She seemed torn. Perhaps she hesitated for fear of hurting me, but she couldn’t hold back. “Sometimes the press is very bad. One day they say you are the best. Next day they say you are the worst. I don’t like this very much.”
I murmured my sympathy and asked her whether fame caused other problems.
“You lose your privacy. Sometimes I want to do something and I don’t feel free enough to do it. I mean people love me almost everywhere. But I don’t feel free.” Once again she ended on what would in the film world be called a slow dissolve.
“You started so young,” I said. “Is there any way in which you feel you missed your childhood?”
“No, not now. Probably a few years ago I did. I wanted to go out more. When I’m at home in Argentina I like to go out with my friends. Go out dancing and go to bed late.” She liked pop music; Chicago and Phil Collins were among her favorites. “Nothing heavy. I like more the slow songs.”
Was there any South American music that moved her?
“No.”
Did she see any contradiction, any unfairness, in the fact that world-class women athletes had to bear the burden of being judged by their beauty and femininity, as well as their performance?
“No,” said Gabriela. “I think every woman wants to be feminine and to look good. That’s what I try to do—look feminine and look good.”
***
Although I came away from the interview convinced that it was futile, I wrote a profile that emphasized Sabatini’s on-court accomplishments, her discipline and diligence, and the beautiful expressiveness of her game. Weeks later when Vogue informed me that the project had been killed, I wasn’t surprised. Yet while I didn’t appreciate it at the moment, I would discover in the next six months that my search for Gabriela Sabatini hadn’t been a waste. Her complicated relationships with family and coaches, her alternating persona as headstrong diva and heartsick ditzy adolescent, her determination to be fit yet feminine, her eagerness to court the public yet avoid the press, her wistful yearning for the prosaic pleasures of youth and for a freedom her millions couldn’t buy her—all of these added up to a composite portrait of the best and worst of women’s tennis.
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