Supermodel and New York Times bestselling author Christie Brinkley joins Zibby to discuss her bighearted, jaw-dropping, and beautifully crafted memoir of resilience and self-discovery, UPTOWN GIRL. Christie reflects on the dazzling highs and devastating lows of her life—from her iconic modeling career and moments of glamour to battles with grief, trauma, stalkers, heartbreak, and motherhood in the public eye. With remarkable humility and humor, she opens up about aging in the spotlight, raising children under scrutiny, divorcing a narcissist, and why she waited until 70 to share her story.

Transcript:

Zibby: Welcome, Christie. Thank you so much for coming on Totally Booked with Zibby to talk about Uptown Girl a memoir. 

Christie: Yeah. So pleased to be here. Thank you for having me. 

Zibby: Oh, it's my pleasure. What a journey. I, there are so many surprising things in this book. I feel like it is such a wild ride. Like I had to buckle my seatbelt. 

Christie: Oh, love it. 

Zibby: I was really taken by just how much grief and loss and trauma has been in your life.

You have had. Yes, of course so much glamor and success professionally and all that, but all these sort of unlucky things. How can, maybe you could talk a little bit about that and just how you find the strength to always just keep going. 

Christie: You know, it's funny because in retrospect I feel that it's like you say unlucky, but I feel like some of the bad things, if they hadn't happened, the next great thing wouldn't have happened. And in, and I'm seeing now as I put it all together, that it really has been an opportunity to find the silver linings in all those bad things and either learn from it, find out about my own strength that I didn't know that I had, or allow it to propel me in a, oh yeah, I'll show you kind of way.

So I don't think of them. I think of them almost like a good thing now, like a gift. That propelled me onto the next thing. 

Zibby: That's a, it's a lovely attitude, but I just, some of the abuse that you faced as a young age losing Olivier, the times you, you almost died. The stalker, the ker outside your room and creed and, just I just couldn't believe one thing and you're just like, and then I just picked up and did the next thing.

So it's a lot and it's really amazing to,.. 

Christie: And, and those are the stories that made it, there are so many more that, that's the thing when you wait until you're 70 to write your memoir, it's just not all gonna fit in the book. It's just not, so I have a lot of stories that I couldn't fit in there because.

My publishers knew the right size of book, otherwise it could be intimidating. Too expensive. And so we had to pick and choose and, but I think that it was a good idea and I think that somehow people are relating to it and are giving me such positive feedback. It is really great. Because when you do put it all out there, the good, the bad, the ugly, and you feel very vulnerable the day before it's coming out. Oh, you know what, if it just sits there, you know what, if nobody gets it, what if? But I'm so relieved. It has been wonderfully received so 

Zibby: well. I am, I'm not surprised.

Thank you for, it's a privilege that you shared your whole life with us. One another thing I was struck by is your humbleness throughout everything. And you had a quote in the book that said, during my 50 years as a model, I've always assumed that every job I've ever had would be my last.

Christie: Yeah. 

Zibby: How do you, tell me about that. This attitude oh, this was great, but it, I'm sure this is the end of the line. Like that kind of attitude. 

Christie: Oh. Definitely I thought. I'm gonna say yes because this may be the last time anybody asks me. And and then I'd go in with the attitude of I better make it good because this is the last one and something to remember.

And I think that it worked for me because I gave it my all and then miraculously there'd be another job and another job. And it wasn't until I realized that. There was actually a possibility that I could actually make a go of this thing. Then I got very nervous about it. Like once I decided, okay, I'm doing this and I'm gonna I'm going to become a model.

I'm gonna eat nothing and I'm gonna exercise and I'm gonna really try and succeed, then I got anxiety because I think it's almost better to look at it like. A one-off. 'cause really now is all you really know that you have. 

Zibby: That's true. I appreciated the times when you're like, and then I had a lot of anxiety, so I finally decided to do something about it.

You do a couple different points in your life and I'm like, okay, I can understand that. Look at all that's happening. Yes. One thing you didn't really talk that much about in the book is how it feels having been a model and having, even though you. You have a very I'm so lucky this happened, and it was not like your goal in life to be a model or anything, how it feels having, aging and being in the public eye and having to cope with all the stuff that we all have to deal with both publicly and because of your role with the beauty world.

How do you feel about that? 

Christie: I think it's really interest, interesting time to age, because aging never had so many options. It's like optional now. If you wanna age or not, that's up to you. And so I think. I think we see examples all around us of aging, not aging gracefully, not aging, not gracefully aging like.

