nicole_powers

Sharon Osbourne has been a lot of things over the years. She's been a tough-as-nails manager, a famed rock wife, a concert promoter, a cancer survivor, a mother of three complex children (and leader of a pack of sometimes unruly dogs), a television personality with multiple shows, and now she's added the title of headmistress to her bag of tricks.

Osbourne, 56, is currently whipping 14 wild rock chicks into shape in her new role as host/headmistress of VH1's Rock of Love Charm School, a reality show that teaches rock and roll etiquette, manners, and discipline to Bret Michaels' cast-offs from Rock of Love and Rock of Love 2.

Who better to teach younger women about what it means to be a classy rock chick and instruct them on how to go from rock cheap to rock chic, from trashy to classy, from groupie to girlfriend? Osbourne's been there/done that and is one of the most respected (and sometimes most feared) women in the entertainment industry today.

In true Osbourne fashion, she drops the F bomb 18 times during our interview, talks about what goes on in bed with Ozzy, gets off on strippers, dishes on which Charm School contestant "has the fucking brain of a peanut," and, get this, calls Sarah Palin "a ballsy little cow." This is why Sharon Osbourne is one of the most rockin' women we know. Read on.

Carrie Borzillo-Vrenna: Ryan Seacrest has nothing on you. You are the hardest-working woman in show business. You're doing the new show Rock of Love: Charm School, but also America's Got Talent, you just finished with The X Factor, then there's the upcoming Osbourne family variety show. You wrote an autobiography (Sharon Osbourne Extreme: My Autobiography, which sold 2 million copies) and have a second book out in November (Sharon Osbourne Survivor: My Story: The Next Chapter). Is it just hard for you to say no to so many fun opportunities?

Sharon Osbourne: Yes it is. And, you know what, you have to love what you do and I love those shows, Rock of Love, so much. I love the rockers. Love! So it's like, "Oh my God! Yes! I have to be with those women." I love women. I don't understand women who hate other women. I steer clear of them.

CBV: Before we get to the Charm School girls, I'm dying to know what you think of Vice President nominee Sarah Palin.

SO: I don't think the woman has the qualifications it takes. She doesn't have the world knowledge. She's just not right for this job she's been put in. She hasn't got the back up. She's got the balls. She's a ballsy little cow. But she doesn't have the goods. She doesn't have the education. And, I think that her views on life are antiquated. I don't want her telling a generation of girls what to do with their body. How dare she? I think that her views on life are very, very archaic. You can tell she's from fucking Alaska. I mean total bubble. I'm totally against what she does with animals. Have you heard what she does with the right paw?

CBV: Oh God. Do I want to hear this?

SO: She cuts off the right paw, takes it into the bar, and gets free drinks in the bar. It's hideous! The woman's got balls, but she hasn't got the back up. She is just archaic. Where the fuck does she come up with some of her views? Even down to her religion. Whatever turns you on. But, I'm sorry, being part of a church that speaks in tongues and they talk about witches. It's like, "Are you nuts?"

CBV: Her husband seems shady to me too.

SO: Oh, he does look shady.

CBV: How fearful are you if John McCain and Sarah Palin win on Nov. 4?

S0: It's not good. It's frightening. It's going to damage this country even more if that's possible. They are the wrong, wrong people. He's too old. His views are dated. And her views are archaic.

CBV: Hypothetically, if you could run for office would you and what would you do?

SO: No. [Laughs] To do it well you've got to be so dedicated and that is very rare these days. People who do it love power.

CBV: What are you most dedicated to right now in your life? What is your number one priority today that brings you the most happiness?

SO: Oh, my animals. They give me so much joy. I can't even begin to express it. In the middle of the night, Ozzy and I will wake up two or three times, and we're kissing the dogs and putting them back in their places, they all have their own place where they sleep. Kissing them and putting them back. Kissing and putting them back. He'll kiss one and I'll kiss the other. I love them.

CBV: The Rock of Love girls could certainly learn a lot from you. You've being a classy rock wife for about 26 years now, a manager, and built an empire, really. Who did you learn from?

SO: I didn't learn from anyone. I just learned from my own mistakes, from my own fuck-ups basically. I definitely didn't have a role model.

CBV: What was your biggest fuck up?

SO: Oh God. Where do you want to begin? [Laughs]

CBV: Let me put it this way: If you could have one do-over in life, what would it be?

SO: Probably one of the deals that I did for Ozzy on publishing I would never have done.

CBV: What about life lessons? What is the biggest life lesson you need to teach these 14 girls on Charm School?

SO: You got to learn to respect yourself because if they don't respect themselves nobody else will. They are not going to get anywhere the way they conduct themselves other than maybe one night to give someone a blow job and then it's all over. They just have to learn to realize that everyone is special because we're all unique. We're all so different. And, it's just an attitude and an air that they've got to develop.

CBV: I agree. But, that said, you don't want to take away their rockness or their edge. You need to take them from trashy to classy while still being rock.

SO: Exactly! And, the thing is, you don't want to squash anyone's personality. A lot of the girls are crazy, but funny. They are really good company, so you don't want to squash that with them. But at the same time, you don't have to give everything. You don't have to walk into a room with one tit hanging out, no pants, and give everybody a blow job and then go home.

