Fergie on choosing music over Harvard and her drug use
A London Times article notes that Stacy Ann Ferguson and her group the Black Eyed Peas have had “a record-breaking consecutive 26 weeks at the top of the US singles chart.”
Here is more from the article :
Fergie could have gone to Harvard if she’d fancied it… straight As, the stint as president of her student council. All the while, she was holding down a full career as a child actress.
These days, pop stars are so well schooled in the blah-blah art of question-dodging they’ll scarcely express a preference for Coke or Pepsi.
Fergie is different, a curious mix of hard and soft: one moment she’ll be effusing about the restorative powers of hypnotherapy, the next be somewhat blasé about the perils of life as an addict.
She gives a wry smile. “Sometimes publicists get really mad with me for talking about stuff like that — but I don’t care.” She cocks her head.
“For me, it’s something I went through. It’s an epidemic, and it’s important to talk about it because it’s a very, very hard thing to stop.”
How did it start? “It started with ecstasy. I loved ecstasy. Loved it, loved it. It was great at first, then it just went…” she mimes a crashing plane with her forearm.
And crystal meth? “It ruins you.” Some days she became insanely paranoid, blacking out the windows in her apartment, convinced she was under FBI surveillance. Others, the danger was more tangible, such as the time she went to buy weed in East LA and ended up with a dealer pointing a gun at her head. “Yeah, that was crazy. Don’t mess with East LA. Thank the Lord, I’m here.”
Was it a case of “child star hits the skids”?
“Definitely. What happens when you’re a child professional is that you have to be, well, professional. You’re taught not to have tantrums, to always people-please. That’s part of how I got into [drugs] later.”
Has she met the other casualties: Britney Spears, Drew Barrymore? “I’ve met Drew, she’s a sweetheart. I just saw Britney the other day at the Teen Choice Awards.” Is there a mutual understanding? “Sure. There are definitely things in common. It’s making that change from being a [child performer], expected to do everything right, to adulthood, when you’re going to have your rebellion phase.”
She laughs, hollowly. But it gets worse, as it’s pushed back a few years? “Yeah, it does,” she sighs.
Her life fell apart. She smoked away her savings, lost her mind (talking to hampers, etc) and ended up living at her parents’ house. There is some speculation that Fergie is older than she lets on (seems unlikely; she grew up on TV), as her unquestionably sexy features can look a touch — how can I put this? — ravaged. But she beat it. “I don’t hang out in circles where everyone is smoking crystal meth out of a pipe. That wouldn’t be smart. You have to make good decisions. I always say I’m retired.”
From Singer Fergie on giving up gangs and drugs, by Giles Hattersley, The Sunday Times [UK] October 11, 2009.
~~~~
For a variety of reasons, many talented people use and abuse drugs. See my articles Actors and Addiction and Gifted, Talented, Addicted – and the page Drugs and creativity.
