Amy (2015) Movie Script
These are the only
three people left.
This is Mr. Alex Steele,
Mrs. Juliette Ashby,
- Mrs. Amy Winehouse.
- Ah, my booby.
In other words,
Mrs. Amy Winehouse.
And everyone else is gone.
D'you want a lick
of the lollipop?
Come on, have a lick.
- No, I don't.
- Have a lick. Come here.
Come and have a lick.
No one wants to lick
your slobbery lollipop.
- Lauren, just lick it.
- Here's me.
It's my 14th...
birthday evening and party.
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday dear Lauren
Happy birthday...
To... you
Oh, wow.
Moon River wider than a mile
I'm crossing you in style...
I was singing
with a little jazz unit,
the National Youth
Jazz Orchestra,
must've been about 16,
and I just loved jazz.
Dinah Washington...
Sarah Vaughan, Tony Bennett.
I learned to sing from listening
to stuff like Monk,
and a lot of soloists as well,
rather than just listening
to singers.
I learned from everything,
really.
...same rainbow's end
Waiting round the bend
My Huckleberry friend
Moon River
And me
So singing has always been
important to me,
but I never thought, "I love
singing, I'll be a singer."
I just thought, "I'm lucky"
there is something
I can always do, if I want to.
"I'm so lucky like that."
But I didn't think
it would be a career choice.
And me
Moon River and me
What's the date?
- Today?
- 24th.
- Is it?
- Yeah.
- The what?
- 24th.
- Of what?
- January.
And, um, what day is it?
- Saturday.
- And what year is it?
Lunchtime.
I was a 19-year-old
office junior
for a promotions company
owned by Simon Fuller.
I just started to try
and kind of blag it myself
as a talent scout.
I was definitely
out of my depth.
My friend Tyler
is a singer.
He was with Nicky Shymansky
and Tyler said,
"My friend Amy sings jazz
and she's great."
Nicky said to me,
"Want some studio time?"
I said, "For what?"
And he was like,
"Well, if you'd write songs,
we'd make a record,
get a record deal."
I was, like,
"What do you get out of it?"
Hello.
I look ugly.
Yeah, look at you.
You look lovely.
I don't. My chin's massive.
- Worried about your chin?
- That's there forever.
There is no greater thrill
Than what you bring to me
No sweeter song
Than what you sing
Sing to me
- Decide to record it?
- Yeah.
Hello.
I'm just here... smoking a fag.
I just like to...
Oh, I look so grim.
I look like a floating head.
You know, I've got no hair.
I'm just on a black screen.
There's my hand.
What's going on?
We'd recorded
quite a few demo recordings,
and I started to talk about
whether she'd ever consider
writing.
She said she's not sure
about writing songs,
but she's written
a lot of poems.
And he's my life
She knew full well
she'd been writing songs,
but they were very
personal songs.
I wouldn't write anything
unless it was directly personal
to me,
just 'cause I wouldn't be able
to tell the story right
because I wouldn't have done it.
Even though some of it
is personal in a sad way,
I'd never let it just be that.
I'll always put a punchline
in the song.
Just try and be different
with my lyrics.
Someone gave me a CD, two songs,
and they weren't necessarily
what you'd call hit songs,
but they conveyed an emotion
that just touched me.
When you have that as an artist,
you usually have
a story to tell behind it.
But it's a big leap of faith.
I think my boss
even questioned the deal,
because we were really
committing to giving
an unsigned artist
close to 250,000 pounds.
We both knew we wanted
to live with each other,
we both knew
we wanted to move out.
She had family issues
and I had lots of things
going on with my family,
and we looked after each other.
It was amazing.
We were young kids
and we were best friends,
in a flat on our own.
She loved it.
Juliette would sing,
Amy would sing...
And we just used
to see each other all the time.
We used to go
to so many gigs with Amy.
And when she first started
doing her music,
we were all so excited
and proud of it.
Where are we, Amy?
- We're in Brighton.
- Yeah, but what are we in now?
Um, we're in, uh...
What's-it Square,
Regency Square, in a black cab.
In a white cab. A beautiful cab.
- And Lauren's with us.
- Ah!
D'you know what my favourite
thing about Nicky is?
His legs.
Aw.
Know what my other
favourite thing is?
- What?
- Not your hair.
She could make you feel
so important...
and then, all of a sudden,
very unimportant.
And then make you feel
so important again.
That was what she did.
She liked to get people
into a comfortable position
and then shock them.
If I got my hair right,
then what would that mean?
That would mean
you were ready to marry me.
Her first relationship
was with an older guy
called Chris.
She really got the hots for him.
Madly in love with him.
She wrote a few songs
about having the hots for him.
And then, eventually,
she lost interest and...
She always used to talk about it
and started writing about that.
I think when I was growing up,
the music that was
in the pop charts or, you know,
the music that was...
that people were releasing
at the time,
I just thought,
"This isn't music,"
this is watered down,
or this is, you know, just crap,
someone else has written it
for you
"and you have to sing it."
It's very much the case
with some music today.
I really started writing music
just as... to challenge myself,
to see what I could write or,
you know,
just because
there was nothing else there
that I could listen to
at the time.
And having listened to jazz
and, you know, great songwriters
like James Taylor
and Carole King,
it was very...
I felt like I had nothing new
that was coming out at the time
that really represented me
or the way I felt.
So I just started writing,
really, my own stuff
and from personal experience.
This is, um,
I Heard Love is Blind.
I'll just clip, clip my hair
out of the way, 'cause
it's gonna get on my nerves.
I remember thinking,
when she walked in,
she was this complete
force of nature.
I thought, "Wow,
there's something about you."
And I remember thinking,
"Please be good."
I wrote this in Miami with
a guy called Salaam and, um...
- and I'm really proud of it.
- She was 18
and she was a very classic
North London Jewish girl.
A lot of attitude.
Quite shy, but something
emanated from her.
She had a charisma.
When you looked
at her lyrical capability
and her melodic capability,
she was a very old soul
in a very young body.
And we did the deal
very, very quickly.
Amy's album came out yesterday
and how many has it sold so far?
A pretty staggering 800,
actually.
That is at least...
I've emptied my bank account
buying 600 of them.
That is, at least half my
friends have bought the album.
Bastards. I'd better call
the other half up today.
Snug in a rug.
She's going to get annoyed.
Amy?
Explain what your little hub
is all about.
- Hello. Oh, you're coming.
- Sleeping!
Just give us a smile,
then we can turn the camera off.
Come on, just give us a quick
one. A one-second flash.
How big do you think
you're going to be?
I don't, at all,
because, you know,
my music is not on that scale.
The music is not on that scale.
Sometimes I wish it was,
but I don't think
I'm gonna be at all famous.
I don't think I could handle it.
I'd probably go mad.
You know what I mean?
I would go mad.
- Where are we going?
- We're going to Birmingham!
Why are we going to Birmingham?
We're going to Birmingham
to sing songs.
- Yeah?
- And make merry.
Oh, that was sick!
That was sick!
- Get me, get me.
- Nicky, that was beautiful.
What are your thoughts
on how beautiful that was?
My turn, my turn!
Wait, let me get
a really good shot.
Oh, what a shot.
Oh!
She don't even care.
Watch it...
watch it go in there.
Got no light in here.
Don't get my spots in.
What spots?
- I love you.
- Do you know I'm zooming in?
You're zooming in
on all my spots!
You're a fucking cunt.
Does my hair look okay
like this?
Yeah, very good. It's lovely.
- Do you promise?
- I promise.
What song d'you think
I should do first tonight?
Right, I think
you should start off with...
Ah, I love your little cap!
It's so cute!
Um, I think you should
start off with a song called...
Oh, on camera. Okay. Okay.
- Go, sister. Go get done.
- Stop!
In my bed
Yeah yeah...
Could you please
introduce yourself?
Yes. Hello. I'm Amy Winehouse.
I'm 20. I'm a jazz singer.
I've heard your record
and it sounds very, uh, mature.
Is it all live?
Also, not only the singing,
but also the instruments?
Yeah, all the instrumentation
is completely live.
I wouldn't have any fake horns
on my record.
I think they put fake strings
on Take the Box,
but I wasn't a part of that.
I would never, ever have put
strings on my record. Ever.
And this guy doing the mix
of this song, he just...
didn't even think about it.
Okay, um...
just a couple of questions.
Um...
- Upset?
- Yeah.
Oh, okay. Okay, okay.
Okay. Um...
There wasn't a girl that had
been gobby in the media
for a long time.
And she could be very cutting.
Especially if she got bored
or felt misunderstood.
I dunno, it seems to me, though,
that every woman
who writes about, you know,
kind of puts it down on a record
doesn't do them any harm.
Look at Dido. I mean, she...
she used that album to
clean out her emotional closet.
- Did she?
- Yeah, it's all about
the break-up of her relationship
and, you know,
- kind of like surviving.
- Mm...
And, uh, and not, not going...
I mean, like the whole thing
about not going down
with the ship.
- Yeah...
- I mean, Dido's Dido,
but, you know, I mean, uh...
I think she's one
of the most exciting
and brilliantly
talented vocalists
to emerge in this country
in many, many years.
It is Amy Winehouse.
Fantastic.
You're managed by the company
who looks after S Club 7,
used to look after
the Spice Girls, Simon Fuller.
Have they tried to mould you
in any way?
Asked you to do things,
to change the way you look
or speak or behave?
Um, yeah, one of them
tried to mould me
into a big triangle shape
and I went, "No!"
No, I've got my own style.
I've got my own style
and I wrote my own songs
and, you know, if someone has
so much of something already,
there's very little you can...
add.
Yeah. You know what I like
about you, as well?
The way you sound so common.
Because I am common
and it's like, you know,
it's so refreshing
to hear someone
who isn't speaking
like they've taken
elocution lessons.
Yeah. They gave me elocution
lessons, but they kind of...
Psht!
- They didn't stick.
- Off my back, yeah.
I realized early on,
when Amy made her mind up,
she made her mind up.
And I found it difficult
to stand up to her.
She would say, "Oh, Mum,
you're so soft with me."
"I can get away with murder.
You should be tougher, Mum."
Well, I just accepted it.
I wasn't strong enough
to say to her, "Stop."
I met another woman when
Amy was about 18 months old.
We worked together.
We were having an affair.
But another eight or nine years
were to pass before I left home.
I was a coward.
But I felt that Amy was over it
pretty quick.
When Amy was a teenager,
13 or 14,
she was being taken
to the doctor's
and she was on antidepressants.
What is it about men
Amy used to always say to me
that that was her dream, really,
to do those sorts of shows,
to play in jazz clubs
to small audiences.
She had one of the most pure
relationships to music,
such an emotional
relationship to music.
Like she needed music
as if it was a person,
and that she would die for it.
Let me read this.
Oh, my God.
Uh, and the winner...
and the song is Stronger Than Me
by Amy Winehouse
and Salaam Remi.
Let's give it up!
This is me, isn't it?
Right here.
Wow!
I don't believe this.
Um, thank you, Salaam.
There's no picture of him,
but Salaam is the most
inspirational producer
I've ever worked with.
And he has that unique skill
of not just having
the most appropriate beat,
but also, um,
drawing the artistry out.
And I guess that's the story
of this song.
- And I wanna thank...
- What I allowed her to do
was to really just
put her wit into her songs.
When I heard her sing
in front of me,
I could tell she was really
like a jazz singer.
She had the stylings
of a 65-year-old jazz singer
who knew the ropes up and down.
It was, like, "Okay, if this is
what you are when you're 18",
then what are gonna be
when you're 25?"
We're now joined by Mos Def
in the backstage area.
Thanks for coming and taking
time out and chatting to us.
I heard they was doing
something, so I came down.
I became aware of Amy in 2004.
I was out in England.
I'm a big jazz fan and I really
liked what she was doing.
I thought it was unique,
it was edgy and sincere.
And that's the thing
I liked most about Amy,
is that she didn't have
any airs. She was real.
I had a chance to meet her
while I was here,
and we hit it off.
We became fast friends.
She was just a charming,
sweet lady.
I had a bit of a crush on her,
to be honest.
She was raw,
she was fast with a blue joke,
could drink anybody
under the table,
wasn't afraid to roll a smoke,
had a big giant laugh,
and was just a sweetheart,
you know?
You don't seem that bothered
about everything.
D'you know what I mean?
You have some artists
that step in here and go,
"Right, I want
that number-one spot."
I want my album
to go number one,
"I wanna chase up
with a second album."
But what's up with you?
I'm determined
on the next thing.
I'm not interested in...
Success, to me, is not success
to... the record company
or whoever.
Success, to me,
is having the freedom
to work with whoever
I wanna work with,
to always be able to just
fuck everything off
and go to the studio when I
have to go to the studio, or...
But you can't do that,
'cause you have
other responsibilities now.
You're becoming an artist
in the public eye.
So, all of a sudden,
you're gonna be...
I'm not saying you're gonna be
hounded by the press,
but you're gonna have
certain responsibilities
that are gonna come
onto your doorstep
that you may not
particularly welcome.
Okay, that's cool, but I think
the more people see of me,
the more they'll realize
that all I'm good for
is making tunes.
So leave me alone
and I'll do it.
I will do the music.
I just need time to do the
music. Know what I mean?