CBV: Yeah, because that's not how you got your husband, Ozzy, right? [Laughs]

SO: [Laughs] It's not. If you want to try to have a relationship, you need to learn that guys want to be supported. They want to be treated well. You've got to spoil them and make them feel special. And, it's not going to make them feel special with somebody acting like that on their arm.

CBV: Confidence and self-respect go hand in hand, how do you help build self-respect in these girls when some of them are a little insecure or lacking a true belief in themselves. Some girls are very lost.

SO: They are lost. But what I do is find the thing that person is good at and help them nurture that. Everybody is good at something. I will find that something in the girl. You find out what your gift is, what they're good at, and you make them feel good about it and encourage them to work harder at whatever gift it is they have.

CBV: And then they get a sense of pride from that and it changes everything.

SO: It changes everything, Carrie. Yes. If you're a great cook, you arrange flowers, great, it doesn't matter what it is. Everyone has a gift for something no matter how big or small. You encourage that, they feel good about themselves, and they go about life in a different way. My thing too, is even if you're a lap dancer, whatever, I don't judge that. But be the best lap dancer you can fucking be. Learn your trade. Be the fucking best. I don't judge that at all. You want to encourage girls to do that because it's empowerment. I understand and I get off on it when you have these really beautiful women have men as putty in their hands. They can do whatever they want with them and it makes me laugh.

CBV: That, to me, is being a strong female - owning what you do and doing it well.

SO: Absolutely!

CBV: I bet some of these girls don't even know what they're good at because no one has encouraged them to try. Maybe someone is doodling and a good picture comes out and you stumble into your thing, your gift.

SO: You know what? One of the girls actually ended up doing that. She didn't realize it. She found her passion. She loved to draw and design t-shirts. I can't say who yet because it hasn't aired yet. But she didn't know she had that talent and it was just great for her. A couple of the girls really did want to go back to school. And it's like, yeah, good for you. Fantastic. It doesn't matter what you've done before. Own it. Don't be embarrassed. The situation is people don't realize how hard it is to grow up in a situation where you have no support from your family. You're not understood. You've got no role models. And, you're there having to teach yourself. What do you do with no education?

CBV: Do you think all of the Charm School girls are going to make it?

SO: Oh, no. Not at all. But, there's a good four of them that are.

CBV: Could any of them work for you?

SO: It's too soon to say. But I've kept in touch with a lot of the girls and they're doing good. I enjoyed them. I enjoyed meeting them and listening to their stories. People are so quick to put other people down. Oh, you've done hard-core porn. I say, "You tell me what you're gonna fucking do when you have no money in the bank and you can't get a job and you have to eat. You have no fucking address to put down when you apply for a job." And, if you're good looking, hey... If I had had that body, I'd be flashing it everywhere. And, that brings me to contestant Frenchie [real name Angelique]. Frenchie just loves sex. She's done porn, stripping, she just fucking loves it and owns it and she's just fantastic. She loves her life. She is happy as can be, ol' Frenchie. And she loves it. More power to her.

CBV: What about today's role models? Little girls look up to people like Paris Hilton, Miley Cyrus, Lindsay Lohan.

SO: They're not role models because those girls that you mention haven't found out who they are yet. They have no fucking idea who they are.

CBV: But the little ones, the 10-year-olds, idolize them and emulate them. That, to me, is a social problem and it's a shame that girls of any age just don't have enough decent role models today.

SO: It is a big problem. It is. You don't want your young 10-year-old going out in a little mini dress. I don't like to see children dress as women. You have all your life to do that.

CBV: Who are the good role models today?

SO: I do not know. It's that fine line because then you get that somebody who is boring. It's so hard. When my kids were growing up it was the Spice Girls and they were harmless. They were big fun. Had a lot of attitude and were all about girl power. You would've never seen them slumped in the back of the car. That wasn't their image.

CBV: Who are your kids' role models today? You?

SO: I don't know who their role models are now. I don't think it's me. Definitely not.

CBV: What is the biggest lesson you ever learned in life?

SO: No matter what you do and you think that nobody knows it, it always comes back to haunt you. When you're young and you fuck up and you do things and you think oh well nobody will ever know. Well that doesn't exist unfortunately. You might as well just own up and own it because you'll never get rid of it.

CBV: Did you idolize other rock wives before you like Yoko Ono, Bianca Jagger, or Priscilla Presley? They were all strong women with their own thing going. Sure, Yoko broke up the Beatles, but at least she wasn't some trophy wife, right? Did they inspire you?

SO: Well, the one thing about those women were they were incredibly strong and they had their own passion and their own thing going on, but at the same time, especially Yoko, she idolized her man. She fought for her man. Some didn't agree with it, but she was doing what she felt was best for him.

CBV: Do you relate to Yoko Ono in that way, with Ozzy?

SO: I fight for my family all the time. I think most women have got that inner lioness instinct to protect your own. But I do think those women all had something else in their lives.

CBV: And, when a rock wife doesn't have her own life or career or something that is her passion, the marriage hardly ever lasts.

