The last five years of Celine Dion‘s life have been filled with huge ups and downs. Her wildly successful residency that lasted the better part of two decades at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas wrapped up in 2019. And, tragically, her husband, Rene Angelil, passed away from cancer in 2016. Her new album, Courage, was released last fall, and last week, a short documentary about it was released on Apple Music.
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The album is accurately named
In the film, Dion talks about why the album is called Courage. “I’ve been going through tough times,” Dion says, “the loss of Rene, realizing that I was going to be a single mom. Him and I, we were one person.” His death hit her hard, obviously. She continues, “I kind of felt like for a moment that there was just one half of me. And then you have to go and put on a short dress…” and go on with the show at Caesar’s.
The album helped her though. The French-Canadian explains, “It was really hard because this is my first English album without Rene. In the process of recording that album, a lot of things changed.” Most importantly, she realized she must be strong — strong for herself and strong for her kids. Still, she questioned herself. “Am I just going to not go on anymore? Or am I going to say, I’m a warrior. I’m a mother. I have strength and I’m going to show them that I can do this,” she said.
So “courage” is the perfect word. Dion says she thinks of Angelil “every day, at least 100 times.” But she is ready to start a new chapter of her life and her career. “You lose the love of your life and you have to carry the house and the children and tell them it’s going to be alright. So I’m not fine, but I am fine because I want to be okay. I need to be okay and I wanted to sing, ‘I’m okay.'”
Celine Dion’s strength has been attacked by tabloids
The strength she shows in the short film refutes a recent story in the Globe that claimed in October that Dion was having a ‘titanic breakdown.’ The phony, tasteless report asserted that the singer was still having trouble dealing with the death of Angelil. It had gotten so bad, according to the unreliable magazine that “the still-grieving widow needs help or she’ll crack up,” as a so-called “pal” told the tabloid. The whole story was not only in poor taste; it was completely false. The latest documentary reveals while she’ll always grieve for her late husband, she is strong and ready to get on with her career and with life with her sons.