Delilah Forever – The Dramatic Life of the Singer Who Became a Legend

“It was enough to hear her once to desire her as a companion, hidden and present, for the hours of the day and the hours of the evening,” wrote the musicologist, poet, and sailor Henri-Jacques, who twice circumnavigated the world via Cape Horn, about Dalida. The younger sister of Maria Callas, the cousin of Edith Piaf, the singing twin of Brigitte Bardot, Yolanda Gigliotti, known as Dalida, who chose to leave life when she reached the age of 54, as if she lived forever.

Her name is on everyone's lips, books, plays, films and television programs are regularly dedicated to her. Albums continue to be released, as they were here. Her tomb, on which stands a life-size statue, is always flooded with flowers, banners and letters. Place Délída in Montmartre, in the center of which stands her bust, is a place of pilgrimage (touching her, in Santa Délída, brings good luck). The dialogue with the star, Yolanda, Délída, Dáli, continues beyond her physical disappearance.

Dalida's life story

childhood

Yolanda Gigliotti was born in Cairo in 1933 to an Italian family from a small, poor, and isolated Calabrian village called Serastretta. Her mother was a housewife and seamstress and her father was a first violinist at the Cairo Opera House. Yolanda is the only child among two brothers, the elder Orlando and the younger Bruno. Yolanda was born with a severe forceps birth and almost suffocated. When she was 10 months old, she was attacked by an eye infection. The neighborhood doctor recommends that the baby's eyes be bandaged for forty days, a guarantee, he says, of their healing.

Yolanda doesn't understand the night that has suddenly descended on her. She screams, chokes, turns blue, tries to tear off the bandage, but her parents tie her hands. Their hearts ache at the sight of the tortured girl, but in those days, ordinary people did not challenge a doctor's order. The tired baby's screams turn into sighs and she falls asleep, her face stained with tears and saliva. The parents truly believe that after forty days of darkness, their daughter will be completely healed. The father improvises lullabies for her on his violin, the mother sings songs to her. The music opens the gates of paradise for little Yolanda in the prolonged, threatening darkness.

At the end of the allotted time, the bandage is finally removed. The inflammation is severe, the eyes are filled with pus. The efforts to find light have caused a squint in both eyes. The neighborhood doctor is helpless. The shocked and frustrated parents consult a specialist. A series of surgeries that the girl will undergo will not be able to prevent a squint in one eye. Yolanda suffers from headaches and is forced to wear glasses with thick lenses. The girls mock her at the school owned by the Catholic Church, but the nun teachers love the serious and studious student.

It is difficult for Yolanda to look at herself in the mirror, but secretly in her heart she knows, and her mother tells her so clearly, that one day the duckling will turn into a swan. Meanwhile, the devoted and loving mother sews clothes for her from scraps. The penny is not abundant, the musician father's salary is not large. Yolanda constantly fears that the darkness will return and needs a nightlight to fall asleep.

In 1940, Egypt entered the war. Fascist Italy and England are enemies. The second dramatic event in Yolanda's life occurs on the night that the father is imprisoned by the British, along with many other Italians, in a concentration camp, simply because he is Italian. The man who returns home, after three years of suffering, hunger and humiliation, is a broken vessel. And as if that were not enough, Pietro, whose entire world revolved around music, has lost his job at the opera. His life is ruined. The family suffers from his screams, his outbursts of anger and his violence.

Pietro did not last and died of a heart attack a year after his release, in 1945, at the age of 41. The 12-year-old Yolanda was left without a father. The love-hate relationship between Yolanda and her father during this difficult period and the feelings of guilt she suffered from, the impossible grief over her father's death, would affect her adult life and her wrong choices in partners. Violence and self-destruction would characterize those with whom Yolanda would fall in love at first sight. She herself would sometimes be angry. Her father's voice seemed to burst from her own throat. Two years of Freudian psychoanalysis would help her postpone the end.

But in the meantime, the future is still ahead of her, the beautiful and noble Yolanda works as a model for the Donna fashion house. In this short period of time, she learned to walk, dress, develop a personal style, smile, and feel comfortable on stage. In 1954, she was elected beauty queen of Egypt and attracted the attention of a popular and successful local film director, Niazi Mustafa, who chose her to play the role of a European nurse who captures the heart of an Egyptian doctor, married and father of a daughter, in the film “Cup, Cigarette.” “Why don’t you call yourself Delilah?” the director suggested.

