Credit: Turman-Foster Company

The story of how Ringo Starr met Barbra Bach

Sat 27 August 2022 6:30, UK

For over 40 years, Ringo Starr has been happily married to Barbra Bach, the equivalent of a millennium in rock ‘n’ roll marriage terms. While Ringo’s acting career was largely ill-fated, one plus point was his marriage to the love of his life.

Before they met, Bach had already been a Bond girl in The Spy Who Loved Me, a role that arrived after transitioning into film after establishing herself as one of the world’s most sought-after models. Throughout the late 1960s, her face had been plastered on magazines, including Vogue and Elle, but over the next decade, Bach proved that she was much more than a pretty face.

Both Starr and Bach had a public profile before moving into Hollywood, and didn’t come from a traditional acting background. Ringo first caught the bug while he was with The Beatles, and following their split, he poured more time into honing his craft. The drummer wasn’t in it for the money or plaudits, but because of a deep-held passion, despite the fact that he was never in line to win an Academy Award.

In 1980, he filmed the slapstick comedy, Caveman, where he portrayed Atouk, who falls in love with Bach’s character, Lana. Meanwhile, real life was imitating art behind the scenes, as the two leading actors on the project became smitten and married less than 12 months later.

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Although the film was met with scathing reviews, with Roger Ebert only giving Caveman one-and-a-half stars out of a possible five when he wrote: “It has a basic problem, which is that there is no popular original material for it to satirize.” Despite the issues with the plot, it was a success at the box office and drew over $16 million.

None of the above mattered to Starr, who was thrilled to be in love once again after being divorced for five years following his split from his first wife, Maureen.

Together, they’ve been through their difficulties, with both struggling with alcohol and substance abuse. In 1988, the couple realised they could no longer live like this and admitted themselves to a rehabilitation facility in Arizona.

In a joint forward in former Beatles press officer Derek Taylor’s 1992 book, Getting Sober, they said: “We used to go on long plane journeys, rent huge villas, stock up the bars, hide and get deranged.”

Fortunately, there was light at the end of the tunnel, and the couple has lived a fulfilled, clean life ever since. If it wasn’t for their decision to swap drugs for meditation and having emotional support from one another, neither of them would likely be here today. Speaking about the key to their relationship in 2015, Ringo concluded: “There’s no escape … I think I love Barbara as much [today] as I did [when we met] – and I’m beyond blessed that she loves me and we’re still together.”