Simon Napier-Bell Shares Initial Reaction to George Michael’s Christmas Death: ‘Oh Damn, George Couldn’t You Have Done This Tomorrow?’ [Exclusive]
Pop star George Michael’s Christmas Day death in 2016 came as a shock, but the day the 53-year-old singer died was especially poignant, especially to those who knew how much Michael loved Christmas.
Michael’s former music manager, Simon Napier-Bell was enjoying a peaceful, candlelit dinner with his partner of 30 years when his phone rang on that fateful day.
“I was sitting by the River Sarawak in Borneo having Christmas dinner with my partner, my boyfriend of 30 years,” he recalled to Showbiz Cheat Sheet. “And there it came on my phone all of a sudden. ‘Can I talk to you?’ Journalists, journalists, journalists saying, ‘We got to talk to you. George Michael is dead.”
Napier-Bell added with a laugh, “It definitely, definitely spoiled my Christmas. So thank you, George. But I would have said that to him if he had been there. It was a shock and was really an awful thing to happen.”
It took a while for George Michael’s death to sink in
Napier-Bell and Michael had a light-hearted, sometimes jokey friendship. So when he first learned of George Michael’s death, Napier-Bell’s instinct was to cling to a fonder way to remember his friend – then the shock hit.
“But the funny thing was, my first reaction is, ‘Oh, damn, George, couldn’t you have done this tomorrow?’ My first thing was it wasn’t terrible sorrow,” he shared. “He’s being annoying … because that’s how artists are. They’re always like that. And then it sank in what I’ve actually read. And well what’s happened is he’s not being annoying. He died and that’s what ruined the day. I can tell you.”
It was widely known how Michael embraced Christmas and loved the authentic 1984 shoot, Wham! did for “Last Christmas.” Michael had hoped “Last Christmas” would have been Wham!’s fourth number-one hit that year, but it was overshadowed by Band Aid’s African relief effort song, “Do They Know It’s Christmas” – the number-one track that also featured Michael.
What happened the last time Simon Napier-Bell saw George Michael?
Looking back on the last few times Napier-Bell saw Michael, he said they didn’t have one of those long, deep conversations.
“It wouldn’t have been a conversation. It’d be a typical music business event,” he said. “I’m not sure which is the last one, but it was one of those events where everybody in the business is there and then suddenly there’s George and, ‘Oh, how are you? How are you doing?’ Big hug. ‘How are things?'”
“It’s the same things you say to everybody else, isn’t it? I mean, that’s the music industry. It’s a pleasure. It leaves you with a little happiness in you. But it happened. But you moved on to somebody else, and so would he,” Napier-Bell said.
“That wasn’t just the last couple of sessions, that’s probably the last three or four,” he added. “I mean, that tends to be what happens in the music industry. You see people, and you are happy to see them. But then there’s somebody else taking your attention, and on and on. Always pleasant to see him, but no big, deep conversation really for quite a long time.”
Napier-Bell goes more into detail about his working relationship and friendship with Michael in the documentaries The Real George Michael (streaming on Amazon, Tubi, Roku, Peacock, Plex and Xumo) and the Netflix film, Wham!