When she went to Camden,
it was very exciting,
'cause it was her first property
that she'd bought,
and we were all really happy.
She loved Camden.
She loved it up there.
But when she went to Camden,
things started changing.
We were the indie kids.
Gazelles, The Rakes,
Babyshambles.
Everyone was a Camden band.
Like, it was cool again.
In them days, it was
very much, like, basically,
if you were in a signed band...
you were a cunt, because...
the best-looking
and the best-dressed
and the coolest people
were the ones
who were born to lose, really.
The Libertines, yeah.
I slept on them.
I came to the Libertines, like,
a year later than everyone else.
But I'm not being funny.
They made people proud
to be British.
That was London for
a real spell, you know?
I run a club called Trash
with my friend Errol.
Did the door there.
Blake would give out flyers
for Trash.
We wouldn't have met each other,
and a lot of people here
wouldn't have known each other
had it not been for Trash.
That's fair enough, innit?
It's the first place I learned
how to pull a bird.
He just loved girls,
you know?
He loved partying
and he loved... shagging.
Always in and out of bed.
We met in a pub,
in the Good Mixer in Camden.
I was at the bar
and she came in.
We just sort of started
playing pool,
then we went to another pub.
And then we went back
to Amy's house.
She was seeing somebody else
and I was seeing somebody else.
But I didn't think of it
as infidelity.
I just thought she was,
like, a young girl
and she was a bit naughty.
And I was the same.
Are you alright?
How you doing? You okay?
What's going on with you
at the moment?
'Cause obviously,
Frank was last year, um,
and we haven't really heard much
from you since then.
So when are we gonna hear
from you next?
What's the next single?
Uh, I can't think
of the next single.
I'm just gonna write
the next album at the minute.
- Uh...
- You having that kind
- of writer's block thing or...
- Yeah, man.
It's hard to write, because, uh,
you can write
a million things a day,
but it's hard to write
something that you're proud of.
So I'm just trying, you know,
I'm just trying.
I asked to see her.
She was late
and she came in with Nicky.
She was a character.
She always called me
Uncle Lucian.
And I really liked her.
And I had enough
of a relationship with her.
So there's no flattery,
it was, like, blunt. And I said,
"Enough, I need another album.
"Now go and write one.
This is horseshit.
"Frank was then, this is now.
They're all gonna forget you."
She didn't like it.
- Nick Shymansky.
- Yes.
Sit up a bit.
- Yes.
- How are you today, darling?
Very good, actually. Thanks.
- How about you?
- Really good.
In between all this,
she decided that she wanted me
to leave 19 with Simon Fuller
to go manage her.
She didn't like being connected
with Pop Idol
and the Spice Girls,
but I thought it would be
incredibly disloyal,
at this point, to walk away.
And Blake was
very quickly becoming
a bigger and bigger character
in all this.
She was with him the whole time
and didn't want
to go to places without him.
We spent the summer together.
She used to say
we're like twins.
And that was our relationship.
I'd like to sabotage myself
and I think Amy
liked to sabotage herself.
Maybe that was our nature.
I used to ask her
why was she promiscuous
and why she was more like a man
with sex.
It's indicative of somebody
that's had a traumatic event,
maybe sexually, themselves.
Sort of made sense to me
from the way she was.
She'd just say, "It's nothing."
"I weren't abused
when I was a kid.
Nothing like that."
Then she said
her dad leaving her mum
was what caused this,
and her
not really seeing her dad.
I understood.
I cut my wrists
when I was nine years old.
I don't know if I wanted
to necessarily die,
I just wanted my mum
to leave my stepdad.
Me and Amy were quite similar.
I fell in love with
someone who I would've died for.
We were in love
and we were together.
And that's like a real drug,
isn't it?
If my man was fighting
Some unholy war
I would be behind him
Straight shook up beside him
With strength he didn't know
It's you I'm fighting for
He can't lose
With me in tow
With me in tow
I refuse
To let him go
To let him go
At his side
And drunk on pride
We wait
For the blow
Ooh...
Oh, let's see
who's gonna be
behind the green door!
- Hi!
- Master of the house
is not in right now.
She is gone somewhere
for a minute to be somewhere.
And somewhere she having dinner,
so I'm having a cheeky cigarette
while she gone.
Don't tell her. Shh.
Cheeky, cheeky. Eh!
Mi scusi.
Tell me about this place.
Alright, while she's away,
I'll give you a tour
of the house. Okay, ready? Okay.
First I lead you
into the main room.
This is usually reserved
for entertaining guests,
but you can be my guest,
darling,
because no one's here today.
Okay, I lead you out
to the grand patio.
Please, please follow.
Don't mind me in my...
- Ah, where you go?
- Okay, darling,
this is the grand patio.
This is Cecil.
- Cecil live here.
- Cecil!
Then we have the bedroom.
It's very nice.
There are some cupboards.
- Ooh.
- See up here,
this is where I sleep
when the master come home.
- The toilet!
- Sometimes when I'm alone,
I have a shower
in all my clothes.
I find this is the only
true way to relax.
Also here, this is the hook
I hang from when I'm in trouble.
It's not very often.
I'm a good boy. I'm a good boy.
Okay, well, this is it.
Welcome to my humble abode.
Amy!
We are sitting...
in a little bar,
drinking cocktails.
There's my cocktail.
There's Amy's little cocktail.
I think it's got Rohypnol in it.
All of a sudden she went to me,
"Lauren, listen to this message.
This is a message from Blake."
I just said to her that I
didn't wanna leave my girlfriend
and we'd probably be better
as friends.
She was obsessing
over these text messages.
He wanted nothing to do with her
and she was obsessing over it.
All she wanted
was for him to wanna see her.
It got messy.
He went back to his girlfriend,
then she got her own back.
She slept with his friend.
The person that lived opposite
in the little court
had Juliette's number and
had called Juliette up to say,
"Amy's fallen over
and she's hurt her head,
so we've gone round there."
It looked like people had been
squatting in her house.
It stank, it was dirty.
And she was lying on the bed
and she had this golf ball
coming out of her head.
So we worked till, like,
3 in the morning
and we cleaned
the whole house up.
And I called her dad
and we called Nick.
We all met there
and it was, like,
this is getting out of control.
We need to get her some help.
I've tried speaking
to the parents
and they really wanna
kinda take it on.
And so, technically,
I sort of kidnapped her.
I picked her up and I thought,
"I'm driving you
"to the middle of nowhere
and we're gonna sit there
until you acknowledge
what's going on."
I drove her
to Black Park in Iver.
And it started off
with her sort of laughing,
"You're such an idiot."
And then it turned into,
"Don't be a prick."
And she kicked my car.
And then she just broke down,
eventually.
Opened up about everything.
She said she thinks
she's got a problem,
she was lost
and out of her depth.
Horrible.
She agreed to go rehab.
I took her to see the rehab guy.
She was, like,
"I don't wanna talk about it.
I'll go if my dad
thinks I should go."
We'd spoken to Mitch.
We'd set it all up
and she turned
into a seven-year-old child.
Sat on her father's lap
and put her arm around him.
I said to the managers,
"She doesn't need to go
to rehab. She's fine."
My dad did actually go,
"You're alright, no need to go."
I said, "Alright, Dad,
I'll go and meet him"
and we'll back out."
Which I did.
She didn't need
to go to rehab.
I think
that was the moment
we lost a very key opportunity.
I'm not saying
it would've worked.
Very often, you have to go
two or three times.
But she wasn't a star.
She wasn't swarmed by paparazzi.
We could've just fucked
Back to Black off,
and Back To Black
might have never happened,
but she'd have had a chance
to have been dealt with
by professionals
before the world
wanted a piece of her.
I never wanted you
To be my man
I just wanted to see
what you can do
Yeah
No.
Yo yo yeah
The label were
considering letting her go.
She ends up
coming back to Miami.
Guy Moot calls me up,
"Hey, sure you wanna do this?"
I was, like, "Listen,
even if you dropped her",
"I would pay her to come
to my house and sing
'cause this shit
fucking moves me."
Many times when I tried
to set you right
It's just too hard
I never wanted you
To be my man
And she totally didn't drink
the whole time she was here.
And she sat out
in my back garden
for, I don't know, four days.
She'd just take her little
notebook and just keep writing.
A.
All I can ever be to you
Is the darkness that we know
And this regret
I got accustomed to
Once it was so right
when we were at our height
Waiting for you
in the hotel at night
I knew I hadn't met my match
With every moment
we could snatch
I don't know
why I got so attached
Took me a while to get my head
around a lot of things.
The actual turning point,
when I was alright with it,
was when I started
writing the album.
I write songs because
I'm fucked up in the head
and I need to put it on paper
and then write a song to it
and to feel better about it.
Have something good
out of something bad.
He walks away
The sun goes down
He takes the day
but I'm grown
And in your way
My deep shade
My tears dry
The ideas were there.
Four or five songs were there.
You can feel something
creatively starting to happen.
But I was still very worried
about her health.
She's really vulnerable
and not in a good place.
And then she said, "So, listen",
are you leaving 19
to manage me?"
And I said, "D'you know what?"
"Unless you let me help you
sort yourself out,
"I'm not doing this shit
for you.
I can't watch you
do yourself in like this."
I remember she came to see me
to talk about wanting
to change management.
I said, "Look,
that's entirely your decision."
We will support you
whatever you wanna do."
Then she said she wanted
to be managed by Raye Cosbert.
All I thought is, "Why on earth
are you gonna be managed"
by your promoter?"
I remember at the time thinking,
"We're now gonna deal
with a promoter
whose main interest will be
to get her out on the road."
And we knew she was very
vulnerable on the road.
When I first met Amy,
I was her concert promoter.
We got talking and she said
that her contract was up with 19
and she wanted
to explore other possibilities.
She said,
"Would you like to do it?"
And I was, like, "Well, yeah,
let's talk about it."
We got on quite well, you know.
I'd be the guy that'd turn up
after the gig and say,
"Well done,
have a glass of bubbly."
And I thought,
"Well, sometimes
someone just wants a change
because they feel
it's right for them to change."
It's like switching
bank accounts.
I was way too close to Amy.
I shouldn't have ever been
that close.
It should've been business.
But when you're 19,
you meet a 16-year-old
and you go through that,
you don't understand that.
We'd spent
all these years together.
And all of a sudden,
out of nowhere, I wasn't there.
When I started writing
the first song about Blake,
the other songs
just wrote themselves.
I was really was on a roll.
Because I had these feelings,
had these words
floating around in me.
When you write a song, you have
to remember how you felt,
what the weather was like,
what his neck smelt like.
You have to remember all of it.
She would tell me stories
about Blake
and this tempestuous,
extreme relationship.
That first day,
she wrote Back to Black,
all the lyrics and the melody,
in two or three hours.
Black
Black
Black
Oh, it's a bit upsetting
at the end, isn't it?
Rrrr... Boom, boom, boom.
I love that. Yes, Amy.
Yeah!
It was just one of those
serendipitous things.
Like, I just caught her
at that magic moment, you know,
and she was just ready
to get it going.
That's why I couldn't understand
what everyone else was saying
about this procrastinating,
troubled artist.
I went out to New York to
kinda hear what they were doing.
And the day I was flying out,
I got a call from management
saying that Amy's nan
had fallen ill
and she wanted to get
straight back to her nan.
Cynthia used to look after Amy.
She was like the mother
that I didn't have.
My own mother
was not really motherly to me.
So Amy and Cynthia
were very, very close.
My mum died
May 5th, 2006.
She had lung cancer.
Cynthia was a very strong
person in her life
and used to tell her how it is.
So it was horrible for her.
That killed her inside.
Well, hang on,
I'm not playing this track now.
Not playing this track now.
I'm not playing this track now.
I spoke to them and they said
it's just unnecessary.
Yeah, yeah. Okay.
We were making
the back end of the record
and we were
at Metropolis Studios
and Amy had bits of vocal
to finish.
Have I got any drink?
Did they bring up that drink?
- It's quite fun, really.
- An acoustic session?
Never been filmed like this.
I've never done it before.
She was having a couple
of whiskey-and-Cokes.
We had broke for lunch.
Amy had ordered
this massive plate of food
and she had a big dessert as well.
She finished the whole thing off
and she disappeared for a while,
and 45 minutes later
came back a bit kind of dazed.
And the studio manager pulled me
out of the session and said,
"Look, I need you to come
and see something."
She took me
to the women's toilets
and Amy had thrown everything up
and literally
redecorated the toilets.
She'd obviously been
wiping her face,
and all the mascara had
been rubbed off on the towels.
And that's when I kinda realized
that something serious
was wrong.
I had a toffee fudge...
but I ate it.
Yummy.
When she was probably 15,
she one day said,
"I've got this
really great diet, Mum.
I eat what I want and then,
I just bring it all up."
I know, I'm a pig.
I know I'm a pig,
I just... can't help it.
I obviously
did not think that deeply of it.
My feeling was, it would pass.
And then she told Mitchell
about it.
He also sort of pushed it aside,
not taking it seriously.
That basically is bulimia.
And it doesn't pass.
- Hello.
- Hello. You alright?
Welcome to the show.
Now, you've been away
for a little while.
What have you been up to?
I've done an album.
It's called Back To Black.
Mm-hmm.
