Dream Girl: My Life As A Supreme.

[Ollie9]

i'm certainly not a doctor or clinical psychologist. so i don't want to say "flo was an alcoholic" but my guess is probably. I don't know all of the various definitions of alcoholic. there's the stereotype of someone stumbling and just being totally incoherent. but there's also "functional alcoholic." again, i don't know what she was in a clinical term. clearly she had issues with misusing alcohol when she was in pain. the proof of this is she used alcohol during periods of very high stress and turmoil. like when she was on the flight to New Orleans and couldn't perform. or in Vegas when she went on stage drunk.

so not sure if this makes her an alcohol or if she was misusing alcohol

It was just that you mentioned Diana being accused of pushing Flo to becoming an alcoholic.
I think Flo was one of those people with an extremely low tolerance to alcohol. A couple of drinks and she was flying. She categorically denys in her interviews with Peter Benjaminson that she ever had a drink problem, but rather enjoyed a few beers.
It’s worth remembering that other than that final night in Vegas when she discovered Cindy’s costume, Flo remained nothing but professional when performing on stage.

[sup_fan]

It was just that you mentioned Diana being accused of pushing Flo to becoming an alcoholic.
I think Flo was one of those people with an extremely low tolerance to alcohol. A couple of drinks and she was flying. She categorically denys in her interviews with Peter Benjaminson that she ever had a drink problem, but rather enjoyed a few beers.
It’s worth remembering that other than that final night in Vegas when she discovered Cindy’s costume, Flo remained nothing but professional when performing on stage.

well, other than that time she was too drunk to even GO on stage

my diana comment wasn't meant to be literal. it was me parroting what the rabid anti-diana fans say about the situation.

in Dreamgirl Mary also mentioned that after the April 67 meeting at Berry's house where they decided Flo had to go, Flo ended up still working with the group. And Mary said it appeared flo was really just going through the motions. Although others have said that Flo was pretty glad to be given a second chance.

Also Flo's "job" was more than simply going onto stage. all of the pr, press interviews, photo shoots, rehearsals, preparing new music in the studio, etc was a massive part of it too. I don't have the specifics but again, mary and other books mentioned that Flo would often be missing and excused as having "the flu" or late or whatever. it's possible that she just skipped out or didn't bother. maybe that was because she was drunk, maybe not. maybe it was she was hung over. maybe she was just in a mood and couldn't deal with it. maybe she really was sick.

[Ollie9]

well, other than that time she was too drunk to even GO on stage

my diana comment wasn't meant to be literal. it was me parroting what the rabid anti-diana fans say about the situation.

in Dreamgirl Mary also mentioned that after the April 67 meeting at Berry's house where they decided Flo had to go, Flo ended up still working with the group. And Mary said it appeared flo was really just going through the motions. Although others have said that Flo was pretty glad to be given a second chance.

Also Flo's "job" was more than simply going onto stage. all of the pr, press interviews, photo shoots, rehearsals, preparing new music in the studio, etc was a massive part of it too. I don't have the specifics but again, mary and other books mentioned that Flo would often be missing and excused as having "the flu" or late or whatever. it's possible that she just skipped out or didn't bother. maybe that was because she was drunk, maybe not. maybe it was she was hung over. maybe she was just in a mood and couldn't deal with it. maybe she really was sick.

I don't consider there to be any rabid, anti- Diana fans on the forum anymore, though perhaps a few Diana never did anything wrong ones lol.
It’s not really fair to Flo to think she might have been drunk when absent through illness which actually wasn’t that many times in the scheme of things. I genuinely believe she was more prone to illness then either Diana or Mary.
I can understand how her being ill might effect the tightly run itinerary of the group, but I don’t think it fair to paint Flo in a less professional light as someone who veered from either being drunk to not actually caring when i truly believe she did.

[RanRan79]

Some of that was Flo acting out. Both she and Mary claim that they were being told certain times for things like interviews only to find out that they were either given a later time in order to give Diana some time alone with the interviewer, or they would find that the interview was over by the time they arrived and Diana had done the whole thing alone. At some point, I can't remember if Mary said it or someone else, Flo's attitude was basically why go through the hassle if these are the games being played?

Gordy fostered an atmosphere within the group that just wasn't conducive to Flo being on her best behavior. That Supreme ship would have rocked a lot longer if he had done all he could to make Flo and Mary happy, rather than expect them to be good with his plans for one of them when they all had dreams and aspirations that they arrived at the company with.

[floyjoy678]

Some of that was Flo acting out. Both she and Mary claim that they were being told certain times for things like interviews only to find out that they were either given a later time in order to give Diana some time alone with the interviewer, or they would find that the interview was over by the time they arrived and Diana had done the whole thing alone. At some point, I can't remember if Mary said it or someone else, Flo's attitude was basically why go through the hassle if these are the games being played?

Gordy fostered an atmosphere within the group that just wasn't conducive to Flo being on her best behavior. That Supreme ship would have rocked a lot longer if he had done all he could to make Flo and Mary happy, rather than expect them to be good with his plans for one of them when they all had dreams and aspirations that they arrived at the company with.

I really can't praise Berry for this reason. He knew what he was doing and was a lot older than the Supremes. I don't think he's held accountable enough for the problems he created.

[Ollie9]

Some of that was Flo acting out. Both she and Mary claim that they were being told certain times for things like interviews only to find out that they were either given a later time in order to give Diana some time alone with the interviewer, or they would find that the interview was over by the time they arrived and Diana had done the whole thing alone. At some point, I can't remember if Mary said it or someone else, Flo's attitude was basically why go through the hassle if these are the games being played?

Gordy fostered an atmosphere within the group that just wasn't conducive to Flo being on her best behavior. That Supreme ship would have rocked a lot longer if he had done all he could to make Flo and Mary happy, rather than expect them to be good with his plans for one of them when they all had dreams and aspirations that they arrived at the company with.

Good factual post regarding what was actually going down at the time.

[sup_fan]

I don't consider there to be any rabid, anti- Diana fans on the forum anymore, though perhaps a few Diana never did anything wrong ones lol.
It’s not really fair to Flo to think she might have been drunk when absent through illness which actually wasn’t that many times in the scheme of things. I genuinely believe she was more prone to illness then either Diana or Mary.
I can understand how her being ill might effect the tightly run itinerary of the group, but I don’t think it fair to paint Flo in a less professional light as someone who veered from either being drunk to not actually caring when i truly believe she did.

completely agree - the forum is, for the most part, very well balanced. people might have differing opinions but the dialogs all tend to be quite civil.

of course when reading posts, you don't get to hear tone or sarcasm or inflection. please note that my replies to you haven't been intended to be stern or harsh

also completely agree that we don't know the reasons for flo's absences. nor do we really know how many there were. was this something the occurred weekly? randomly? no idea. was she sick? pissed off? depressed? avoiding work? drunk? again, don't know

what seems to be clear is her reliability was declining steadily. this was a super-high pressured job and there were millions of $ at stake. everyone [[flo included i believe) wanted the money riches and rewards of this experience. but flo was struggling to match the level of work as the others.

now we know there were a lot of details as to WHY she was coming apart. and today we would handle it differently. but unfortunately that wasn't the case in the mid 60s