You Only Get One Life (11 page)

I soon learned the movie-making expression ‘hurry up and wait’. Indeed, I spent most of my time hanging around for that moment when I would be deposited in front of the cameras and everyone would be ready. In that precise second everything would be silent and as the scene started I had to remember all the lines, all the moves – and to bring them to life. Sometimes there were explosions going off and the set would be filled with fighting and fire but I still had to concentrate on my small section. It took a lot of getting used to but I felt I was coming home and at 21, I knew this was what I wanted to do. I still love that feeling and always have done, whatever film I’ve been on.

On a set there’s always a sense of barely contained chaos and insanity; directors often work themselves into a fury making their ideas work. Everyone on set forms such intense relationships over the course of shooting and the sheer volume of different people working on individual tasks makes every day a constant turmoil of creativity. And then somehow it works out at the end – it
has
to work out.
I soaked up the atmosphere and when shooting finished, I was very quiet and usually returned to my apartment. I lived near the coast outside Rome and Kasper and Julian stayed with me for a while, but it just wasn’t practical with me working long hours and six-day weeks, and so they just ended up hanging around for no real reason. Julian was too small to have such constant upheaval in his young life and back home Kasper could get on with his music.

We took turns to visit and when we weren’t together I called every evening to find out how everyone was doing, but something had changed. The days with Sonja seemed to be longer and my conversations with Kasper shorter; we talked without actually saying anything. While we never failed to discuss how Julian was doing, we gradually stopped finding out how the two of us were doing. Before long we weren’t saying ‘I love you’. Our chats were those of close friends, respectful but increasingly distant. Passion had been replaced by trust and routine; there was no longer any chemistry. It was quite a shock for me to realise that I couldn’t love him as I had and this was heartbreaking: I had been so sure that my feelings could withstand anything. As the months on location went by, I became increasingly upset about my personal situation – it was clear that we couldn’t go on.

It was mostly my fault. As things became more difficult with Kasper, I began spending more time with Arnold. Today, with the distance of time, I can see the tension stretched between life on a movie set and a home life hundreds of miles away but I wasn’t capable of managing the situations simultaneously and so I chose the nearest one. I thought that I had a big opportunity to make it in this new
world and I gave it everything; there was nothing left of my creativity after working on dialogue, costumes and in the acting itself. I didn’t leave enough to maintain a relationship, let alone a family. Always tired, I didn’t have the wisdom to balance out the personal and the professional. When I was with Kasper and Julian I did really want to be with them, but there didn’t seem to be a workable compromise. My young head was filled with dreams I’d had since I was a kid, and so I went for it.

The crew had become a 143-strong ‘family’. Groups of us would go out after our 16-hour days and Arnold sometimes came along. I was naturally very flirty and maybe there was already something there because of our roles in the movie, I don’t know: we were supposed to be in love on screen. Away from the cameras, superstar Arnold was charming, kind and confident in himself. Very down-to-earth, though his body always seemed impossible – you couldn’t ignore it when we were running around half-naked in our battle gear! He was so out of proportion, it was crazy. I can’t say that the look did much for me but he was an incredible sight.

The two of us had energy between us, not only as actors but also as two real people. What started as fictional characters became part of us. It was also hardly news in Hollywood that two people working in the charged atmosphere of a film set might get into some inappropriate situation; that was the way it was. You could be briefly thrown together with someone you found attractive and then, unfortunately, you had to go back to reality. It wasn’t any different with Arnold and me.

It started with long conversations about everything and
anything. Work was tiring and the intensity didn’t just evaporate as shooting finished. At length it channelled itself into an outrageous affair, and we both knew that when the film was finished, so were we. Time was limited so we didn’t hold back – we really made the most of it. The set lights would barely be off before we disappeared to do our thing: we wanted time to ourselves and we wanted to try everything. And when we were alone, that’s exactly what we did. Afterwards, I would be back as the rookie actress and he was back to thinking about his dreams, his goal – a long way down the road – of being Governor of California. Even then.

