Naomi Campbell reveals the hard bargain she drove as leader of the supermodel gang to star in George Michael's Freedom! music video
Naomi Campbell has revealed the hard bargain she drove with George Michael for the supermodel gang to star in the late singer's famous music video Freedom!
The video, directed by Academy Award nominee David Fincher, saw Naomi, 53, Cindy Crawford, 57, Christy Turlington, 54, Linda Evangelista, 58, lip-sync the lyrics, while George himself did not appear.
The women went on to walk down the Versace catwalk to the song in 1991, days after filming the iconic video.
In the new Apple TV documentary The Supermodels, Naomi recalls how George managed to get them all on board and how it propelled their fame to greater heights.
She says: 'We get this phone call that George Michael wants us in his video. So we all talk . . . who’s going to tell George?
Naomi Campbell has revealed the hard bargain she drove with George Michael to star in his famous music video Freedom! as leader of the supermodel gang
The video, directed by Academy Award nominee David Fincher, saw Naomi, 53, Cindy Crawford , 57, Christy Turlington , 54, Linda Evangelista , 58, lip-sync the lyrics
'Basically I’m in a nightclub in Los Angeles . . . and George is there and he comes up to me and he says, "So what is it you guys want?"
'I said, "We want this much money and round-trip Concorde tickets" and he says, "And that’s it?" and I went, "That’s it".
Annie Veltri, who represented the supermodels, helped negotiate the deal and agreed all her clients would be equally paid at $15,000 a day.
'We were not knowing the impact that that video had at all. We didn’t have time to know because honestly we were just jumping from one country to the next,' Naomi adds, according to The Sun.
It was only when they walked down the Versace catwalk to the song, they realised it was a pivotal moment in their career.
Christy says: 'You could feel that moment. That is a moment where you kind of new. It is iconic, actually.'
George died of heart disease on Christmas day in 2016 aged 53. He is one of the best-selling musicians of all time, with his sales estimated at between 100 million and 125 million records worldwide.
The Supermodels will take fans back to the 1980s at the start of their modelling careers and document how the four women came together from across the globe and collectively achieved a notoriety that transcended throughout the industry.
The four-part series will also examine the ladies work today, in not only the fashion industry, but activism, philanthropy and business, and how the quartet have blazed a path for the next generation.
Sorely missed: George died of heart disease on Christmas day in 2016 aged 53 (pictured 2005)
Amazing: The women went on to walk down the Versace catwalk to the song in 1991, days after filming the iconic video
Iconic: Annie Veltri, who represented the supermodels, helped negotiate the deal and agreed all her clients would be equally paid at $15,000 a day (pictured Linda Evangelista)
The Supermodels: Fans will be brought back to the 1980s at the start of their modelling careers and document how the four women came together from across the globe
Back: The ladies, alongside fellow supermodels Carla Bruni, Claudia Schiffer and Helen Christensen reunited on the catwalk in 2017 for the Versace SS18 show
Originally from south London, Naomi established herself among the top three most recognizable and in-demand models of the late 1980s.
Just before she turned 16, she was on the cover of British Elle and in 1987, she became British Vogue's first black cover girl since 1966.
Meanwhile Cindy is said to have featured on around 500 magazine covers and walked for shows including Chanel, Dolce & Gabbana, Christian Dior, DKNY, and previously, Valentino.
The ladies, alongside fellow super models Claudia Schiffer, Helen Christensen and Carla Bruni reunited on the catwalk in 2017 for the Versace SS18 show at Milan Fashion Week.
Fashion's golden girls brought the show to a stunning climax, after it was opened by Kendall Jenner and model sisters Bella and Gigi Hadid.
The Nineties supermodels walked designer Donatella Versace down the runway to rapturous applause as they paid tribute to her late designer brother Gianni Versace, who was killed in 1997.
On the 20th anniversary of his death, it was a fitting tribute to a man with whom each of the women worked personally during their modelling days.
The series is directed by Academy Award winner Roger Ross Williams and Larissa Bills, while it was executive produced by Brian Grazer and Ron Howard's Imagine Documentaries.
The Supermodels launches on Apple TV+ on September 20.
