Sometimes without make-up, sometimes completely naked: Instead of struggling with getting older, the Oprah Winfrey of the Netherlands chats about her private life in a relaxed and tasty way. But not everything.
Linda de Mol is turning 60. So what? Hiding her age is no longer an option for the queen of the Dutch entertainment industry. Always relaxed, always tasty, the blonde show host seems to say to herself – and on the cover of her women’s magazine “Linda” she presents the face without makeup, “that looks back at me in the mirror every morning when I get out of the shower”.
In a self-ironic tone, she reveals: “My skin is pretty good for a 60-year-old, with the help of a little Botox and occasional and courageous laser treatments (one week I looked like I had been dragged across a gravel path).”
You might call it self-promotion. But the daughter of pop star John de Mol (1931-2013) and sister of the media entrepreneur of the same name hardly has a problem with that. For her 59th birthday, she even dropped all her clothes and posed naked on a camping chair for the “Linda” cover, her intimate body parts cleverly and modestly covered by her arms and legs.
Linda said in her column that she thought it would be wonderful to walk around a campsite stark naked. But as a celebrity, she unfortunately has to forgo this: there are people lurking everywhere who don’t allow her “an inch of privacy with their cell phones.”
There is certainly something to that. The entertainer, who was born in the media city of Hilversum near Amsterdam, has not only made a name for herself with great television shows. Her private life has also often attracted more public interest than she would have liked, even if she herself has occasionally made it a topic of discussion.
In the 1990s, she was also a star in Germany with the show “Traumhochzeit”. She sent couples into marital bliss in front of up to eleven million viewers. Giant cakes, champagne and cute lovebirds were just as much a part of the show as Linda’s sugary sweet “Meisje” accent.
But her luck in show business was accompanied by bad luck in love. In 1995, after four years of marriage, she divorced jeweler Fred Reuter. Her relationship with television director Sander Vahle, with whom she has two children, lasted until 2007. 16 years later, she described how painful this separation was in her magazine: “I tore pictures off the wall, crying.”
Vahle was followed in 2008 by the musician Jeroen Rietbergen, who is seven years younger than Linda. The equally dramatic end of this relationship came in early 2022 in the wake of one of the biggest scandals in the history of Dutch television. Rietbergen and other participants in the casting show “The Voice of Holland” were accused of sexual assault and abuse of power.
“I’ve been in a terrible nightmare for a few days,” Linda reported at the time. The investigation against Rietbergen has since been closed – due to a lack of evidence, as the public prosecutor’s office announced in May. Reports appeared in the Dutch media that “Linda and Jeroen are back together,” but the show host has not yet commented on this.
In Germany, love for Linda cooled off some time ago. In 2008, she hosted a one-off new edition of “Dream Wedding” for ZDF (formerly on RTL), with rather moderate success. The big comeback never came. In her home country, however, she was considered the most successful and best-paid entertainer and talk show host for many years, the Dutch Oprah Winfrey.
Linda caused a sensation with the Dutch equivalent of the US series “Desperate Housewives”, the soap “Gooische Vrouwen”, in which she played a leading role. Episodes of her show “Ik hou van Holland” (I love Holland) with prominent Dutch people were also repeatedly successful.
Linda caused a stir when she approached 50 and declared that wrinkles, sagging cheeks and the menopause were not suited to show business. She was then told by prominent citizens and angry viewers that getting older is a part of life. The fact that she now sees things the same way is made clear by her “Linda” cover photos before her 59th and 60th birthdays, naked and without makeup.
Source: Stern
I am an author and journalist who has worked in the entertainment industry for over a decade. I currently work as a news editor at a major news website, and my focus is on covering the latest trends in entertainment. I also write occasional pieces for other outlets, and have authored two books about the entertainment industry.
