Carly toyed with making another album of standards with Richard Perry, trying to capture the large audience that Moonlight Serenade had attracted. One day, Warren Beatty called her, seemingly out of the blue, and urged her to make this record with Perry. Carly told her old friend Warren that, like always, she was keeping her options open.
Summer 2011. Carly sang with the Boston Pops at a benefit for the Nantucket Cottage Hospital. She sang at a birthday party for Bill Clinton on the Vineyard. At another venue, she appeared onstage with Ben Taylor and John Forté. She collaborated with playwright Ernest Thompson on a new song, “The Father-Daughter Dance,” for a revival of On Golden Pond in New Hampshire. The Boston Globe sent a reporter to the Vineyard to interview her. Carly explained that in general she was feeling better but was still prone to depression, due to some hormonal losses after her bout with cancer. Asked if she still thought about retiring, she answered: “I want to make the most of my time. I’m into writing poetry now, and piano concertos. My weakness is my tendency for laziness. But I’m determined to remain a body in motion. I want to rev it up!”
The reporter remarked that Carly’s voice still sounded very strong, and asked her secret.
“Letting love come into my life,” she replied. “Feeling love makes me feel like I want to shine.”
As of this writing in 2012, Carly Simon hasn’t retired. She’s still moving between her homes in New York and Martha’s Vineyard; still nurturing friends and family; still carrying a major torch; still worrying about the state of the world; and still creating when her faithful muse visits her, in the wee small hours of the morning.
Acknowledgments
The author wishes to thank the Simon family for decades of inspiration (and fun). Thanks also to the Davis family, for the same. Christopher B. Davis contributed research and maintained editorial standards. Everyone who was interviewed is a gem. Thanks to the great journalists who covered the Carly Simon story in the past. To my colleagues at Gotham Books in New York, I’m sorry this took so long, but like many things, it was too much fun to stop. Special thanks to editors Lauren Marino and Cara Bedick, plus publisher Bill Shinker. Cheers to David Vigliano and John Pelosi, Esq. As mentioned in the introduction, this biography is unauthorized. Thanks to Carly for her help. Bonum quo antiquius eo melius.
—STEPHEN DAVIS
More Room in a Broken Heart: The True Adventures of Carly Simon Page 39
