

on earth As J K Rowling put it, “To the well-organised

mind, death is but the next great adventure”—all we need

to do is to recalibrate our notion of passing On p72, we

talk to five women who did just that and overcame their own fear of dying Now, they’ve made it their mission to help others do the

same through some unique if somewhat unconventional methods

Anna

Eva

EDITORS’ LETTERS

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Over To You

LETTERS ON THE FEBRUARY ISSUE

We pay £50 for Letter of the Month and £30 for all others

I was mesmerised, it’s totally awe-inspiring and captivating I could not resist moving from Olly Mann’s attic, to Jane Goodall’s remembrance, to SAD management, to saving humanity and more Reader’s Digest is addictive

and I am so glad I subscribed

Muhammed Hebala, Yorkshire

OUT WITH THE OLD

Olly Mann’s column about repurposing his old files really made

me chuckle My dad is a hoarder and always urged us to hang on

to all our old school work and books, just in case they one day came in useful I took his advice for a while and then I realised that I was never going to read through all that stuff

again So, I recycled it Except, like Olly, I couldn’t

bear to part with the university essays I doubt I

will ever refer to them again, but it’s comforting

to know they are there; a physical reminder of

times gone by I donated the empty folders to

my dad in the hope they’d help him sort his own

vast collections of papers

Jennie Gardner, Somerset

8 • APRIL 2019

R E A D E R ’ S D I G E S T

APRIL 2019 • 9

Richard E Grant’s interview was

a compelling article His career

in the entertainment industry is

going from strength to strength

even after two decades in the

business I best know him from

his roles as Dr Zander Rice in

the film Logan and Izembaro in

the sixth season of Game of

Thrones—a particular favourite

of mine

I did find it a shame, however,

that he said he was not a very

forgiving person It took me a

long time to recognise what

forgiving someone can do for

your soul

I’ve spent a lot of my life

holding onto things I didn’t know I was holding onto for fear

of appearing weak if I forgave and moved on However, I soon realised that when you start building walls to protect yourself from one person, your entire head, heart and way of thinking is surrounded by roadblocks You are holding onto a grudge so tight it spills into all your other relationships

I hope one day Richard finds it

in his heart to be more forgiving He would feel much better about himself if he did I know I did about myself

Corrina C Williams, Denbighshire

O V E R T O Y O U

10 • APRIL 2019

MAKING SOUNDWAVES

I was very interested to read

your article about the book Last

Train to Hilversum: A Journey in

Search of the Magic of Radio

Like the author Charlie Connelly

I remember how back in the

Sixties a radio was huge and had

names such as Hilversum printed on

the wavelength selector As a child, I

always listened to Children’s Hour on

the BBC Home Service, and I managed

to appear on the programme several

times—first, as a contestant in

Regional Round Later, I was invited to

THE SKIN YOU’RE IN

Skin says it all in her article, “If I ruled

the World.” Feminism means equality

with men—that’s it We only complicate

the issue by demanding other pointless

changes I also agree with her thoughts

that youth clubs are essential for young

people and motorbikes deserve the use of

the road as much as other vehicles

Most of all, we need to ditch the blame culture

and use argument and discussion more often We

should be prepared to accept differences of opinion with

humour, tolerance and honesty Having another point of view does not make you right or wrong, but debate gives you an insight into the views of others and, most importantly, why they think differently

Philippa Sampson, Devon

Send letters to readersletters@readersdigest.co.uk

Please include your full name, address, email and daytime phone number

WE WANT

TO HEAR

talk about my love of clarinet music This led to becoming a Young Critic, for which I visited the theatre, cinema and art exhibitions My name was even

printed in Radio Times!

