Anselmo Feleppa was George Michael’s first and biggest love. Below is a collection of interview passages where George talked about his love for Anselmo and how deep the impact of loving and losing Anselmo in his life.
On How He Met Anselmo
I didn’t meet him at the concert. I realised about a day after we’d met that he was in the crowd. He’d told me he was there. And I realised that I’d seen him and had to avoid him ‘cause he was staring so intently at me – and he was really cute. I put that together later. It’s quite a sweet thing really, but when I saw him the next day in the lobby of the hotel I made the association. The bizarre thing was, I saw him with this girl and presumed he was straight. I thought, “Lucky cow!” And he looked at me as we were leaving the hotel to drive to this island 200 miles away. I’d fallen in love by then twice – with the wrong people, really – but I already knew that feeling where you kind of click, before I even said a word to them. And it happened in the lobby when I looked at him. And I remember getting on the bus and thinking, “That’s really odd, I got that little click – I’ll never see him again. Why would that happen?” Three days after we arrived, he’d made his way onto the island, through one of the promoter’s children or something.
And he’d followed me for 200 miles – that would send me running for the hills normally. I remember freaking out when he got to the hotel ‘cause I thought, “Fuck, that’s why I was going to see him again”. We had about two or three days on the island… and we got it together. And within days I outed myself to just about everybody in that circle of friends, work colleagues and stuff. It was very immediate.
SOURCE: George Michael’s Interview with Gay Times (2007)
On the Joy of Finding Anselmo
I was so proud of him. I was so proud {tears} … that I was so proud that this was my destiny. This was … because you have to understand. By the time I met Anselmo, I had made the decision to jump off the merry-go-round. And I was already in the early stages of my confrontation with Sony but for six months I was happier than I’ve ever been in my entire life. Fame, money all the things you know. Everything else just kind of paled by comparison. To finally at 27 years old, waking up in bed with someone who loves you, you know, and Anselmo was absolutely that.
SOURCE: George Michael: Red Line Radio Interview (Part 1)
On Living in Los Angeles with Anselmo
Er, did she ever meet him? No, she never met him. I was getting confused with someone else she met that I was in love with. I remember him telling me ‘the way your mum looked at me – she absolutely knows.’ Cause it was a ‘don’t hurt him’ kind of look. And as it happened that bloke did really hurt me. But I knew she knew, because the two years that I was living in LA with Anselmo she never picked up the phone and called me once. And that for her that meant ‘well, if he wants to tell me he will, but I don’t want to have someone else pick up the phone on the other end and then pretend that I don’t think it’s odd.’ This is something else that’s very important to my particular story, and that’s that my coming out was not… I won’t go further into it than to say that within my family, it was not coming out that I was afraid of, or thought would be dangerous, because I knew my mum would absolutely be fine with it.
SOURCE: George Michael: Days Of The Open Hand (Attitude, 2004)
On Anselmo’s AIDS Diagnosis and Sony
Now, had Anselmo not been diagnosed with HIV I don’t think I would have had the anger to take Sony to court for treating me badly. I was too happy in that six months before he was diagnosed! I would never really have considered it. I was too happy! Once I was terrified .. and angry … angry .. about my beautiful boy being taken from me, there was the part of my personality that could say, “Okay, fuck this!” This can’t all be bad I’ve got to do something good with this time in my life and that’s why I tried to do. I mean, people can say what they want. They thought I was going to win. I promise you the people in the industry at that time thought, “Of course he’s gonna win!” The contracts of the 1980s had been got rid of in the film industry in the 1950s. So why were they still there in the 1980s? It’s the only industry on earth which has no free agency!
