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Interview with Sharon Osbourne

Aired March 08, 2010 - 16:49   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Sharon Osbourne has been called a housewife, superstar...

(MUSIC)

ANDERSON: Married to backbiting rock star, Ozzy Osbourne, she's helped shape his career since the late 1970s.

Sharon really entered the public eye with reality TV program, "The Osbournes," a show that won MTV's highest ever rating. Diagnosed with cancer while "The Osbournes" was still on air, she went on to found the Sharon Osbourne Colon Cancer Program.

After recovering, she went back to managing entertainers and being a mentor and judge on shows like "The X Factor" and "America's Got Talent." Now, she's adding writing to her long list of accomplishments, branching into fiction with her new novel, "Revenge".

Author, mother and media mogul, Sharon Osbourne is your Connector of the Day.

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ANDERSON: Well, I hooked up with Sharon in London for you.

And I started by asking her why she wanted to write the novel "Revenge".

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SHARON OSBOURNE, AUTHOR, "REVENGE": I know it. It just -- it was something I never had on my agenda of things I wanted to do in my life. And it just happened all organically. I had been working with Little Brown, my publisher, for, you know, a -- over three or four years. And they liked the stories I made up. I love to exaggerate. And they think you should write stories, you don't write a novel. And I'm like no. All right, then I will.

And I love it.

ANDERSON: This is the first that are fiction, of course. I mean you've written an autobiography before.

OSBOURNE: Yes.

ANDERSON: Was -- was it more difficult, this?

OSBOURNE: Oh, no, it's so much easier, because you can just say whatever you want because that's it. That's -- that's this whole thing about fiction, you can say whatever you want. You can take the story in any direction. And you've got that fabulous freedom.

ANDERSON: Sharon, is it, in any way, autobiographical?

OSBOURNE: No. None of it.

ANDERSON: It's not?

OSBOURNE: No. I mean places, yes. The places I write about are places that I -- I've known. And so that way it's easier to describe and get, you know, a sense of it.

ANDERSON: Yes.

OSBOURNE: So you have to draw from experience with things like that.

ANDERSON: The first one out.

Are you going to do another one?

OSBOURNE: It depends. You know, I -- I've started to write another one, but if this one doesn't hit, then I don't think I'll ever do another one again.

ANDERSON: We've got some questions from the viewers.

Lilly says: "Did you find writing a novel to be a relief and did it allow you to say things that you couldn't or shouldn't say in reality?

OSBOURNE: Yes, unfortunately it does, but, unfortunately, I had to keep putting myself back, because I was going too far. I'm like oh, no, that's going over that fine line -- you know, that fine line and you jump right over.

ANDERSON: Yes.

OSBOURNE: I had to keep pulling myself back.

ANDERSON: Did you have Ozzy and the kids read it before it was published?

OSBOURNE: They haven't read it at all. They are not interested.

ANDERSON: Really?

OSBOURNE: Oh, yes. Not interested at all, my, thanks.

(LAUGHTER)

ANDERSON: Michael Bennett writes and he says: "How has fame affected your family life? And -- and would you consider yours a close family?"

OSBOURNE: Fame is fabulous if you -- if you keep it to -- to what it is and don't take it for more than it is. You have to be very realistic about it. And, yes, we're an extremely close family.

ANDERSON: Nadx Saynes writes in, Sharon, saying: "What's the secret for being such a strong and powerful woman in every respect?"

OSBOURNE: I -- there isn't any secret, you know?

It's just that I started, you know, working at such a young age. You build character. You build strength from that. I -- I definitely, you know, my first day at a job, I didn't come in and was like a force to be reckoned with. It obviously comes with age and -- and experience.

ANDERSON: You don't come back here very often.

Carol asks: "How do you keep your sanity living in a place like LA?"

OSBOURNE: You know, because we don't -- we live in LA, but we don't live the L.A. lifestyle. We have a close group of friends and we -- we do our own thing. We don't, you know, go to the opening of an envelope, oh, there's another opening of a club or a restaurant or a movie. And, you know, you get your movers and your shakers in there with everything. And it's the same group of desperate people trying to get recognition, you know?

And we just don't -- don't do that. We go to things that we want to go to...

ANDERSON: Yes.

OSBOURNE: -- if we want to go. But we don't live that L.A. cliche, you know, life. We just don't. You know, we're -- we're too busy picking up dog crap on the floor.

ANDERSON: Do you miss the U.K.?

OSBOURNE: Of course I do. I absolutely do. But, you know, if the right thing came along for me, I -- I'd be back like, you know, in a shot.

ANDERSON: Lawrence Karka asks: "Please let Mrs. Osbourne tell the world how she survived all these years of marriage to a rock star and still remained sane."

OSBOURNE: Yes, well, that's...

(LAUGHTER)

ANDERSON: Relative?

OSBOURNE: Yes, no...

(LAUGHTER)

OSBOURNE: -- the committee is out on that one. No, it's -- you love someone, you fit, you know, and that's it. It's -- he's my man.

ANDERSON: Rob asks: "Sharon, what's your favorite Ozzy album and why?"

OSBOURNE: My favorite Ozzy album is an album called "No More Tears." And just -- it's -- I never get fed up of listening to it. You know, I absolutely adore the album.

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ANDERSON: What a joy. And she wasn't feeling very well that day, so what a trooper, as well.

Tomorrow, our Connector of the Day is world famous composer Andrew Lloyd Webber. He's in London for the premier of his new musical, "Love Never Dies," the sequel to his smash hit, "Phantom of the Opera?.

Remember that one?

It's been out for years, hasn't it?

Head to CNN.com/connector with what you want to ask Andrew Lloyd Webber. It's your part of the show, as we always remind you. And KISS -- you can find them there online, as well, one of our Connectors last week.

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