Cher: Farrah Fawcett Is 'Cancer Free'

LOS ANGELES, Calif. --

In a candid interview with Access Hollywood’s Billy Bush, Cher opened up about her good friend Farrah Fawcett and the latest on her battle with cancer.

“She’s tough. I don’t think I could’ve gone through what she did,” Cher told Billy. “She is now cancer free so this will be a real interesting thing.”

Stunning news from the legendary diva about Farrah’s condition and, in fact, it was Cher who encouraged her friend to seek treatment in Germany.

“It is a completely different kind of treatment,” Cher explained. “She had the cancer and then it went to her liver and so what they do there is, instead of giving you chemo all over, they do a thing called (chemo)embolization where they take whatever chemo that they were going to give you and they put it directly into the tumors into your liver and then when they shrink down smaller enough they do a thing called Cyberknife and they go in and they just take it out."

And Cher knows first-hand about the level of treatment on Germany. She sought treatment herself to help get rid of the debilitating Epstein-Barr virus – an illnewss that got so bad, it left Cher bedridden for two years.

But now the virus is dormant as Cher sets out to conquer Las Vegas with a three-year, 200-show stint at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace. But given her health condition, is she up for the job?

“Is it at all a concern?” Billy asked Cher.

“It usually happens when everything is over, because you go and you go and you go and then your resistance is low and that is kind of when it attacks you,” she said.

And while she’s ready to return to the stage, don’t expect to see Cher out and about – the paparazzi are keeping her inside.

The paparazzi, I think they used to be okay when I was younger and then as I got older they got kind of rough and now they’re just treacherous bastards who cut your throat for a picture,” Cher noted. "It's hard to go any place. You feel kind of like a prisoner."

The paparazzi of today would have had a field day with Cher back in the ‘70s had she taken up the offers from the likes of Elvis Presley and Marlon Brando to date her. However, she did date on fellow superstar in the mid-‘80s – Tom Cruise.

“Was it great?” Billy asked.

“Yeah, he was fabulous. Just fun and adorable. Adorable man. He’s got that kind of bad boy side to him,” she smiled. “But no, he was sweet.”

Of course, when you’re Cher, dating isn’t always so easy.

“I read that men are intimidated by you,” Billy said. “Why?”

“I remember this time Michelle Pfeiffer and I were going somewhere and we wanted to go dance. We were on our way to a party and we went to this club in Santa Monica and we sat there and thought ‘Why is no one asking us to dance?’” Cher recalled. “Thank God two of my gay friends came in and we danced for an hour and then we left. I’m sure somebody wanted to dance with us, but nobody came up.”

Copyright 2008 by NBC Universal, Inc. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

• PRINT