Yolanda, who loved the Bible stories from her days at the nuns' school, adopts the name for herself. In another small role, in a French director's film set in Egypt, "The Mask of Tutankhamun," Yolanda-Delilah plays the character of a spy, Pam Patel. In both films, she sings and dances. "You should go to Paris," advises Marco de Gustin, the French director, "I'm sure you'll find a job there."

Delilah in France

On December 24, 1954, Yolanda fulfilled her dream and took off for Paris. The beginning in the big city was not easy. Yolanda lived in a small, cold room and ate hard-boiled eggs. Her luck was on her side and she appeared in two cabarets on the Avenue des Elysées. The writer and screenwriter Alfred Mascher suggested that she change her name from Delilah to Delilah. It would be better if she freed herself from the biblical image, from the inevitable association with Samson. Twice a door instead of twice a learner. D as in Dieu le Pere (God the Father). Mascher himself does not know how far he hit the mark.

On April 9, 1956, Dalida takes part in a competition to discover young talents at the Olympia Hall. Eddie Barclay, owner of a record company, and Lucien Morris, director of the young radio station Europe 1, who would become mythological figures in their fields, destinies and marketing champions, are present. The exotic charm of the young and inexperienced singer is at work.

Lucien and Eddie take her under their wing. The first records are released, Lucien plays her songs constantly on the radio station he runs, “Bambino”, a version French A Neapolitan song from 1956, The Agony of a Boy in Love with a Woman (an allusion to the impossible love of a mother), sold half a million copies. Each song by Delida, a singer and actress, is a mini-drama, a story dramatized in a few minutes.

Bambino

Between Lucien Maurice and Jean Sobieski

Yolanda would indeed later become a generous and comforting maternal figure to her partners and friends, a child desperate for love, helpless and an unattainable goddess in the imagination of her fans, all at the same time. Lucien Morris was born in 1929 and lost his father in the Holocaust. Like Dalida, he too was orphaned at a young age. Married and the father of a daughter, he decided to divorce in order to marry Dalida after five years of living together with the star. But Dalida was too young for marriage.

A few months later, the couple separated but remained friends in heart and soul until Lucien committed suicide by gunshot at the age of 41. Dalida, who was a good friend of Pygmalion, who made her a star, left him the first apartment she bought, on the top floor of an elegant 40s building in the 16th arrondissement. Lucien would never leave the apartment at 7 Ankara Street again. He lived there with his third wife, with whom he had two more daughters, and where he ended his life.

Lucien is all about Delilah's professional success, building her career, while she, who is 4 years younger than him, is thirsty for life. Eddie Barclay, witnessing friction between Lucien and his wife, invited the singer to the Cannes Film Festival so she could have some fun. At a dance party, Delilah met a beautiful, carefree young blond, Jean Sobieski, whose talent as a painter had not yet been discovered. In the meantime, his only occupation is to enjoy every moment, between the Riviera and the left bank of the Seine.

Dalida leaves the apartment on Ankara Street and rents an apartment in the posh Neuilly district to live there with Jean. Her brother, who is 3 years younger than her, Bruno, changes his name, on Lucien's advice, to that of his older brother, Orlando. From 1966 he becomes his adored sister's manager and watches over her like a guardian angel. Her cousin Rosie arrives from Cairo to serve Dalida as secretary and soulmate.

Lucien Maurice did try to delay Delilah's career in response to her relationship with Jeanne, but the relationship improved, despite the divorce in 1962. Her appearance at the Olympia Hall as a leading star in December 1961 was a great triumph, even though her many enemies expected her downfall. The two thousand spectators were captivated by her charm. The cheers were thunderous, and Lucien Maurice, sitting pale in the audience, was overcome with conflicting emotions, but was nevertheless happy with her joy and proud of his work.

At the end of 1961, Dalida purchased a city mansion in the heart of Montmartre, four floors and a garden, where she will live for the rest of her life and where she will receive her many friends. In the meantime, she moves in with Jean Sobieski, who decorates the walls of the house with his paintings. Dalida will invest a lot of resources in interior design from her beloved bastion, Safe Harbor. Dalida is in love with Montmartre and the Rue Le Pic that climbs up to her house, with its shops and restaurants, somewhat oriental, which remind her a little of the city of her childhood.