Aging yourself because you're trying so hard not to age that it's actually making you look older than you are. It's very interesting. So with all the options out there, there's a lot of talk about aging and also we are the generation, like the My age and I would say 10, 10 years below even 20 years below me and up, we're really the generation that is changing the way we think about those numbers because this is an industry that told me I'd be chewed up and spit out at 30. And at 30 I remember I was on top of a mountain. I had just hiked and I never felt better. And I was like, so much for your idea of, chewing up and spitting out. And there were moments where the business. My, my beauty business, my, fashion and beauty world, no longer was like, sending me offers all day long and all of that, and it was up to us to create ourselves and talk about aging and talk about representation. Just like the industry has spread its arms so beautifully to be accepting and to actually help people see beauty in all sizes, all shapes, all colors, ethnicities, that age is like the last frontier.

It really remains the last frontier and everybody's aging in their own individual ways. And I think that all those different ways should be represented and discussed because, there are so many options now. And so I think it. As I said, I think it's an interesting time to be aging in America.

Zibby: Absolutely. A hundred percent. And what is it like bringing up? So your daughter? Alexa, Ray, I was her counselor a long time ago in a day camp out in the Hamptons. 

Christie: You're kidding. 

Zibby: Oh, I was like a CIT at the time and she was in my group and it was so cute, like watching whatever little performances and whatever.

Wow. 

Christie: Which camp was that? 

Zibby: Oh my gosh. 

Christie: In the city or in the country? 

Zibby: No, in the country. Yeah. East Hampton, it doesn't exist anymore. It was like a tiny little camp East Hampton Day camp or something. 

Christie: Yes.

Oh, she's so terrified to go there. Oh, she would cry like the whole way there, and then she would get there and always had fun.

She'd always come back going, we had fun and she did not wanna go there. 

Zibby: You write about her and your other kids in the book, and I'm wondering how you handle being in the public eye and then when things happen with your kids, you touch on this in the book, when she had so much heartbreak and how supportive you were of that.

And, as a mom of four myself, that really, hit home to me. Like, how do you go through those moments, A, in public and just b as a mom. 

Christie: Yeah. Having kids is probably one of the areas that's the toughest. Dealing with a certain amount of celebrity and the scrutiny that goes along with it is hard When that overlaps and they start scrutinizing your kids and comparing, and that really hurts really.

It's the one thing that I can say has been the biggest bummer of being, famous, is that because you never want what you are doing to hurt anybody. And Alexa, she really got hurt by things that the media would say about her and continued to say about her through the years. It was really hard on her and it really affected her and I think it's really hard.

My other two came 10 years later and Sailor who got compared to me for looking like me had, also difficulty with that because she struggled with her weight and she. Dabbled in modeling. She didn't really love it. It wasn't her thing, but when she was younger and she dabbled in it, she thought, now I have to look like a model and I have to lose weight.

But it was rough on her too, and she got an eating disorder and she got like anorexic and. It's just tough. So now I say to them, look at somebody like Kate Hudson, who's so well adjusted. She's got Goldie Hawn super famous, like really famous, and Kurt Russell as her dad and or stepdad, and she.

Just keeps doing things like she never lets any of the press bother her or catch up to her. If anybody ever dared call her a Nepo baby or whatever, she just like shrugs it off and is on to the next thing, so I try and just say to them, don't even read the press for starters, and not the press, but the letters or the people write, although, I must say, I think we have a very nice group of people on our Instagram. I rarely see anybody being mean there. I think they, it's just all beautiful souls, but it has been, difficult to get through all of that. And really I think the best advice that I can give is to just keep charging ahead and don't let anything slow you down.

And if they. Say, I say to Alexa if they say You're a Nepo baby because you sing, it's do they say to the kid whose dad, owns the hardware store and he takes over the hardware store, said a Nepo baby. It's like it's a family business. Like you grew up on a sound stage or on a the edge of Madison Square Garden stage, that's your life.

That's how you grew up. Of course that's gonna be an influence. And of course you're gonna wanna go into showbiz yourself and so what Nepo baby is just a term that means your parents were in showbiz, so run with it. Who cares. 

Zibby: You also wrote about another book you found useful about divorcing a narcissist and.. 

Christie: Yeah.

Zibby: Dealing with narcissistic personalities. What's your advice or experience there? That's of something that affects so many people. 

Christie: Yes. Luckily there are resources now that will connect you to other people that are going through similar things. When I was going through my last divorce.

There was very little information on narcissism and what that really means. And now luckily there, there are resources and specifically divorcing a narcissist and one mom's battle website will help. People navigate these waters, not feel like they're crazy, not feel alone, because it is a long haul battle that you're gonna face.

