Elle Macpherson: Flawless at 50

Elle Macpherson says she was an ‘insecure dork’ at the height of her model stardom. Now, at 50, she reckons she looks better than ever — but don’t ask her about skinny models, writes Matthew Stadlen.

As I turn the corner, I almost bump into the 1.83m (6ft)-tall frame of a supermodel. In fact, Elle Macpherson is wearing high heels, so she’s even taller. Her hair, too, is long and cascades down her almost elfin face in blond strands. She’s all in black and her leather skirt billows, hiding the famous legs. She is an impressive sight, but the most extraordinary thing about it, surely, is that she turned 50 in March.

One of the original supermodels to emerge from the 80s, by the close of the decade Macpherson was recognised internationally as “The Body”. Not content simply to be known for her looks, she turned the most famous body on the planet into a brand. Her lingerie range, Elle Macpherson Intimates, is sold around the globe. She has also hosted – and been executive producer for – reality fashion shows on both sides of the Atlantic.

Still, it can’t have been easy for one of the world’s most desired women to reach her 50s.

“I don’t think beauty’s reserved for youth,” she tells me, sitting elegantly on a black sofa.

“I think women today want to look good, they don’t want to look young. They want to feel good, they don’t want to behave like a teenager necessarily. My ambition has been to navigate this phase of my life with grace and I feel like I’m doing that. I see my priorities changing. I realise that this is a period where you can either go with it or it can be quite difficult.”

Can you imagine, she asks, what it would be like for someone who has spent their life in the public eye, to realise suddenly that they don’t look the same as when they were 20? “It could be really uncomfortable.”

But Macpherson is, she says, at ease. “I feel better now than I’ve ever felt. I look at pictures of myself when I was younger and I think, ‘God, I was so gorgeous there, but I didn’t feel it’. Or, ‘Wow, I look so much better now’. I was such a dork and I can see insecurity written all over my face, trying to be something I wasn’t – even though at the time I thought I was cool.”

Born in Sydney, Macpherson had what she describes as an easy, simple childhood. She swam every morning at 5.30am, played netball and lists debating as one of her “greatest” school achievements.

Her parents separated when she was 10 and she moved between her father and mother.

He was a sound engineer who started a shop in his garage and expanded into a chain of stores; she was a nurse, among other things, and remarried a lawyer.

Macpherson can trace herself through her “three” parents. “My step-father taught me commitment, discipline, respect for the world and for difference of opinion. He taught me the importance of education. The things I learned through school have supported me all my life: methodical preparation; making lists. If I put the work in, usually the by-product is a great result.”

Her mother taught her flexibility. “She went where her heart was. Do what you love, love what you do. And then my dad was really savvy and entrepreneurial, he thought outside the box. He was a bit of a rebel and a hard worker.”

After winning a place to study law at a Sydney university – which one she can’t remember – Macpherson deferred and went to model in America. And that was that.

“I just never came home,” she says, and laughs. She launched a career in fashion and was married to her first husband, a photographer, at 21. She adorned the much-coveted cover of Sports Illustrated a record five times – hence “The Body” – and, in 1986, Time magazine put her on its cover.

But Macpherson wanted more. Rather than allowing magazines to make money out of her image, she began to make calendars herself. “I thought, ‘Why am I doing a calendar for Sports Illustrated? Everybody seems to like the pictures, why don’t I just make my own?’”

So she did. In 1989, when New Zealand company Bendon approached her to help it break into the Australian market, she cut herself in on the deal and created what would become Elle Macpherson Intimates. “I made about £20,000 for the year. And then we just grew and grew.”

Elle Macpherson at 50 is a very different woman to the supermodel in her 20s. There was the party lifestyle for a start. “I have done it all. I’m a girl from the 80s – what do you think?! I went to Studio 54 and I met Michael Jackson, Andy Warhol and Diana Ross, and I hung out in that scene. It was very hedonistic and there was the rise of the supermodel and the rise of Wall St and it was very potent and intoxifying and fast-paced and exciting.

I was a part of that movement and really indulged and enjoyed. And I was there, 100 per cent.” Drugs and booze? She laughs. “Not for the last 11 years.”