SO: As a whole, they don't last and it's because you then can easily become obsessive and too clingy to your man because you don't have anything to do with your life and that can become dangerous.

CBV: Well Charm School contestant Megan might be in trouble if she marries a rock star. She said in a recent episode that she doesn't see herself working.

SO: She said her ambition was to be a trophy wife. Oh God. Well she has got the fucking brain of a peanut. She does have a pretty damn good body, but no fucking brain. Her brain is between her legs. She told me she was an accountant and an estate agent.

CBV: Didn't another contestant, Jessica, say she worked at NASA?

SO: Yes, but she did. She doesn't work there anymore. But she did. She was a very bright and very nice young girl. She's a very good girl.

CBV: So far on the show, you are pretty damn nice and you never lose your cool. You are sort of famous for, well, being pretty rough in business. How are you staying so sweet and nice for this girls, who you must just want to shake into submission?

SO: It's like kids. You can't keep losing it. You have to find the right time to talk to them. The only thing they're doing right now is letting themselves down. If they want to act like morons, go ahead. But some of the girls do want to better themselves; others are just playing the game.

CBV: You do have a reputation for being ruthless and tough. How does that make you feel?

SO: It doesn't bother me at all. It's not like I cultivate it. It's like, "Hey fuck you." I don't bother anybody, but if you fuck with me then that's it. I've always been that way. Kind of insular, keep my head down, and do what I do. But if someone wants a piece of what I've got, no fucking way.

CBV: When you were younger and overweight, did that have to do with your confidence? On a recent episode one contestant was called chubby and she wasn't. Does that bring up painful memories for you?

SO: Yeah. I had no confidence with me. I was everybody's best friend. I was everybody's drinking buddy. I was a lot of fun, so they'd want to hang out with me. But, nobody wanted to fuck me. Nobody wanted to take me out. And, I was okay with that for a while. I carved my little niche out, but I was very insecure with men.

CBV: How did you get Ozzy?

SO: We laughed at the same things. He was my buddy. We'd known each other for 10 years before we even kissed. We had a relationship together. It can work. Things do happen. I'm just glad it happened when I was older when I could handle the whole situation.

CBV: What is the secret to staying together for 26 years, especially when many years were filled with substance abuse and other shenanigans?

SO: I'm not a quitter. I'm in for the long haul. People give up so easily and they forget why they fell in love in the first place. And, then when someone fucks up and you disrespect each other, you just have to fix it.

CBV: When Ozzy was in his darkest days with drugs and booze, how did you help him and help yourself? What advice could you give to readers who have a partner or friend in that situation?

SO: You have to educate yourself. When you understand what it's about, you can handle that person better. But to go in and not know about drug addiction or alcohol addiction, you will drown. It's not a game. It's not just something you do if you're in rock and roll. Alcoholism, drug addiction is fucking serious. You have to understand it to be able to live with it, like I did.

CBV: How is your health?

SO: I'm gooood. I'm good. I've been good for four years.

CBV: Do you have anxiety about the cancer coming back or do you just forget about it, put it out of your mind?

SO: You don't forget about it. It's everywhere. It's so prevalent now. You see cancer everywhere. If it comes back, you just up and deal with it.

CBV: What can you tell us about the new variety show, which I've read is called either The Osbournes Variety Show or The Osbournes: Loud and Dangerous?

SO: We don't have a title yet. They call it variety because in TV everything has to be put in a category. If a show is non scripted and has music, it's variety, so that's why it's tagged variety. It'll be a lot of comedy sketches. It'll be like Saturday Night Live but with audience participation. It airs Jan. 21, 2009. I'm really excited about working with the kids and Ozzy again. We're going to have a lot of our friends on the show too as guests.

CBV: Your older daughter, Aimee, isn't on it is she? We all know how she refused to do The Osbournes back in 2002-2005.

SO: Oh my God! I've asked her and she's like, "nope." I respect her a lot because it is easy to be enticed and she just isn't. She just likes to live her life and come and go where nobody bothers her.

CBV: How are Jack and Kelly? They've had their ups and downs over the years. Jack is producing a documentary on Ozzy. He's working on that now. We don't have a date for it yet.

SO: They're good. They've done damage to themselves but they've learned from it and they are good people. That is what it's about-raising good people.

CBV: So, will you kill me if I ask you about the famed 2000 Billy Corgan quitting memo where you resigned from managing the Smashing Pumpkins by saying, "It was with great pride and enthusiasm that I took on management of the Pumpkins back in October, but unfortunately I must resign today due to medical reasons-Billy Corgan was making me sick!!!''

SO: Oh God! Do you know?! I saw him at the Scream Awards [10/19/08 in Los Angeles]. We hadn't seen each other since that whole thing in Germany. The first time we ran into each other and we hugged and kissed and laughed. I was so glad.

CBV: What else do you want to do with your life? It seems you've done it all.

SO: Well, not another talk show. I was horrible at that! But, I love doing theater. I did the Vagina Monologues a couple of years ago and I absolutely loved it. I'd like to go do something else in the theater. I don't know what yet. I might do a one-woman show.