Jean Sobieski left home at her request after about two years together. The handsome young man, who was a stranger to the world of show business until he met Dalida, took advantage of his connections with her and began a career as an actor. His first role was in the film “Striptease” in which he played the main character alongside the German singer Nico. Dalida celebrated the event at her home and invited the Crazy Horse dancers to perform. But the charm of Jean’s personality, although he promised her to return to painting, had worn off. Jean easily succumbed to the sirens of the glamorous world.

And maybe she shouldn't have left Lucien Maurice? And maybe she should have started a family with him? Delilah loved children so much. Even her brother Orlando, the person closest to her along with her cousin Rosie, wasn't sure about the rightness of the step of parting with the talent scout and great radio personality. Living together with Lucien, had they continued, would perhaps have spared his sister the suffering she would have suffered in the future. She had a son... The song "Luca", from a later period, 1983, is moving and heartbreaking:

Lucas Luca

Lucien Maurice broadened Dalida's horizons in the field of light music and entertainment. Jean Sobieski opened up the world of art and painting to her. Christian de la Maiziere talks to her about books. To the promoter and journalist, who also captivated the son of Juliette Greco And Brigitte Bardot, a dark past. He chose to enlist in the ranks of the Waffen-SS, a military wing of the SS, which fought alongside the Wehrmacht, under the command of Heinrich Himmler.

In vain, de la Maiziere tried to pose as a forced laborer. His deception was discovered and in 1946 he was sentenced to 5 years in prison. Two years later, he received a pardon from President Vincent Auriol and embarked on a career as an artist agent and film critic, close to celebrities such as Jean Gabin, Michel Audiard, René Keller, and Pierre Brasseur. His romantic relationship with Dalida would come to an end in 1966.

Dalida's Israeli connection

In 1965, Dalida performs in Casablanca, Morocco, in front of ten thousand spectators. At the sound of “Hava Nagila,” the second song in the program, the chief of police comes on stage and orders Dalida to stop the show. Israeli songs are forbidden in the country. Dalida firmly refuses and continues. A small part of the audience is pleased and applauds, the majority is furious and throws tomatoes and eggs at the singer and her orchestra. The next day, police came to question the singer at the hotel and part of her salary was confiscated to compensate the grumbling audience.

But none of this spoiled the good mood of the brave woman who jokes about the omelette her drummer made on his drums. Despite threats of boycott from Arab countries, Dalida will continue to sing “Hava Nagila” and will even add “Hina Ma Tov” to her repertoire. At her performances in Israel, she will be enthusiastically received by her fans. Quite a few of her songs are full of cheerfulness and healthy humor. The song “As Mistengat Said” is full of amusing self-irony. This is a poem by Mistengat, the famous cabaret singer of the 1920s and 1930s, which served as a source of inspiration for Dalida’s:

It's true.

Here is Dalida's very personal version:

Comme disait Mistinguett (As Mistinguett said)

Dalida and Luigi Tenco

In 1966, Delida's friends at the Italian record label suggest that she meet a talented young songwriter, composer, and singer, Luigi Tenco, who could bring about a revolution with his original and daring protest songs, so different from the prevailing cliché. The regulations state that every Italian singer who comes to perform his song at the San Remo Festival must be accompanied by a foreign international singer who will sing the same song. The Italian team arrives at Delida's house accompanied by 28-year-old Luigi to convince the singer to take him under her wing at the festival.

A relationship develops between Luigi, who grew up without a father and is thirsty for recognition, and the star. Dalida fell in love at first sight with the tormented and handsome young man, with his piercing gaze, of course, and would do anything for the success of his poignant song “Ciao Amore Ciao.”

Luigi’s feelings and motives are much less clear. His song was excellent but was rejected at the outset by the festival organizers who asked Delilah to choose another song from the thirty that had entered the competition. “If you don’t accept Tenco’s song, I won’t participate in the festival,” she told the judges, who gave in to the star. Tenco, of course, knew nothing about the secret contacts between Delilah and the judges.

Luigi Tenco was born in 1938 to a wealthy family that owned a farm and vineyards. His father, Giuseppe Tenco, was killed a few months before Luigi's birth when a cow kicked him in the temple while milking. Some say that Giuseppe was drunk at the time of the accident that took his life. Luigi has an older brother, Valentino, who is 9 years older than him. A few years after Luigi's birth, one of the neighbors tells the astonished boy that the father he did not know and whose name he bears is not his father.