‘I love making movies,’ he said, ‘and I love being an actor. One day I’m going to make it in politics.’ I didn’t doubt his sincerity or his belief in his own ability, though I have to say I wasn’t entirely sure that he would do it, though he was politically engaged: he really wanted to spend his life making things better. He was already world-famous, but it would take years of slogging away in politics to get what he wanted.

‘Is that realistic? Don’t you think that sounds a little fantastic?’ I asked.

‘I think anyone can get what they want if they work at it,’ he told me with total seriousness, ‘if they dedicate their life to it.’ When Arnold wanted to convince you of what he was saying he did it in a way that made sure you believed him and actually I was not that surprised when he did go on to do exactly what he said he would. Both he and Ronald Reagan made bad movies and then had huge success in politics. I’m also sure that when Arnold’s done with his Californian work he’ll come back and do movies again. He
never needs to work again in his life, but I know that acting is a big part of who he is as a person and he won’t be able to let it be.

Not surprisingly, I wasn’t honest with Kasper about what was going on with Arnold. There was such distance between me and Denmark and though it was the only time I ever did anything like that in my life, I still felt terrible. I already knew the marriage was over but the affair meant there was really no going back. It made sense: if I still loved him I would never have been able to go to bed with someone else at all, much less see them for any length of time. I had a big mess of my own making that I needed to clean up when I got back home and I paid for all the fun we had with a deep sense of guilt: I knew that at the very least I owed it to Kasper to set the record straight and try to work out what we were going to do for the future, for Julian.

Denmark, when summer ends, has a particularly dismal grey about it. I was sitting on the sofa in Kasper’s apartment gazing over at him and feeling so sorry for how sad I’d made him. He was trying to take it all in – and he was still very much in love with me. It made me think of all those family and friends who said at the time that we got married too quickly and perhaps we shouldn’t have had a child together, and yet I loved Julian more than anything on this earth. He was still the best thing that ever happened to me.

However bad things were for Kasper, he showed incredible strength of character in the way he behaved. He always respected the decision I’d made and for me that was the mark of a true man – by which I mean he didn’t get
angry or violent. We were able to face the reality of our situation together. There were so many difficult emotions and we tried so hard to figure it all out. I knew it was right, but I was utterly miserable. And, of course, in all of this my biggest worry was what was going to happen with Julian. Kasper worked musician hours – in the studio until 3am regularly and sometimes much later. I travelled a lot and had the next four months of my life mapped out in my contract to do publicity for
Red Sonja
.

As I debated with myself about the best solution I went to my mother to get her advice at length. Every mother knows how difficult it is to be separated from their child for any significant amount of time but looking at it through Julian’s eyes, I knew that he needed stability and he could only really have that if he was properly looked after by my parents. I only had two weeks to sort everything out before I had to go on a worldwide tour for the movie. It was so painful but also just as obvious that I couldn’t take Julian on such an extended trip. I couldn’t subject him to endless flights and nights in hotel rooms. Kasper was based in Denmark but he was always busy and frequently out playing late when he wasn’t in the studio. We just weren’t the parents that I always wanted for my child. Kasper agreed and it was decided that whenever either of us could, even if it was only for weekends, we would have Julian stay with one or other of us, but the rest of the time he would be brought up by his grandparents.

I did feel that this was the right thing to do. In the end Julian spent his first five years with them and I know how much I owe both Kasper and my parents for creating a
stable, loving environment for my boy to grow up in. Everything my parents had warned about had happened: I was too young and too busy with my own life to give Julian what he needed. I should have listened, but I followed my heart. I had tried to be responsible and had done everything to have a good pregnancy but when I ultimately needed to step up to the mark, I flunked it.

My parents even suggested I have an abortion when they first heard we were expecting, but I would never have been able to do that. We never regretted it and today Kasper and I are friends, but the falling apart of our relationship was no less painful for our enduring love for Julian. If nothing else, at least we were fortunate in being successful enough to be able to provide financially for our child.

