Music legend Tina Turner is bidding fans adieu with an emotionally wrenching new documentary about her life, her struggles and her happiness, The New York Post reported.
In the documentary titled “Tina,” the icon takes a stroll down memory lane, recalling a painful childhood with a neglectful mother, an abusive husband, the loss of a child and the love she was able to discover in her later years.
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According to the Post, Turner’s transparency about the abuse she endured throughout her life was more of a reflection than a purge.
“It wasn’t a good life. The good did not balance the bad. I had an abusive life. There’s no other way to tell the story. It’s a reality. It’s a truth. That’s what you’ve got, so you have to accept it,” she said.
Turner’s relationship with her mother, Zelma, was far from idyllic. She described the woman as “cold and unloving,” only offering the legendary entertainer support if there was something to gain.
“Mom was not kind,” she recalled. “When I became a star, of course, back then, she was happy because I bought her a house. I did all kinds of things for her. She was my mother.”
She didn’t want me. She didn’t want to be around me, even though she wanted my success. But I did for her as if she loved me.”
The 81-year-old superstar also shared that she is still reeling from the effects of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) stemming from years of abuse she suffered while married to the late Ike Turner. Turner, who married Ike in 1962, had grown accustomed to abuse from her mother that it was merely a transference of power when it happened with her late ex-husband. With her marriage to Ike, the singer transformed from Anna Mae Bullock to Tina Turner.
The Post reported that one of the singer’s most somber moments of her life was her oldest son’s death.
On July 3, 2019, Craig Hill, a child she had with a member of Ike Turner’s band, committed suicide. Turner told CBS News’ Gayle King in an interview that loneliness took her son away.
“I think Craig was lonely. That’s what I think really got him more than anything else. I have pictures all around of him smiling, and I think I’m sensing that he’s in a good place. I really do,” the mother of four revealed.
The documentary also highlights that Turner has now found everlasting love with German producer Erwin Bach, who is 16-years younger than her. According to the Post, the two met when she was 46. The “Private Dancer” singer admitted her attraction to Bach was instant but that she wasn’t looking for love.
“When you come to LA, I want you to make love to me. I thought that I could say that because I was a free woman, I didn’t have a boyfriend. I liked him,” she said, recounting that moment to the Post.
“There was nothing wrong with it — it was just sex. And he looked at me as if he didn’t believe what he was hearing.”
The couple’s love blossomed, but they didn’t marry until 2013– four years after her final performance.
The octogenarian has had a series of health setbacks, including a stroke in 2013, intestinal cancer and kidney problems. In 2017, Bach donated a kidney to his wife.
The lovebirds live in Switzerland– where Turner is a citizen. She relinquished her U.S. citizenship in 2013.
Turner wants to live out her remaining years privately after being in the spotlight for most of her life. The documentary is Turner’s final curtain call for an extraordinary entertainer.
The documentary airs on HBO on March 27.
