1962–1964: The origin and career development Cheryl Sarkisian first met
Salvatore Bono in a Los Angeles coffee shop in November 1962, when she was sixteen. Eleven years her senior, Bono was working for record producer
Phil Spector at
Gold Star Studios in
Hollywood. The two became best friends, eventual lovers, and had an unofficial wedding in 1964. They were later legally wed after the birth of their child in 1969. They released some singles in 1964, including "
The Letter", with
Vault Records, and "The Letter", "Do You Wanna Dance" and "Love Is Strange", with
Reprise Records. In September 1964, they released "
Baby Don't Go" The album contained the number one single "
I Got You Babe".
Look at Us peaked at number two on the
Billboard chart for eight weeks in the later part of 1965. The couple appeared on many of the top television shows of the era, including
The Ed Sullivan Show,
American Bandstand,
Where The Action Is,
Hollywood A Go-Go,
Hollywood Palace,
Hullabaloo,
Beat Club,
Shindig!,
Ready Steady Go! and
Top of the Pops. They often wore colorful custom-made, coordinating outfits, and Cher was said to own more than 100 pairs of
bell-bottoms. Their rising fame led to photo features in
Vogue and
Life. Following the album's success, they purchased a $75,000 one-bedroom home in the
Encino neighborhood of the
San Fernando Valley in October 1965. At one point, they had five songs in the US
Billboard top 50 simultaneously, a feat equaled only by the Beatles and
Elvis Presley. Together they had become, according to
Time magazine's
Ginia Bellafante, rock's "it" couple. Periodic solo releases by Cher continued during this period, including major successes with "
Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)", and
Burt Bacharach &
Hal David's theme from "
Alfie" (as heard in the motion picture
Alfie, as well as a single release), both in 1966. Because they sided with the young people being harassed on the
Sunset Strip during the
Sunset Strip curfew riots; they were removed from their promised position of honor in the
Tournament of Roses Parade in January 1967. In 1967, Sonny and Cher released their third album, ''
In Case You're In Love. It peaked at number 45 in the U.S. charts. It contained two hit singles, both written by Bono, "The Beat Goes On" ( 6 on the Billboard
Hot 100) and "Little Man" (No. 21 on the Billboard'' Hot 100). "Little Man" became the duo's biggest hit in Europe, surpassing "I Got You Babe"; it reached the top ten in Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK. Its parent LP, "In Case You’re In Love," also produced "The Beat Goes On," which remains today a constant reminder of the pair’s greatness. In 1967, the pair bought a 34-room
Bel-Air estate on Cloud Road for $250,000, acquiring the property from actor
Tony Curtis.
1967–1969: Film career and career woes In an attempt to capitalize on the duo's initial success, Bono speedily arranged a film project for the duo to star in, but the 1967 feature,
Good Times, was a major bomb, despite the efforts of fledgling director
William Friedkin and co-star
George Sanders. After
Good Times flopped in 1968,
Columbia Pictures immediately sold rights to their intended follow-up film
Speedway to
MGM. The couple were replaced by
Elvis Presley and
Nancy Sinatra. In 1969, another film,
Chastity, starring Cher, written and produced by Sonny, was also a commercial bomb. Sonny and Cher's career had stalled by 1968 as album sales quickly dried up. Their gentle, easy-listening pop sound and drug-free life had become unpopular in an era increasingly consumed with the
psychedelic rock of the evolving landscape of American pop culture during the late 1960s. "
Hippies thought we were square, squares thought we were hippies," Cher later recalled. Network TV talent scouts attended one of the couple's Las Vegas shows and determined the act had potential appeal for a variety series. Sonny and Cher welcomed their first and only child together,
Chastity Bono—named after Cher's film—on March 4, 1969.
1970–1977: TV success, Cher goes solo and divorce In 1970, Sonny and Cher starred in their first television special,
The Nitty Gritty Hour, a mixture of
slapstick comedy,
skits, and live music. The appearance was a critical success, which led to numerous guest spots on other television shows.
The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour debuted in 1971 as a summer replacement series. throughout its initial four seasons on CBS. '' advertisement, February 12, 1972 Sonny and Cher's dialogues on the show were patterned after the successful nightclub routines of
Louis Prima and
Keely Smith: the happy-go-lucky husband squelched by a tart remark from the unamused wife. The show featured a stock company of zany comedians, including
Teri Garr, Freeman King, Ted Ziegler, Billy Van and Murray Langston (later
The Unknown Comic on
The Gong Show). One sketch satirizing
CBS's detective show
Cannon and its portly star
William Conrad was so successful that Sonny and Cher staged several follow-ups, with
Tony Curtis as "Detective Fat". Everybody in these sketches wore wide-waisted "fat suits" (similar to hoop skirts), so Detective Fat
and his clients
and his suspects would spend most of the time bumping each other and bouncing across the crowded room. The duo also revived their recording career, releasing the album
All I Ever Need Is You, and charting two more top ten hits: "
All I Ever Need Is You", and "
A Cowboy's Work Is Never Done" in 1972. Around this time, Cher had become a major star on her own, due in part of the success of the singles "
Gypsies Tramps and Thieves" and "
Half-Breed", both of which reached number one on the pop charts. In 1972, Sonny and Cher bought actor Tony Curtis'
Owlwood Estate—a 12,600-square-foot
Tuscan-style mansion in
Holmby Hills, Los Angeles—for $750,000. Cher won a Golden Globe Award for Best Performance By an Actress in a Television Series – Musical or Comedy for
The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour in 1974. Bono launched his own show,
The Sonny Comedy Revue, in the fall of 1974, retaining the "Sonny and Cher" troupe of comedians and writers. Cher also announced plans to star in a new variety series of her own. Critics predicted that Bono would be the big winner with a solo comedy vehicle, and held little hope for Cher's more musical showcase. After only six weeks, however, Bono's show was abruptly canceled. As a result, they went their separate ways until Cher attended the opening of one of Bono's restaurants in something of a reconciliation.
The Sonny & Cher Show returned in 1976, even though they were no longer married (the duo "reunited" with a humorous handshake). In 1976,
Mego Toys also released a line of
toys and dolls, in the likeness of Sonny & Cher. The release of these fashion dolls coincided with the popularity of
The Sonny & Cher Show. By 1977, the variety television genre was falling out of fashion, the show ended, and Sonny and Cher finally parted ways for good.
1978–1999: Later career and reunions Sonny Bono went on to an acting career and later entered politics, eventually becoming a member of the
U.S. House of Representatives. Cher went on to become a
Grammy Award-winning solo singer and an
Academy Award-winning actress. The couple made two surprise impromptu reunion performances: the first on
The Mike Douglas Show in the spring of 1979, singing a medley of "
United We Stand" and "
Without You", and the second on November 13, 1987, on
Late Night with David Letterman where they performed their hit song "I Got You Babe"; it turned out to be the last time the two would perform together. In early 1999,
And the Beat Goes On: The Sonny and Cher Story, directed by David Burton Morris and starring
Jay Underwood and Renee Faia, was broadcast on
ABC. The TV movie was based on the autobiography of Bono, and focuses on the relationship between the couple during the early 1960s to their divorce in the mid-1970s. This movie was also nominated for two
Emmy Awards. ==Bono's death, music copyright==