Luigi is born from his mother's love affair with a young student. Luigi's world suddenly collapses. He feels betrayed. The once happy boy becomes withdrawn, suspicious, and gloomy. Like Delilah, he also cannot sleep without a nightlight. As a young man, he conquers the hearts of many women and embarks on a career as a musician and actor.

On the stage of the San Remo Festival, Luigi is shaking with fear. Before the performance, he swallowed quite a few tranquilizers and alcohol. And as if that weren't enough, he's not used to singing with a symphony orchestra. Never has his performance been so bad as on that fateful evening, January 27, 1967. Delilah hopes to rectify the situation, and indeed her version is received with applause. But the audience apparently cheered Delilah and not the song, which was not in keeping with the spirit of the commercial festival in the first place. Either way, Tanko's song did not qualify for the finals.

Ciao amore ciao (Ciao amore ciao)

Luigi refuses to attend the official dinner at the end of the day and goes up to his hotel room. Fifteen minutes later, Delilah finds him lying on the floor next to the bed, his shirt stained with blood. Luigi shot himself in the temple. Suspicions of murder were raised, but the case was closed. In a letter he left, Tenco writes that his suicide was an act of protest against the wrong choice of his Italian audience, dedicating 5 years of his life. Not a word to Delilah. “Our life became hell,” Orlando says of the tragic period.

Rosie never leaves Delida for a moment. Delida has hatched a ruse. She tells Rosie that she must take a plane to Turin, to meet Luigi's uncle (who doesn't exist in reality). Rosie and her husband Ivan accompany her to the airport and as soon as they turn their backs, Delida rushes in a taxi to the hotel in the Champs-Elysées district where she and Tanko used to meet when he came to Paris (Delida and Luigi decided to keep their affair a secret). The receptionist recognizes her but suspects nothing. Delida orders a bottle of mineral water and asks that she not be disturbed in any way for any reason.

The next day, the experienced chambermaid, who has worked in luxury hotels for 40 years, finds no peace in her soul. She has been ordered not to disturb the star, but at 10 p.m. she decides not to obey. When she opens the door, she discovers Dalida lying on the bed, pale, almost blue, dying, empty sleeping pill tubes beside her.

 Delida left three letters. One to her beloved mother, the second to her faithful friend, Lucien Morris, who would have to break the difficult news to the family and guide them through the necessary steps, the third to the audience in which she explains that life without Luigi Tenco would be unbearable. She is going to complete in heaven what she could not accomplish on earth. She has no hatred in her heart for herself or anyone else.

The French press still portrays Tenco and Delida as Romeo and Juliet. The Italian press, however, paints a different picture when it publishes Tenco's letters to another young woman, Valeria, whom he knew before meeting Delida. Valeria is pregnant (she will soon lose the baby when a car hits her) and the infatuated Tenco wants to marry her. Valeria enters a restaurant in Rome one evening and discovers her fiancé Luigi accompanied by Delida.

She decides to break off relations with him, but Tanko doesn't give up. He sends her many letters in which he asks her for forgiveness for being seduced by the big star and swears to her that he only loves her, Valeria. To hell with San Remo, he wants to go with her, with Valeria, to Kenya, in Africa, after the festival to spend time together and discover the meaning of life. He told Dalida everything. His life without Valeria is not life.

Dalida and her friends from the Italian record company, however, testify that Tanko and she were about to get married in April. Valeria, Luigi, Dalida, the San Remo Festival – the truth surrounding the events and characters is complicated and difficult to crack. To what sounds like a telenovela, we can add the cliché: Tanko took his secret to the grave with him. Even clichés are found in life itself. Orlando testifies that he has never suffered so much as on the day he saw his sister breathing heavily, her body in spasms. Twenty years later, when Dalida repeats the act and this time gets what she wants, his suffering will not be so great. Such deep sorrow is experienced only once in a lifetime.

Spiritual rebirth

Delida miraculously came back to life after 6 days in a coma. In a long and painful operation, healthy skin was transplanted from her buttocks and groin to the heel where the disease had spread. Orlando and his mother come to live with her in a four-story house in Montmartre. The apartment that Delida bought for her mother is now at the disposal of her older brother and his wife, who have just had a son. Delida's brother guessed her wish and named the newborn Luigi. 7 years later, his brother Roberto will be born.

