Studying Time: 3 minutes
Billy Joel is opening up for the primary time a couple of very darkish chapter in his life.
A brand new documentary in regards to the rock legend titled Billy Joel: And So It Goes premiered on the Tribeca Movie Competition this week.
And it accommodates scenes during which Joel admits to just about taking his personal life after having an affair with the spouse of his greatest pal.
Billy Joel performs at Allegiant Stadium on November 09, 2024 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Picture by Ethan Miller/Getty Pictures)
A tumultuous time for Billy Joel
In his early 20s, Joel fashioned a band known as Attila along with his pal Jon Small. He later moved in with Small, his spouse, Elizabeth, and their son.
“Bill and I spent a lot of time together,” Elizabeth mentioned within the documentary, including that their affection for each other was a “slow build” (per Individuals journal).
Ultimately, Joel got here to his pal with the reality: “I’m in love with your wife.”
“I felt very, very guilty about it. They had a child. I felt like a homewrecker,” Joel says within the movie. “I was just in love with a woman and I got punched in the nose which I deserved. Jon was very upset. I was very upset.”
American singer-songwriter, composer and pianist Billy Joel performing dwell, UK, seventh June 1984. (Picture by Ted Tub/Every day Specific/Hulton Archive/Getty Pictures)
Joel says he practically took his personal life amid guilt of affair
Joel, in fact, was kicked out of Small’s residence, and he says it was then that he entered the bottom level of his life.
“I had no place to live. I was sleeping in laundromats and I was depressed I think to the point of almost being psychotic,” he mentioned within the documentary.
“So I figured, ‘That’s it. I don’t want to live anymore.’ I was just in a lot of pain and it was sort of like why hang out, tomorrow is going to be just like today is and today sucks. So, I just thought I’d end it all.”
On the time, Joel’s sister, Judy Molinari, was working as a medical assistant, and she or he gave him some sleeping tablets for his insomnia.
“But Billy decided that he was going to take all of them… he was in a coma for days and days and days,” she mentioned within the movie, including:
Billy Joel attends the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Area on February 04, 2024 in Los Angeles, California. (Picture by Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Pictures for The Recording Academy)
“I went to go see him in the hospital, and he was laying there white as a sheet. I thought that I’d killed him.”
As soon as he was out of the hospital, the singer drank “a bottle of Lemon Pledge” in a second try to take his personal life. Joel says it was Small’s forgiveness that finally pulled him out of his deep despair.
“Even though our friendship was blowing up, Jon saved my life,” Joel mentioned.
“He never really said anything to me, the only practical answer I can give as to why Billy took it so hard was because he loved me that much and that it killed him to hurt me that much. Eventually I forgave him,” Small mentioned.
The laborious occasions weren’t over
Billy Joel broadcasts the tip of his residency at Madison Sq. Backyard in 2024 throughout a press convention on June 1, 2023, in New York. (Picture by ANGELA WEISS/AFP by way of Getty Pictures)
Billy and Elizabeth reconnected years later. They married in 1973 however divorced 9 years later.
Within the a long time that adopted, Joel battled alcoholism and married three extra occasions.
He was just lately pressured to cancel his upcoming tour on account of a neurological dysfunction, however the Piano Man stays as widespread as ever, and up to date years have seen a resurgence of curiosity in his huge physique of labor.
“I got out of the observation ward, and I thought to myself, you can utilize all those emotions to channel that stuff into music,” he mentioned of his darkest days.
And Joel has spent the previous 50 years remodeling his many ups and downs into artwork that’s delighted thousands and thousands.
