Bette Midler ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images
Bette Midler was “absolutely” sex positive in the course of the early days of her profession.
“, you’re only young once. I had such fun,” Midler, 78, told The Hollywood Reporter in an interview published on Friday, August 2. “I had numerous boyfriends. We did all of it.”
When asked who’s the “sexiest famous man” she’d ever encountered, the Emmy winner answered, “David Bowie. Mick Jagger.”
Midler, who dated her late manager Aaron Russo from 1972 to 1979, said her youth “was great fun until it wasn’t.” The actress, who first appeared on Broadway in 1967’s Fiddler on the Roof, recalled “all the things” coming to a “screeching halt and life intervened.”
Midler noted that the AIDS epidemic was considered one of the largest aspects in why her wild times suddenly stopped. “There have been people leaving, dying, having breakdowns,” she remembered. “I got here to a fork within the road, privately and personally, and I said, ‘This will not be going to finish well, so let’s just stop.’ So I did.”
The Hocus Pocus star said she “began attempting to be somewhat more responsible” after the sexually transmitted disease spread throughout the U.S.
“It’s all a part of growing up. Most individuals do grow up. And I did. It took me a minute, but I did,” Midler continued. “I married, I had a daughter, and nothing will tighten up your lifestyle like a baby.”
Bette Midler Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
Midler married Martin von Haselberg in 1984, and after 40 years together the couple are still going strong, thanks in no small part to their sleeping arrangement.
“Separate bedrooms,” she identified as the key to her marriage. “My husband is a snorer. I was a champion sleeper. Not now. I don’t sleep in any respect. So I didn’t wish to not sleep. There you go.”
Two years after welcoming her and von Haselberg’s only daughter, Sophie, now 37, Midler starred in 1988’s Beaches. From there, her profession continued to flourish with roles in 1993’s Hocus Pocus and 1996’s The First Wives Club.
Warning: This story comprises spoilers from Hocus Pocus 2. One other black flame candle! It took 29 years for Hocus Pocus 2 to return to fruition — but Hocus Pocus 3 won’t take nearly as long. In September 2022, Hocus Pocus stars Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Najimy reprised their roles as iconic Sanderson sisters […]
In recent times, Midler has once more change into a household name starring in The Politician from 2019 to 2020 and reprising her role as Winifred Sanderson in Hocus Pocus 2. Her latest role is playing Marilyn in The Fabulous 4 alongside Susan Sarandon, Megan Mullally and Sheryl Ralph Lee. Midler is well aware female icons are having a moment in the case of the box office.
“There’s been a bunch of those movies, like Book Club and 80 for Brady,” Midler said of the genre. “It’s all women of a certain age. We’re old-timers who’ve been through quite a bit, are very well-known and type of loved by the population.”
