David Bowie’s Widow Iman Abdulmajid Tells Oprah’s ‘Where Are They Now’ The Secret To Her Long-Lasting Marriage
This weekend, David Bowie’s widow, model Iman Abdulmajid, speaks to Oprah Winfrey’s Where Are They Now? program about her life with the iconic singer. But fans hoping for an inside glimpse into the life of the very private couple may be disappointed. In a preview clip posted on the Huffington Post, it is revealed that the interview was taped just prior to Bowie’s death in January.
Iman is shown in her offices, discussing her work as a cosmetics entrepreneur. She says she leaves work by 3 p.m. to get home to her family. Privacy, in her words, is part of the reason her marriage to Bowie lasted more than two decades. The powerhouse celebrities tied the knot back in 1992.
“We both understand the difference between the person and the persona. When we are home, we are just Iman and David. We’re not anybody else.”
Iman and David so closely guarded their home lives that, according to a 2013 interview with The Edit, not even Oprah Winfrey was allowed to film in the couple’s apartment in New York where they lived with their 15-year-old daughter Alexandria.
“I’ve never had any members of the press in my home. Oprah [Winfrey] tried to photograph my closet. I said, ‘But it’s in the apartment and nobody steps in there.'”
But when asked in the new interview about the secret to a lasting marriage, Iman also cited good timing. While insisting women can’t have it all “at the same time,” and stating that marriage isn’t necessary at all, she said people have to be in the right place in their lives to have a strong relationship.
“I think the secret to a lasting marriage is timing, first of all. You have to be at the right time in your life that you’re ready for an ever-lasting relationship, that it becomes first, a priority in your life.
“If your career is important to you, don’t get married and have children. Because something will give. I know we, as women, we want to be able to have it all. But we can’t have it all at the same time.”
Iman and David Bowie’s union was the second marriage for each of them. Both had children from prior relationships. Upon Bowie’s death on January 10, it was his son Duncan Jones, 44, who took to Twitter to confirm the news. On the one-month anniversary of his father’s passing, Jones revealed that he and his wife are expecting their first child this June.
Iman, now 60, married David Bowie after two years of dating. She maintained social media silence in the weeks after her husband’s death, but eventually returned to Instagram with the simple message, “Love and Gratitude.”
While Iman never stopped being a fixture on the fashion scene, attending events in New York and elsewhere, Bowie shied away from publicity in his later years. In the Edit interview, Iman described Bowie as a voracious reader, who would spend hours with books and got daily deliveries of new reading material. She said he was a positive influence on her and their daughter, then 12 years old.
“He’s very good for everyone, including me and the little one, because there is nothing he’s not curious about.
“He’ll say, ‘You’ve got to read this’, and I’ll say, ‘But you’ve just given me five books that I haven’t read yet!”
Where Are They Now? airs on OWN.
[Photo by Monica Schipper/Getty Images]
