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Billy Joel reveals in his new HBO documentary “and so it goes”, that he tried twice to take life. Triggered by his affair with the wife of a bandmate. And that one of these experiments brought him into a coma.
Feelings of guilt, pain and separation of friendship
Before he was “The Piano Man”, twenty-year-old Joel played in a hard rock band named Attila from Long Island together with his best friend Jon Small. Joel finally moved to Small, his wife Elizabeth Weber and her little son. During this time, Joel and Weber spent “a lot of time together”. And a romance developed “slowly”. Joel finally admitted Small: “I’m in love with your wife.”
“I felt very, very guilty about it. They had a child. I felt like a home destroyer,” said Joel according to “People” in the documentation. “I was just in love with a woman. And I got a blow on my nose that I deserved. Jon was very upset. I was very upset.”
The affair led to the dissolution of Attila, to the (temporary) end of his best friendship. And to be thrown from Small’s house. “I didn’t have a place to live. I slept in laundry and was depressed. Probably to the brink of madness,” added Joel. “So I thought: ‘That’s it. I don’t want to live anymore.’ I just had great pain. So I thought I would end everything. “
First attempted suicide with sleeping pills – days in a coma
Joel’s sister Judy, then a medical assistant, had previously prescribed sleeping pills to help him sleep. Joel’s first attempt at suicide was to “take everyone at once”.
“He was in a coma for days and days,” says Judy in the documentary. “I went to the hospital to see him. And he was white as a sheet. I thought I had killed him.”
Second attempt with furniture cleaner – rescue by the betrayed friend
Joel, disappointed that his attempt had failed, woke up in the hospital. And swore to make it “right” the second time. He said he drank a whole bottle of the cleaning agent “Lemon Pledge”, whereupon his former best friend Small took him to the hospital. “Although our friendship had breakled, Jon saved my life,” said Joel.
Small added in the documentary: “He never really said anything. The only practical explanation that I can give why Billy took it so hard is that he loved me so much. And destroyed it internally. Ultimately, I forgiven him.”
The turning point through stay in the clinic – music as a valve
After this attempt, Joel had himself been entered into an observation station for a few weeks. A decision that changed his life. “I got out of the station and thought: You can use all these emotions to channel them in music,” said Joel.
Appointment of the affair and current health
An addendum to the affair: Joel and Weber later came together and married. The marriage lasted from 1973 to 1982.
“And so it it goes” on Wednesday premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival. However, Joel was unable to take part in the demonstration due to a recently diagnosed brain disease. However, the singer sent a message about the filmmakers. “Getting old is shit. But still better than being burned.”