Record Company: Whitney Houston Is Straight as an Arrow

Tuesday, May 15, 2007
By Roger Friedman

Whitney Houston is straight as an arrow, not doing drugs and working hard in the studio. That's the word from her record company Monday in response to my weekend report from the Bahamas that the recovering singer looked red-eyed and stoned at Stevie Wonder's spectacular birthday concert.

Let's take Whitney and her reps at their word. Why not? The goal here is to see Houston back in business, healthy and restored to her former vibrancy pre-Bobby Brown. If it's happening, and her appearance and attitude belie it, well, what the heck.

By the way, the "older man" who was described as Whitney's constant companion over the weekend was her brother Gary, a former drug addict who's been clean for some time, a source says, and he is also committed to his sobriety.

Whitney, they say, has been in the studio now for more than a month.
"She shows up at 3 p.m., stays as long as she's needed and is doing her practicing at home," a source said.

As I reported in February, among the producer/writers she's working with are Diane Warren, R. Kelly, Jermaine Dupri and Kenny "Babyface" Edmonds. Warren's song is titled "I Didn't Know How Much Strength I Had." Dupri cut his track last week.

I suppose Whitney is distrustful of the press, and she has every reason to be. In the tabloids she has been sold out by just about every member of her ex-husband's family, not to mention former employees, etc. She's been the subject of the worst photographs in the history of any person, famous or not. It can't be easy.

But Houston also has to take responsibility for the chaos she created in her career beginning in September 2003. That's when she appeared on stage at Madison Square Garden at Michael Jackson's 30th anniversary show looking anorexic and nearly dead.

From then on, her public appearances were calamities, culminating in her famous "I can afford better drugs than crack" interview with Diane Sawyer. And let's not forget the Atlanta landlord who found her in his rented condo two years ago, high as a kite and living with a washed-up pop singer.

Let's hope that all this amounts now to "Houston, we had a problem." Past tense.

Whitney, we're rooting for you.
親愛的惠媽....
加油咧!!!!