Naturally, after leaving school

I went to work for the BBC I spent a few years in their press office and met many celebrities, including an astronaut from the Apollo missions Reading about this book brought back all my happy memories of the time

I worked in radio

Lucy Pesaro, Middlesex

See the world

TURN THE PAGE…

Aloe Dichotoma—the quiver tree—

grows mostly in the southern, rocky

areas of the African continent Extreme

temperature variations, sparse rain and

relentless sunshine make survival here

anything but easy With its forked silver

limbs and comparatively massive trunk

however, this tree has adapted well to its

perilous surroundings and grows up to

30ft tall Its shimmering bark reflects the

sun while its branches are particularly

efficient at storing water Not even a

night-time frost presents a challenge

to the quiver tree, as the surrounding

stones effectively store the day’s heat,

releasing it slowly until the next sunrise

15

Ispent school lunchbreaks in the

library This was neither nerdy

reclusion nor hipster affectation:

I could, conceivably, have joined the

cool kids behind the tennis courts,

but I didn’t smoke; and, if an

aspirational geek culture around

comic books and computer games

existed in the early 1990s, it had yet

to reach north Hertfordshire No, I

went to the library simply because it

had central heating, and large tables

around which my mates and I made

each other laugh, and it wasn’t the

sick room Students who hung

around with Matron in their leisure

time had mummy-issues This I

knew, even then

It felt lightly subversive, sneakily

I T ’ S A M A N N ’ S W O R L D

sharing crisps and bantering boisterously in the reading room as the occasional teacher tutted Plus,

we were spared the school bullies, who tended not to frequent the library Bullies aren’t big readers.That building, with its peppery carpet tiles and phlegm-coloured radiators, bequeathed me many fond memories It housed an industrial-sized photocopier, for example, from which I pumped out 200 weekly copies of the school newspaper (under my editorship, we went tabloid “Worm Found On School Potato!” was the sensational highlight.) The library also contained the school’s sole copy of Microsoft Encarta, the “digital encyclopaedia” CD-Rom

Encarta was a bit like Wikipedia, in the same way that a rainy car-boot sale is a bit like Amazon It proffered thousands of articles, analogue equivalents of which were already accessible in the school’s dusty

Fatherhood finds Olly Mann reigniting

his adolescent love for libraries

Parenting By

The Book

Olly Mann presents

Four Thought for

BBC Radio 4, and the award-winning

podcasts The Modern

Mann and Answer

Me This!

16 • APRIL 2019

of the most-borrowed authors in

the UK— Jeffrey Archer, James

Patterson, Jaqueline

Wilson— it’s clear

that the majority of

borrowers are,

essentially, enrolled

for entertainment

Nonetheless, for over a

decade I didn’t set

foot in a library What

was the point, I

reasoned, when I could

I T ’ S A M A N N ’ S W O R L D

buy whatever book I wanted—at second-hand prices if I didn’t want to shell out the RRP—and get it

delivered to my door with the click of

a mouse? Libraries, or so it seemed

to me, were nothing more than day-care centres for the technologically illiterate

Then I became a dad, and, like many parents, re-discovered the joy

of libraries My three-year-old son, Harvey, seemingly had no need for library membership: his bedroom shelf heaves with brilliant books by Judith Kerr, Alan Ahlberg, and probably more works by Julia Donaldson than even Julia Donaldson has in her personal collection They amassed at great speed when I clocked that—since Harvey has a knack for emotionally manipulating me into buying him some tchotchke or trinket every time

we hit the high street—that thing might as well be a book, rather than some cover-mounted plastic plaything en route

to landfill

But I sensed Harvey had begun to see books as rather too available, too unremarkable

I want him to be familiar with, and undaunted

by, the habit of reading But I also recall, from

my own

copies of Britannica—but with the

thrilling opportunity to click on a

short accompanying video

illustrating some of the entries I

suppose this was intended to inspire

related reading Instead, I just

watched the small selection of videos

on endless repeat, and became

unhealthily obsessed with hideous

moments from history Thus, aged

13, I could recite Herb Morrison’s

report from the Hindenburg disaster,

verbatim Oh, the humanity!

After that, libraries never seemed

as much fun Indeed, during my

university years, the library was

perhaps the only building on campus

where fun was specifically

prohibited I did enjoy an occasional

nap in there—slumped over a book

of Anglo-Saxon grammar in the hope

its contents would absorb into my

brain by osmosis—but basically my

perception of libraries became

linked with work, not pleasure What

a shame! Just glancing down the list

18 • APRIL 2019

R E A D E R ’ S D I G E S T

childhood, that a certain scarcity can

add to the magic of discovering a

favourite new tome I still recall the

excitement of unearthing wonderful

stories, deep at the back of the

communal shelves, and my mixed

emotions at having to return them,

three weeks later, for another child to

enjoy I wanted Harvey to have

experiences like that So, we joined

our local library

At first, the idea of ordering a book,

then waiting a week for it to arrive,

completely foxed him He’s grown

at soft-play in a chocolate factory—took some time to teach But now Harvey is a firm fan of the library experience He has his own little card, understands his

