Gitte the Great

Brigitte Nielsen is one very busy woman. She's an actress, of course, the star of such films as Beverly Hills Cop II, Red Sonja, Rocky IV and Cobra. Then there's her career as recording star; she recently cut her first pop-rock album, Every Body Tells a Story, which includes two songs she co-wrote and has already been released in Europe. Naturally, she plans a series of music videos to help push the album. And then there's TV--Italian TV, at least, where she's just finishing a 14-week stint co-hosting Festivale, a popular weekly variety show on which she sings, chats with celebrities and screens her videos. "It's wonderful publicity," she says. But most of all, Brigitte is busy being half of one of Hollywood's steamiest divorces.

Back in 1985, it was big news when Gitte (pronounced ghee-ta) met Sylvester Stallone. She had gone to New York to discuss her first Playboy pictorial (Rating Nielsen, September 1985) and to promote her first film, Red Sonja, when she discovered that Rocky himself, her longtime heartthrob, was also in town. Although married to a Danish musician and the mother of an infant, Gitte was not shy about getting to meet Stallone, leaving, she admits, eight messages a day at his hotel for five days running. When words failed and Stallone didn't respond, Gitte resorted to visual aids, sending her picture to his hotel room. That, naturally, got Stallone's attention. Within four months, they were engaged; nine months later, they were married. And, of course, 18 months later, they were embroiled in a divorce so messy that several tabloid editors thought they had died and gone to heaven.

"Sex on the Sly?" headlined People magazine, which managed to cram all the rumors about the divorce into one juicy paragraph: "Gitte is said to have been sleeping with (1) her Beverly Hills Cop II director, Tony Scott; or (2) her secretary, Kelly Sahnger, whose new breasts and improved nose were a gift from her boss; or (3) Cop II co-star Eddie Murphy; or (4) all of the above...." The relentlessly tacky New York Post, not surprisingly, staked out the Gitte beat with a vengeance. Paparazzi caught her cavorting in the French seaside resort of St.-Tropez with banker Lucas Rossi, whom the Post described as "a well-known Italian playboy" and "a lusty Lothario," adding, "Brigitte's public display of togetherness with her Riviera Romeo comes just a month after European papers blamed the breakup of the Stallone marriage on a possible relationship between her and Miss Sahnger."

Given the enormous amount of attention she received, Gitte, who is now 24, also proved quite adept at side-stepping, well, personal queries. Her comments on the divorce have been exceedingly brief. "We are not here to talk about my private life," she told People. And even though she had obviously given liberally of her time for this Playboy pictorial (her third), nailing her for an interview was not so easy; and getting her to answer questions about what had gone wrong was a challenge that would daunt Rambo. Our first phone conversation lasted a generous five seconds. "I'm very busy right now," she said with Nordic firmness. "Could you call me later?" She was in a San Fernando Valley recording studio, putting the finishing touches on her album. Calls went back and forth; sometimes Gitte explained how busy she was, while other times the excuses fell to Kelly Sahnger (yes, that Kelly Sahnger). "Call back in 15 minutes" was the usual request. Fifteen minutes later, it turned out, Gitte had already left the studio.

She was gone, but we were not forgotten. A mere five minutes later, our phone rang and it was Gitte, who sounded as if she were calling from an empty high school gym. She was, in fact, taking time to talk while on the high-risk San Diego Freeway, prepared to spill all on her car's speaker phone, as she headed toward home in her Mercedes.

What are we going to talk about?" asked Gitte, while the cellular-phone signal faded in and out as the car passed between the hills. The usual stuff, we told her: her career, the pictorial, the divorce.

Suddenly, we weren't talking with Gitte anymore. And we weren't on the speakerphone. Kelly Sahnger, the most infamous secretary since Fawn Hall, had picked up the car-phone receiver and was lecturing us about discussing the divorce. "It's totally against what she wants to do or what I think she should do," warned Kelly. "She doesn't want to ever talk about it."

We pressed the issue but struck out. "I don't want to sound mean or anything," said Kelly, sounding mean, "but there's no use in even talking about Sylvester. It's just that she won't do that. It's old news. Why even bother to bring it up? Sylvester Stallone is out of her life."

And, apparently, out of our interview, which turned immediately to Gitte's career news--"I love the fact that I have both acting and music," said Gitte, speaking for herself this time, "because they are such different things. In acting, you always portray somebody else. In singing, you are you--you bring your personality, your feelings, your emotions out of you," she confided. "If the album is a hit in Europe, we definitely have a go-ahead here in the U.S. I wouldn't want to release it here if it's not good." Unfortunately, the vagaries of the L.A. cellular-phone system soon proved as formidable a challenge as Gitte. The signal faded in and out, questions and answers had to be repeated and there lingered the anxiety that if we forgot and mentioned you-know-who, we might risk causing a 12-car pile-up on the 405. At one point, the signal disappeared entirely.

Minutes later, we were relieved when Gitte called back to answer our question on why she had chosen to do the Playboy pictorial. Actually, it wasn't Gitte. "This is Kelly again," said a familiar voice. "Brigitte and I were talking, and she doesn't want to say why she did Playboy."

"I have a reason," Gitte broke in, "but it's not anything I'd like to talk about. It's very personal." Having already learned how to adapt to these sticky situations, we artfully dodged the issue with a truly tough question: Where will you be living now as a permanent home base?

Gitte confessed that she planned to stay in L.A., and now that she was no longer chez Rambo, she'd buy her own house. (By the way, the tabloids estimate that she's sitting pretty from the pay-out dictated by a prenuptial agreement she and Stallone had signed.) "I love the weather and I love the opportunity to be a success. People have really respected me here."

We could tell that Gitte was beginning to tire. After all, her day had started at eight that morning with business calls and meetings, and she had spent the afternoon and much of the evening in the recording studio. She was on her way home at 9:30 P.M. to change for an important dinner meeting, and the next morning, she'd be leaving for her lengthy European stay.

Do you like this pace? we asked. Don't you need more time to unwind? The phone made some strange noises. The Mercedes was apparently getting closer to home, entering a hilly area that's death to car phones. Gitte said, "Hello?" plaintively, and then we were disconnected once again. It was, we supposed, life in the fast lane.