Paula Yates

Personal

Vocation

Traits

Family

Welsh TV personality in the UK, the former wife of rocker Bob Geldof and due to marry Michael Hutchence of the Australian rock group INXS (the father of her fourth daughter) when he died 12/22/1997 under mysterious circumstances, found hanging in a Sydney hotel room. Paula was a tarted-up presenter of the TV series "The Tube," also appearing on "The Big Breakfast" morning interview show. She loved to use "shock" as an attention-getter and her approach took her from flirtatious celebrity interviewer to celebrity in her own right. Engagingly ebullient and flirtatious, her irreverent approach to the rich-and-famous won her industry awards twice. As a provocative columnist and author, her subjects ranged from baby care to sexual turn-ons. However, it was her notably frank autobiography that made her best known. As a child, Paula had an uncomfortable relationship with her dad, TV star Jess Yates (known as "the Bishop" for his presentation of the religious show "Stars on Sunday.") It was an unconventional childhood in a unique family. Her dad was 16-years-older than her mom, Heller Thornton, a former showgirl, actress and writer of erotic novels. From age eight, the girl lived mostly with her mom, at times in Malta and Majorca. It was a considerable revelation to discover in late 1997, via DNA testing, that Yates was not her father at all, but rather, her dad was Hughie Green, TV host of several popular shows. When she found this out, it added further strain to her relationship with her mom, which was already tenuous. Paula’s first step into show biz was a job as press officer to the television glove puppet ‘Sooty.’ Sacked because of her pink hair and rubber trousers, she was forced to take a job as a cleaner with a West End employment agency. Her future began to take shape only when she embarked on a relationship with her first rock celebrity partner, the American, Richard Hell, who became a minor punk sensation with his 1977 record "Blank Generation" and through Richard, she met Bob Geldof. With her toe in the show business door, Yates produced her first book, "Rockstars In Their Underpants," consisting of semi-clad photographs of everyone she and Geldof knew. She loved the notoriety and enthusiastically took on a monthly column in "Cosmopolitan" magazine. Her big break came when she was recruited with Jools Holland as co-presenter of "The Tube," an anarchic TV pop show which swiftly developed cult status. She stayed with the show for five years, winning the best documentary award at the New York Film Festival two years running for her interviews with Tina Turner and Elton John. Paula graduated to Channel Four's early morning program, "The Big Breakfast," where she interviewed stars while everyone reclined on a large bed. By now she had three daughters, Fifi Trixibelle (born 1983), Peaches (born 1989) and Pixie (born 1990) and she wrote two books about parenting, in which she urged women to stay at home to look after their children and to breast-feed their babies for as long as possible. She had finally married Geldof in Las Vegas in 1986. In 1995, Paula was fired from her TV hostess job and her tangled life began its most turbulent period. She began an impassioned affair with the Michael Hutchence, singer with the rock group INXS, whom she called "a sexy love god." They met in 1994 and began a three-year affair. She was linked to alcohol and drugs and Geldof secured custody of their three daughters. Yates had her breasts enlarged, and trilled that the first time she and Michael went to bed, "he did six things within the first hour I was sure were illegal." Pregnant, she divorced Geldof in 1996 and gave birth to Michael’s daughter, Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily. Paula and Michael were planning to marry and move to Australia and were negotiating the purchase of a house overlooking Sydney Harbor. Michael’s drug days were allegedly over and they both were filled with promise when mysteriously and tragically, in 1997, Michael was found dead in a hotel room. Paula insisted that it was an accident rather than a suicide, but was nonetheless treated several times for depression and made a suicide attempt herself in 1998. She was found dead at her home in London on 9/17/2000. Her body was found by a friend after repeated phone calls went unanswered. Tiger Lily was playing by herself when Mummy would not wake up, and an empty vodka bottle and half-empty one of barbiturates left mute testimony. Link to Wikipedia biography