How would you describe it?
It's a lot more... more...
I don't wanna say more raw,
but it's not got all the clever,
like, jazz chords.
It's not really like that now.
I've been listening
to a lot of girl groups,
a lot of garage bands.
It's kinda what it's like.
It's a lot more guitar.
I'm a guitarist,
I've been listening
to a lot more guitar bands.
In Camden,
you can't really
get away from it, so...
- You can't.
- It rubbed off on me.
Would you go as far as to say
it's a bit more accessible
than your debut?
I'd say it was more accessible.
It's not necessarily more poppy,
but, you know,
jazz is quite an exclusive.
Not exclu...
It's quite an elitist music,
you know,
and this album's
a lot less like that.
I'd rather be at home
with Ray
So let's talk
about your music, then.
And Rehab has gone down so well.
Are you kind of surprised
by the reaction to it?
Uh... I am, actually.
I never even thought
it'd be a single, really.
The record company were like,
"We want it to be a single."
And I was, like,
"Okay, I love all of it,"
know what I mean?
I'm really proud of it.
Now, the Q Awards,
which you were at yesterday.
Did you have a good time?
I had too good a time,
to be honest.
If that's possible.
Alcohol is bad, kids.
...in a shot glass
They tried to make
me go to rehab
I said no no no
Can you tie that any tighter?
What are you doing?
You have to be able to sing.
How can you breathe when
you're singing? That's tight.
Breathe? Sing? What?
There was already
this atmosphere of celebrity...
all tied into Rehab.
Rehab was the pivotal song.
It was the song that gets her
into a particular place,
her becoming a commercial star.
The winner of the Best
British Female this year,
way more rock'n'roll
than Liam Gallagher,
it's the one, the only...
Amy Winehouse!
Okay, let's just go.
Get the... get the... Go.
Ali, just go, man.
We're... we're still friends
We're still friends
We're still friends
Ooh. Rach, this is Blake.
He's my fianc.
Hello.
Turn the volume up!
We're kickin' off
the 107 days of summer,
on 107.5, WBLS!
No no no
The man said
Why do you think you're here
I said I got no...
I'm gonna
I'm gonna lose my baby
So I always keep
A bottle near
He said
I just think you're depressed
This me
Yeah baby
And the rest
I love, not like, Amy Winehouse,
because her voice
is the most original voice
that I've heard in the last,
I dunno, 10 years.
My daughter turned on to it,
everybody got turned on to it.
And I've turned all my friends
on to it.
Her CD is entitled
Back to Black.
Please welcome Amy Winehouse.
I just
Oh I just need a friend
See I'm not gonna spare
ten weeks
Have everyone think
I'm on the mend
And it's not just my pride
It's just till these tears
Have dried
They tried to make me go
to rehab
Amy called me.
Then I saw her in New York.
She wasn't puffed up
about herself at all.
She was almost embarrassed
by the fact
that she was doing so well.
She expressed a lot of concern
and fear
about where things were gonna go
and how she was gonna handle it.
She was just, like,
"What am I supposed to do
in this space, you know?"
I won't go go go
Amy Winehouse! Nice job!
Thank you very, very much!
Everybody just wanted
to spend time with Amy.
In our business,
there's nothing
that can prepare you
for that level of success.
There's no textbook.
You can warn an artist,
you can try
and prepare them for it,
but at the end of the day,
until you go through it,
it's unlike anything
you've ever encountered.
By yourself! By yourself!
By yourself!!
How do you think
the shoot's going, baby?
- Really well, baby!
- Yeah? Enjoying yourself?
What's it like to be shot
by Terry Richardson?
What's he like at shooting?
It's a lifelong dream come true.
What do you think
about the broken glass?
Um, I wrote "I love Blake"
on my tummy.
Did you? Did you outline it?
I wrote "I love Blake"
on my tummy.
I can't see any scars.
It's just chicken scratch.
So what's been your highlight
of the day?
Um...
it'll be in about five minutes.
When?
We go in the toilet
and I fucking...
- Blake, sit here.
- Yes, Terry, sir.
Amy, sit there.
Amy.
That's good, that's lovely.
You've been famous in the UK
for a little while longer.
Does it seem like it's different
how you're treated here,
in a way too, compared to...
The way people write about you,
it's almost like a 23-year-old's
never wanted go out
and have fun before.
It's kind of hypocritical,
in a way, too.
Uh... I wouldn't know,
I really wouldn't know.
Um... you guys have known
each other for a long time.
You've known each other...
You grew up together?
- Almost.
- Almost?
You were fighting
to get her back?
And what happened?
The day we got married,
we went out on a boat
around Miami,
smoked a cigar and...
it was like a real achievement,
an amazing thing that me
and her had actually done.
We'd actually gotten married.
And we did it
exactly how we wanted to.
You lazy people!
Hurray! Wave!
Her whole thing was she wanted
to feel how he felt.
And she was, "I just wanna feel
what he's feeling."
"I wanna be on the same level.
Otherwise he's there
and I'm here."
That's what she wanted,
that was the goal.
Welcome back to 45th at Night.
Please give a warm,
warm round of applause
for Amy Winehouse.
Yeah I cheated myself
Like I knew I knew I would
I told you
I was trouble
You know that I'm no good
Thank you very much.
Oh, have they? Bollocks.
Have they? Fuck.
I heard about that as well.
Amy,
can you talk in the kitchen?
After we came back
from America, married,
that was the first time Amy
tried crack cocaine and heroin.
I'd used by then and enjoyed it.
It completely eradicates
any sort of negative feelings.
And then Amy tried it with me.
And it just got a grip of both
of us really quickly from then.
Amy.
- Yeah?
- Come in here.
- Coming!
- Oh, change the record.
Just come on.
Pass me a little, uh...
Come on!
Are you alright
keeping the rollers in?
- Yeah.
- Yeah?
Do you ever have time
to stand back and think,
"This is alright.
Quite good, this."
Yeah. Uh...
Uh, I dunno. Yeah, I suppose so.
I suppose if my husband's happy,
I'm happy. Um...
But, yeah, I've done well,
I've done really well.
But, um...
I just want to be able to go
and do a next... an album again,
and... keep doing...
just keep doing music
really well,
rather than...
I love doing gigs, though.
I just want to go and do
another album now, so...
Yeah.
I got a phone call
in the middle of the night,
and Blake said to me,
"Something's happened.
"She doesn't know who I am
and she keeps saying your name.
Can you come round?"
So obviously I got up,
and I got in the car
and I started driving.
I got a phone call from Blake,
freaking out, off his nut,
saying she's overdosed.
And I said, "Right."
Go to the closest hospital now
and I'll be there."
She was petrified.
He was petrified.
She looked like a child.
She scared herself, basically.
And the doctor called us
into a room and said,
"With the amount of cocaine,
heroin,
"alcohol and crack cocaine
in her blood system,
"we're amazed
she's not in a coma.
"You've got away with it
this time,
"but she's a petite, young girl;
Her body
can't keep up with this."
She was asleep
and it was very calm.
Nicky was one side of the bed,
I was the other side of the bed,
and we said,
"What are we gonna do now?
How do we deal with this?"
And then it all just started up.
The whole circus
started up again.
And that's when
Raye and Mitch decided
to do an intervention.
Within... hours,
there were Sun, The Mirror,
News Of The World journalists
booked up in every room.
Every single conversation
that happened
was in the Sun and The Mirror.
Fuck knows if they were hacking
the phones or whatever.
And there's pictures
of all of us there, sat outside.
Amy was awake
by then and she was eating,
but she wasn't well
and she wasn't right.
The doctor that they got in
looked me dead in the eye
and he said to me,
"If she has another seizure,
she'll die."
And then I was told that she was
going to America to perform.
I was, like, "No, she's not."
We had Mitchell
in a hotel room with us,
begging him,
"Please do something."
"What am I gonna do?
She's gotta go on tour."
"Take her passport away
from her,
do something so she can't go
on tour. She needs help."
"Can't do that,
she's got a tour booked."
So I went into her
room and I stole her passport.
And then I got told,
"What you done that for?
She's gotta go to America.
Why have you done that?"
The doctor's just been round
to check her blood
and check everything.
Blake's managed to get to Hook,
get into her bedroom,
and the next checkup,
the doctors found out she's
got heroin in her blood again.
When I found out,
with the girls,
that she was taking heroin,
and we went to this hotel room
that she was staying in,
and Amy just sat there
and didn't really say anything.
Her manager
then said something like,
"Girls, there are lots
of professionals,
"lawyers and doctors,
all sorts of people,
that function on this stuff."
In helping promote the album,
and get the shows on the road,
I kind of done
what I was supposed to do.
And I felt that it's now
the family's responsibility.
I'm here, but there's only
so much I can do about this.
Amy Winehouse
has pulled out
of a string of concerts in
the U.S. and Canada next month
because of health issues.
The 23-year-old...
Now she's one of Britain's
brightest talents,
but the singer Amy Winehouse
has cancelled yet more gigs,
this time in Norway,
after she was admitted
to a hospital in London
yesterday.
Her record company said it was
just down to severe exhaustion,
but with her reputation
for hard drinking and drugs...
The Amy link came about
through Russell Brand,
who was trying to get Amy
to come into rehab.
And then, also,
Mitch had gotten involved.
And I first met Amy
when she came with Blake
to be assessed for treatment.
It was very much
being led by Blake,
although I did think
she was probably more willing
to go to rehab than he was.
She was a very vulnerable woman.
And I felt very clearly
that it was a common case
of one person having a situation
that was very beneficial
to their using,
not wanting the other person
to get better
for fear of losing
the gravy train.
They were insistent
on doing rehab together,
which, of course, we would've
considered to be disastrous.
I would personally find it
almost unethical
to take the couple
into treatment at the same time.
But her management, and Mitch,
managed to find somewhere
where they could go together.
Oh, it's recording shit.
It won't stop.
- Hey, uh... say hello.
- Hello!
Amy, got anything to say?
Only if you sing
your favourite hit, Rehab.
They tried to make me go
I said no
Where are we right now? Amy?
Alex, can you say? Where are we?
Known to some as...
So can we have the new updated
version of Rehab, please, Amy?
First time? Amy?
I want the new version of Rehab.
Please, baby,
for our personal private movie.
They came back from Osea Island,
and had a suite at the hotel,
and they binged.
It was ugly.
They weren't happy souls
when they were high.
I kicked off...
I broke a bottle
and I cut my arm.
And then she grabbed the bottle
off me and she nicked her arm,
and she said,
"I'll do anything you do."
She said,
"Love is, in some ways,
killing me, Raye Raye."
She felt torn
between those two things:
The guy that she really loved,
but having to keep up with
the consumption of substances
that they both were trying
to do at the same time.
It was just a horrible pendulum
swinging one way to the other,
one extreme to the other,
all the time.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Amy Winehouse!
And I've worked
with a lot of people.
I'm telling you,
she has one of the best voices
of anybody of all time.
Amy Winehouse!
More trouble for Amy Winehouse.
The singer's Camden home
was raided by police last night,
who used a battering ram
to smash down her front door.
This was the moment
police arrested and handcuffed
Blake Fielder-Civil
on suspicion of attempting to
pervert the course of justice.
A spokesman for the star saying
she was in no way
connected with the arrest.
Shut the door.
When he went to jail,
she spiralled...
downward very quickly.
Amy! Amy! Amy!
Get out of the way!
For Album of the Year:
Amy Winehouse for Back to Black.
For Best Female
Pop Vocal Performance:
Amy Winehouse for Rehab.
Can somebody wake her up
this afternoon around 6:00
and tell her?
Drunk ass.
For Best New Artist,
the nominees are...
We did everything
within our power to help Amy.
But you can't force treatment
on somebody.
And I felt that
that's Amy's responsibility
to get herself well.
I'm sorry...
Okay, fellas, make some room,
please.
- This way, this way.
- Can't see the steps.
By then, she was incredibly
famous, very wealthy,
and she had a complete
infrastructure around her
where everybody
was doing everything for her.
And that's not real life.
We had the Grammys coming up.
I said, "You need to be clean."
If you're not clean,
you're not doing anything."
So I had a contract drawn up
and it said,
"You, Amy Winehouse,
"have agreed
to go to a facility now.
"You're never gonna make
another record again,
"you're never going
to perform ever again
unless you get clean."
And God bless her, she did.
Live,
it's music's
biggest night of the year
as the National Academy
of Recording Arts and Sciences
presents
the annual Grammy Awards.
This is going live tonight
thanks to the Grammys
in the States, okay?
Now, the lady behind me
is up for six awards!
She's already won two.
Grazie!
Thank you!
Ladies and gentlemen,
please welcome
two Grammy favourites:
Natalie Cole
and Tony Bennett.
Good evening.
Grammy history has never
sounded or looked any better
than this man right here.
That's right!
Dad, Dad, Tony Bennett.
These are this year's nominees
for Record of the Year.
Irreplaceable: Beyonc.
The Pretender:
Foo Fighters.
Umbrella: Rihanna,
featuring Jay-Z.
What Goes Around Comes Around:
Justin Timberlake.
His album's called
What Goes Around Comes Around?
And Rehab: Amy Winehouse.
And the Grammy goes to...
Amy Winehouse!
Amy!
