Christie Brinkley Reveals Shocking Truth Behind Billy Joel's 'Uptown Girl' — It Wasn’t About Her… Until One Heart-Melting Confession Changed Everything
Christie Brinkley revealed she wasn't in her ex-husband Billy Joel's head when he wrote 'Uptown Girl.'
May 1 2025, Published 1:30 p.m. ET
Christie Brinkley just pulled a 180 by revealing she wasn't the muse behind Billy Joel's massive hit.
It's been assumed Brinkley was the singer's Uptown Girl for years – but in her shocking new memoir, she says the song was never about her, but a "fantasy girl" instead, RadarOnline.com can reveal.
The model said Joel later came to the realization she was his 'Uptown Girl' after they had been dating for a few months.
Brinkley, 73, was married to Joel, 75, from 1985 to 1994, making him her second husband. Together, they have one daughter, Alexa Ray Joel, now 39.
The couple first crossed paths in 1983 on the Caribbean island of St. Barts and tied the knot on March 23, 1985, aboard a yacht on the Hudson River; which was also Joel's second marriage.
Joel was Brinkley's second husband, and the two share 39-year-old daughter Alexa.
In her new memoir, ironically titled Uptown Girl, Brinkley admitted Joel's song wasn't originally written with her as the inspiration – despite the fact that she starred in the music video.
She wrote: "Six months into our relationship and one month after An Innocent Man started dominating the airwaves, we did something that would change my life and characterize us as a couple for the rest of our relationship: we made the music video for Billy’s new song 'Uptown Girl.
"Unlike what many people think, Billy didn’t write the hit about me – at least, not initially – nor about Elle MacPherson, but about someone who was as much fantasy as 'the Girl in the Red Ferrari.'"
However, Uptown Girl quickly became Brinkley's signature song after Joel came to the realization she was the "fantasy girl" in his head all along.
The model wrote: "(Until) one day, when we were out in his home on Long Island, which overlooked Oyster Bay Harbor, and he suddenly turned to me with a smile on his face that grew wider as he spoke."
She recalled him saying: "I just realized something about this song that I started writing a while ago about someone I was imagining.
"And now I’m looking at you here, and I don’t have to imagine her anymore – you're right here in front of me, you're my real uptown girl."
Elsewhere in her book, Brinkley revealed the struggles of living with Joel's alcohol addiction – even though she was initially reluctant to share some of the details in writing.
Before the book’s release, she said the singer would go missing for days on alcohol-fueled benders, leaving her plagued by terrifying visions of him crashed into a tree.
Brinkley's new memoir reveals bombshells from her four marriages, including her struggles with Joel's alcoholism.
She explained: "If there wasn't that issue … I do think that we were probably really soulmates, it was an amazing time of my life."
One time, Joel vanished in the middle of their Thanksgiving dinner, and Brinkley locked him out of their Hawaii hotel suite after hearing he'd been spotted with an Australian actress.
He came back "visibly and audibly drunk," Brinkley wrote in her book, and broke out into a fit of rage.
The breaking point came when Joel, drunk, blamed his band for eating his pasta at their East Hamptons home – even though he'd eaten it all himself.
Revealing she asked him for a divorce the next day, Brinkley said: "He was acting delusional in a way I’d never seen before."
Brinkley said: "To be clear, I never wanted to end things with Billy. I read every self-help book I could find… we went to see a string of psychiatrists, psychologists and other medical doctors."
The Movin' Out singer first went to rehab in 1992 and got sober, but returned in 2005 after a relapse.
In 2023, he told the Los Angeles Times that he stopped drinking "a couple of years ago." He is now married to his fourth wife, Alexis Roderick, and they have young daughters Della Rose and Remy Anne.
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Brinkley continued: "He’s the father of my firstborn and we spent such great formative years together. And I’ll love him forever. Things just reached a point where I knew I couldn’t live with him."
She also confirmed she spoke to Joel before writing her new book.
Brinkley said she is still close to Joel and even talked to him prior to releasing her memoir.
She explained: "Billy said, 'Go ahead and tell your story… the good, the bad, whatever you need to say.'
"Leaving Billy wasn’t easy for me to do — and it's not easy to say anything bad about somebody that I hold in such high regard… (although) I don’t think it’s bad."
Prior to Joel, Brinkley was married to Jean-François Allaux, and later tied the knot with Richard Taubman and Peter Cook. Her relationship with Cook ended in 2008 after learning of his infidelity.