responsibilities to return the books

he borrows, and is exposed to a broader range of the community than elsewhere: pupils revising for their GCSEs, local poets and authors, and those old chaps who ostensibly

turn up each day to read The Telegraph, but really, I suspect, are

there for the company Last week, indeed, Harvey was so excited to visit the library that he did a wee on the floor The staff were very sympathetic.Fatherhood, then, has rekindled

my affection for libraries But I must say, I miss the banter n

VIRTUOUS VERMIN

These facts might make you look at rats a little differently…

Rats are capable of empathy A recent study showed that they will choose to help a swimming rat get out of water over chocolate for themselves

At the height of druglord Pablo Escobar’s power, ten per cent of his wealth was written off, because rats had managed to nibble into so many of the

cash stacks stored in his warehouse When they’re tickled rats are sent into fits of ultrasonic giggles inaudible to humans They enjoy the experience so much, they often chase researchers’ hands for more

The distinguished actor chats to Eva Mackevic about his

latest passion project, The White Crow, working with

Anthony Minghella and the importance of kindness But

he’s not too happy about it

20

My shirt is soaking wet. It’s

not a particularly hot day

though, and—no—I haven’t

been caught in the rain or sprinted to

the office—I’ve been on the phone to

Ralph Fiennes for the last half an hour

He called me from New York, where

he’s taking a few days off from filming,

and from the moment I answered the

phone and heard a frostily composed:

“Hello, Eva This is Ralph Fiennes,”

I knew I had my work cut out

I’m on the phone to Ralph to

discuss his third directorial venture,

The White Crow—a biographical

drama about the world’s most

prolific ballet dancer, Rudolf

Nureyev, detailing his life from

the poverty-stricken childhood

in eastern Siberia to his dramatic

Ralph Fiennes

Goes Off Script

20 • APRIL 2019

defection from the USSR in 1961

In addition to directing the film, Ralph also plays Nureyev’s teacher, Alexander Pushkin, performing the role entirely in Russian

The film, he tells me, wasn’t an easy one to make, especially from

a financial perspective “It was extremely difficult A lot of drama

is made on TV now, and this was a film with a lot of scenes in Russian and French, which is a tough sell because English-language movies are more commercially attractive in the market place I also wanted an unknown dancer who could act the role I suppose people were looking for global names which help to sell a movie Not having any always makes

ENTERTAINMENT

It is a tad odd then that far from

relishing the opportunity to sing

the praises of his pet project, Ralph

sounds bored and annoyed, as if he’d

rather be getting his teeth pulled than

having this conversation with me

right now

As we’re chatting about The White

Crow, including the intricacies of

shooting heavily choreographed

scenes and working with a

first-time actor (Nureyev’s portrayed

by the James Dean-esque Russian

ballet soloist, Oleg Ivenko), drawing

questions out of Ralph actually feels

like pulling teeth—each answer is

preceded by a heavy sigh and a pause

that feels like an eternity When it

finally does surface, it inevitably

begins with, “It’s very hard to talk

about these things,” “I don’t know how

to answer your question,” or some intricate variation of the two

I get it, though With such a rich and distinguished filmography under his belt, Ralph can afford to be a tad capricious After all, he’s worked with everyone from Steven Spielberg to Wes Anderson, has been nominated for two Oscars and his stage credits are what any Shakespeare interpreter’s dreams are made of

He is, however, best known for his menacing, villainous film roles, such as the sadistic SS officer in

the war epic, Schindler’s List, or the

fearsome Lord Voldemort in the

Harry Potter franchise

“I look for some point of identification with a character As an actor, if you’re excited by the things

doing, that gives

you the fuel to

play the part ”