Uh...
thank you to everyone
at Island Records.
Everyone at EMI Music
Publishing.
To Raye Raye,
to Mark Ronson and Salaam Remi.
To my mum and dad.
For my Blake,
my Blake incarcerated.
And for London!
This is for London!
It was a beautiful evening.
You get those awards
like that...
it just made all the work
seem worthwhile.
Amy's completely clean
and looking amazing.
It's just overwhelming.
I was just hysterically crying.
I was so overwhelmed,
I was so proud of her.
And I was just flashing
our whole life, our childhood.
And then she saw me crying.
Juliette, come up.
She grabbed me,
pulled me up onstage
and took me off the stage.
And I was having
a bit of a panic attack.
I was, like, "I can't believe
this is happening."
This is amazing.
I'm so proud of you."
And I'm looking at her,
trying to get some form
of reaction, and she went,
"Jules, this is so boring
without drugs."
And I felt really, really,
really sad for her.
Amy? Amy?
Amy, how do you feel
after winning a Grammy?
- Congratulations.
- Did you enjoy it?
- Whoops. Sorry.
- I'm going to see my husband.
I was staying
at the K-West Hotel.
Very late in the night,
she knocks on the door,
and I'm alone.
She comes in,
and she just sits on the couch.
I remember feeling
like really happy for her,
and also concerned,
'cause she really didn't know
how to be that thing
that she had been pushed
to become from her own success.
Then she pulled out
this aluminum foil.
She said,
"Does this bother you?"
And I said, "Amy, I love you."
"I don't mind that you get high,
but I mind that you get high."
She did what she did
and I was, like,
"This is someone
who is trying to disappear."
Gents, get away from the door,
please.
Fuck off, please. Sorry, mate.
I was called out
to do security for her.
The security that she had,
it just could not handle
the whole paparazzi situation.
- See ya.
- Night-night, Amy.
I could feel
that she was a humble person,
but she was just caught up
in a bad situation.
She was not well at all:
Physically, mentally not well.
All she ever wanted
was people to tell her,
"Pack it in, stop it."
And me and Lauren
would not tolerate any of it.
It was Nick that said,
"The only thing you girls can do
"is show her you don't want
to be a part of it,
and when she needs help,
you're there for her."
Tough love.
And I just said to her,
"If you want me to help you,
I'll help you.
"I love you, but I don't like
who you've become,
and I don't want
to be around you."
Where a lot of money
and a lot of expectation
is at stake,
people's ideas
become a bit skewed.
They want to try
and get it sorted out
in a way that doesn't upset
this financial trajectory
that's going on.
From the 6th of September,
we're not gonna be doing
any more work
for the foreseeable future.
Amy's going to be concentrating
on writing her new album.
Uh... there's five gigs,
which, contractually,
we are obliged to do.
There's a couple this weekend.
It was all over the media
that Amy was getting $1 million
for some shows.
Huge money. But by that point,
it was much more likely
to not be a good show
than to be a good show.
She just wanted to get better.
She knew that things were wrong,
and she was just very exhausted
and tired
of the whole situation.
She couldn't escape her life
in this horrible goldfish bowl.
She'd began to unravel in public
and the media treatment
pushed her
further and further
over the edge.
D'you see Amy Winehouse
in the paper this week?
My God!
She looks like a campaign poster
for neglected horses.
Easy, lad.
It was like a feeding frenzy.
Suddenly,
it was cool to crack jokes
about a bulimic's appearance
or her drug addictions.
According to contactmusic.com,
Amy Winehouse's next album
features songs about cooking,
about cooking.
That's what they say.
Cooking crystal meth,
black-tar heroin.
Amy, cheer up.
She couldn't escape it.
No one would leave her alone.
It was just disgusting.
The mainstream media
was just all over her.
Amy Winehouse,
she's like a... a mad person.
St. Lucia was our place.
We were supposed to be there
for a week,
we ended up there
for, like, six months.
She decided that St. Lucia
was a place
that she really liked,
and she invited me to go.
You know, as soon as she went
to St. Lucia,
there was no more crack cocaine.
That was done.
And that's when
the heroin stopped.
But give her a free bar,
of course she's gonna drink.
It was kind of obvious
that she was just supplementing
alcohol for drugs.
I haven't seen Amy
for six weeks.
We've got a lot to talk about,
a lot of exciting things
happening.
We're talking
about the forthcoming album,
some other business matters.
So I think it's... it's gonna be
an exciting time.
Ah-ah! Naughty!
Amy, Amy!
She was, like,
"Why is he bringing another
camera crew to St. Lucia?
"Dad, you want money?
I'll give you money.
"Why are you doing
your life story,
which is really my life story?"
She just felt like,
"My dad's doing a lot of stuff
for money or the limelight."
- Want me to go with you?
- Yeah.
You can follow down,
if you want.
I'll ask her.
Amy? How do you do it?
Just push and hold the button.
I'm really sorry.
Is that alright?
All the way from...
Okay!
- Is that okay?
- Thank you.
- Pleasure.
- Thank you.
Why have you got to make
a comment like that?
Why... why...
why you got to do that?
A mug of? They asked
to take a picture of you.
Richard...
No, that's got nothing to do
with it. I'm talking to you
about those two people
who wanted a lousy photograph,
and you got to make them
feel bad about it.
She just wanted her dad,
and he didn't just come
by himself,
he came with cameras,
audio guys...
But she worshipped
the ground he walked on.
I was in jail with 500 fellas
reading the papers
and there's a picture of my wife
on a page with a fella.
It's not easy
to go through things like that.
To put it bluntly, I didn't have
a very high opinion of myself
after the treatment I've had
for the past two years
with my wife.
I kind of just had the wind
knocked out of my sails.
So I just thought, "Fuck this.
You know. I'm a big man."
"I'm a handsome fucking guy.
I ain't on heroin.
"I'm going to the gym a lot,
I dress well.
So what the fuck am I doing
wasting my time with her?"
And then the chorus come in.
And, um, the last verse is:
My son came up with the idea
of getting
the most contemporary artists,
and I kept saying to myself,
"Who sings the right way,
the real jazz singing?"
And when I heard Amy Winehouse,
I immediately said,
"This one's got it."
Everybody just said,
"Oh, I don't know
how you're gonna handle her."
- Where do you want to be?
- I'll be here.
Okay. This is weird.
I've never done
anything like this.
I've never done anything
like this.
In which way?
To sing with one of my idols...
- Oh, no...
- and have it filmed.
But it's good, it's good,
'cause then,
I can make my dad jealous,
after, when I show him,
when he sees it.
I can't believe it
It's hard to conceive it
That you would
turn away romance
Whoa oh oh oh oh oh
Are you pretending
It looks like the ending
- Yeah.
Unless I could have
one more chance
To prove dear
- My...
- Sorry, sorry, that was me.
- I was terrible. I was terrible.
- No, no...
I don't want to waste your time.
It's getting better each time.
Don't... Really.
I just don't wanna
waste your time.
Ahem.
We'll keep doing it
till we got one.
It's right in there, okay?
You're not in any hurry,
are you?
- No! Of course I'm not.
- I'm not either. We have time.
Just gotta get it right,
I've got to get it right.
- I'm not getting it right.
- Oh, you are, you are.
It's getting better each time
and you sound wonderful.
Just a minute,
I'm getting some water.
The most famous artists
I ever met
are the most nervous
before they hit that stage.
No matter how much you feel it,
you want to feel it even more,
so that it becomes
an honest recording.
And that's what Amy had.
She had that gift.
She was a natural,
true jazz singer.
And a jazz artist doesn't like
50,000 people in front of him.
My life a wreck
You're making
You know I'm yours
Just for the taking
I'd gladly surrender
Myself to you
Body and soul
Thank you!
- I think we got it.
- Yeah.
- Okay.
- I'm like you, you know?
- Each time, it's different.
- Yeah. No, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
It's never the same thing twice,
right? Yeah.
No, I'm like you.
Not you're like me.
I get it from...
my idols, like you.
That's the right way to do it.
She skyped me. She was happy.
The Tony Bennett thing, I mean,
she was, you know, a fan.
It was about her saying,
"I'm not a singer,
I'm a jazz singer."
Then she said,
"Let's do this jazz project
with Questlove..."
She's such a jazz snob.
She'd always be
on her computer sending me MP3s.
"Listen to this, listen to this,
listen to this."
I thought
I had my doctorate in jazz,
but no, she taught me a lot.
She was, like, "Alright,
we're gonna start a super group:".
You, me,
Mos and Raphael Saadiq."
I was, like, "Okay."
And she assigned homework.
"Alright, study this record,
study this record..."
Amy had a good period.
She could go for four weeks
at a time with no alcohol.
And she very much felt
that she was the best
that she has ever been.
But she went to the Priory,
in May, to be checked,
and there was some very...
serious things
that were being spotted.
It was the cumulative effect
of drinking and bulimia.
She could feel perfectly fine
and have heart irregularities.
Her heart can stop
if she started drinking again.
I said, "Look,
is this what you want?"
Do you want to die?"
And she said,
"No, I don't want to die."
All the signs were positive.
I thought, "Right, okay",
we've got a little
chink of light."
The Tony Bennett thing
was a good catalyst,
and it shows
that she still had it.
We had the offers
to do these shows,
and I said to her,
"You don't have to do them.
There's no pressure.
We got no record to promote."
But she wanted to do it.
She skyped me.
She wanted to do
all these other projects
with Questlove and Mos Def.
She was, like,
"I don't need this."
She just didn't wanna go.
The material felt so tired
and didn't feel
relevant to her anymore.
But because
she was such a huge star
and there was all
of these different pressures,
she had to keep performing
Back to Black.
She didn't want to do that.
As soon as she knew
that tour was looming,
she got wasted,
wasted so that
she wouldn't be able to go.
Amy was passed out,
asleep, on her sofa.
She gets put
in the back of a car, asleep,
and she wakes up at the airport
and gets put on a private jet.
Amy! Amy! Amy!...
Belgrade!
Introducing Amy Winehouse!
Whoo!
I wasn't sure what was going on.
She just wouldn't sing.
It was the first time ever
that had happened.
It felt like the end.
It was someone who just
really didn't care anymore.
To the extent
where she was willing
to sabotage not just her career,
but her friendships
and her musical relationships.
But it's amazing to me.
Why keep putting her onstage?
Because surely her managers know
she has a problem.
This was supposed to be
a major comeback, guys,
and she totally blew it.
Go!
"Yay!"
NICK: The 24th of July
was my wedding day,
and Amy was due
to be at the wedding,
and we'd spoken and I felt
like she was really excited
about my wedding, actually.
And she said
she hadn't been drinking
and she can't wait
to see the family, and Salaam,
and some people
that had been on the journey
were gonna be there.
She rang me up and I thought,
"Oh, my God,
what's happened now?"
'Cause that's the first thing
that goes in my head.
And she just went, "Jules..."
And it was my Amy,
completely normal.
And she kept saying
she'd never done this before.
She just kept saying sorry.
It was like complete clarity
over the whole situation
of the nightmare
of the past however many years
that we'd just gone through.
"Jules, I'm so sorry,
I'm so sorry..."
Like when you're a kid
and you panic
that you've done something wrong
and you wanna just fix it
there and then,
that's how it was.
I just wanted to grab her,
bring her back to me,
wrap her in my house,
not let her out.
And she called me the next day,
and it was just so weird
hearing her talk normally,
because for so long,
we'd just been pining for her...
Like, I missed my best friend,
Lauren missed her best friend.
We just wanted
to have a normal conversation.
She just kept going,
"Can I see you?
Will Lauren speak to me?
Can we start again?"
I was, like, "Of course, we can,
we're always here."
We've been waiting for you
to talk to us."
She said,
"I'm gonna call you tomorrow."
I was, like, "Okay, I love you."
"I love you too."
She just looked
like she was sleeping.
She was on top of the bed,
just... sleeping.
But she was gone.
- No!
- Oh, my God.
Rest in peace, Amy!
Amy's blood alcohol level
was four to five times higher
than the driving limit.
Maybe a combination
of her eating disorders
and the alcohol
just made her heart stop.
She was one of the truest
jazz singers I ever heard.
To me, she should be treated
like Ella Fitzgerald,
like Billie Holiday.
She had the complete gift.
If she had lived,
I would've said,
"Slow down,
you're too important."
Life teaches you
really how to live it
if you can live long enough.
Well sometimes
I go out by myself
And I look across the water
And I think of all the things
what you're doing
And in my head
I paint a picture
Since I've come on home
Well my body's been a mess
And I've missed
your ginger hair
And the way
you like to dress
Won't you come on over
Stop making a fool out of me
Why don't you come on over
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Did you have to go to jail
Put your house
on up for sale
Did you get a good lawyer
I hope
you didn't catch a tan
I hope you find the right man
who'll fix it for ya
And are you shopping
anywhere
Changed the colour
of your hair
And are you busy
And did you have
to pay that fine
That you were
dodging all the time
Are you still dizzy
Since I've come on home
well my body's been a mess
And I've missed
your ginger hair
And the way
you like to dress
Won't you come on over
Stop making a fool out of me
Why don't you come on over
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Whoa Valerie
Oh Valerie
Oh Valerie
Valerie yeah
Valerie
Why don't you come on over
Valerie
three people left.