SOURCE: George Michael: Red Line Radio Interview (Part 1)
On the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert
I found out that Anselmo was ill the day after… No, the evening Anselmo came home and said he needed to be tested, the morning after that Freddie Mercury died. Just to make it an extra special day for me. And so then when it came to performing it was just an overwhelming day, because it was so sad I was having one of the proudest moments of my life… without Freddie Mercury there. And this poor man who loved me, who wouldn’t dreamt of not going, had to sit through that day, and sat through that day so kind of proudly and bravely. It was just horrible really. Absolutely horrible. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
SOURCE: George Michael on Queen & David Bowie (2007)
Anselmo was there and I was dying inside. And my whole … I went into another place! I went into another place. This was the loudest prayer of my life. And it’s not an accident … it’s not an accident that the performance, probably most well-known in my career, was sung to my lover who was dying. That will hopefully never happen again. The fact that it happened that way … I mean, my God, talk about destiny.
SOURCE: George Michael: Red Line Radio Interview (Part 2)
On AIDS and Anselmo’s Death
The start of the downward spiral can be pinpointed to New Year 1991 when his Brazilian boyfriend Anselmo Feleppa flew to London to tell George he had tested positive for AIDS. It was just three months after they met. “He’d had the result earlier but he told me it was negative because he didn’t want to spoil my Christmas,” says George, who dedicated Older to Anselmo. Anselmo eventually died of a brain haemorrhage in 1993, shortly after returning to Brazil for a blood transfusion.
SOURCE: George Michael on Beating Drugs, Depression and His Outing in LA (GQ Magazine, 2004)
It was untimely, but that way he never lost his dignity, and I suppose I was spared the worst of what some people go through. But I’m still convinced that had he been in the USA or London, he would have survived, because just six months later everyone was on combination therapy.
SOURCE: George Michael on Beating Drugs, Depression and His Outing in LA (GQ Magazine, 2004)
I have a perspective in HIV and AIDS because I lost somebody to it. Anselmo (Feleppa, his first boyfriend) died the year before combination therapy became commonly used – it’s absolutely distressing to think that had he lived another year, he would still be here today. Because of Anselmo and because I’m the generation that I am, I never struggled with the idea of safe sex. My generation of gay men believed somewhat that the wrath of God was somehow involved in this disease – that we were being punished for having too much fun. That made us very responsible, people used condoms very quickly.
SOURCE: George Michael Speaking to New Generation of Gays (Metro, 2011)
On Catholicism and Anselmo
Anselmo had a strict Catholic upbringing and to this day, the effect it had on his life is something that leaves a bitter taste in George’s mouth. “I can’t bear Catholicism. One of the most heartbreaking things I ever saw was when I went into Anselmo’s room one afternoon and he was sitting there in bed with his prayer cards. I just thought to myself, ‘Please don’t tell me you think you’re going to hell.’ It makes me so angry and I sincerely hope he didn’t fear that.”
SOURCE: George Michael on Beating Drugs, Depression and His Outing in LA (GQ Magazine, 2004)
On Getting Outed
Actually, it didn’t change my life because from the moment I met Anselmo, I was out in my own life with everyone immediately.
SOURCE: George Michael’s Interview with the Gay Magazine ‘The Advocate’ (1999)
I don’t understand this idea that my sexuality was shrouded in any sort of mystery. I mean, there were three page articles about Anselmo in the papers! There was one by Tony Parsons, who I thought was a good friend. If Tony Parsons writes an article that I had taken part in about my dead was a mess, And I’m lover, where is the mystery? He outed me. Basically, I told him all this stuff as a mate, because my life had changed so much and I wanted to tell him what I’d gone through. And he put it all into print. But I didn’t deny it, so all those statements stood.
SOURCE: George Michael on the Thrill of Cruising (Attitude, Part 4)
On the Impact of His Fame
I think he went to Brazil because he feared what my fame would do to him and his family if he got treatment elsewhere. I was devastated by that. The idea that he had the opportunity to go somewhere better but wouldn’t take it because of my fame makes me feel very guilty.”
SOURCE: George Michael on Beating Drugs, Depression and His Outing in LA (GQ Magazine, 2004)
On Blaming the Press
I was really angry with the press. Anselmo wouldn’t accept medical help in LA. He always wanted to go back to Brazil, and I really think one of the reasons he insisted on that was that he was afraid for himself and his catholic family if, being my boyfriend, the press got hold of the fact he was HIV+. And I think it killed him. He went to Brazil and wasn’t getting the best treatment that he could have. He died the year before combination therapy really kicked in, and with the right help I think he could have stayed alive. And so I was not a big fan of the press at that point in time. I hated them. I felt that to some degree they had been responsible for his death.