Today, Macpherson seems a devoted mother. She mentions her elder son’s upcoming GCSEs three times, and clears her diary for cricket on Monday and Wednesday afternoons.

She is rigorously organised, although she doesn’t make as many lists as she did. “I’m streamlining my life. Before it was like I was in list fog. But there’s a lot to be said for making lists and the satisfaction of ticking them off.”

Each area of her life is carefully choreographed. “I like to get my nails done because grooming is important to me, and I use my hands a lot. I get them done maybe twice a month and I schedule my nail appointment the same way I schedule a conference call. It has the same importance.”

Macpherson used to host a lot of dinner parties but now she rarely socialises during the week. “The kids don’t go to bed until 9pm or 10pm, and I don’t like to go out before they are in bed. And that’s okay.”

She separated from Arpad Busson, the multimillionaire father of her two sons, in 2005, and last year married billionaire Jeffrey Soffer. He lives in Florida and Macpherson hopes to move there from London. “I have three beautiful stepchildren and two children, and I married the man I love.”

Macpherson is now promoting an “alkalising” food supplement she helped develop with a London nutritionist whom she met in her late 40s, when she wasn’t feeling her best.

“I was getting jet-lagged, my skin was really dry, I was not feeling motivated and I couldn’t sleep at night. I started putting weight on around my waist, which was unusual for me.”

Her supplement is, she says with no hint of irony, a “sort of a gift to other people”. She now feels nourished on a “cellular level”, but concedes that “healthy diet, exercise, love, lots of water, having a laugh” are also important.

I ask her how she keeps so fit. “Don’t obsess. Keep it simple. Have fun. Do sport.”

She says she walks, runs and works out at the gym. Whatever happens, she does 45 minutes “of something” a day. It could be acupuncture, stretch, yoga or weights. “Or going for a walk in the park.”

The fashion industry has been kind to Macpherson, so I’m not surprised when she sings its praises. “It has supported me for 30 years and I’m in a business made by women for women. I find that incredibly supportive, inspiring and profound to some extent, because there are so many people who are employed in the fashion and beauty world and I feel that people are able to use fashion as a way of expressing themselves.”

But when I ask about skinny models, she surprises me. “I think you’ve got better questions than that one.” Really? “Yeah.” Why? “I think that’s just one of those criticisms that don’t have a lot of merit or meaning. Jockeys are very small. And? Football players are really big. And? You have specialised body types for particular jobs.”

During the interview I’ve found myself searching for signs of ageing. I cannot resist asking whether this unusual 50-year-old has had any work done.

“On my house?” she replies and laughs. “It’s not really my thing. Quite clearly. Look at this face, it’s very natural.”

Before we part, I ask for her biggest quality and fault. There’s a long pause. “I can’t think of a witty answer and it needs one.” She laughs again. “I don’t want to be too earnest.”

- Daily Telegraph UK

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Home News Prostitution is one name, human trafficking is…

Waterloo Region Record

WATERLOO REGION — The Gucci handbag often gives her away.

Along with the expensive lingerie, the sex toys, the designer watch and the multiple iPhones.

But the dead giveaway is the tattoo, often of the pimp’s street name, marked on the back of her neck or the inside of her wrist.

Sometimes, there is another woman in the hotel room known as the “bottom b—-” who is in charge of keeping order: tracking the johns, collecting nearly $1,000 a day and ensuring the working girl hustles seven days a week and has sex with up to 15 men a day.

The older girl takes on the role of recruiter. She’s the trusted one out of the “stable” of girls and oversees the operation when her boss, the pimp, isn’t around, said Const. Jason Morton of the Kitchener detachment of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

This is the seedy underworld of human trafficking where girls as young as 16 are coerced into what police are calling modern-day sex slavery.

Their bodies, in provocative poses, are posted on a classified website. This site sells boats, furniture, pets, as well as sex.

Customers scroll the listings, pick their favourite and text or call the phone number to book an appointment.

The oldest ‘profession’ that will likely always exist, you say.

For some, prostitution may be a choice, but for most, particularly here in the region, selling your body for sex is often a means of survival.

Locally, social agencies, sex work advocates and police say there is a varied spectrum when it comes to prostitution in Waterloo Region.