R E A D E R ’ S D I G E S T

APRIL 2019 • 23

that your character is doing, if your imagination is stimulated by a scene… that gives you the fuel to play the part, whether they’re good, bad, gentle, kind—or evil monsters You want

to feel how it’s written, I want my imagination to be stimulated by that.” When I ask him whether he feels more comfortable playing villains

or good guys, like The White Crow’s

kind-hearted if slightly meek dance teacher, Pushkin, Ralph practically scolds me for asking such a simplistic question: “I don’t think it’s healthy to

think in terms of, Am I comfortable

or not, it’s more useful to think, Am I closer to getting to some kind of truth here? That’s what you want to be

dancer Oleg Ivenko on

the set of The White

Crow; (top right) as

Lord Voldemort in the

Harry Potter films;

(above) as Amon Goeth

in Schindler’s List

24 • APRIL 2019

and the characters he plays Are the

good ones easier for him to relate

to? Does he consider himself to be a

kind person in general? Finally, I get

a slight reaction Ralph chuckles with

grace and a hint of derision: “Well, I

think that’s something we should all

watch out for, isn’t it? You’re asking

me a big question Isn’t it a lesson

of life to learn how to wrangle one’s

impetuous emotions and selfish

feelings? As you get older, you begin

to see how your actions affect others

and hopefully you gather some kind

of sensibility.”

Now we’re getting somewhere

Ralph reveals that his mother Jennifer

was the perfect example of this kind

of behaviour: patient and tolerant, she

was the one who nurtured her son’s

interest in acting “She was a strong

believer that the child must discover

things for themselves, and must be

given the freedom to find the thing that they wanted to do.”

He even recalls the day he told her he wanted to pursue acting: “I was doing a foundation course at the Chelsea College of Art, which I was enjoying There was a freeing nature

to that course after the conventional grammar school environment The art school atmosphere was designed to push you to be inquisitive and curious and something about it gave me the confidence to say, ‘This is what I need

to do.’ Once I said that to my mother,

it was as if she’d been waiting for me

to say it She was completely behind it She was really supportive of what all her children chose to do.”

Having directed his third film

now, I wonder whether Ralph applies a similar method of gentle encouragement to the way he

Isn’t it a lesson of life to learn how

to wrangle one’s impetuous

emotions and selfish feelings? As you get older, you begin to see

how your actions affect others ”

“

I N T E R V I E W : R A L P H F I E N N E S

R E A D E R ’ S D I G E S T

APRIL 2019 • 25

manages actors on set “That’s a very

beautiful way to instruct and one that

I aspire to but I know I’m quite vocal

I sometimes have to say, ‘No, it has to

be like this.’ But I think the thing is to

say, ‘Yes, that’s interesting but what

happens if we go here? One of the

basic things about directing is not to

close a door You don’t want to close

down the confidence of an actor who’s

exploring and that’s really important.”

Having been on the other side of

the camera, Ralph knows what makes

a great director—he’s had numerous

masters to learn from over the years

As I probe him for anecdotes on the

different movie heavyweights he’s

worked with—Spielberg, Minghella,

26 • APRIL 2019

Redford—he shares bite-sized morsels about their individual styles “They’re all very different Anthony Minghella had a very particular, gentle, probing style I think he genuinely wanted

to see what an actor could reveal for him, and bring to a line or a moment That’s quite rare, when someone is genuinely exploring And Steven [Spielberg] is very different Much more vocal and direct in a very exciting way He would say, ‘Say

it quicker’ or ‘Change the line a bit’ I could really feel his technical knowledge And then there would

be someone like Wes Anderson who would be very precise The words written in the screenplay are the

I N T E R V I E W : R A L P H F I E N N E S

APRIL 2019 • 27

words you’re going to speak He’s not someone who encourages any improvisation around the text Wes loves the actors to do lots of different takes which I like because I get permission to reinvent a scene in many different ways That’s exciting.”

Ralph could talk about directing

all day He admits that he doesn’t have a great technical knowledge but says that he has found the process of learning what a lens can do to a face

or a camera move can do to a moment fascinating His private life? Not so much The moment I allude to his dating life, he shoots right back: “I’m not going to talk about it The tone of your question is towards my personal life and the moment you bring in the word ‘romantic’, my doors are closing.”

“Not to worry,” I say and move on to the next question, but I immediately feel the repercussions of my careless move, as Ralph reverts back to one-word answers:

“What do you do to relax?” I ask

“I love reading.”

