The dark side of Dusty Springfield: Queer History's of Forgotten Icon, died 2nd March 1999

By editorial board on March 12, 2023

The legendary British singer who fell in love with American R&B was also a queer icon; an aspect of her identity that is often overlooked.

In 1963, Springfield released her first solo single, ‘I Only Want to Be with You’

recently Google Doodle celebrated Dusty Springfield, the British singer who became an icon in the 60s and whose career spanned five decades.

She was one of the greatest female singers Britain has ever produced, the voice of her generation – and a woman always ahead of her time, but raging paranoia about her looks and voice plagued the Sixties icon until her death.(Sources:Dailymail  - Vice.com)

'She was a perfectionist. To see someone like that was quite an education,' said Kiki Dee

Born Mary Isabel Catherine Bernadette O’Brien to Irish immigrants in 1939, Springfield was a plain, albeit tomboyish child who earned the name ‘Dusty’ playing football with the boys on the street outside the family home in Ealing.

Though her sexuality was an open secret to the gay community, the fact that Springfield was a lesbian is not common knowledge today, thanks in part to the legacy of homophobia that left prominent queer figures in constant fear of being outed.

Modern biographies seem only to bring her sexuality to the forefront when detailing the tragic self-destruction that defined her lost years in Los Angeles, where she moved to escape public scrutiny. There, she formed many long-term relationships with women, most notably American actress Teda Bracci, who she unofficially wed in 1983. “In England, she had the whole lesbian thing thrown at her in the papers,” remembers Neil Tennant of The Pet Shop Boys. “She wasn't married. Did she or did she not have a boyfriend? Those days were tough.”

In addition, Dusty had long known she was attracted to girls. She’d experienced her first crush on one of the nuns at her convent school.56 Dusty Springfield ideas | dusty springfield, dusty, springfield

Later, she told her lover Sue Cameron she would watch, transfixed, while the girl across the road from her childhood home undressed in front of the window.

Like many other aspects of her true self, her sexuality had to be concealed at all costs.

‘She was a very private person,’ says Jean Westwood, one of Dusty’s first backing singers.

Dusty with Elton John, Lulu and Madeline Bell. She had agreed to record Don't Go Breaking My Heart with Elton, but somehow the offer was withdrawn and he went on to duet with Kiki Dee
Dusty with Elton John, Lulu and Madeline Bell. She had agreed to record Don't Go Breaking My Heart with Elton, but somehow the offer was withdrawn and he went on to duet with Kiki Dee

‘She was terrified if it came out it would ruin her career and her fans would leave, so she refused to talk about it.’

Dusty began her first serious relationship when she fell in love with American singer Norma Tanega, who soon moved into her west London house.

'If you want to kill yourself,’ Dusty Springfield said, ‘this is the way you do it.’

In 1983 at her wedding to Teda Bracci on a friend's California ranch
In 1983 at her wedding to Teda Bracci

She emerged from the kitchen with a broken cup, slashed her wrist and then came after her lover Teda Bracci, cutting Teda’s leg. Bracci responded by hitting her repeatedly around the head with a boot.

Dusty’s relationship with Teda was volatile, based on mutual attraction and outbursts of temper, though they had recently ‘married’ – in November 1983 on a friend’s California ranch.

Dusty's duet with the Pet Shop Boys became her second biggest hit ever
her duet with the Pet Shop Boys, became her second biggest hit ever.

Dusty had been drinking wine and taking valium when Teda returned to their apartment and the inevitable row ensued.

'She was a perfectionist. To see someone like that was quite an education,' said Kiki Dee

She had spent 11 years in Hollywood, struggling for much of that time with alcoholism and mental illness as her fortune and career ebbed away.

Her moods often swung wildly between harming herself and harming others.

That day, Dusty fled from the apartment clutching her mouth and was admitted to Cedars-Sinai hospital with her face swollen and blackened and her front teeth missing – a sight that reduced those who visited her to tears.

Her fight with Bracci that day had serious consequences. Borrowing some money, she hired a cheap plastic surgeon to repair her mouth. The result was that her face looked partially frozen, and she lost the characteristic, animated smile that had always seemed to light her up.

 



She finally sobered up, but her mental health problems persisted.

Just two years later she was admitted to a locked psychiatric ward at New York’s Bellevue Hospital after one more in a long line of suicide attempts.

Returning to England in 1989, she gradually rebuilt her career. But, as ever, triumph was tinged with tragedy.

In 1994 she found an indentation in her breast and was diagnosed with the cancer that would kill her five years later, at the age of 59.

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