This is Mr. Alex Steele,
Mrs. Juliette Ashby,
- Mrs. Amy Winehouse.
- Ah, my booby.
In other words,
Mrs. Amy Winehouse.
And everyone else is gone.
D'you want a lick
of the lollipop?
Come on, have a lick.
- No, I don't.
- Have a lick. Come here.
Come and have a lick.
No one wants to lick
your slobbery lollipop.
- Lauren, just lick it.
- Here's me.
It's my 14th...
birthday evening and party.
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday dear Lauren
Happy birthday...
To... you
Oh, wow.
Moon River wider than a mile
I'm crossing you in style...
I was singing
with a little jazz unit,
the National Youth
Jazz Orchestra,
must've been about 16,
and I just loved jazz.
Dinah Washington...
Sarah Vaughan, Tony Bennett.
I learned to sing from listening
to stuff like Monk,
and a lot of soloists as well,
rather than just listening
to singers.
I learned from everything,
really.
...same rainbow's end
Waiting round the bend
My Huckleberry friend
Moon River
And me
So singing has always been
important to me,
but I never thought, "I love
singing, I'll be a singer."
I just thought, "I'm lucky"
there is something
I can always do, if I want to.
"I'm so lucky like that."
But I didn't think
it would be a career choice.
And me
Moon River and me
What's the date?
- Today?
- 24th.
- Is it?
- Yeah.
- The what?
- 24th.
- Of what?
- January.
And, um, what day is it?
- Saturday.
- And what year is it?
Lunchtime.
I was a 19-year-old
office junior
for a promotions company
owned by Simon Fuller.
I just started to try
and kind of blag it myself
as a talent scout.
I was definitely
out of my depth.
My friend Tyler
is a singer.
He was with Nicky Shymansky
and Tyler said,
"My friend Amy sings jazz
and she's great."
Nicky said to me,
"Want some studio time?"
I said, "For what?"
And he was like,
"Well, if you'd write songs,
we'd make a record,
get a record deal."
I was, like,
"What do you get out of it?"
Hello.
I look ugly.
Yeah, look at you.
You look lovely.
I don't. My chin's massive.
- Worried about your chin?
- That's there forever.
There is no greater thrill
Than what you bring to me
No sweeter song
Than what you sing
Sing to me
- Decide to record it?
- Yeah.
Hello.
I'm just here... smoking a fag.
I just like to...
Oh, I look so grim.
I look like a floating head.
You know, I've got no hair.
I'm just on a black screen.
There's my hand.
What's going on?
We'd recorded
quite a few demo recordings,
and I started to talk about
whether she'd ever consider
writing.
She said she's not sure
about writing songs,
but she's written
a lot of poems.
And he's my life
She knew full well
she'd been writing songs,
but they were very
personal songs.
I wouldn't write anything
unless it was directly personal
to me,
just 'cause I wouldn't be able
to tell the story right
because I wouldn't have done it.
Even though some of it
is personal in a sad way,
I'd never let it just be that.
I'll always put a punchline
in the song.
Just try and be different
with my lyrics.
Someone gave me a CD, two songs,
and they weren't necessarily
what you'd call hit songs,
but they conveyed an emotion
that just touched me.
When you have that as an artist,
you usually have
a story to tell behind it.
But it's a big leap of faith.
I think my boss
even questioned the deal,
because we were really
committing to giving
an unsigned artist
close to 250,000 pounds.
We both knew we wanted
to live with each other,
we both knew
we wanted to move out.
She had family issues
and I had lots of things
going on with my family,
and we looked after each other.
It was amazing.
We were young kids
and we were best friends,
in a flat on our own.
She loved it.
Juliette would sing,
Amy would sing...
And we just used
to see each other all the time.
We used to go
to so many gigs with Amy.
And when she first started
doing her music,
we were all so excited
and proud of it.
Where are we, Amy?
- We're in Brighton.
- Yeah, but what are we in now?
Um, we're in, uh...
What's-it Square,
Regency Square, in a black cab.
In a white cab. A beautiful cab.
- And Lauren's with us.
- Ah!
D'you know what my favourite
thing about Nicky is?
His legs.
Aw.
Know what my other
favourite thing is?
- What?
- Not your hair.
She could make you feel
so important...
and then, all of a sudden,
very unimportant.
And then make you feel
so important again.
That was what she did.
She liked to get people
into a comfortable position
and then shock them.
If I got my hair right,
then what would that mean?
That would mean
you were ready to marry me.
Her first relationship
was with an older guy
called Chris.
She really got the hots for him.
Madly in love with him.
She wrote a few songs
about having the hots for him.
And then, eventually,
she lost interest and...
She always used to talk about it
and started writing about that.
I think when I was growing up,
the music that was
in the pop charts or, you know,
the music that was...
that people were releasing
at the time,
I just thought,
"This isn't music,"
this is watered down,
or this is, you know, just crap,
someone else has written it
for you
"and you have to sing it."
It's very much the case
with some music today.
I really started writing music
just as... to challenge myself,
to see what I could write or,
you know,
just because
there was nothing else there
that I could listen to
at the time.
And having listened to jazz
and, you know, great songwriters
like James Taylor
and Carole King,
it was very...
I felt like I had nothing new
that was coming out at the time
that really represented me
or the way I felt.
So I just started writing,
really, my own stuff
and from personal experience.
This is, um,
I Heard Love is Blind.
I'll just clip, clip my hair
out of the way, 'cause
it's gonna get on my nerves.
I remember thinking,
when she walked in,
she was this complete
force of nature.
I thought, "Wow,
there's something about you."
And I remember thinking,
"Please be good."
I wrote this in Miami with
a guy called Salaam and, um...
- and I'm really proud of it.
- She was 18
and she was a very classic
North London Jewish girl.
A lot of attitude.
Quite shy, but something
emanated from her.
She had a charisma.
When you looked
at her lyrical capability
and her melodic capability,
she was a very old soul
in a very young body.
And we did the deal
very, very quickly.
Amy's album came out yesterday
and how many has it sold so far?
A pretty staggering 800,
actually.
That is at least...
I've emptied my bank account
buying 600 of them.
That is, at least half my
friends have bought the album.
Bastards. I'd better call
the other half up today.
Snug in a rug.
She's going to get annoyed.
Amy?
Explain what your little hub
is all about.
- Hello. Oh, you're coming.
- Sleeping!
Just give us a smile,
then we can turn the camera off.
Come on, just give us a quick
one. A one-second flash.
How big do you think
you're going to be?
I don't, at all,
because, you know,
my music is not on that scale.
The music is not on that scale.
Sometimes I wish it was,
but I don't think
I'm gonna be at all famous.
I don't think I could handle it.
I'd probably go mad.
You know what I mean?
I would go mad.
- Where are we going?
- We're going to Birmingham!
Why are we going to Birmingham?
We're going to Birmingham
to sing songs.
- Yeah?
- And make merry.
Oh, that was sick!
That was sick!
- Get me, get me.
- Nicky, that was beautiful.
What are your thoughts
on how beautiful that was?
My turn, my turn!
Wait, let me get
a really good shot.
Oh, what a shot.
Oh!
She don't even care.
Watch it...
watch it go in there.
Got no light in here.
Don't get my spots in.
What spots?
- I love you.
- Do you know I'm zooming in?
You're zooming in
on all my spots!
You're a fucking cunt.
Does my hair look okay
like this?
Yeah, very good. It's lovely.
- Do you promise?
- I promise.
What song d'you think
I should do first tonight?
Right, I think
you should start off with...
Ah, I love your little cap!
It's so cute!
Um, I think you should
start off with a song called...
Oh, on camera. Okay. Okay.
- Go, sister. Go get done.
- Stop!
In my bed
Yeah yeah...
Could you please
introduce yourself?
Yes. Hello. I'm Amy Winehouse.
I'm 20. I'm a jazz singer.
I've heard your record
and it sounds very, uh, mature.
Is it all live?
Also, not only the singing,
but also the instruments?
Yeah, all the instrumentation
is completely live.
I wouldn't have any fake horns
on my record.
I think they put fake strings
on Take the Box,
but I wasn't a part of that.
I would never, ever have put
strings on my record. Ever.
And this guy doing the mix
of this song, he just...
didn't even think about it.
Okay, um...
just a couple of questions.
Um...
- Upset?
- Yeah.
Oh, okay. Okay, okay.
Okay. Um...
There wasn't a girl that had
been gobby in the media
for a long time.
And she could be very cutting.
Especially if she got bored
or felt misunderstood.
I dunno, it seems to me, though,
that every woman
who writes about, you know,
kind of puts it down on a record
doesn't do them any harm.
Look at Dido. I mean, she...
she used that album to
clean out her emotional closet.
- Did she?
- Yeah, it's all about
the break-up of her relationship
and, you know,
- kind of like surviving.
- Mm...
And, uh, and not, not going...
I mean, like the whole thing
about not going down
with the ship.
- Yeah...
- I mean, Dido's Dido,
but, you know, I mean, uh...
I think she's one
of the most exciting
and brilliantly
talented vocalists
to emerge in this country
in many, many years.
It is Amy Winehouse.
Fantastic.
You're managed by the company
who looks after S Club 7,
used to look after
the Spice Girls, Simon Fuller.
Have they tried to mould you
in any way?
Asked you to do things,
to change the way you look
or speak or behave?
Um, yeah, one of them
tried to mould me
into a big triangle shape
and I went, "No!"
No, I've got my own style.
I've got my own style
and I wrote my own songs
and, you know, if someone has
so much of something already,
there's very little you can...
add.
Yeah. You know what I like
about you, as well?
The way you sound so common.
Because I am common
and it's like, you know,
it's so refreshing
to hear someone
who isn't speaking
like they've taken
elocution lessons.
Yeah. They gave me elocution
lessons, but they kind of...
Psht!
- They didn't stick.
- Off my back, yeah.
I realized early on,
when Amy made her mind up,
she made her mind up.
And I found it difficult
to stand up to her.
She would say, "Oh, Mum,
you're so soft with me."
"I can get away with murder.
You should be tougher, Mum."
Well, I just accepted it.
I wasn't strong enough
to say to her, "Stop."
I met another woman when
Amy was about 18 months old.
We worked together.
We were having an affair.
But another eight or nine years
were to pass before I left home.
I was a coward.
But I felt that Amy was over it
pretty quick.
When Amy was a teenager,
13 or 14,
she was being taken
to the doctor's
and she was on antidepressants.
What is it about men
Amy used to always say to me
that that was her dream, really,
to do those sorts of shows,
to play in jazz clubs
to small audiences.
She had one of the most pure
relationships to music,
such an emotional
relationship to music.
Like she needed music
as if it was a person,
and that she would die for it.
Let me read this.
Oh, my God.
Uh, and the winner...
and the song is Stronger Than Me
by Amy Winehouse
and Salaam Remi.
Let's give it up!
This is me, isn't it?
Right here.
Wow!
I don't believe this.
Um, thank you, Salaam.
There's no picture of him,
but Salaam is the most
inspirational producer
I've ever worked with.
And he has that unique skill
of not just having
the most appropriate beat,
but also, um,
drawing the artistry out.
And I guess that's the story
of this song.
- And I wanna thank...
- What I allowed her to do
was to really just
put her wit into her songs.
When I heard her sing
in front of me,
I could tell she was really
like a jazz singer.
She had the stylings
of a 65-year-old jazz singer
who knew the ropes up and down.
It was, like, "Okay, if this is
what you are when you're 18",
then what are gonna be
when you're 25?"
We're now joined by Mos Def
in the backstage area.
Thanks for coming and taking
time out and chatting to us.
I heard they was doing
something, so I came down.
I became aware of Amy in 2004.
I was out in England.
I'm a big jazz fan and I really
liked what she was doing.
I thought it was unique,
it was edgy and sincere.
And that's the thing
I liked most about Amy,
is that she didn't have
any airs. She was real.
I had a chance to meet her
while I was here,
and we hit it off.
We became fast friends.
She was just a charming,
sweet lady.
I had a bit of a crush on her,
to be honest.
She was raw,
she was fast with a blue joke,
could drink anybody
under the table,
wasn't afraid to roll a smoke,
had a big giant laugh,
and was just a sweetheart,
you know?
You don't seem that bothered
about everything.
D'you know what I mean?
You have some artists
that step in here and go,
"Right, I want
that number-one spot."
I want my album
to go number one,
"I wanna chase up
with a second album."
But what's up with you?
I'm determined
on the next thing.
I'm not interested in...
Success, to me, is not success
to... the record company
or whoever.
Success, to me,
is having the freedom
to work with whoever
I wanna work with,
to always be able to just
fuck everything off
and go to the studio when I
have to go to the studio, or...
But you can't do that,
'cause you have
other responsibilities now.
You're becoming an artist
in the public eye.
So, all of a sudden,
you're gonna be...
I'm not saying you're gonna be
hounded by the press,
but you're gonna have
certain responsibilities
that are gonna come
onto your doorstep
that you may not
particularly welcome.
Okay, that's cool, but I think
the more people see of me,
the more they'll realize
that all I'm good for
is making tunes.
So leave me alone
and I'll do it.
I will do the music.
I just need time to do the
music. Know what I mean?