“What was the last thing you read?”

“Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America.”

“Did you enjoy it?”

“I did Your half hour is up,

…GROWING UP IN BROOKLYN

I spent my first couple of years living

on a high street before we moved to

a more rural area I was always out

on the street with my friends from

the neighbourhood There wasn’t

this fear of trouble or being

abducted, or murdered back then

…I STARTED PLAYING GUITAR

WHEN I TURNED 12—my parents

bought me one for Christmas It was a

Harmony Rocket and it was kind of

simplistic, but I had it for a long time

I used to sit in my room making noise for hours and hours

…I ENJOYED ALL THE USUAL SUSPECTS during my childhood:

The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, all the British Invasion bands I have always been a big fan

of Cream—when their first album came out, that was a big deal I was also exposed to really diverse music, Latin and R&B and all kinds of stuff beyond rock ‘n’ roll Hip-hop in particular was very exciting

ENTERTAINMENT

Co-founder and guitarist of the legendary new

wave band, Blondie, Chris Stein (69) has also made waves as a photographer, with his work perfectly capturing the heyday of New York City

30 • APRIL 2019

30

I R E M E M B E R …

32 • APRIL 2019

I realised this energy going on uptown was the same as what we were doing downtown

…I GOT THROWN OUT OF SCHOOL

for having long hair The dean called a bunch of us into his office and told us

he was worried that our hair would blow in front of our faces and we would get hit by cars

I was happy to get out, I hated public school Schools are different now because they’re inclusive and there’s diversity but when I was a kid, they were staffed by some sociopaths

who shouldn’t have been near

children, let alone teaching them

…MY MUM WAS ALWAYS VERY SUPPORTIVE She was a painter, and

her work was very abstract, esque She used to be a window designer in Manhattan and claimed

Picasso-to have hung out with Willem de Kooning and people like that I always

A young Chris poses with his

father who died aged just 55

saw her painting when I was a kid, but

I didn’t appreciate it until much later

I wish I had more of her stuff left

…MEETING DEBBIE HARRY I went

to see the first ever Stilettos concert, and I was really taken with Debbie

I thought she was terrific, and I could already see in her what a lot of people saw later on Shortly after, I joined the band She was a little more tentative

in the early years, but she always had charisma We were friendly for a few months before we got involved romantically and we’ve been friends ever since We had a conversation last night and we’re both really positive

I tend to be pretty optimistic in general, I just try to move forward

…I’D JUST COME BACK FROM LONDON when I met Debbie I met

APRIL 2019 • 33

R E A D E R ’ S D I G E S T

I R E M E M B E R …

34 • APRIL 2019

Lemmy [of Motörhead] there when he

was in Hawkwind and talked to him in

a pub for a while I stayed up by

Portobello and I went to Notting Hill

Carnival That was the first time I was

exposed to reggae music I was really

excited by that because, like hip-hop, I

wasn’t very familiar with the genre I

had only heard “Stir It Up” by Johnny

Nash in the States before then

…THE SCENE AT CBGB WAS

EXCITING, but also very isolated and

incestuous The audience was made

up of people from the

bands and their friends

There wasn’t a lot of

outside attention at first

The British papers were

the first to pick up on the

New York music scene

Melody Maker and NME

came over—before then

we’d only been covered

by local press There was

a legend that Jackie

Kennedy went to CBGB The veracity

of that I don’t know, but the

story goes around…

…DEBBIE AND I WERE a lot more

tentative when we first performed as

Blondie We had to learn it all We’re

not extroverted people and there was

a lot of self-pushing to get ourselves to

do it

…WE WERE DOING AN IN-STORE

APPEARANCE at a place called Our

Price Records on Kensington High Street They expected a couple hundred people, but thousands showed up The street was blocked, and the police had to come out—it was full-on mania It was exciting, but

we weren’t quite ready for it The Beatles were our heroes, so it was cool

to go through the same rights of passage

…I WAS ALWAYS FOOLING AROUND WITH BOX CAMERAS as

a kid but the first real camera I owned was a Pentax At first, I just

wanted to make nice images and shoot stuff that I saw around It was only later that I thought about putting together some kind of

atmosphere of the period in my books There’s a lot of stuff I wish I’d taken pictures

of, but I’d often go to a

concert and think, I can either take pictures or enjoy the music, it’s one or the other We saw

