Music icon Boy George celebrates his 61st birthday today (June 13).
The Culture Club singer and The Voice judge has written some of the world’s most iconic songs, as well as influencing generations of artists for years to come.
He has also led a very interesting life, including working in the cloakroom of one of the UK’s most influential clubs, as well as making Hollywood cameos in hit action series and soaps.
That’s not all, as he has also amassed an eye-watering net worth throughout his career.
As Boy George celebrates his birthday, Daily Star takes a closer look inside his life.
Blitz Club fame
(Image: Hulton Archive)
A few years before he rose to global fame in chart-topping eighties group Culture Club, Boy George was already a well-known face in London.
He worked in the cloakroom of the famous Blitz Club by Covent Garden, which was a weekly club night ran by stars including Steve Strange of Visage – and which would go on to influence the music and fashion of the time.
Ultravox singer Midge Ure, who regularly appeared at the club, told BBC: “You could stand in the Blitz club and look around you and there’d be future journalists and filmmakers and writers and musicians, and a young Boy George taking coats at the coat check.
(Image: Redferns)
“There was something really vibrant about that, and they were responsible for that.”
The club featured many of the future stars of the decade, including Boy George, Marilyn and Spandau Ballet to name a few – but it also turned away one of the most famous stars in rock ‘n’ roll – Mick Jagger.
Midge Ure added: “He [Steve Strange] famously turned away Mick Jagger because he thought he was too rock and roll. But when David Bowie turned up, all these cool kids suddenly went into turmoil and meltdown because the king had appeared.”
Huge net worth
(Image: Dave Benett/Getty Images for DKMS)
Boy George is a music icon, having released global chart-topping smashes including Karma Chameleon and Do You Really Want To Hurt Me with Culture Club.
Along with launching his own solo career following the group’s break up in 1986, he landed hits including Everything I Own, before Culture Club reunited again for multiple tours in the decades since.
They have also released albums including Don’t Mind If I Do in 1999 and Life in 2018, with Boy George being awarded an Ivor Novello in 2015 for his Outstanding Services to British Music.
(Image: Getty Images)
He was also listed at number 46 in a poll by the BBC of the 100 Greatest Britons.
In 2016, he also replaced Tom Jones as a judge on The Voice UK and subsequently appeared on its Australian counterpart for over three series between 2017-2019.
It is no surprise then that the singer has a huge estimated net worth of over £26.5m from his music and talent show stints.
That’s not all, as it is also reported that there is a biopic about the star’s life in the works too.
Jail time
(Image: Corbis via Getty Images)
In 2009, Boy George was sentenced to 15 months in jail for falsely imprisoning a male model and escort, and later served four months of the sentence following good behaviour.
He has since spoken about that time in his life in numerous interviews, and speaking to Readers Digest in 2021, he said going to prison was “life changing”.
He also added: “I always maintained that jail would finish me off, but it didn’t. You somehow find the strength.”
Sobriety
(Image: Getty Images)
Boy George has also revealed that he has not touched drink or drugs in the past decade, during an interview with The Guardian, and that he is proud of his recovery.
He told the paper: “In terms of my own recovery, obviously I’m very proud of that, but I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about it.
“I know I’ll never drink or take drugs again, as much as I can know it. When I got clean, I remember calling my mum and saying: ‘I’m so awful.’
“And she was like ‘Just stay clean. You don’t have to apologise.”
Hollyoaks cameo and Hollywood links
(Image: Getty Images)
In 2003, Boy George made a surprising cameo as himself in the Channel 4 soap Hollyoaks – opening the door for numerous guest appearances in the soap from icons including Chesney Hawkes and Rick Astley.
That was not Boy Georges’s only foray into acting however, in 1986, he also made a cameo appearance in the hit TV series The A-Team as a character called Cowboy George.
As part of the episode, the singer kicked down a door as part of an action sequence, and the star of the show Mr T could be seen dancing to Culture Club’s global hit Karma Chameleon.
He has also been portrayed on screen by Hollywood stars including Douglas Booth, who played the singer in the 2012 BBC drama Worried About The Boy.
Love life
(Image: Getty Images)
Although Boy George tends to keep his romantic life private, he revealed in his 1995 autobiography Take It Like A Man that he had a relationship with Culture Club drummer Jon Moss.
It is reported that the singer has also revealed that some of the group’s songs were inspired by their relationship, which lasted over four years until 1985.
Although the band split up in 1986, the group reunited in 2018 for the Life album – with Jon Moss and Boy George working together again in the studio.
(Image: Getty Images North America)
Speaking in 2020, Boy George also told Smooth Radio: “I forgot about all that really amazing stuff when I met him and you know how much I was in love with him and how it was so beautiful and exciting and all the stuff happened. It got lost in all this kind of bitterness and all this feuding.
“So it was interesting for me to sit with Jon and go: ‘Actually mate, I might have to apologise to you for some things.”
It is not known if Boy George is in a relationship at the moment – but he did confirm in 2015 that was single in an Instagram post, captioned: “Yes I’m single. You’re gonna have to be amazing to change that.”
For more of the latest showbiz news from Daily Star, sign up for one of our newsletters here.
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
