Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
‘Me I can’t believe this is actually happening!” Suzette Charles says on video. At 63, he is about to release his self-titled album 33 years later than expected, and his disbelief is palpable. She was crowned the first Miss America in 1984, at the age of 20, in controversial circumstances, Charles faced difficulties throughout her life. He faced a difficult journey Bill Cosby and label harassment, and her debut album was shelved when songwriters Stock Aitken Waterman (SAW) – who produced major hits for Kylie Minogue, Rick Astley and others – parted ways. Then came a marriage of many years that seemed to put an end to his artistic career. He said: “You can’t fix these things.”
But Charles has also teamed up with Mike Stock to complete some of the more impactful projects, his best known name. “I love how the song turned out,” Stock says. “I’ve worked with Paul McCartney, Donna Summer, Cliff Richard – as a singer, I’d put Suzette in that bracket.”
Charles was a theater student in Philadelphia: “I sang everywhere, everywhere,” he says. From the age of nine, he starred in commercials for Colgate and Coca-Cola and appeared on Sesame Street and Morgan Freeman’s children’s TV series The Electric Company. At the age of 15, she sang in the musical Hair, and narrowly missed out on the role of Coco Hernandez in. Popularity to Irene Cara. They shared a manager, who allegedly forced Cara to participate. Charles smiles wistfully: “That was a taste of business.”
Her mother encouraged her to compete in the Miss America 1984 pageant. Some warned Charles against it – “don’t even get close to this, it’ll make you crazy” – but she made it to the finals as Miss New Jersey, her parents’ hometown. At the event, among other contestants in secret – “they try to poke holes in your dress or ‘accidentally’ spill Coca-Cola on your dress” – Charles sang Barbra Streisand’s Kiss Me in the Rain. He became the first runner-up, losing Vanessa Williams. “I was surprised, because I thought my work was very good.”
But 10 months later, Williams – who now has a successful music and acting career – was forced to step down after Penthouse magazine published a nude photo of her past. Charles says all contestants signed an agreement saying nothing in their past would “embarrass” the organizers, such as abortion. “It was considered a Miss Goody Two Shoes incident. Everyone signed it. (Williams) 100% knew he took pictures that would incriminate him.” But Charles thinks that the organizers of the show made sense, “because it took many months”. Charles was chosen as the winner: “A painful admission,” he says. She agrees with critics who see the regular Miss America pageant as backward. “The first plan was to empower women, but we’re in a different phase. I think maybe it’s time to say goodbye.”
The success, combined with his acting skills, led to Charles signing up to sing in a cabaret supporting Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr and Stevie Wonder on tour. The latter asks him his opinion on new songs, and once he called him a few hours later to play I Just Called to Say I Love You on the phone. Charles told him his future hit was simple: “Stevie, you’ve written a Song in the Key of Life!”
Bill Cosby also invited Charles to perform on tour as part of his comedy routine, after being cast as his daughter in the upcoming sitcom The Cosby Show. Even back then, years before he was charged with gross misconduct, rumors of Cosby’s bad behavior were common. “My father called Bill Cosby and said, ‘I understand you have a history. I’m Italian – you touch him, you’ll deal with me.’ Cosby was booed, and started walking off the stage before he finished. He said: ‘We had a party last night and I invited Miss America but she didn’t come. Can you believe that? Embarrassing me in front of the audience. And I just play and smile. ” It is said that the Cosby Show offer was canceled.
Charles did not see any criminal behavior, but he heard whispers. “I would see the hotel staff: ‘You should have seen what happened last night.’ But I didn’t want to do that, because he was a very controlling person.” How did he feel when Cosby’s abuse – including the sexual harassment and sexual assault – was revealed? “We heard that he might be a cheater, very close. We didn’t hear that he was using drugs.
By the end of the 80s, Charles was competing to be a recording artist: Capitol labeled him a “techno-style singer” while RCA wanted to call him an R&B artist in the “sultry Sade style”, ignoring his pop interests. He seemed to have no control over his abilities. “Yes, that’s right, it’s my picture,” he says. “It was frustrating. I consider myself a multicultural person. He wanted to make the same ‘pop, R&B, bluesy, soul-y’ music as Rick Astley and Lisa Stansfield, and he felt his ideas, like working with writer and pop-R&B singer Freddie Jackson, were ignored. “He just wanted to tick boxes.”
SAW’s Stock says such attitudes were prevalent throughout the industry at the time. “A lot of artists’ careers have been ruined because of this. SAW was different, he says. “We always went against the grain and the industry, and we did a lot of things. We did everything to help the singer and the song. I like to know about the person, and then write something that is relevant to their life.
Charles made a bold move to leave his RCA. He flew to London in 1993 and turned up at the SAW office unannounced. After confirming his story, Stock tested his credentials by having him sing You Are My Sunshine. Impressed, he quickly began writing six songs for her. He said: “I got something from him that he felt was a little shackled, that he liked to sing. Stock “got me right away,” says Charles.
One song, Free to love againwas released, reaching No 58 in the UK. It proved to be his last. RCA dropped Charles, unhappy that he had gone to London, but SAW split after the fall. This made Charles confused: “I didn’t know what happened.
“He was caught up in the chaos,” says Stock, who found it too painful to continue working for SAW. The whole story was very sad. I needed to fill my mind and do something.
Charles went further: when he returned to the US, he received a call from music producer David Foster, who had just had a great success with Céline Dion and Whitney Houston: “I almost fell off my chair!” In 1994, Charles recorded material for an album for Foster’s imprint 143 Records, a sub-label of Atlantic, but it was never released. “I don’t know why,” he says.
Fortunately, Charles then married a doctor who, she says, did not want her to continue her career. “I raised two children, secretly dreaming: “What happened to my work? He felt that he could not explain his past life in the house. It was a quiet thing, as if I had anything to be ashamed of.
His absence was noted: People magazine was one of several publications that carried a story on his whereabouts. But he remained busy with household chores. “I felt very sad.
After his daughter went to college, Charles decided: “I have to live my life.” He got divorced, went back to school and started dating again. The first day, a lawyer named Paul Kaplan, knew that Charles had worked with Stock. “He said, ‘What are you studying?’
But Charles was not convinced. “I thought: I’m too old, they don’t answer my email.” Stock responded, although he did not mention the plan to work together, but in 2015 they met again at his studio. And when I listened to the old songs – “surreal, I remembered what I heard when I sang them” – Charles told him to finish the song.
“By any stretch of the imagination, why would you do this?” Stock says. But he is such a nice guy, you can’t deny him. Nobody (in the music industry) wants to please women of a certain age. But they also have the right to sing.”
In 2024, he began re-recording the old songs along with five new songs about “being in a relationship that keeps you going,” says Charles. Again she felt that he understood her. “We get along well. I don’t know his personality, but he knows me inside.”
The result is Stock’s classic mix of disco-pop bangers and the occasional epic ballad. Old songs took on new meanings, especially Free to Love Again: “I’m free, baby!” He says. Charles is now married again, to Kaplan. “I spent many years with someone who wanted to put me in a bedroom.
It’s an ending he never imagined. While touring with Sammy Davis Jr, Charles used to sing his song I’ve Gotta Be Me. “And I didn’t even know what hell was,” he says. He began to swell and wipe away his tears. “I understand what it means now. I’m living my best life.”