Bob Marley in Texas and I wish I’d brought a camera to that That was one of my favourite concerts ever

…ANDY WARHOL WAS REALLY SWEET, such a nice guy and a great

listener He always lent this air to any event he was at If you were at a party and Andy showed up, you’d think,

Okay now we’re at the right party I

used to say it was like the pope

“My memories

of 9/11 are very vivid because

we were right there It was heavy duty, and it hurt for

a long time”

coming in He was always very

gracious and friendly, so I never

felt put off photographing him by

his status

…THE LAST TIME I SAW DAVID

BOWIE was right before he died

He was always very kind and

professional But he was really

cautious when I was around him

with a camera because he was

protective about his image, so I only

managed to get a couple shots of him

and Debbie

We were on tour with him in

America when he was playing

keyboards for Iggy Pop on the Idiot

tour It was our first big tour and we

were really excited to be with those

guys because they were our heroes

I remember having conversations

with David where he was analysing

the punk scene and what it meant to

be a punk Iggy was being a punk

before anyone else was I photographed Debbie and Iggy too, and he was always a lot looser

…I MET MY WIFE [ACTRESS BARBARA SICURANZA] when she

was doing a show I thought she was really attractive and smart, so I pulled myself together and approached her

We were friends for quite a while before we got together romantically

…MY MEMORIES OF 9/11 ARE VERY VIVID because we were right

there I don’t think I appreciated the

APRIL 2019 • 35

R E A D E R ’ S D I G E S T

“Thousands of people showed

up The street was blocked, the police came—it was full-on mania”

Debbie with actor Dennis Christopher and Andy Warhol (Below); with David Bowie

I R E M E M B E R …

36 • APRIL 2019

scale of it at the time It was heavy

duty and it hurt for a really long time

We were about ten blocks away from

the site when it happened My wife

and I took a bunch of videos—you

can find them online A few of them

were filmed in Debbie’s apartment

We were visiting because she’d just

gotten a kitten, and you can see it

in some of the videos Then we

walked back downtown with our

cameras facing forward and there

was this huge dust cloud We cried a

few times

I kept coming across cars that

had stopped in the street, and there

would be a whole crowd of people

listening to the radio with the doors

thrown open As we passed one of

the local hospitals there was a huge,

huge line around the block, of people

wanting to donate blood They

were turning people away because

they couldn’t accommodate them,

and they didn’t think there would be that many survivors, which is so sad

in retrospect

There was a lot of camaraderie in New York for about a year after that But it changed our cultural

environment and the financial environment in the city too, because

it opened the floodgates to consumerism Suddenly New York got a lot of attention

…HOW FATHERHOOD CHANGED

ME My daughters help me with my

old age because I have to keep up

“My daughters help me with

my old age because I have

to keep up with them”

Debbie has owned several cats over her lifetime, one of which featured in Chris’s videos of 9/11

R E A D E R ’ S D I G E S T

Everybody is at the mercy of Amazon and so on There used to be so many great little bookstores and gas stations in the city and you can’t find

a gas station anywhere now There used to be all these little clubs too and now everything has changed over to big hotels and chains It’s still a thriving city though, and there are a lots of cool bands like Surfbort, a great punk freak band who I really like.n

As told to Anna Walker

Point Of View: Me, New York City and The Punk Scene by Chris Stein is available now, published by Rizzoli, £40

APRIL 2019 • 37

with them It’s kind of fascinating

seeing them evolve and become

more intelligent At one point they

only cared about Spongebob, but

now that they’re 13 and 15 I can talk

to them about movies and social

things that go on in the world

They’re both really into graphic stuff

now The little one is drawing all the

time and the older one does a lot of

video and editing They’re both very

modern kids though, and on their

phones all the time…

…NEW YORK HAS CHANGED SO

MUCH It’s the same as London or

any other big city, where small

businesses are having trouble

Do you now understand the value of

my counsel to start exerting yourselves with all your strength for what is good, and to keep your thoughts pure ? Not giving up, but pursuing this course with all your longing, all your energy?

It will uplift you ! It will change you and your environment !

— In the L ight of Tr uth

Grail Message

Foundation