The media attacked me for my decision to leave Kasper and Julian to pursue my own career, but it wasn’t just something I decided on a whim. Later still it would be suggested that I had left my husband and child for Sylvester Stallone and it was too good a story for them not to report even though I didn’t even meet Sylvester until a long time after my break-up, let alone get together with him. Yes, it was my fault that the relationship failed but it wasn’t quite the way it was depicted and it certainly wasn’t as casual as many people would like to think.

I not only promoted
Red Sonja
without my first child and my husband but also without my own name. Being told that ‘Gitte’ sounded ridiculous was not a big deal in relative terms, but changing the identity my parents gave me didn’t do anything for my self-esteem at that point. I wasn’t Hollywood enough as Gitte, said producer Dino De
Laurentiis. ‘What about Brigitte?’ he asked me. I guessed I thought it was fine.

Perhaps it would at last let me leave behind my schooldays as Gitte the giraffe. Brigitte the movie star – why not? Gitte was still me but Brigitte was my escape. For me it was more than signing a legal document: Brigitte could be my energetic alter ego in high heels and mini-skirts, taking risks, being provocative and leaping into the unknown. Gitte would always be the home girl, comfortable and informal, who believed in traditional family values and whose goal was to have an ordinary life.

Since the day Dino encouraged me to become Brigitte I have always seen myself as being a woman with those two distinct sides, but they don’t always get on. Gitte has always been more forgiving of Brigitte’s superficial nature and can laugh off her excesses, whereas Brigitte has less patience with Gitte’s shyness and her insistence on following rules. I don’t think that the conflict between the two will be resolved, but it’s much easier for me to live with both as time goes by.

Brigitte was dominant for much of my career and people always responded to her and she played up to them. It was so much more exciting to be Brigitte – that was when the fun happened. Gitte was hiding inside me all along and I know now that she should have been allowed more space – not listening to her would almost cost me my life. Today I am Gitte first and she is the one who exercises most influence over my work and personal life. You could say that I’ve only found myself at the age of 47 and that I finally found peace.

It was not always like that.

S
ylvester Stallone was very beautiful. He was the sexiest, most delicious man I’d ever seen. As a 13-year-old I’d seen him in his classic boxer role in
Rocky
while I was a competitive swimmer. I thought the film was romantic and powerful. I’d never been the sort of girl to have posters of movies or boys in my room – I had a picture of my beloved horse instead. Getting autographs didn’t do it for me either, but I liked
Rocky
for what it was.

What hadn’t made so much of an impression on me when I first saw it was that Sylvester had written the screenplay and had gone to I don’t know how many people to try and secure funding. When he finally found someone who was interested they didn’t want him to act or direct. As I got to know the movie business I came to realise how much he must have endured to achieve his dreams and how badly he would have been treated along the way. It made me wonder – and still does now – at the self-belief and determination he
must have needed to maintain his vision of himself as Rocky in the face of endless rejection. Where did that come from in a man? It got to the point where he was considering using his fee from selling the screenplay to buy his way into the lead role. His was the classic story of battling his way up from nowhere to becoming one of the most successful superstars in the world by the early ‘80s: it really did only happen in Hollywood.

And here’s a tale that sounds like it belongs in the movies – only five days after leaving Denmark for the
Red Sonja
promotional tour I sat down to dinner with Sylvester and his brother. Life was wilder and faster than I’d ever believed.

Arriving in New York I was immediately thrown into the PR machine. I was doing back-to-back interviews from morning until night. Most evenings I called Denmark but I also had friends in the city from my modelling days. We met for drinks but they were accompanied by a very irritating man who wouldn’t stop going on about how well he knew Sylvester Stallone. More to shut him up than anything else I said that I would really like to meet the star and if this guy was indeed on such good terms with him then surely it would be easy to set that up.