On one end, are the extreme cases of young girls who are being trafficked by pimps, held up in hotel rooms for days not even knowing what city they’re in, having sex with countless men and never seeing a dollar of their earnings. Everyone agrees they are victims.

The young women are often seduced, some with big-ticket items such as Michael Kors watches, while others who are vulnerable and have little are content with a free meal from McDonald’s.

Pimps act as boyfriends and soon the men have full control over the young women, taking them to hotels across the province to have sex with men and pocketing thousands of dollars a day. The girls are often beaten to keep them in line and some are fed drugs to get them addicted.

Then there are the street-level prostitutes working the “stroll” of the east end of King Street in Kitchener who offer sex in cars and area motel rooms. Their challenges are numerous: from mental health issues, drug and alcohol addictions to a lack of adequate housing.

There are also women who work from their homes for themselves. It’s their job.

This week in Ottawa, hearings were held on the federal government’s new prostitution bill which creates new offences for clients and pimps, but does not criminalize sex workers.

The bill still makes everyone guilty if they communicate to purchase sex in a public place, or in a place where people under 18 are present.

But under the new law, prostitutes could rent apartments, screen clients, hire a receptionist or security guard and advertise what they are offering.

The government is also pledging $20 million to help women, who they see as victims, to leave the business.

Kitchener-Waterloo MP Peter Braid, a Conservative, said the federal government is taking the approach that women involved in prostitution are vulnerable and exploited.

“The goal of the legislation is to reduce the demand for sexual services and therefore reduce prostitution itself,” he said. “It’s perhaps naïve and unrealistic that it can be entirely eliminated but it can be reduced.”

“A vile aspect of prostitution is human trafficking,” Braid said. “All of society needs to be concerned about this.”

. . .

Angie Murie, co-chair of the local Sex Workers Action Network and executive director of Planned Parenthood of Waterloo Region, said when it comes to sex workers, she works on a harm-reduction model.

That means she wants to reduce the violence many of the women encounter with johns. She is concerned with their well-being and safety, not questioning the women on why they do what they do.

“Some are victims of crime, yes they are. Are they victims of prostitution, no,” Murie said. “These women don’t need saving. They need a job, a place to stay and trauma counselling.”

She’s worried about politicians taking a moral high ground to protect a “victim” who doesn’t want protection.

“Do you think paying for sex is evil? I would say no. What is evil is men beating and raping women,” said Murie.

Planned Parenthood is conducting face-to-face interviews with sex workers, and in three weeks has interviewed 35 workers, five of them men. The most staggering result has been the level of violence most of the street-level women are facing at the hands of their customers, she said.

“We are not about the issue of prostitution. We don’t debate,” Murie said. “It’s about the people doing it. If they need help, we should be there.”

For police trying to manoeuvre through this murky territory, they stick to what they see as an obvious crime — human trafficking of young girls.

“Our role is to identify vulnerable victims. We are not here to pass judgment,” said Const. Graham Hawkins of Waterloo Regional Police Service.

Police have met with local hotel managers and in the fall hope to meet with high school guidance counsellors so that they, too, can recognize the signs of girls in forced prostitution.

Hawkins, who works in intelligence, was assigned full time to human trafficking about 18 months ago.

Hawkins, who poses as a john but identifies himself as a police officer when he shows up at hotel rooms, said he has asked young girls where they are and most of them have no idea what city they are in.

In one case, Morton recalls arriving at a hotel room and the young woman said, “This isn’t what you think it is. I’m being forced to do this.”

She had told two johns that day the same story but they didn’t believe her. They had sex with her and left.

Other times, young women are hostile and refuse help, often suffering from Stockholm syndrome, a phenomenon in which hostages express empathy for their captors, Hawkins said.

A sure sign of a woman being trafficked is the tattoos on her neck, arms or fingers by her pimp. Police also look for bruising, scars and cigarette burns.

In another case, police found a girl who had the word “respect” tattooed on one cheek and “loyalty” tattooed on the other side of her face.

A committed investigator, Hawkins has helped young women escape from the violent confines of their pimps. He’s formed friendships with them and checks on the young women regularly to make sure they have the supports they need.

