Inside Olivia Newton-John's tragic final days before death at 73
Inside Olivia Newton-John's tragic final days before death at 73
Connor McCrorySat, September 26, 2026 at 9:00 AM UTC
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Olivia Newton-John passed away at 73 (Image: Getty)
A new biography shows how Olivia Newton-John spent her last years surrounded by family, focused on others and unwilling to give in to self-pity as she faced the cancer that ended her life.
In A Little More Love, published by Bloomsbury Publishing, author Matthew Hild traces the singer and actor's career and personal life, including the period leading up to her death from breast cancer in 2022. She was 73.
One of the book's passages comes from Newton-John's nephew, Emerson, who visited her ranch in 2021. While the two sat together outdoors, the Grease star "put her hand on his shoulder and started sobbing," according to the biography. The news follows the Beach Boys abruptly canceling concert dates ahead of an anniversary tour.
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"It was sad," Emerson told Michele Manelis in 2024. "I realized at that moment, 'She's ready.'"
"The last two or three years were very painful for Olivia," he said. "But she was very strong about it."
Olivia Newton-John is most famous for her Grease appearance (Image: Getty)
Newton-John's fight with the disease stretched across three decades. She was first diagnosed in 1992, and 20 years later she opened the Olivia Newton-John Cancer & Wellness Centre in Australia to treat patients.
When the cancer returned in 2013, she chose not to make it public.
"I thought, 'It's my life,' and I just decided to keep it to myself," she later said on the Australian television program "Sunday Night."
Four years later, in 2017, she revealed that the cancer had come back again and spread to her sacrum, the bone at the base of the spine.
"I am really grateful for and touched by the worldwide outpouring of love and concern," she said in a statement then. "I'm totally confident that my new journey will have a positive success story to inspire others!"
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Her husband, John Easterling, became central to her care. In 2020, the couple created the Olivia Newton-John Foundation Fund to back research into plant-based cancer treatments.
"I'm very lucky to be married to a wonderful man who is a plant medicine man, and he has great knowledge," Newton-John told People magazine in 2021. "Now he's growing medicinal cannabis for me, and it just has been wonderful. It helps me in every area."
Her daughter, Chloe Lattanzi, 40, whose father is Newton-John's former husband Matt Lattanzi, also stayed close.
The two spent the COVID-19 pandemic together in California and in 2021 recorded a duet, Window in the Wall.
"It moved me to tears," Newton-John said of first hearing the song. "It's a very healing song. I thought, 'This is very special, and I want to sing it with Chloe.'"
Hild said the singer's outlook shaped how she spent her remaining time.
"In those final years of her life, she had John, she had her daughter and I think she was determined to make them not dwell on negatives," he said. "But I think from 1992 on, she was grateful for every moment she had."
"She was determined not to feel sorry for herself," Hild said. "She was aware that she had the power to inspire other people."
A Little More Love is available now wherever books are sold.
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Source: “AOL Entertainment”
