Name: Sir Elton John Age: 58 Nationality: British Claim to fame: The flamblyant king of pop marries. Well, kind of!
When Sir Elton John and David Furnish walked out of Guildhall in Windsor, on Wednesday last, they were ‘man and man’. Well, what else would you call a gay couple who have tied the knot in a civil ceremony?
They are among the 700 gay couples who were joined in civil partnership on December 21, the first day that same-sex unions become legal in England and Wales. Under the new civil partnership law, these couple are now granted the same property and inheritance rights as married heterosexuals and entitles them to the same pension, immigration and tax benefits. However, it is not considered a marriage in the proper sense.
The ceremony was a small and private one, with close family members and a few friends. It is reported that Sir Elton John turned down 5.7 milllion pounds for the exclusive rights of this event by a TV channel because they wanted to keep things private. This is the second time this year that a high-profile ‘wedding’ has taken place at Windsor’s Guildhall — Prince Charles married the Duchess of Cornwall there in April.
Canadian-born Furnish, 43, has been with John, 58, for around 12 years. In the evening they threw a lavish party for their friends and family. However, this is not the pop star’s first marriage — he was previously married to Renate Blauel in 1984, but they divorced four years later.
Earlier, the Pop icon and his boydriend threw a stag party, but it was slightly different from the usual. Instead of celebrating seperately their last day of freedom as heterosexual couples traditionally do, they partied together with their friends. Some 180 friends and family gathered at a trendy West End club. Bryan Adams, Liz Hurley and reportedly Elizabeth Taylor were among the guests, while TV presenter Paul O’Grady compered the party.
Elton John, who changed his name from Reginald Kenneth Dwight, is a flamboyant pop star. He’s survived career dips, drug addiction and a variety of public court cases to become one of the most successful and enduring musicians of the last 40 years. He made the piano more fashionable than the guitar on the pop scene. And this is not surprising, as he started playing the piano at four and won a scholarship to the prestigious Royal Academy of Music at 11! But his rise to stardom started when he met lyricist Bernie Taupin and formed a partnership that endures to this day. From 1972 to 1975, he released seven consecutive albums that topped the charts, and Elton John clearly dominated the charts in the mid-Seventies. He has sold an estimated 200 million records worldwide and performed classic hits including Your Song and Candle in the Wind.
Wearing outrageous costumes and glasses, he has been the consummate live entertainer, providing a splashy, larger-than-life visual spectacle to complement his music. He is among the first few high profile figures who came out publicly with their homosexuality. Now that even a conservative society like Britian, at least according to Western standards, is showing its acceptance of homosexuals, getting anything accepted under the pretext of equal rights will become easy. What is this world turning into?
When Sir Elton John and David Furnish walked out of Guildhall in Windsor, on Wednesday last, they were ‘man and man’. Well, what else would you call a gay couple who have tied the knot in a civil ceremony?