One such woman who was being held in hotel rooms in Toronto, Burlington and Waterloo Region is Tamara. The 26-year-old woman now lives in an apartment in Hamilton.

She grew up in Nova Scotia where she was in various foster homes and then bounced between Ontario and Nova Scotia with abusive boyfriends.

She met a man online who paid for her flight to Toronto. He promised her a penthouse apartment but checked her into a hotel where she would have sex with men.

She secretly kept tip money to buy food because her pimp wanted her skinny and didn’t allow her to eat. His name was tattooed on the back of her neck.

Tamara recalls when Hawkins showed up at her door while she was at a Cambridge hotel. She was scared and didn’t want his help. She had been beaten and nearly choked to death by her pimp.

Police helped her cover up her tattoo and she was introduced to the Hamilton-based agency that helps trafficked victims known as Walk with Me.

Locally, a group of agencies came together to form the Waterloo Region Anti-Human Trafficking Coalition 18 months ago.

By fall, the group hopes to launch an online guide of supports in the community to assist victims, says co-chair Sara Casselman, who is operations manager at the Sexual Assault Support Centre of Waterloo Region.

“Human trafficking has only been on the radar for the past few years,” she said. “If you don’t talk about it, you don’t realize it’s a problem.”

. . .

Simone Bell grew up in Ottawa Valley’s suburbia.

Her dad was an engineer, her mom a nurse and she was oldest child with three little brothers. She was an athlete in high school and planned to go to college.

She had a boyfriend and admits she was attracted to the “bad boys.”

Bell recalls a phone call from a friend of her boyfriend who said he was in jail for possession of a firearm.

She went to meet the friend. Once there, the man turned violent, punching and kicking her and suggesting the loss of the guns was now her debt.

The man threatened her, suggesting he knew her parents by name and where they worked. He also knew the names of her brothers and their friends.

“That was the biggest invisible gun held to my head,” said Bell, who recently spoke in Kitchener to social workers, teachers and sex worker advocates.

The man dropped her off at her home and said he would be back to pick her up.

“I followed what he said. I was petrified for my family,” she said.

Within hours, he had her passport, health card and bank card. Her Facebook and Gmail accounts were under the pimp’s control.

She was taken to a rundown apartment above a laundry mat and there she was gang-raped in what survivors now call “the breaking process.” She was 21.

“After the breaking process, you die. You go somewhere else,” she said.

Her four-year nightmare began. Her day started at 7 a.m. with a steady stream of men coming to her hotel room until about 4 a.m. daily.

“You become a sexualized person who hustles for money. A sexual object is who you are,” she said.

She was fed oxycodone on a schedule and heroin needles were shoved in her arm.

“Thank God I had those drugs. They numbed me,” she said.

To further humiliate Bell, her trafficker sent messages on her Facebook and Gmail account to her family and friends suggesting she could offer “special services” to anyone looking for sex.

“People assumed I was a drug addict and a prostitute,” she said. “That’s how the control through shame starts. Your real self is gone.”

The pimp contacted her parents and said he was trying to help her turn her life around and get her to stop selling her body for her drug habit.

“It took me further away from my family,” she said.

Bell experienced seizures from being kicked in the head and spent time in the psychiatric ward. After each hospital visit, he was waiting to pick her up.

She was trafficked between Ottawa, Montreal and Toronto.

“I didn’t know what day of the week it was,” she said. “I had no idea this was happening to other people. You fear everybody.”

She was repeatedly beaten, thrown down the stairs and one time had her head held under water in the bathtub. Her pimp smoked crack and when high kicked her for his own pleasure.

Bell tried to run away many times. But finally one day she was successful. Her pimp accused her of stealing from his mother and she knew a vicious beating might kill her.

There were workers at the pimp’s house, landscaping the yard and fixing the backyard pool. Because of that distraction, she was able to run from the house and call her father who took her to the hospital.

Bell, now 28 and an outreach worker in Ottawa, said she speaks often to social workers, medical professionals, police and parents so that people start to recognize the signs of girls who are trafficked.

“No one asked the right probing questions. I suffered in silence and let everyone think I was prostitute,” she said.

lmonteiro@therecord.com ; Twitter: @MonteiroRecord