Laughter

 

Up against a window

Photo by Paul McCartney 

 

Ringo is Life of the Portman Party (1986)

 Ringo is Life of the Portman Party

By Martha Woodham

The Atlanta Journal

October 12, 1986

    He's known as "Richie" to his friends, and Ringo Starr was just playing "Richie" Monday night at a party at Jack and Mary Portman's house, accompanied by his wife, actress Barbara Bach, and assorted business partners along for a lark.

     The former Beatle was in town to announce the opening of the Brasserie, a restaurant in John Portman's Peachtree Center. Starr's primary role in the venture is to promote the restaurant, although he did say, "There'd be lots of pictures of me hanging about."

     The ex-Beatle, who had a quiet Sunday night at the Marriott Marquis, graciously posed for photographs and chit-chatted with many of the 300 guests at the party. Earlier, he and his mates had lunched with the Portman clan in John Portman's office dining room, where he and his wife often held hands. They held hands at the party that night as well. 

    "What's his wife's name," one woman whispered. "I should have read Rolling Stone before I came."

     That evening, she wore a long print top that fit over a pleated skirt in another pattern. Starr wore a white coat, a black shirt, and a thin black tie with white squiggles. John Portman wore a business suit, though he had joked earlier about resurrecting a flower power shirt to wear.

     "I wouldn't trust any guys whose shirts are darker than their jackets," one guest quipped.

A snapshot in the crowd

 October 6, 1986 

Turning up for Twiggy

 September 16, 2026 

A Couple of Starrs (1981)

 A Couple of Starrs

By Fred Robbins

Thursdays Woman

September 17, 1981

    Soon after the Beatles' cyclonic arrival in the United States in 1964, Ringo Starr made it clear, indeed, that he wasn't enchanted by American women. "They have too much to say here," he declared. "They boss a man around. I'll have no woman bossing me around."

     He was 24 then. He's 41 now, and he's both mellower and wiser. Now he knows that American women, like women everywhere, defy stereotyping. Ringo also knows that a guy can't stop lightning. That's the title song he wrote for his latest album, and it refers directly to the love that struck with such dazzling force when movie actress Barbara Bach, who grew up in Queens, New York, came into his life.

     On April 27, 1980, Ringo and beautiful Barbara stopped finding it fate, that is. That was the day he recalls when he told her he loved her for the first time. On April 27, 1981, they became Mr. and Mrs. Richard Starkey. They pledged their vows in London at the Marlebone Registry Office in the presence of family and friends, including ex-Beatles Paul McCartney and George Harrison. As hundreds of fans screamed outside, their wedding party at an exclusive London club was enlivened by a spontaneous jam session, bringing the three surviving Beatles together musically for the first time in a decade. Their impromptu reunion found them playing many of their great hits of the past, including, of course, "All You Need Is Love."

     Love, says Ringo, is the last thing he expected to find when he agreed to having Barbara Bach be signed as his leading lady in the comedy movie Caveman. Nor was he particularly anxious to marry again after his divorce from Maureen Cox, his hometown sweetheart in Liverpool, and the mother of his three children, the eldest of whom is 15. "I was married for 10 years before," he said, "and I had a good marriage for eight years, and then it fell apart. And you don't really know why, because it doesn't come apart in one day. You don't wake up in the morning and say 'that's it.' It takes a couple of years for it to finally drag itself out."

     For several years after his divorce, Ringo opted for a live-in relationship with actress-photographer Nancy Andrews, who was still with him when Caveman went into production in Porta Va'arta, Mexico. And just before his recent marriage, she filed a still-unsettled $7.5 million palimony suit against him.

     When Barbara Bach was first suggested as his co-star, Ringo says, "I had never seen her on the screen, not even in the James Bond movie, The Spy Who Loved Me. I kept asking, 'What does she look like?' And everyone said, 'Oh, she's a beautiful girl.' They finally showed me some photographs, and they were right."

     But Ringo was no stranger to Barbara Bach. As a teenager, the now 34-year-old beauty would have considered herself lucky just to meet or touch Ringo Starr. But the thought of someday knowing and loving him was too much to imagine. "I was one of the early Beatles fan," she told me. "When they first arrived in America. I was living on Long Island, close enough to go to Kennedy Airport, where they landed. I was right there with my Beatle wig on, in the midst of that mob, with my little sister Marjorie, screaming and yelling."

     Offered the role in Caveman, Barbara jumped at it because it was a comedy, and because at long last she'd meet Ringo. "From the beginning, I was happy to discover that Richie (her name for Ringo) is one of the warmest, kindest, most loving human beings I'd ever met. Even though I didn't fall in love with him immediately," she says. Like Ringo, the former cover girl had also experienced a 10-year marriage that ended in divorce.  Modeling and acted in Italy, starring in dreadful movies like The Humanoid and The Island of the Fish Men. Barbara married a handsome Italian businessman and became the mother of two, Francesca, 12, and Johnny, 8. 