In the corridors of Italian television, Delida meets a poor philosophy student, Lucio, who admires Luigi Tenco. Lucio has come to serve as an extra on Delida's television show, but the world of glamour is alien to him. The star will finance his studies but will no longer answer his passionate letters. The age difference, Lucio being twelve years younger than her, bothers her. When she discovers her pregnancy, she decides to terminate it. Orlando and Rosie thought that motherhood would help Delida, but what had been done could not be undone. And worst of all, from now on Delida will not be able to give birth.

Dalida tries to find solace in reading books. She left school at the age of 14 and is thirsty for knowledge. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (Jesuit priest, scientist, theologian and philosopher), Tagore, Freud, biography of Jung. Her thirst for Eastern wisdom leads her to a lecture by Arnaud Desjardins, known for his book “The Ways of Wisdom”, an expert on Hinduism, Afghan Sufism, Tibetan Buddhism, Zen teachings and more. He serves as her spiritual teacher and will become her partner for about 3 years, until 1970, to the delight of his wife, the mother of his two children.

Dalida will make many trips with him to India to stay at the ashram of Swami Prajnanpad. The latter dissuades his disciple Arnaud Desjardins from divorcing his wife in order to marry Dalida: “No father divorces.” He instructs Dalida to continue entertaining the crowd, delighting them with her music: “This is her destiny.”

The separation from Arnaud Desjardins, the suicide of Lucien Maurice, the sudden death of her mother, three events that occur in close proximity. Dalida copes with and even comforts and encourages her younger brother, who was very attached to his mother.

The subconscious now takes the place of spirituality at the center of Dalida's interest. An experienced professional will enlighten her with explanations of Freud's teachings, Dr. Guy Pitchal, a psychoanalyst and endocrinologist, a resident of Montmartre and owner of a villa in Saint-Tropez. He and his wife Jacqueline, immersed in the world of show business, will be her friends for years to come. Dalida can call Guy Pitchal even in the middle of the night.

She rereads Freud's writings, which are already worn out from being overwritten, and are laden with handwritten notes. Jung also intrigues her. Psychoanalysis with Dr. Miruz is a cause of both suffering and relief for her. Under his influence, she reads "Thalass," a book by the Hungarian psychoanalyst and Freud's student, Sándor Ferenczi.

Dalida and “The Count de Saint-Germain”

Richard Champret, the most colorful of Delilah's men, will live by her side for 9 years, from 1972 to 1981. He calls himself the Count de Saint-Germain and presents himself as an alchemist who turns lead into gold. The bitter truth is that Richard, after a difficult childhood, spent 6 years in prison for attacking his employer, in the bar where he worked, for the purpose of robbery. The books he read in prison about the adventures of the Count de Saint-Germain, a mysterious and magical alchemist, scholar and expert in history, teller of the Arabian Nights, a talented bard who won the trust of Louis XV, fired his imagination.

Like the model of identification he chose to cover up reality and its beauty, Richard, the womanizer, was also talented in many fields. He tried his hand at writing, music, acting, and painting, and especially excelled at sculpture: the giant animals he sculpted from metal were spectacular. But the alchemist's dream did not come true. Dalida did everything she could to help him build a career as an artist and survive on his own, but time and time again Richard destroyed everything he had almost achieved.

In the early years, the successful Dalida, at the height of her professional glory, flourishes alongside the handsome and entertaining man, rediscovers her femininity and builds a spectacular villa in Corsica, high above Marina di Fiori, overlooking the Gulf of Porto-Vecchio, to spend time there with her partner during times when she is not busy touring around the world.

Delida generously hosts her friends in the luxurious, rounded mansion, which includes a living room with oriental sofas, six en-suite bedrooms, a pool, terraces and a huge garden. A tragic event will break the pleasant streak. On June 18, 1976, Delida and Richard returned from a night out at the house in Montmartre and were surprised to see a light in the room of the Portuguese housekeeper, Maria. She had requested and received a 10-day leave.