It's very hard to divorce a narcissist because they can't have a chink in their armor. They can't have a chip that's anything less than perfect. And you are putting that chip there, that chink in their armor. And so they need to destroy you. And so that's really hard. To deal with. So I'm glad that that there are resources now, and Tina Swen has written these like several books now and as I mentioned, has a very good website and Instagram and can help people understand what they're up against.

Zibby: Amazing. You had another bestselling book come out years ago, and now this book, uptown Girl is a New York Times bestseller. Congratulations. 

Christie: Thank you. 

Zibby: How have you found the industry to have changed in those intervening years? I know the books are quite different.

But what do you think? 

Christie: Yeah. The books are very different.

Like I've had two beauty books out before. Both of them were on the New York Times bestseller list. My first one stayed there for a while because it was supported by a Diet Coke commercial that had me reading my book cover open like this, and then dropping the book. To see me behind the book and sipping my Diet Coke, which was new on the market, and we thought that was so good for you, so that was a big seller.

And I, when it came to the memoir, I was told it's extremely hard to get in this category. It's extremely hard. To get on the best sellers list. So do not be discouraged. It's, it may not happen. And then we came out of the box and we went to number four and I was like, ah it was really great because, I did put it all out there and I felt the the night before it was going to hit the bookstores and everything I was feeling.

Kind of vulnerable. And I felt what if nobody cares? And what if nobody picks it up? What if they all think, oh my God, she's been around 50 years. We know all there is to know about her. And I just, I thought I could just picture the piles of books just sitting there. And I was like, oh, but oh my goodness, people have been so sweet, so lovely.

They're connecting with the material. I'm getting letters nonstop in my Instagram and real reviews like, that are really glowing and people are saying the nicest things, like I didn't want it to end and I picked it up and I couldn't put it down. And I sat and read it. Read it in two days, and.

I'm nearing the end, so I'm savoring it now. I don't want it to end, so I'm reading I'm only allotting myself two pages a day so I can make it last. I, and then one person wrote your book makes me wanna get up and live and. I just, it's just really it's better than I ever could have imagined.

This feedback has just been so great. I am so grateful to everybody that's written to let me know how much they liked it. It means so much to me. I really. Thank you everybody. If you're listening. 

Zibby: When you were worrying that night before it came out and feeling quite vulnerable, was there one part that you were like, Ooh, should I not have put that in?

Christie: Yeah I, part that stressed me the most, 'cause I'd never, ever wanna hurt him, is about Billy. And, I don't like to ever say anything bad about anybody. And so I tried to, but I needed to explain myself like why would I ever have walked away from that relationship? That was so wonderful.

That was so just beautiful. But there was something that was. That I couldn't compete with that I tried and I tried to come at it every angle. I knew how, and, I tried to make our life as perfect as I could, his life as perfect as I could. And I tried, but I had to. I had to do some, just preserve my own soul at that time.

And so I had to walk away, but I had to also write so that people understood why. And I think that in context I make it clear that he was. Under a kind of stress that people, no one should have to deal with the kind of stress that he was under extenuating circumstances that were really awful. And so obviously it doesn't excuse, there is the disease and there's, but it explains why that got out of hand, but i, I worried about that. I just don't want to ever hurt anybody. 

Zibby: And how has it landed? Have you gotten, have you heard from him about it? 

Christie: When it first came out the first day, it sounded like some sort of revenge novel, the way it was being, like, written about in the press. And so I had to explain to the press that I didn't like it being lifting. We were together for 12 years. We dated the first year and lived together. We were engaged the next year, and then we were married for whatever the years. And so during that time, I. I have like maybe four instances in the book of where, his behavior hurt me and I explained it, and in context I think it's understandable.

Out of context. I had to say, Hey, this is not a revenge memoir. This is not written with the purpose of sound of hurting anybody, so please don't. Pluck things and make it seem like out of context that I'm just complaining because I think I made it very clear how magical my time with him was. 

Zibby: I thought you wrote about it with a lot of respect.

I really do. I. You are not the only woman who has had to deal with a spouse who has, alcohol or drug problems. And, I felt you were very compassionate and you even showed us some of the reasons why he was under all that stress, I didn't take it that way, having read it, just good.

Christie: That's what I'm hearing. Also, people are like, no, I actually was always a Billy Joel fan and I love him even more after reading your book. Aw. But I'm hearing from most people. That's good. I'm so glad. 

Zibby: Okay. Christie, thank you so much. I really loved it. I loved learning about you and all the things I never knew.

And you're speaking French and being an artist and photographer and just like your whole story, your deep love for your parents and it was just really, it was quite a ride. So thank you for that. Thank you for sharing it. 

Christie: Thank you so much for your time today and and for reading my book and giving me such a nice review.

Zibby: Oh, thank you. Alright, thanks a lot. Okay, bye-bye.