    Love slipped up quietly on Barbara and Ringo. "I was looking for Prince Charming," the hazel-eyed Barbara admits, "but quite honestly, I never thought I would find him. I never thought I'd get married again. Secretly, though, I was waiting and hoping for Prince Charming, and he came along, but I didn't recognize it at first.

     "I'm usually attracted to people who can laugh," Barbara continues, "So I was naturally attracted to Richie. We both agree that the best thing in life is laughter and having a good time. Also, I like sensitive people, and despite his great gifts as a performer and what many people may think, Richie is basically shy, compassionate, and understanding of others. Each new thing that I learned about him made me love him more."

     Both Ringo and Barbara wear star-shaped gold pins encasing a sliver of windshield glass; the pins, which he designed, signify an event that changed their lives. After the completion of their movie, the two went together to England, where they miraculously survived a devastating automobile crash. One rainy day, when they were on an outing in Ringo's Mercedes 350 SL. A skidding truck came hurling toward them. Trying to avoid a collision, Ringo spun the wheel sharply, and the car, going into a skid, toppled three lamp posts. He was thrown clear as the car rolled over twice, finally coming to a stop on the grassy island between highways, completely demolished, with its roof caved in, trapping Barbara inside. Incredibly, they escaped injury and suffered only severe shock. 

    "The accident happened on the 21st of April last year," Ringo relates.  "It brought us even closer together than we'd been because we realized that any day we could be separated; since that day, we have not been separated. Six days after it happened, it was like I was struck by lightning. I said 'I love you,' and we began making plans to marry."

     Of the crash, Barbara says, "It went by so quickly that we only realized how tragic it could have been once we lived through it and saw the condition of the car; we admitted to one another. Then we survived this, so we are meant to survive a lot of other things too. The little windshield pins that we wear are a constant reminder that everything that's happened between us was faded."

     Both say they do not expect marriage to change anything in their relationship. "Getting married is really just saying to the world we are together, and we plan to stay together forever," said Barbara. "And by having the same name, we believe that perhaps it will make it a bit easier on the children."

     Says Ringo, "Getting married will not alter our lives in any way. While I have no guarantee, I'm planning to spend the rest of my life with Barbara. This is forever for me."

     Speaking of Barbara, Ringo waxes lyrical. "Of course, her obvious qualities attracted me first, but that's just the surface. She's a very gentle woman, very giving, very loving, and she likes to play like I do. There's a whole woman there. Inside the lady is just as much beauty as outside. That's the difference. There are a lot of good-looking women, but very few beautiful women. And the beauty, I think, comes from within the soul. I'm a romantic, and I love being in love with Barbara."

     Since their marriage, Ringo and Barbara live just like they did before in a house in the Hollywood Hills with her children, and they vacation at the villa he has in Monte Carlo; Barbara adds that she remains friendly with her ex-husband, who is frequently around. "He comes to L.A., stays at the house with us, and visits the kids," she says. 

    While he's been more active in movies than any of the other Beatles, Ringo doesn't want anyone to get the mistaken notion that he is forsaking music. "I am a musician," he says empathetically. "Though there may be long periods between albums, there will always be a new one, but what's the hurry? I've got another 40 years. The music scene is in a state of transition now," he observes. "As the Beatles, we were lucky," Ringo says. "We were able to stay together as a group longer than most. Everything seems to be going at a faster pace now, and the turnover today is frightening. You can have a group up there as number one, the biggest thing in the world, and two months later, nobody wants to know them. Somebody new has come up."

     Then Ringo talks of his musician son and smiles as he relates. "He's 15 now and already in a band, a heavy metal band. I've got records of his, and they'll wipe you out. But he's not into Beatles music at all, no way. And he has a great line.   He says,  'You know those records you made, Dad? Some of the tracks weren't bad.'"

     Even for Ringo, the Beatles are yesterday, and he realistically says "You can't live in the past." Speaking of the Beatles, inevitably brings up the subject of the tragic death of John Lennon. "Barbara and I were on holiday in the Bahamas when her daughter called and told us what had happened," he says. "The shock, of course, was just a mind blower. John was more than a good friend to me. I looked at him as a brother, like I do the other two, Paul and George, being that I was an only child. So his death just blew me away. When something like that happens, you react in one of two ways: you either go hide somewhere with your grief, or you go and visit. Our decision was to get on a plane to New York just so we could say to Yoko Ono, 'We're here if there's anything we can do,' and there really wasn't. I said to Yoko, 'I know how you feel.' She looked at me very honestly and said, 'No, you don't,' and she was right. I was close to John, but nowhere near as close as she was, they were like one soul within two people."

     Barbara admits she was unprepared for the mob scene she and Ringo encountered outside the Dakota in New York after paying their condolences to Yoko Ono. Her face clouds as she recalls it. "When we walked out of the Dakota, I was really frightened. Such a crush of people! They kept yelling, 'We love you, Ringo,' and they were all grabbing at him. And I am obviously not used to that, as Richie is. So I was yelling back, 'You're hurting him. If you love him, have some respect for the man. He's making a condolence call.'

