Singer Olivia Newton-John, who gained worldwide fame as high-school sweetheart Sandy in the hit musical movie Grease, died on Monday after a 30-year battle with cancer. She was 73.
Newton-John “passed away peacefully at her ranch in Southern California this morning, surrounded by family and friends,” said a statement from her husband, John Easterling, posted on her official social media accounts.
The multiple Grammy-winning entertainer, whose career spanned more than five decades, including chart-topping songs such as Physical, devoted much of her time in later years to charities after first being diagnosed with breast cancer in 1992.
Photo: Richard Chung, Reuters
The British-born and Australian-raised star dedicated a number of albums and concerts to raise funds for research and early detection of the disease, including the construction of a health center named after her in her adopted home Melbourne.
No cause of death was given.
Newton-John was best known for starring in the 1978 musical Grease alongside John Travolta as the-girl-next-door Sandy, who trades her ankle-length skirt and prim and proper hair for skin-tight black pants and a perm.
“My dearest Olivia, you made all of our lives so much better. Your impact was incredible. I love you so much,” Travolta wrote in an Instagram post on Monday signed “Your Danny, your John!”
Travolta has previously said meeting and working with Newton-John “was my favorite thing about doing Grease.”
Australian singer Kylie Minogue said she had loved and looked up to Newton-John since she was a child.
Born in Cambridge, England, in 1948, Newton-John was the youngest of three children.
She immigrated to Melbourne with her family when she was five. A passion for music saw her perform in several Australian TV shows as a teenager, before moving to England in the 1960s where she teamed up with fellow Australian performer Pat Carroll on the UK pub and club circuit.
From the 1970s, she would go on to top international charts for decades with songs that stretched into folk, country and pop, earning four Grammys from 12 career nominations.
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