SOURCE: George Michael: Sex, Drugs and Sony (Big Issue magazine, 1996)
I kind of blamed them for Anselmo’s death, because if he hadn’t been terrified of them he would have received treatment in LA or London. He received treatment in Brazil, ‘cause he didn’t want to bring that on his family. I’ll never forgive them for that.
SOURCE: George Michael’s Interview with Gay Times (2007)
On the Depression after Anselmo’s Death
Did he come close to a breakdown at the time of Anselmo’s death? “No, not then,” he recalls. “After he died I went through bereavement counseling which helped me a lot. I’m not naturally depressive. I mean, I’ve suffered from depression in depressive circumstances, but I don’t have a tendency towards it. I’m not very good at wallowing. If I’m going to feel bad, I distract myself.”
SOURCE: George Michael: Sex, Drugs and Sony (Big Issue magazine, 1996)
On Coming Out to His Parents After Anselmo’s Death
I didn’t come out with my mother and father until immediately after my first boyfriend, Anselmo, died. It was horrible, but the day after he died I wrote my parents a letter. It was such an easy letter to write. I felt that when he died he was passing a gift, saying, “I introduced you to yourself, and I opened you up to everyone you loved except your mom and dad. And you have to deal with that.” So I wrote them a letter and saw them as soon as I got home after I’d been to Anselmo’s funeral in Brazil. And everything was fine; it was wonderful. Of course, they were more concerned that I had just lost my partner than that I’d actually finally said what they already knew.
SOURCE: George Michael’s Interview with the Gay Magazine ‘The Advocate’ (1999)
I don’t know if he particularly suspected it when I was young. It was my mum I felt the fear from. Knowing my father, he couldn’t even consider he could have a gay son. He’s of his generation, a Greek Cypriot man. But my mum was afraid of my father’s judgement of me. I now realise she was afraid that if the gene was in me, I’d turn out the same way – which was easy to believe in 1965. So it’s sad – and I’m sure it didn’t help in my whole sexual development – but there was nothing that even vaguely made me think my mum would have any problem with it. And she didn’t. it was a complete non-issue, ‘cause the reason I came out to my parents was that my partner (Anselmo) had died. So my pain and grief became the issue for her.
I wrote them a four-page letter after he died, and it was the easiest thing I’ve ever written, considering my sexuality was the only unsolved issue. It was easy, in terms of my sexuality, to come out to my parents, you know? Not exactly a rare situation, but difficult when you’re George Michael. I really should ask my dad to it to me again, because my mum said it was the most beautiful letter she’s ever read; it explained completely how I felt and why she didn’t have to worry about me. It was the easiest thing – and it should have been the most difficult thing.
SOURCE: George Michael’s Interview with Gay Times (2007)
On Life After Anselmo’s Death
The honest truth I needed to sort out my personal life. Then I felt I sorted out my personal life. Then I found out my partner was ill. I knew I was not going to be able to work. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to write or singe while I was as terrified as I was of losing my partner. He died. I spent 2 years grieving over that. 3 years after Anselmo died, I met Kenny. I called my mother the day after I met Kenny to tell her I met this wonderful man. Unfortunately, it was the same call she had to tell me she had cancer.
SOURCE: George Michael’s Oprah Winfrey Show Interview (2004)
I was so devastated by Anselmo dying. I was in a world of my own. I didn’t attempt any relationship in that time. And then, of course, I met Kenny three years after Anselmo passed away.