When she went to Camden,
it was very exciting,
'cause it was her first property
that she'd bought,
and we were all really happy.
She loved Camden.
She loved it up there.
But when she went to Camden,
things started changing.
We were the indie kids.
Gazelles, The Rakes,
Babyshambles.
Everyone was a Camden band.
Like, it was cool again.
In them days, it was
very much, like, basically,
if you were in a signed band...
you were a cunt, because...
the best-looking
and the best-dressed
and the coolest people
were the ones
who were born to lose, really.
The Libertines, yeah.
I slept on them.
I came to the Libertines, like,
a year later than everyone else.
But I'm not being funny.
They made people proud
to be British.
That was London for
a real spell, you know?
I run a club called Trash
with my friend Errol.
Did the door there.
Blake would give out flyers
for Trash.
We wouldn't have met each other,
and a lot of people here
wouldn't have known each other
had it not been for Trash.
That's fair enough, innit?
It's the first place I learned
how to pull a bird.
He just loved girls,
you know?
He loved partying
and he loved... shagging.
Always in and out of bed.
We met in a pub,
in the Good Mixer in Camden.
I was at the bar
and she came in.
We just sort of started
playing pool,
then we went to another pub.
And then we went back
to Amy's house.
She was seeing somebody else
and I was seeing somebody else.
But I didn't think of it
as infidelity.
I just thought she was,
like, a young girl
and she was a bit naughty.
And I was the same.
Are you alright?
How you doing? You okay?
What's going on with you
at the moment?
'Cause obviously,
Frank was last year, um,
and we haven't really heard much
from you since then.
So when are we gonna hear
from you next?
What's the next single?
Uh, I can't think
of the next single.
I'm just gonna write
the next album at the minute.
- Uh...
- You having that kind
- of writer's block thing or...
- Yeah, man.
It's hard to write, because, uh,
you can write
a million things a day,
but it's hard to write
something that you're proud of.
So I'm just trying, you know,
I'm just trying.
I asked to see her.
She was late
and she came in with Nicky.
She was a character.
She always called me
Uncle Lucian.
And I really liked her.
And I had enough
of a relationship with her.
So there's no flattery,
it was, like, blunt. And I said,
"Enough, I need another album.
"Now go and write one.
This is horseshit.
"Frank was then, this is now.
They're all gonna forget you."
She didn't like it.
- Nick Shymansky.
- Yes.
Sit up a bit.
- Yes.
- How are you today, darling?
Very good, actually. Thanks.
- How about you?
- Really good.
In between all this,
she decided that she wanted me
to leave 19 with Simon Fuller
to go manage her.
She didn't like being connected
with Pop Idol
and the Spice Girls,
but I thought it would be
incredibly disloyal,
at this point, to walk away.
And Blake was
very quickly becoming
a bigger and bigger character
in all this.
She was with him the whole time
and didn't want
to go to places without him.
We spent the summer together.
She used to say
we're like twins.
And that was our relationship.
I'd like to sabotage myself
and I think Amy
liked to sabotage herself.
Maybe that was our nature.
I used to ask her
why was she promiscuous
and why she was more like a man
with sex.
It's indicative of somebody
that's had a traumatic event,
maybe sexually, themselves.
Sort of made sense to me
from the way she was.
She'd just say, "It's nothing."
"I weren't abused
when I was a kid.
Nothing like that."
Then she said
her dad leaving her mum
was what caused this,
and her
not really seeing her dad.
I understood.
I cut my wrists
when I was nine years old.
I don't know if I wanted
to necessarily die,
I just wanted my mum
to leave my stepdad.
Me and Amy were quite similar.
I fell in love with
someone who I would've died for.
We were in love
and we were together.
And that's like a real drug,
isn't it?
If my man was fighting
Some unholy war
I would be behind him
Straight shook up beside him
With strength he didn't know
It's you I'm fighting for
He can't lose
With me in tow
With me in tow
I refuse
To let him go
To let him go
At his side
And drunk on pride
We wait
For the blow
Ooh...
Oh, let's see
who's gonna be
behind the green door!
- Hi!
- Master of the house
is not in right now.
She is gone somewhere
for a minute to be somewhere.
And somewhere she having dinner,
so I'm having a cheeky cigarette
while she gone.
Don't tell her. Shh.
Cheeky, cheeky. Eh!
Mi scusi.
Tell me about this place.
Alright, while she's away,
I'll give you a tour
of the house. Okay, ready? Okay.
First I lead you
into the main room.
This is usually reserved
for entertaining guests,
but you can be my guest,
darling,
because no one's here today.
Okay, I lead you out
to the grand patio.
Please, please follow.
Don't mind me in my...
- Ah, where you go?
- Okay, darling,
this is the grand patio.
This is Cecil.
- Cecil live here.
- Cecil!
Then we have the bedroom.
It's very nice.
There are some cupboards.
- Ooh.
- See up here,
this is where I sleep
when the master come home.
- The toilet!
- Sometimes when I'm alone,
I have a shower
in all my clothes.
I find this is the only
true way to relax.
Also here, this is the hook
I hang from when I'm in trouble.
It's not very often.
I'm a good boy. I'm a good boy.
Okay, well, this is it.
Welcome to my humble abode.
Amy!
We are sitting...
in a little bar,
drinking cocktails.
There's my cocktail.
There's Amy's little cocktail.
I think it's got Rohypnol in it.
All of a sudden she went to me,
"Lauren, listen to this message.
This is a message from Blake."
I just said to her that I
didn't wanna leave my girlfriend
and we'd probably be better
as friends.
She was obsessing
over these text messages.
He wanted nothing to do with her
and she was obsessing over it.
All she wanted
was for him to wanna see her.
It got messy.
He went back to his girlfriend,
then she got her own back.
She slept with his friend.
The person that lived opposite
in the little court
had Juliette's number and
had called Juliette up to say,
"Amy's fallen over
and she's hurt her head,
so we've gone round there."
It looked like people had been
squatting in her house.
It stank, it was dirty.
And she was lying on the bed
and she had this golf ball
coming out of her head.
So we worked till, like,
3 in the morning
and we cleaned
the whole house up.
And I called her dad
and we called Nick.
We all met there
and it was, like,
this is getting out of control.
We need to get her some help.
I've tried speaking
to the parents
and they really wanna
kinda take it on.
And so, technically,
I sort of kidnapped her.
I picked her up and I thought,
"I'm driving you
"to the middle of nowhere
and we're gonna sit there
until you acknowledge
what's going on."
I drove her
to Black Park in Iver.
And it started off
with her sort of laughing,
"You're such an idiot."
And then it turned into,
"Don't be a prick."
And she kicked my car.
And then she just broke down,
eventually.
Opened up about everything.
She said she thinks
she's got a problem,
she was lost
and out of her depth.
Horrible.
She agreed to go rehab.
I took her to see the rehab guy.
She was, like,
"I don't wanna talk about it.
I'll go if my dad
thinks I should go."
We'd spoken to Mitch.
We'd set it all up
and she turned
into a seven-year-old child.
Sat on her father's lap
and put her arm around him.
I said to the managers,
"She doesn't need to go
to rehab. She's fine."
My dad did actually go,
"You're alright, no need to go."
I said, "Alright, Dad,
I'll go and meet him"
and we'll back out."
Which I did.
She didn't need
to go to rehab.
I think
that was the moment
we lost a very key opportunity.
I'm not saying
it would've worked.
Very often, you have to go
two or three times.
But she wasn't a star.
She wasn't swarmed by paparazzi.
We could've just fucked
Back to Black off,
and Back To Black
might have never happened,
but she'd have had a chance
to have been dealt with
by professionals
before the world
wanted a piece of her.
I never wanted you
To be my man
I just wanted to see
what you can do
Yeah
No.
Yo yo yeah
The label were
considering letting her go.
She ends up
coming back to Miami.
Guy Moot calls me up,
"Hey, sure you wanna do this?"
I was, like, "Listen,
even if you dropped her",
"I would pay her to come
to my house and sing
'cause this shit
fucking moves me."
Many times when I tried
to set you right
It's just too hard
I never wanted you
To be my man
And she totally didn't drink
the whole time she was here.
And she sat out
in my back garden
for, I don't know, four days.
She'd just take her little
notebook and just keep writing.
A.
All I can ever be to you
Is the darkness that we know
And this regret
I got accustomed to
Once it was so right
when we were at our height
Waiting for you
in the hotel at night
I knew I hadn't met my match
With every moment
we could snatch
I don't know
why I got so attached
Took me a while to get my head
around a lot of things.
The actual turning point,
when I was alright with it,
was when I started
writing the album.
I write songs because
I'm fucked up in the head
and I need to put it on paper
and then write a song to it
and to feel better about it.
Have something good
out of something bad.
He walks away
The sun goes down
He takes the day
but I'm grown
And in your way
My deep shade
My tears dry
The ideas were there.
Four or five songs were there.
You can feel something
creatively starting to happen.
But I was still very worried
about her health.
She's really vulnerable
and not in a good place.
And then she said, "So, listen",
are you leaving 19
to manage me?"
And I said, "D'you know what?"
"Unless you let me help you
sort yourself out,
"I'm not doing this shit
for you.
I can't watch you
do yourself in like this."
I remember she came to see me
to talk about wanting
to change management.
I said, "Look,
that's entirely your decision."
We will support you
whatever you wanna do."
Then she said she wanted
to be managed by Raye Cosbert.
All I thought is, "Why on earth
are you gonna be managed"
by your promoter?"
I remember at the time thinking,
"We're now gonna deal
with a promoter
whose main interest will be
to get her out on the road."
And we knew she was very
vulnerable on the road.
When I first met Amy,
I was her concert promoter.
We got talking and she said
that her contract was up with 19
and she wanted
to explore other possibilities.
She said,
"Would you like to do it?"
And I was, like, "Well, yeah,
let's talk about it."
We got on quite well, you know.
I'd be the guy that'd turn up
after the gig and say,
"Well done,
have a glass of bubbly."
And I thought,
"Well, sometimes
someone just wants a change
because they feel
it's right for them to change."
It's like switching
bank accounts.
I was way too close to Amy.
I shouldn't have ever been
that close.
It should've been business.
But when you're 19,
you meet a 16-year-old
and you go through that,
you don't understand that.
We'd spent
all these years together.
And all of a sudden,
out of nowhere, I wasn't there.
When I started writing
the first song about Blake,
the other songs
just wrote themselves.
I was really was on a roll.
Because I had these feelings,
had these words
floating around in me.
When you write a song, you have
to remember how you felt,
what the weather was like,
what his neck smelt like.
You have to remember all of it.
She would tell me stories
about Blake
and this tempestuous,
extreme relationship.
That first day,
she wrote Back to Black,
all the lyrics and the melody,
in two or three hours.
Black
Black
Black
Oh, it's a bit upsetting
at the end, isn't it?
Rrrr... Boom, boom, boom.
I love that. Yes, Amy.
Yeah!
It was just one of those
serendipitous things.
Like, I just caught her
at that magic moment, you know,
and she was just ready
to get it going.
That's why I couldn't understand
what everyone else was saying
about this procrastinating,
troubled artist.
I went out to New York to
kinda hear what they were doing.
And the day I was flying out,
I got a call from management
saying that Amy's nan
had fallen ill
and she wanted to get
straight back to her nan.
Cynthia used to look after Amy.
She was like the mother
that I didn't have.
My own mother
was not really motherly to me.
So Amy and Cynthia
were very, very close.
My mum died
May 5th, 2006.
She had lung cancer.
Cynthia was a very strong
person in her life
and used to tell her how it is.
So it was horrible for her.
That killed her inside.
Well, hang on,
I'm not playing this track now.
Not playing this track now.
I'm not playing this track now.
I spoke to them and they said
it's just unnecessary.
Yeah, yeah. Okay.
We were making
the back end of the record
and we were
at Metropolis Studios
and Amy had bits of vocal
to finish.
Have I got any drink?
Did they bring up that drink?
- It's quite fun, really.
- An acoustic session?
Never been filmed like this.
I've never done it before.
She was having a couple
of whiskey-and-Cokes.
We had broke for lunch.
Amy had ordered
this massive plate of food
and she had a big dessert as well.
She finished the whole thing off
and she disappeared for a while,
and 45 minutes later
came back a bit kind of dazed.
And the studio manager pulled me
out of the session and said,
"Look, I need you to come
and see something."
She took me
to the women's toilets
and Amy had thrown everything up
and literally
redecorated the toilets.
She'd obviously been
wiping her face,
and all the mascara had
been rubbed off on the towels.
And that's when I kinda realized
that something serious
was wrong.
I had a toffee fudge...
but I ate it.
Yummy.
When she was probably 15,
she one day said,
"I've got this
really great diet, Mum.
I eat what I want and then,
I just bring it all up."
I know, I'm a pig.
I know I'm a pig,
I just... can't help it.
I obviously
did not think that deeply of it.
My feeling was, it would pass.
And then she told Mitchell
about it.
He also sort of pushed it aside,
not taking it seriously.
That basically is bulimia.
And it doesn't pass.
- Hello.
- Hello. You alright?
Welcome to the show.
Now, you've been away
for a little while.
What have you been up to?
I've done an album.
It's called Back To Black.
Mm-hmm.
How would you describe it?