Richard quickly goes up to the room, armed with a rifle. When he opens the door, he finds a man in his underwear. Maria has given her young lover, who has recently arrived from Portugal, the key to her room without informing the landlady. The young man has difficulty explaining his presence, especially since he does not speak French. Richard shoots and severely wounds the unfortunate young man in the stomach.

At trial, Richard argued in his defense that he did not intend to shoot and was sentenced to a year of probation, a fine, and compensation for the man whose life was saved after a series of surgeries but remained partially disabled.

At the request of Richard, who does not feel comfortable in Montmartre, Dalida buys a plot of land in Neuilly and builds a luxurious villa around an interior garden. But Richard goes from bad to worse and his relationship with Dalida deteriorates. He humiliates his partner in public and brings his conquests to her house, in her absence.

Dalida finally decides to break off her relationship with him and asks him to leave the house. Richard begs, cries, threatens, but Dalida is firm in her mind this time. About two years after the separation, in 1983, deeply in debt due to a wasteful and delusional lifestyle, he will commit suicide in a rented car, near Saint-Tropez, together with his partner.

Mitterrand's cynical exploitation and return to Cairo

Dalida filled the void left by the separation from her companion by renewing her friendship with François Mitterrand. She had met him in Marseille in 1972, at a gala party hosted by the then mayor, Gaston Defer. Mitterrand, impressed by the singer's performance, asked to meet her afterwards.

And now, when he is running for president, why not enlist the popular singer, who has sold millions of albums, in the election campaign? Dalida, in the name of her friendship with François Mitterrand, cooperates, to the dismay of her two brothers, especially the eldest, who warn her of the dangers of taking an explicit position, especially since Dalida does not belong to one political camp or another.

 And indeed, the reactions are not slow in coming. The media speculates, stirs, mocks, calls Mitterrand “Mimi Lamoroso” (based on the international hit “Gigi Lamoroso”). Orlando has always vigorously denied all rumors of a romantic relationship between his sister and the womanizing president. He courted her, yes, but she rejected his advances and only friendship and respect prevailed between them, according to Orlando. It is likely that Dilda fell captive to Mitterrand’s seductions, biographers confirm. What is certain is that Dilda spared no expense in entertaining and the president-elect took advantage of this.

Under the spell of Mitterrand's personality and wisdom, the admired singer opened the door of her Montmartre château to the president-elect and his intellectual courtiers, hosting lavish banquets in their honor (François was keen on seafood), thirstily drinking up snippets of conversations on topics that were hitherto foreign to her.

When Mitterrand was elected president in 1981, Dalida was bitterly disappointed. After the intoxication of the first months as president, he no longer needed her. His entourage took advantage of the singer's popularity to promote him. And now, ironically, the media treats her as the new president's protégé, as if she hadn't built her career on her own and reached the heights in previous eras, during the time of de Gaulle, Pompidou, and Déstaing.

For the first time in her life, Dalida feels out of place in Paris and embarks on a concert tour abroad that lasts more than a year. When she returns home, she suffers another disappointment from a young, handsome Egyptian-French pilot, who, after a year of romantic relationship, breaks off the relationship. He used his connections with the star to get a role as an actor in a film and has since disappeared.

A few months before her death, Dalida had successfully played the lead role in the dramatic film “The Sixth Day” by the great Egyptian director Youssef Chahine, based on a novel by André Shadid (the mother of singer and director Louis Shadid). Yolanda’s life as an artist began in an Egyptian film and ended in an Egyptian film. Youssef Chahine had met Yolanda on the set of “Cup, Cigarette” and it was only with her that he cast her for the lead role in his current film, some thirty years later.

At the premiere in Cairo, the enthusiastic crowd, men, women and children, crowded onto balconies, in the streets, cheering her passionately, shouting her name, throwing jasmine flowers at her car, trying to touch her hair. Santa Dalida. Dalida was considered a saint because, according to her fans' belief, she returned from the world of the dead to the world of the living, after attempting suicide in a hotel in the Champs-Elysees district.

An orchestra plays her songs. As her car passes by the humble house where she was born, tears well up in her eyes. This will be her last triumphal procession. The security guards fear for her safety and smuggle her in a truck to the movie theater. The next day, the Egyptian newspapers will describe her entry into Cairo as Cleopatra's entry into Rome.