… Even though it was a horrendous experience to lose Anselmo, it had been a terrific experience to have my first relationship. Then, at the point I felt ready to start that journey again, the poor man had to hold me up. I was on my knees again, just horrible timing. After my mum died, I went pppphhhh…
SOURCE: George Michael’s Interview with Gay Times (2007)
I was with Anselmo for two years. After that was a total nightmare. It was a difficult time to lose someone–after two years–because I was still in love with him in such a romantic way. It was also difficult because I felt like I waited so long to find him. Not many people wait until they’re 27 to have that experience. I literally had five or six months of pure joy before I found out he was ill. Then it was all fear–pure fear. I just wish I’d had a bit longer before that was ripped away.
SOURCE: George Michael’s Interview with the Gay Magazine ‘The Advocate’ (1999)
On the Album ‘Older’ and ‘Jesus to a Child’ Single
I made it so clear on that album that I was not going to run away from all the Press reports about Anselmo. “Not to put a dedication to him would be ludicrous because so much of it was about him. Bereavement tinges the whole album
SOURCE: George Michael on his Deep Love and Grief for Anselmo Feleppa (Daily Mirror, 1997)
I’m very proud of “Listen Without Prejudice.” But I think the whole experience of losing Anselmo; the period of grief, which was roughly two years that I didn’t write a note of music. And then, the absolute knowledge that the next album I was going to write would be about grief and recovery. Older is my greatest moment, in my opinion. And as I’ve said before I don’t ever want to be that inspired again.
SOURCE: George Michael: Red Line Radio Interview (Part 2)
It’s very autobiographical. And there’s not one track on that that album that is not about Anselmo, about the actual grieving, which was the somewhere I wrote with my friend David Austin “You have been Loved” which is my favorite on the album because it explores a Catholic woman losing her gay son to this awful awful awful disease and her unabated love of her religion. It doesn’t shake her religion. It shook my spirituality to lose a partner. The fact that it didn’t shake a really devout Catholic woman, you know, I found it incredible, incredible. And the number of people who come up to me and say, “Oh, you don’t know how much you helped me with Older when I lost this person or when I lost that person, or when I lost you know, my whoever.”
SOURCE: George Michael: Red Line Radio Interview (Part 2)
The single is a tribute to a close Brazilian friend, Anselmo Feleppa, who died suddenly from brain haemorrhage two years ago. “Yes, it’s a sad song but I hope it has a positive message too – I didn’t want it to be all ‘woe is me, woe is me’. It is a song about bereavement. But also about hope.”
SOURCE: By George, He’s Back (8 Days Magazine, 1996)
Anyway, I thought the best way to respond to the tabloids and the international rags was to write and sing an album for Anselmo. About loving him and about losing him. When I did that it took me a couple of years because it was kind of recovery, but I released it in 1996. It was called Older and it became.. thank you … it became internationally – outside of America – it became my fastest selling and biggest selling album. I released two singles from it. One was called Jesus to a Child, the other was called Fast Love.
SOURCE: George Michael Speech at Equality Rocks Concert (2000)
The most devastating incident occurred in 1993 when his friend Anselmo Feleppa, a 32-year-old Brazilian – “someone that I truly loved” – died. A searing sense of loss, a gradual healing and a kind of redemption followed. “I can’t talk about that in any detail,” Michael apologises. “It’s just not me to do that. The album refers to it several times. I’d just say that it was the most enlightening experience that I’ve ever had. The minute someone you really love is irretrievably lost you understand life in a different way.” He reaches instinctively for another cigarette. “Your perspective changes. You understand how short life is, how incredibly painful it can be. But once you’ve seen the worst of things you can then see the best of things, so that experience was very painful at the time but very positive in its outcome.
SOURCE: George Michael: Sex, Drugs and Sony (Big Issue magazine, 1996)
Charlotte F. Hopkins asks: What inspired you to write, “Jesus To A Child”?
George Michael: Simple answer. Anselmo Felleppa [a close friend of George who passed away]. Sorry…Feleppa!!! One L! That’s in case his mum is online!!!