It's a lot more... more...
I don't wanna say more raw,
but it's not got all the clever,
like, jazz chords.
It's not really like that now.
I've been listening
to a lot of girl groups,
a lot of garage bands.
It's kinda what it's like.
It's a lot more guitar.
I'm a guitarist,
I've been listening
to a lot more guitar bands.
In Camden,
you can't really
get away from it, so...
- You can't.
- It rubbed off on me.
Would you go as far as to say
it's a bit more accessible
than your debut?
I'd say it was more accessible.
It's not necessarily more poppy,
but, you know,
jazz is quite an exclusive.
Not exclu...
It's quite an elitist music,
you know,
and this album's
a lot less like that.
I'd rather be at home
with Ray
So let's talk
about your music, then.
And Rehab has gone down so well.
Are you kind of surprised
by the reaction to it?
Uh... I am, actually.
I never even thought
it'd be a single, really.
The record company were like,
"We want it to be a single."
And I was, like,
"Okay, I love all of it,"
know what I mean?
I'm really proud of it.
Now, the Q Awards,
which you were at yesterday.
Did you have a good time?
I had too good a time,
to be honest.
If that's possible.
Alcohol is bad, kids.
...in a shot glass
They tried to make
me go to rehab
I said no no no
Can you tie that any tighter?
What are you doing?
You have to be able to sing.
How can you breathe when
you're singing? That's tight.
Breathe? Sing? What?
There was already
this atmosphere of celebrity...
all tied into Rehab.
Rehab was the pivotal song.
It was the song that gets her
into a particular place,
her becoming a commercial star.
The winner of the Best
British Female this year,
way more rock'n'roll
than Liam Gallagher,
it's the one, the only...
Amy Winehouse!
Okay, let's just go.
Get the... get the... Go.
Ali, just go, man.
We're... we're still friends
We're still friends
We're still friends
Ooh. Rach, this is Blake.
He's my fianc.
Hello.
Turn the volume up!
We're kickin' off
the 107 days of summer,
on 107.5, WBLS!
No no no
The man said
Why do you think you're here
I said I got no...
I'm gonna
I'm gonna lose my baby
So I always keep
A bottle near
He said
I just think you're depressed
This me
Yeah baby
And the rest
I love, not like, Amy Winehouse,
because her voice
is the most original voice
that I've heard in the last,
I dunno, 10 years.
My daughter turned on to it,
everybody got turned on to it.
And I've turned all my friends
on to it.
Her CD is entitled
Back to Black.
Please welcome Amy Winehouse.
I just
Oh I just need a friend
See I'm not gonna spare
ten weeks
Have everyone think
I'm on the mend
And it's not just my pride
It's just till these tears
Have dried
They tried to make me go
to rehab
Amy called me.
Then I saw her in New York.
She wasn't puffed up
about herself at all.
She was almost embarrassed
by the fact
that she was doing so well.
She expressed a lot of concern
and fear
about where things were gonna go
and how she was gonna handle it.
She was just, like,
"What am I supposed to do
in this space, you know?"
I won't go go go
Amy Winehouse! Nice job!
Thank you very, very much!
Everybody just wanted
to spend time with Amy.
In our business,
there's nothing
that can prepare you
for that level of success.
There's no textbook.
You can warn an artist,
you can try
and prepare them for it,
but at the end of the day,
until you go through it,
it's unlike anything
you've ever encountered.
By yourself! By yourself!
By yourself!!
How do you think
the shoot's going, baby?
- Really well, baby!
- Yeah? Enjoying yourself?
What's it like to be shot
by Terry Richardson?
What's he like at shooting?
It's a lifelong dream come true.
What do you think
about the broken glass?
Um, I wrote "I love Blake"
on my tummy.
Did you? Did you outline it?
I wrote "I love Blake"
on my tummy.
I can't see any scars.
It's just chicken scratch.
So what's been your highlight
of the day?
Um...
it'll be in about five minutes.
When?
We go in the toilet
and I fucking...
- Blake, sit here.
- Yes, Terry, sir.
Amy, sit there.
Amy.
That's good, that's lovely.
You've been famous in the UK
for a little while longer.
Does it seem like it's different
how you're treated here,
in a way too, compared to...
The way people write about you,
it's almost like a 23-year-old's
never wanted go out
and have fun before.
It's kind of hypocritical,
in a way, too.
Uh... I wouldn't know,
I really wouldn't know.
Um... you guys have known
each other for a long time.
You've known each other...
You grew up together?
- Almost.
- Almost?
You were fighting
to get her back?
And what happened?
The day we got married,
we went out on a boat
around Miami,
smoked a cigar and...
it was like a real achievement,
an amazing thing that me
and her had actually done.
We'd actually gotten married.
And we did it
exactly how we wanted to.
You lazy people!
Hurray! Wave!
Her whole thing was she wanted
to feel how he felt.
And she was, "I just wanna feel
what he's feeling."
"I wanna be on the same level.
Otherwise he's there
and I'm here."
That's what she wanted,
that was the goal.
Welcome back to 45th at Night.
Please give a warm,
warm round of applause
for Amy Winehouse.
Yeah I cheated myself
Like I knew I knew I would
I told you
I was trouble
You know that I'm no good
Thank you very much.
Oh, have they? Bollocks.
Have they? Fuck.
I heard about that as well.
Amy,
can you talk in the kitchen?
After we came back
from America, married,
that was the first time Amy
tried crack cocaine and heroin.
I'd used by then and enjoyed it.
It completely eradicates
any sort of negative feelings.
And then Amy tried it with me.
And it just got a grip of both
of us really quickly from then.
Amy.
- Yeah?
- Come in here.
- Coming!
- Oh, change the record.
Just come on.
Pass me a little, uh...
Come on!
Are you alright
keeping the rollers in?
- Yeah.
- Yeah?
Do you ever have time
to stand back and think,
"This is alright.
Quite good, this."
Yeah. Uh...
Uh, I dunno. Yeah, I suppose so.
I suppose if my husband's happy,
I'm happy. Um...
But, yeah, I've done well,
I've done really well.
But, um...
I just want to be able to go
and do a next... an album again,
and... keep doing...
just keep doing music
really well,
rather than...
I love doing gigs, though.
I just want to go and do
another album now, so...
Yeah.
I got a phone call
in the middle of the night,
and Blake said to me,
"Something's happened.
"She doesn't know who I am
and she keeps saying your name.
Can you come round?"
So obviously I got up,
and I got in the car
and I started driving.
I got a phone call from Blake,
freaking out, off his nut,
saying she's overdosed.
And I said, "Right."
Go to the closest hospital now
and I'll be there."
She was petrified.
He was petrified.
She looked like a child.
She scared herself, basically.
And the doctor called us
into a room and said,
"With the amount of cocaine,
heroin,
"alcohol and crack cocaine
in her blood system,
"we're amazed
she's not in a coma.
"You've got away with it
this time,
"but she's a petite, young girl;
Her body
can't keep up with this."
She was asleep
and it was very calm.
Nicky was one side of the bed,
I was the other side of the bed,
and we said,
"What are we gonna do now?
How do we deal with this?"
And then it all just started up.
The whole circus
started up again.
And that's when
Raye and Mitch decided
to do an intervention.
Within... hours,
there were Sun, The Mirror,
News Of The World journalists
booked up in every room.
Every single conversation
that happened
was in the Sun and The Mirror.
Fuck knows if they were hacking
the phones or whatever.
And there's pictures
of all of us there, sat outside.
Amy was awake
by then and she was eating,
but she wasn't well
and she wasn't right.
The doctor that they got in
looked me dead in the eye
and he said to me,
"If she has another seizure,
she'll die."
And then I was told that she was
going to America to perform.
I was, like, "No, she's not."
We had Mitchell
in a hotel room with us,
begging him,
"Please do something."
"What am I gonna do?
She's gotta go on tour."
"Take her passport away
from her,
do something so she can't go
on tour. She needs help."
"Can't do that,
she's got a tour booked."
So I went into her
room and I stole her passport.
And then I got told,
"What you done that for?
She's gotta go to America.
Why have you done that?"
The doctor's just been round
to check her blood
and check everything.
Blake's managed to get to Hook,
get into her bedroom,
and the next checkup,
the doctors found out she's
got heroin in her blood again.
When I found out,
with the girls,
that she was taking heroin,
and we went to this hotel room
that she was staying in,
and Amy just sat there
and didn't really say anything.
Her manager
then said something like,
"Girls, there are lots
of professionals,
"lawyers and doctors,
all sorts of people,
that function on this stuff."
In helping promote the album,
and get the shows on the road,
I kind of done
what I was supposed to do.
And I felt that it's now
the family's responsibility.
I'm here, but there's only
so much I can do about this.
Amy Winehouse
has pulled out
of a string of concerts in
the U.S. and Canada next month
because of health issues.
The 23-year-old...
Now she's one of Britain's
brightest talents,
but the singer Amy Winehouse
has cancelled yet more gigs,
this time in Norway,
after she was admitted
to a hospital in London
yesterday.
Her record company said it was
just down to severe exhaustion,
but with her reputation
for hard drinking and drugs...
The Amy link came about
through Russell Brand,
who was trying to get Amy
to come into rehab.
And then, also,
Mitch had gotten involved.
And I first met Amy
when she came with Blake
to be assessed for treatment.
It was very much
being led by Blake,
although I did think
she was probably more willing
to go to rehab than he was.
She was a very vulnerable woman.
And I felt very clearly
that it was a common case
of one person having a situation
that was very beneficial
to their using,
not wanting the other person
to get better
for fear of losing
the gravy train.
They were insistent
on doing rehab together,
which, of course, we would've
considered to be disastrous.
I would personally find it
almost unethical
to take the couple
into treatment at the same time.
But her management, and Mitch,
managed to find somewhere
where they could go together.
Oh, it's recording shit.
It won't stop.
- Hey, uh... say hello.
- Hello!
Amy, got anything to say?
Only if you sing
your favourite hit, Rehab.
They tried to make me go
I said no
Where are we right now? Amy?
Alex, can you say? Where are we?
Known to some as...
So can we have the new updated
version of Rehab, please, Amy?
First time? Amy?
I want the new version of Rehab.
Please, baby,
for our personal private movie.
They came back from Osea Island,
and had a suite at the hotel,
and they binged.
It was ugly.
They weren't happy souls
when they were high.
I kicked off...
I broke a bottle
and I cut my arm.
And then she grabbed the bottle
off me and she nicked her arm,
and she said,
"I'll do anything you do."
She said,
"Love is, in some ways,
killing me, Raye Raye."
She felt torn
between those two things:
The guy that she really loved,
but having to keep up with
the consumption of substances
that they both were trying
to do at the same time.
It was just a horrible pendulum
swinging one way to the other,
one extreme to the other,
all the time.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Amy Winehouse!
And I've worked
with a lot of people.
I'm telling you,
she has one of the best voices
of anybody of all time.
Amy Winehouse!
More trouble for Amy Winehouse.
The singer's Camden home
was raided by police last night,
who used a battering ram
to smash down her front door.
This was the moment
police arrested and handcuffed
Blake Fielder-Civil
on suspicion of attempting to
pervert the course of justice.
A spokesman for the star saying
she was in no way
connected with the arrest.
Shut the door.
When he went to jail,
she spiralled...
downward very quickly.
Amy! Amy! Amy!
Get out of the way!
For Album of the Year:
Amy Winehouse for Back to Black.
For Best Female
Pop Vocal Performance:
Amy Winehouse for Rehab.
Can somebody wake her up
this afternoon around 6:00
and tell her?
Drunk ass.
For Best New Artist,
the nominees are...
We did everything
within our power to help Amy.
But you can't force treatment
on somebody.
And I felt that
that's Amy's responsibility
to get herself well.
I'm sorry...
Okay, fellas, make some room,
please.
- This way, this way.
- Can't see the steps.
By then, she was incredibly
famous, very wealthy,
and she had a complete
infrastructure around her
where everybody
was doing everything for her.
And that's not real life.
We had the Grammys coming up.
I said, "You need to be clean."
If you're not clean,
you're not doing anything."
So I had a contract drawn up
and it said,
"You, Amy Winehouse,
"have agreed
to go to a facility now.
"You're never gonna make
another record again,
"you're never going
to perform ever again
unless you get clean."
And God bless her, she did.
Live,
it's music's
biggest night of the year
as the National Academy
of Recording Arts and Sciences
presents
the annual Grammy Awards.
This is going live tonight
thanks to the Grammys
in the States, okay?
Now, the lady behind me
is up for six awards!
She's already won two.
Grazie!
Thank you!
Ladies and gentlemen,
please welcome
two Grammy favourites:
Natalie Cole
and Tony Bennett.
Good evening.
Grammy history has never
sounded or looked any better
than this man right here.
That's right!
Dad, Dad, Tony Bennett.
These are this year's nominees
for Record of the Year.
Irreplaceable: Beyonc.
The Pretender:
Foo Fighters.
Umbrella: Rihanna,
featuring Jay-Z.
What Goes Around Comes Around:
Justin Timberlake.
His album's called
What Goes Around Comes Around?
And Rehab: Amy Winehouse.
And the Grammy goes to...
Amy Winehouse!
Amy!
Uh...
thank you to everyone
at Island Records.