      "Since it was not a concert or public appearance, I did think it was very disrespectful of the crowd not to leave him alone, not to let us even get to the car. All the running, pushing, shoving, and screaming was terrifying. It was sheer madness. In a crowd like that, one person can tick something off, and that is what we're always afraid of."

     And that is why Ringo never ventures out now without being accompanied by two bodyguards. "Suddenly, you're made to realize that it can be dangerous out there,"  he says. "Once it starts, it's like a forest fire. A lot of people get ideas, so until it cools off, you've got to protect yourself against that. But you must not allow yourself to become bitter. You cannot blame the whole human race for one man, you know, you can't blame New York where it happened. There were some really nice people in that town, in every town."

     Ringo readily admits he's still not fully reconciled to John Lennon's death. "I was upset and pretty low for a long time," he said. "It does get easier because we all have to carry on living, but then again, it gets brought up all the time, so it still knocks me down. Then you start remembering the good times, which is what you should do. It also helps that I strongly believe in reincarnation. It's pointless if you think there's no life after life. Why would you try to do or create anything if you thought that's the end of it? Everyone comes back as another human being. I believe I'm going to come back, and I believe that John will too."

     Ringo hopes that no one believed the widely reported story that he, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison had reunited to do a memorial album to John Lennon. "It was just a rumor," he insists. "We have no intentions. We are still close, all three of us, but we have our separate lives, even though we help each other. Paul produced three tracks on my recent album. He also wrote two tracks for me, and on one of the tracks he plays drums and I play guitar. Also on Paul's new album, I'm on two tracks playing drums by myself on one, and on another with Steve Gatt, a very good New York drummer. Meanwhile, George made a new album on his own. We're all doing our albums, you know. We're all carrying on, and we will always be friends, though we will never again be the Beatles."

Ringo Prepares for His Old Age (1986)

 

Ringo Prepares for His Old Age

No Writer Listed

Reading Evening Post

August 27, 1986

    Former Beatle Ringo Starr is planning his retirement home. Ringo will be 46 soon, and with the children growing up, he's looking ahead to old age. So he has drawn up plans to build a retirement home, but it will be a cut above most people's dreams.

     The luxury villa will be set in its own grounds in a corner of Tittenhurst Park, the heavily guarded estate he owns in exclusive Sunningdale near Maidenhead. An application for planning permission to build the villa in the 80-acre park has been submitted to Windsor and Maidenhead Borough Council, which is due to debate the scheme tomorrow.

     A borough council spokesman said there is a recommendation from the officers to refuse the application because the site lies within a green belt. The plan is due to go before Berkshire County Council planners next month, and they are also being urged to turn it down.

     Ringo's solicitor, Mr. John Hemingway, said, "The villa would be in a segregated part of the estate on the site of a former house, so we live in hope that the planners will agree to the scheme.

     "It would be a natural development. The application has been submitted by Mr. Starkey's trustees. The thinking is long term. His oldest son has already married, and the other children are growing up. Probably the existing house will be far too big for Mr. Starkey and his wife in years to come. It is sensible to start planning an alternative home now. The family is growing up, and he is looking to the future."

     Ringo, who has three children from his first marriage, is married to actress Barbara Bach, who has a daughter from her first marriage; he has owned Tittonhurst Park for some years and lives in a large mansion patrolled by security guards and dogs. The estate is screened by electrified fencing. Mr. Hemingway thought Ringo would sell or lease the mansion and move into the new villa.

In Malibu

 August 18, 2026 -- Ringo and Barb were seen out and about in Malibu 

The Wedding Reception

July 27, 1986
 

Ringo Starr: Mojo Icon Award Winner

 July 21, 2011 -  Mojo Awards in London 

Peace, Love and Cake

 July 7, 2011

Hard Rock Cafe in Hamburg, Germany 

Night out in Monte Carlo

 July 5, 2001 

Celebrating Lady Liberty

 July 2, 1986 

Beatle family photos

This has to be one of my all time favorite photos of Ringo and Paul 

June 20, 2006

Twenty years ago the Love Show premiered and there was a huge Beatles family reunion.  Of course as far as I am concerned the Beatles family is a very large one that includes many amazing people -- some of them are pictured here.  
 

The Family Way

 June 29, 1996

So happy together

 

Making the rounds

 May 30, 1986 

Flower Show

 May 26, 2006 -- Ringo and Barb at the Chelsea Flower Show 

Out on the town

 May 21, 1991  -- Oh Ringo -- please don't ever shave your beard again. 

On the House For Ringo! (1986)

 

I know this is a light-hearted story from 1986, but I can't help but feel a little sad reading it and knowing what we know now about Ringo and Barb's alcoholism during this time in their lives.  If they kept drinking like this, neither one of them would be with us today -- or if they were, Ringo wouldn't be able to keep up with touring and jumping jacks on stage.  So let this be a cautionary tale to Beatles fans everywhere—if you're struggling with addiction, get help!  Ringo did, and look how great he is doing today! 

From the Daily Record

May 8. 1986