SOURCE: George Michael’s First Online Chat with Fans (1998)
On How Anselmo Broke Down His Reserve
He broke down my reserve … My reserve was partly there because of the way I was brought up and it was partly there because I was a celebrity. And it still is, to some degree. But anyone who knew me before I met Anselmo would tell you that he opened me up completely – just in allowing myself to trust my intuition. To say to myself, this isn’t going to hurt. Life is not going to hurt you if you just open up to it a little bit more. And I am so grateful for that.
SOURCE: George Michael on his Deep Love and Grief for Anselmo Feleppa (Daily Mirror, 1997)
On Being His Savior
He was the most beautiful, kind-hearted, angelic person I’ve ever met which is sometimes hard for my partners since his death to take on. Because you can’t take on a ghost, you know. You can’t. You can’t rival a ghost. But he’s still … but he’s still, 23 years later brings a tear to my eye. He was my savior, you know. He was my savior. He was the reason I had the strength to go to battle with Sony and stand-alone and be without a central career for the next three years.
SOURCE: George Michael: Red Line Radio Interview (Part 1)
On How Anselmo Changed The Way George Looked at Life
I really believe that he changed the way I look at my life. And I think he changed it because he was such an incredibly positive person. He had a love of life that we just can’t grasp in this country. I think he took away that slightly puritanical, Victorian aspect of my upbringing. I didn’t really know how to enjoy myself before I met Anselmo. I learned to travel more, to experience new things – and not only with him. I went scuba diving, hang-gliding – I jumped off Sugar Loaf Mountain a couple of years ago. He made me realise how English I was. After I met him, I became much more tactile with people. He was somebody who was there to show me that you don’t have to be the way you are.
SOURCE: George Michael on his Deep Love and Grief for Anselmo Feleppa (Daily Mirror, 1997)
On the Deep Impact Anselmo Had on His Life
I don’t think that you lose love when someone dies. If you have loved, then the love you felt never goes away. It is with you forever.
SOURCE: George Michael on his Deep Love and Grief for Anselmo Feleppa (Daily Mirror, 1997)
I hate the fact that I lost Anselmo but I am still incredibly lucky to have had him in my life
SOURCE: George Michael on his Deep Love and Grief for Anselmo Feleppa (Daily Mirror, 1997)
1991 was actually the same year that I had my first relationship with a man. I was 27 years old. I know the guys are thinking.. you’re thinking: “Fuck! Fancy going 27 years without a decent shag.” But believe me, I’ve been making up for lost time! Anyway, his name was Anselmo Feleppa and he was a beautiful warm-hearted, funny human being. I loved him very, very much. Unfortunately in 1993, he died of an AIDS-related brain hemorrhage. And I found myself in the same position as so many people out here tonight. And it took a while to get over that.
SOURCE: George Michael Speech at Equality Rocks Concert (2000)
Had I just plowed on after “Faith” and try to get to my next album and plowed on; and not met, and loved, and lost Anselmo who knows if I would have got to “Jesus to a Child,” Fast Love,” “Spinning the Wheel,” “You have been Loved.” Who knows if I would have got to those things. I don’t think I would have. I think if I believe in my destiny in any way, I believe I was destined to feel that particular pain so that I could do the ultimate with my music in terms of healing.
SOURCE: George Michael: Red Line Radio Interview (Part 2)
Similar Posts:
- An Audience with George Michael: Interview with Chris Evans (1996)
- George Michael Interview with Capital FM Radio with Dr. Fox (Dec 1998)
- George Michael: Red Line Radio Interview (Part 2)
- George Michael: Red Line Radio Interview (Part 1)
- George Michael on his Deep Love and Grief for Anselmo Feleppa (Daily Mirror, 1997)
Thanks for allowing me to get closer to this beautiful soul. I believe that all of us who have been deeply impacted by the AIDS epidemic share a special bond that has helped us survive our losses together. I don’t think we’d have survived it alone. I thank George for his beautiful honesty, vulnerability and integrity. I’m grateful that he allowed himself to stand among us as well as his enormous gift of putting our emotions into music.
Enjoy perspective version of “Father Figure” 1988-1991 as a REAL 50 SHADES OF GREY STORY https://youtu.be/IiPK5G_TWHk