It’s International Women’s Day, so what better time to check in with Cyndi Lauper, the one-of-a-kind pop star who is still synonymous with the 1983 song “Girls Want to Have Fun” – an instant feminist anthem that went on to influence a generation of female performers (and listeners) while also becoming an expression in the everyday vernacular. Lauper, now 70, is in the news this week, having just entered a partnership with the Swedish masterminds behind the immersive virtual concert ABBA Voyage.
The Pophouse Entertainment Group, co-founded by ABBA singer Björn Ulvaeus, acquired a majority share of the award-winning singer-songwriter’s music with the aim of bringing her music to fans and younger audiences through new performances and live experiences.
Lauper, who rose to fame in the 1980s with hits such as “Time After Time” and “True Colors” – in addition to the aforementioned “Girls” – says she’s not aiming to replicate the glittery supernova brought to stage in ABBA Voyage where stupefying technology offers digital avatars of the ABBA band members as they looked in their 1970s heyday, but rather an “immersive theatre piece” that transports audiences to the New York she grew up in.
The Queens, NY, resident has long advocated for women’s rights and gender equality, and her 1983 hit “Girls Just Want to Have Fun,” has been reinvented by other female artists through the years – a responsibility Lauper says humbles her,
It was during the large Women’s March in 2017 following the inauguration of Donald Trump where she saw protesters with signs reading “Girls just want to have fun(damental rights)” that gave her the impetus to raise money for women’s health. So far, she has raised more than $150,000 to help small organizations that provide safe and legal abortions.
“I grew up with three women (mother, grandmother, aunt). I saw the disenfranchisement very clearly. And I saw the struggles, I saw the joy, I saw the love,” she said. “And it made me come out with boxing gloves on.”
Lauper hopes the new show can bring the memories of those women back to life a little, along with “the reasons I sang certain songs, and the things that I wrote about.”
Here’s the one that started it all.
Lyrics
I come home in the morning light
My mother says, “When you gonna live your life right?”
Oh, mamma, dear, we’re not the fortunate ones
And girls—they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have fun
The phone rings in the middle of the night
My father yells, “What you gonna do with your life?”
Oh, daddy, dear, you know you’re still number one
But girls—they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have
That’s all they really want
Some fun
When the working day is done
Oh, girls—they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have fun
Girls—they wanna
Wanna have fun
Girls wanna have
Some boys take a beautiful girl
And hide her away from the rest of the world
I wanna be the one to walk in the sun
Oh, girls—they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have
That’s all they really want
Some fun
When the working day is done
Oh, girls—they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have fun
Girls—they wanna
Wanna have fun
Girls wanna have
They just wanna, they just wanna
(Girls)
They just wanna, they just wanna
(Girls just wanna have fun)
When the working
When the working day is done
Oh, when the working day is done
Oh, girls
Girls just wanna have fun