Barbra Streisand: I haven't had much fun in my life
Entertainment
I'm a very private person. I don't enjoy stardom
(Web Desk) - When Barbra Streisand was 17 years old and living away from home for the first time, she set herself a goal.
"I have to become famous," she told herself, "just so I can get someone else to make my bed."
"I could never figure out those corners," laughs the star, reminded of that youthful ambition.
"But, you know, it was more exciting to dream about being famous than the reality. I'm a very private person. I don't enjoy stardom."
"Barbra Streisand represents a triumph of aura over appearance. Her nose is too long, her bosom too small, her hips too wide.
Yet when she steps in front of a microphone she transcends generations and cultures."
The media had an odd fixation on her appearance from the outset.
She was called an "amiable anteater" with an "unbelievable nose", who resembled "a myopic gazelle".
It was only when she became a superstar that the focus changed. Suddenly, Streisand was a "Babylonian queen" whose profiles were laced with superlatives - 250 million records sold, 10 Golden Globe awards, five Emmys and two Oscars, for acting and songwriting.
But the damage was already done. "Even after all these years, I'm still hurt by the insults and can't quite believe the praise," writes the star in her new autobiography, My Name Is Barbra.
The book, she says, is her attempt to correct the record.
"It was the only way to have some control over my life," she says.
"This is my legacy. I wrote my story. I don't have to do any more interviews after this."
Thankfully, she's granted one last interview to the BBC from the comfort of her clifftop home in Malibu.
Despite a reputation for running late, she turns up on time - even after a last-minute scramble to find her glasses.
She's everything you could hope for: Candid, funny, approachable, slightly pampered, hugely charismatic and occasionally prone to bonkers tangents.
"I feel for flowers just like I feel for ants," she declares at one point. "I can't even crush them."
Streisand's memoir has been almost 25 years in the making.
She started making notes - writing longhand, in pencil - in 1999.
The finished manuscript is almost 1,000 pages long and heavy enough to be used as a weapon.
The star claims her "memory is fickle" but the book is crammed with delicious details of backstage arguments, bewildered suitors and at least one incident of falling off a London bus.
She talks about cloning her favourite dog, and signing into hotels as "Angelina Scarangella"; then reveals that her marriage to James Brolin was the inspiration for Aerosmith's I Don't Want To Miss A Thing.