The end

It seemed to Delilah that the love of the crowd, the public success, was not compatible with her private success, with her love life as a woman. Before traveling to shoot the film in Cairo, in 1985, she met a doctor named François Naudy. Dr. Naudy, an internist at a clinic in Paris since 1981, who also studied philosophy, published several books on scientific, philosophical and literary subjects. After a few months of happiness, François Naudy changed his behavior, avoiding her invitations, canceling meetings at the last minute. François Naudy yielded to Delilah's entreaties to come stay at her house in Corsica, but shortly after his arrival, he received a phone call ordering him to return urgently to Paris. On a sadistic day? On a Friday evening, when they were about to go together to the musical comedy "cabaret", he calls her and, as usual, cancels his visit. François Nodi denied any connection to Dalida's suicide. "We were friends, it's possible that another man is involved in this."

François Nodi's cancellation that Friday evening was the straw that broke the camel's back. Two eye surgeries that same year evoke painful childhood memories in her. For several months now, Orlando has been worried about his beloved sister's behavior. Her interest in life seems to have stopped. Age is threatening her. She is tired of dancing and perhaps also of singing. The light in her eyes has gone out. Playing the lead role in the dramatic film, entering the skin of an Egyptian woman with a tragic fate, so far from Dalida and yet so close to her, contributed to the great fatigue that overcame her. Dalida wanders from room to room in her castle, fleeing the sunlight that she has loved so much all her life, isolating herself, withdrawing. What more can life bring her?

On May 3, 1987, Delida-Yolanda was found lifeless in her bed, after swallowing sleeping pills in a glass of whiskey. This time, too, she kept her well-wishers away with a ruse: “I’m going out to see a concert, followed by dinner at a restaurant. I’ll be back at night. Don’t disturb me sleeping in until late the next day.” She leaves in her car, makes a detour, and returns to the empty house. Next to the empty glass is a note: “Life has become unbearable for me, forgive me.” For the first time in her life, Yolanda didn’t turn on the nightlight and fell asleep in the dark.

Throughout all those years of personal suffering, but also happiness – Dalida loved life despite everything and enjoyed its pleasures, the singer's career never stopped soaring, taking off, developing, changing, and thriving. Dalida won all the possible awards and decorations, sang about two thousand songs, in many languages, sold over one hundred and fifty million records worldwide, and performed in all parts of the world.

Dalida's poems

Sixties

In the 1960s, when the twist season arrived, when many other singers did not survive the transformation and were pushed out by the younger competitors, Dalida adapted the new fashion to her personality, even though she did not like the twist, and reaped victories with songs like “Itsy Bitsy Patty Bikini” and “Patty Gonzalez”:

Itsi bitsi petit bikini

Petit Gonzales

In 1959, Delilah recorded the song “Love in Portofino,” in which she celebrated the beauty of Portofino, a small, picturesque seaside town in the province of Genoa, Italy. The story of the song shows how everything Delilah took to heart turned to gold. It also shows how she walked between success and failure. And Delilah knew, this time with the help of Eddie Barclay, the legendary record label owner, to cross that threshold.

Love in Portofino

At that time, Portofino was still unknown. Delilah had been deeply enchanted by it during her visit there in 1958 with Lucien Morris. The Italian duo, lyricist Leo Chiosso and composer Fred Buscaglione, released the original song that year, mostly in Italian, with one recurring line in English: I found my love in Portofino. Composer and singer Fred Buscaglione performed it for the first time.  

French lyricist Jacques Larue took a look at the song and adapted it entirely into French under a different text and a different name. The French singers who sang it were not successful. Then producer Eddie Barclay stepped in and obtained the song for Delilah. Jacques Larue rewrote the French part, reducing it to a minimum so that it would be an addition to the original Italian song with the repeated line in English. Delilah performed it in all three languages, Italian, English and French, in the summer of 1959, and the song conquered the European market and became a commercial success. Experts even considered it a masterpiece of the singer's early repertoire. Despite dozens of other performances, the captivating single remained associated with Delilah and even gave its name to her sixth album, which was released at the end of the year.

Shortly after the release of the single, Portofino became a popular destination for couples in love who were captivated by Delida's melodious voice. In 1960, the mayor of Portofino thanked Delida for her contribution to encouraging tourism in the area. The song became, indeed, a symbol of the coastal town of Portofino. Everything Delida touched turned to gold, we said.

