Sir Elton John’s ex-wife Renate Blauel has initiated legal proceedings against the singer in the superior court, in a rare intervention by a woman who has been avoiding advertising for decades.
Blauel filed the legal paperwork last week and is seeking a court order against his former partner, according to documents seen by The Guardian.
The German-born sound engineer met John while recording his return album Too Low for Zero in 1983 and they married the following year while on tour in Australia. The relationship ended in divorce in 1988.
Later, John announced that he was gay and met his future husband, David Furnish, and had children.
Blauel has rarely been heard in public since the divorce, though there was renewed interest in her relationship with John after she was briefly described in last year’s biopic Rocketman, in which Celinde Schoenmaker portrayed her.
John is named as the defendant in legal filings. Their representatives declined to comment on the case.
The reason for the mandate request is unclear, but the approach is often taken in relation to privacy issues or to avoid posting material.
Blauel’s lawyer confirmed that she had submitted the documentation. He declined to explain why she had felt the need to seek a high-court injunction against her ex-husband after decades of silence, but said she “hoped to resolve it amicably.”
In his autobiography, published last year, John describes his agony over his divorce from Blauel and his struggle to accept his sexuality.
“I had broken the heart of someone who loved and loved me unconditionally, someone whom I could not criticize in any way,” he wrote. Despite all the pain, there was no acrimony involved at all. For years afterwards, every time something happened to me, the press appeared at the door of their house, looking for me to scrub the earth, and it never has: it told them to leave it alone. ”
In the book, he said he had very limited contact with Blauel after the separation. “I saw her once we divorced … When I had children, I invited her to [John’s home] Woodside because he wanted her to meet them; I wanted to see her, I wanted her to be part of our lives, and we part of hers, in some way, ”he wrote. “But she did not want to, and I did not insist on the subject. I have to respect how he feels. “
