Lucille Ball Told Cher to Leave Sonny Bono: ‘You’re the One With the Talent’

Cher’s memoir is finally here, and it is just as juicy and dramatic as music lovers had hoped it would be. Filled with intrigue, secrets and honest confessions, the singer held nothing back regarding topics like mental health, her rise to fame and her marriage to Sonny Bono. Below, we have rounded up what the singer said about all the former topics, including the time Bono told her that he wanted to kill her. Keep scrolling for more! 

What Cher revealed about her relationship with Sonny Bono

Cher and Bono were married from 1964 until 1975, and during that time, the two released several number-one hit songs, including “I Got You Babe.” And while it may have seemed like the two were head over heels in love with each other, it turns out the real story was much darker and twisted. 

In her new memoir, the singer details how controlling her former husband was. He reportedly would not let her wear perfume or attend a Tupperware party hosted by Mairlyn Wilson Rutherford, the wife of Beach Boy member Brian Wilson. 

Cher went on to detail how, in 1972, the two were taping an episode of "The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour” in Las Vegas, Nevada and then were supposed to perform at the Sahara Hotel. On the way there, Bono reportedly told Cher that he had signed them up to "perform in Vegas every summer for God knows how many years.” 

This deal eventually led Cher to consider ending her own life and leaving Bono behind. 

“I saw how easy it would be to step over the edge and simply disappear," the singer wrote. “For a few crazy minutes, I couldn’t imagine any other option. I did this five or six times and each time, I’d think about Chas [her and Bono’s kid], about my mother, about my sister, about everybody, and how things like this could make people who look up to me feel that it’s a viable situation and I would step back inside.” 

Following that, Cher and Bono split up. During the week, he would live and perform with her husband, but he allowed her to spend the weekends alone in Malibu, California. Her husband also only gave her $5,000 a month, despite most of their money being jointly brought in. 

During their separation, though, Bono reportedly got so jealous that he even considered killing his wife. 

“Sonny and I were becoming friends again. One morning I came down to breakfast and he surprised me by saying, ‘You know, after you went off with Bill [their guitarist] that night at the Sahara, I seriously thought about throwing you off our balcony,’” Cher wrote. 

“He laughed a little at that and so did I,” she continued. “It was crazy that he was telling me. He went on: ‘I figured I’d plead insanity like Spade Cooley and get seven years in jail before they released me. Then I’d get a book deal and my own show.’”

“Oh, you did, did you?’ I replied. ‘Well, there would have been no need to push me because I was gonna jump!’ Within seconds, we were howling,” the singer finished. “No one watching our response to what had been the darkest moment of our marriage would have understood.” 

Another thing Cher revealed was that her and Bono’s marriage was “loveless.” 

“The confusing thing was that, although I was deeply unhappy, I still loved Sonny, but I was no longer in love with him,” writes Cher. “We were an amazing team on TV but at home things were falling apart. He didn’t notice me anymore, so he didn’t see it.”

“I was able to live with him because I compartmentalized my feelings and was used to censoring what I said and did around him.” 

How Lucille Ball helped Cher leave Sonny Bono 

Also in her memoir, Cher revealed that it was Lucille Ball who helped her leave Bono. 

“I called Lucille Ball to ask for her advice,” the singer wrote. “I told her, ‘Lucy, I want to leave Sonny and you’re the only one I know that’s ever been in this same situation. What should I do?’ Lucy and her husband had also become famous working together as stars on TV. And he was a huge womanizer too. Then Lucy had left him. She told me, ‘F--- him, you’re the one with the talent.’”

Cher eventually divorced Bono in 1975 and then remarried singer and songwriter Gregg Allman later that same year; however, Cher filed for divorce nine days later. 

Cher: The Memoir: Part One of a Two-Part Memoir from the Iconic Artist and Actor is available for purchase now.

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