Everyone at EMI Music
Publishing.
To Raye Raye,
to Mark Ronson and Salaam Remi.
To my mum and dad.
For my Blake,
my Blake incarcerated.
And for London!
This is for London!
It was a beautiful evening.
You get those awards
like that...
it just made all the work
seem worthwhile.
Amy's completely clean
and looking amazing.
It's just overwhelming.
I was just hysterically crying.
I was so overwhelmed,
I was so proud of her.
And I was just flashing
our whole life, our childhood.
And then she saw me crying.
Juliette, come up.
She grabbed me,
pulled me up onstage
and took me off the stage.
And I was having
a bit of a panic attack.
I was, like, "I can't believe
this is happening."
This is amazing.
I'm so proud of you."
And I'm looking at her,
trying to get some form
of reaction, and she went,
"Jules, this is so boring
without drugs."
And I felt really, really,
really sad for her.
Amy? Amy?
Amy, how do you feel
after winning a Grammy?
- Congratulations.
- Did you enjoy it?
- Whoops. Sorry.
- I'm going to see my husband.
I was staying
at the K-West Hotel.
Very late in the night,
she knocks on the door,
and I'm alone.
She comes in,
and she just sits on the couch.
I remember feeling
like really happy for her,
and also concerned,
'cause she really didn't know
how to be that thing
that she had been pushed
to become from her own success.
Then she pulled out
this aluminum foil.
She said,
"Does this bother you?"
And I said, "Amy, I love you."
"I don't mind that you get high,
but I mind that you get high."
She did what she did
and I was, like,
"This is someone
who is trying to disappear."
Gents, get away from the door,
please.
Fuck off, please. Sorry, mate.
I was called out
to do security for her.
The security that she had,
it just could not handle
the whole paparazzi situation.
- See ya.
- Night-night, Amy.
I could feel
that she was a humble person,
but she was just caught up
in a bad situation.
She was not well at all:
Physically, mentally not well.
All she ever wanted
was people to tell her,
"Pack it in, stop it."
And me and Lauren
would not tolerate any of it.
It was Nick that said,
"The only thing you girls can do
"is show her you don't want
to be a part of it,
and when she needs help,
you're there for her."
Tough love.
And I just said to her,
"If you want me to help you,
I'll help you.
"I love you, but I don't like
who you've become,
and I don't want
to be around you."
Where a lot of money
and a lot of expectation
is at stake,
people's ideas
become a bit skewed.
They want to try
and get it sorted out
in a way that doesn't upset
this financial trajectory
that's going on.
From the 6th of September,
we're not gonna be doing
any more work
for the foreseeable future.
Amy's going to be concentrating
on writing her new album.
Uh... there's five gigs,
which, contractually,
we are obliged to do.
There's a couple this weekend.
It was all over the media
that Amy was getting $1 million
for some shows.
Huge money. But by that point,
it was much more likely
to not be a good show
than to be a good show.
She just wanted to get better.
She knew that things were wrong,
and she was just very exhausted
and tired
of the whole situation.
She couldn't escape her life
in this horrible goldfish bowl.
She'd began to unravel in public
and the media treatment
pushed her
further and further
over the edge.
D'you see Amy Winehouse
in the paper this week?
My God!
She looks like a campaign poster
for neglected horses.
Easy, lad.
It was like a feeding frenzy.
Suddenly,
it was cool to crack jokes
about a bulimic's appearance
or her drug addictions.
According to contactmusic.com,
Amy Winehouse's next album
features songs about cooking,
about cooking.
That's what they say.
Cooking crystal meth,
black-tar heroin.
Amy, cheer up.
She couldn't escape it.
No one would leave her alone.
It was just disgusting.
The mainstream media
was just all over her.
Amy Winehouse,
she's like a... a mad person.
St. Lucia was our place.
We were supposed to be there
for a week,
we ended up there
for, like, six months.
She decided that St. Lucia
was a place
that she really liked,
and she invited me to go.
You know, as soon as she went
to St. Lucia,
there was no more crack cocaine.
That was done.
And that's when
the heroin stopped.
But give her a free bar,
of course she's gonna drink.
It was kind of obvious
that she was just supplementing
alcohol for drugs.
I haven't seen Amy
for six weeks.
We've got a lot to talk about,
a lot of exciting things
happening.
We're talking
about the forthcoming album,
some other business matters.
So I think it's... it's gonna be
an exciting time.
Ah-ah! Naughty!
Amy, Amy!
She was, like,
"Why is he bringing another
camera crew to St. Lucia?
"Dad, you want money?
I'll give you money.
"Why are you doing
your life story,
which is really my life story?"
She just felt like,
"My dad's doing a lot of stuff
for money or the limelight."
- Want me to go with you?
- Yeah.
You can follow down,
if you want.
I'll ask her.
Amy? How do you do it?
Just push and hold the button.
I'm really sorry.
Is that alright?
All the way from...
Okay!
- Is that okay?
- Thank you.
- Pleasure.
- Thank you.
Why have you got to make
a comment like that?
Why... why...
why you got to do that?
A mug of? They asked
to take a picture of you.
Richard...
No, that's got nothing to do
with it. I'm talking to you
about those two people
who wanted a lousy photograph,
and you got to make them
feel bad about it.
She just wanted her dad,
and he didn't just come
by himself,
he came with cameras,
audio guys...
But she worshipped
the ground he walked on.
I was in jail with 500 fellas
reading the papers
and there's a picture of my wife
on a page with a fella.
It's not easy
to go through things like that.
To put it bluntly, I didn't have
a very high opinion of myself
after the treatment I've had
for the past two years
with my wife.
I kind of just had the wind
knocked out of my sails.
So I just thought, "Fuck this.
You know. I'm a big man."
"I'm a handsome fucking guy.
I ain't on heroin.
"I'm going to the gym a lot,
I dress well.
So what the fuck am I doing
wasting my time with her?"
And then the chorus come in.
And, um, the last verse is:
My son came up with the idea
of getting
the most contemporary artists,
and I kept saying to myself,
"Who sings the right way,
the real jazz singing?"
And when I heard Amy Winehouse,
I immediately said,
"This one's got it."
Everybody just said,
"Oh, I don't know
how you're gonna handle her."
- Where do you want to be?
- I'll be here.
Okay. This is weird.
I've never done
anything like this.
I've never done anything
like this.
In which way?
To sing with one of my idols...
- Oh, no...
- and have it filmed.
But it's good, it's good,
'cause then,
I can make my dad jealous,
after, when I show him,
when he sees it.
I can't believe it
It's hard to conceive it
That you would
turn away romance
Whoa oh oh oh oh oh
Are you pretending
It looks like the ending
- Yeah.
Unless I could have
one more chance
To prove dear
- My...
- Sorry, sorry, that was me.
- I was terrible. I was terrible.
- No, no...
I don't want to waste your time.
It's getting better each time.
Don't... Really.
I just don't wanna
waste your time.
Ahem.
We'll keep doing it
till we got one.
It's right in there, okay?
You're not in any hurry,
are you?
- No! Of course I'm not.
- I'm not either. We have time.
Just gotta get it right,
I've got to get it right.
- I'm not getting it right.
- Oh, you are, you are.
It's getting better each time
and you sound wonderful.
Just a minute,
I'm getting some water.
The most famous artists
I ever met
are the most nervous
before they hit that stage.
No matter how much you feel it,
you want to feel it even more,
so that it becomes
an honest recording.
And that's what Amy had.
She had that gift.
She was a natural,
true jazz singer.
And a jazz artist doesn't like
50,000 people in front of him.
My life a wreck
You're making
You know I'm yours
Just for the taking
I'd gladly surrender
Myself to you
Body and soul
Thank you!
- I think we got it.
- Yeah.
- Okay.
- I'm like you, you know?
- Each time, it's different.
- Yeah. No, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
It's never the same thing twice,
right? Yeah.
No, I'm like you.
Not you're like me.
I get it from...
my idols, like you.
That's the right way to do it.
She skyped me. She was happy.
The Tony Bennett thing, I mean,
she was, you know, a fan.
It was about her saying,
"I'm not a singer,
I'm a jazz singer."
Then she said,
"Let's do this jazz project
with Questlove..."
She's such a jazz snob.
She'd always be
on her computer sending me MP3s.
"Listen to this, listen to this,
listen to this."
I thought
I had my doctorate in jazz,
but no, she taught me a lot.
She was, like, "Alright,
we're gonna start a super group:".
You, me,
Mos and Raphael Saadiq."
I was, like, "Okay."
And she assigned homework.
"Alright, study this record,
study this record..."
Amy had a good period.
She could go for four weeks
at a time with no alcohol.
And she very much felt
that she was the best
that she has ever been.
But she went to the Priory,
in May, to be checked,
and there was some very...
serious things
that were being spotted.
It was the cumulative effect
of drinking and bulimia.
She could feel perfectly fine
and have heart irregularities.
Her heart can stop
if she started drinking again.
I said, "Look,
is this what you want?"
Do you want to die?"
And she said,
"No, I don't want to die."
All the signs were positive.
I thought, "Right, okay",
we've got a little
chink of light."
The Tony Bennett thing
was a good catalyst,
and it shows
that she still had it.
We had the offers
to do these shows,
and I said to her,
"You don't have to do them.
There's no pressure.
We got no record to promote."
But she wanted to do it.
She skyped me.
She wanted to do
all these other projects
with Questlove and Mos Def.
She was, like,
"I don't need this."
She just didn't wanna go.
The material felt so tired
and didn't feel
relevant to her anymore.
But because
she was such a huge star
and there was all
of these different pressures,
she had to keep performing
Back to Black.
She didn't want to do that.
As soon as she knew
that tour was looming,
she got wasted,
wasted so that
she wouldn't be able to go.
Amy was passed out,
asleep, on her sofa.
She gets put
in the back of a car, asleep,
and she wakes up at the airport
and gets put on a private jet.
Amy! Amy! Amy!...
Belgrade!
Introducing Amy Winehouse!
Whoo!
I wasn't sure what was going on.
She just wouldn't sing.
It was the first time ever
that had happened.
It felt like the end.
It was someone who just
really didn't care anymore.
To the extent
where she was willing
to sabotage not just her career,
but her friendships
and her musical relationships.
But it's amazing to me.
Why keep putting her onstage?
Because surely her managers know
she has a problem.
This was supposed to be
a major comeback, guys,
and she totally blew it.
Go!
"Yay!"
NICK: The 24th of July
was my wedding day,
and Amy was due
to be at the wedding,
and we'd spoken and I felt
like she was really excited
about my wedding, actually.
And she said
she hadn't been drinking
and she can't wait
to see the family, and Salaam,
and some people
that had been on the journey
were gonna be there.
She rang me up and I thought,
"Oh, my God,
what's happened now?"
'Cause that's the first thing
that goes in my head.
And she just went, "Jules..."
And it was my Amy,
completely normal.
And she kept saying
she'd never done this before.
She just kept saying sorry.
It was like complete clarity
over the whole situation
of the nightmare
of the past however many years
that we'd just gone through.
"Jules, I'm so sorry,
I'm so sorry..."
Like when you're a kid
and you panic
that you've done something wrong
and you wanna just fix it
there and then,
that's how it was.
I just wanted to grab her,
bring her back to me,
wrap her in my house,
not let her out.
And she called me the next day,
and it was just so weird
hearing her talk normally,
because for so long,
we'd just been pining for her...
Like, I missed my best friend,
Lauren missed her best friend.
We just wanted
to have a normal conversation.
She just kept going,
"Can I see you?
Will Lauren speak to me?
Can we start again?"
I was, like, "Of course, we can,
we're always here."
We've been waiting for you
to talk to us."
She said,
"I'm gonna call you tomorrow."
I was, like, "Okay, I love you."
"I love you too."
She just looked
like she was sleeping.
She was on top of the bed,
just... sleeping.
But she was gone.
- No!
- Oh, my God.
Rest in peace, Amy!
Amy's blood alcohol level
was four to five times higher
than the driving limit.
Maybe a combination
of her eating disorders
and the alcohol
just made her heart stop.
She was one of the truest
jazz singers I ever heard.
To me, she should be treated
like Ella Fitzgerald,
like Billie Holiday.
She had the complete gift.
If she had lived,
I would've said,
"Slow down,
you're too important."
Life teaches you
really how to live it
if you can live long enough.
Well sometimes
I go out by myself
And I look across the water
And I think of all the things
what you're doing
And in my head
I paint a picture
Since I've come on home
Well my body's been a mess
And I've missed
your ginger hair
And the way
you like to dress
Won't you come on over
Stop making a fool out of me
Why don't you come on over
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Did you have to go to jail
Put your house
on up for sale
Did you get a good lawyer
I hope
you didn't catch a tan
I hope you find the right man
who'll fix it for ya
And are you shopping
anywhere
Changed the colour
of your hair
And are you busy
And did you have
to pay that fine
That you were
dodging all the time
Are you still dizzy
Since I've come on home
well my body's been a mess
And I've missed
your ginger hair
And the way
you like to dress
Won't you come on over
Stop making a fool out of me
Why don't you come on over
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Whoa Valerie
Oh Valerie
Oh Valerie
Valerie yeah
Valerie
Why don't you come on over
Valerie