The seventies

In the 1970s, Delilah's repertoire was enriched with songs with more serious, tragic lyrics. Her moving performance of Serge Lama's poem "Loneliness" placed her on a par with Edith Piaf:

I am sick (loneliness)

Serge Lama owes the success of the song, which he also performed, to Delilah. However, the singer with a diverse repertoire continues to sing her popular songs. “He Just Turned 18,” an original composition, is a huge success:

He had just turned 18 (He had just turned 18)

The song, which tells of a one-night stand between a young man and an older woman twice his age, echoes the personal story of Delida, who at the age of 34 became pregnant by a 22-year-old man, Lucio. This love story ended dramatically because 15 years after the termination of the pregnancy, Delida discovered that she would not be able to give birth because of it. She sang the song in six languages, French, English, Italian, Spanish, German, Japanese – an international success!

That same year, 1973, the song “Frola… Frola…” by Delilah and Delilah was released, the story of which is an opportunity to debunk the urban legend about a passionate romance between the two. Delilah and Delilah met in 1956 in the stairwell of a building on rue Jean Mermoz in the Champs-Elysees district. They both lived, each separately, in a shabby attic room. They were Delilahs who expected success. Occasionally they would eat a hard-boiled egg for dinner together and occasionally Delilah would accompany Delilah to job interviews. When luck shone on both of them, they parted ways but met again, about ten years later, in 1963 in Rome, both barely thirty years old and already stars, each coming to the city for his own business. Then they spent a few nights together and parted ways again as good friends.

Ten years after their brief romance, when Delilah received “Frola… Frola…”, a French adaptation of an Italian song, she immediately thought of her friend Delon, who of course did not refuse. The two recorded the song, which became an international hit. Delon felt deep pain when he learned of his friend Delilah’s suicide.

…Paroles… Paroles

In 1977, Dalida sang “Salma Ya Salma,” composed in 1919 by the Egyptian composer and singer Sayyid Darwish. The French version is also available in Arabic and other languages ​​(Italian, German, and Spanish). Dalida sang in Arabic, in an oriental rhythm, an Egyptian song recorded in a modern-Western style. On November 19, 1977, when Anwar Sadat landed at Ben-Gurion Airport on his historic visit, he was greeted, among other things, by the sounds of “Salma Ya Salma.” Dalida cried with emotion. There is no greater joy than being a bridge between two beloved countries, being the singer of peace.

Salma ya Salama

The eighties

In the late 1970s and 1980s, Dalida was the first French artist to join the disco movement. At the age of 47, she learned to dance in the new style and reinvented herself in a spectacular disco show, in sparkly, tight costumes, in dresses with deep cleavage. She was enthusiastically received at Carnegie Hall in New York, and achieved huge victories in a series of impressive performances at the Palais des Sports in Paris, accompanied by 11 dancers and 30 musicians. The dizzying show included 12 costume changes, and on Broadway in France! Among her many songs in the new style, the sequel to “Gigi Lamoroso” called “Gigi in Paradisco” stands out. Gigi Lamoroso, the Neapolitan singer beloved by women, who returned disappointed from America, was murdered by one of his many lovers and is now in heaven:

Gigi L`Amoroso

Gigi in paradisco

Record sales have declined slightly, but Orlando has many plans in store, the closest to being realized among them being a musical comedy in which Delilah will play the role of Cleopatra. But the star has decided otherwise. In the famous poem “To Die on Stage,” Kebal declared with a committee that just as she was master of the choices in her life, so she will be master of her death. And the equally famous poem, “In My Own Way,” expresses a similar idea:

In my own way

Did you like the article? Want to read about more singers?

Here are some articles by Dr. Orna Lieberman that may interest you:

• Michel Delfèche, the troubadour who sang from the heart to the heart
• Leo Marjean: French singer, music hall legend
• Michel Berger – Everything for the sake of music
• A youth potion in a French cup, served by Charles Ternay, Herbert Pagani, Julien Keller, Etienne Daou and more
• In Fire, Water and Beyond – Chansons for a Friend
• Johnny Alliday: A Brief History of the French Rock Idol
• Black Fate: The Story of Rock Singer Bertrand Cante
• Tormented Love, Healing, and Redemption in French Poems
• Joe Dessins, American Singer in Paris, Triumphs and Tribulations
• Yves Touati, the Cherry Band and the Clanks of Marseille