My Wild Ride

DOING IT HIS WAY. ROCKER JON BON JOVI TALKS ABOUT HIS LONG-STANDING MARRIAGE TO HIS HIGH SCHOOL SWEETHEART, HIS BIGGEST REGRETS AND WHY HE HAS NO PLANS TO RETIRE.

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Silver Fox

“Let me tell you, I’ve earned this gray hair,” says Jon. “I’ve been through enough.” 

“Family man, what a concept. How’d I end up the poster boy for that?”

DURING an interview with Bravo host Andy Cohen in early May, Jon Bon Jovi revealed his most cringeworthy moment from the 1980s, the decade his band, Bon Jovi, broke onto the music scene. “You want to embarrass me? Tie me to a chair and make me watch videos from my first two albums,” said Jon with a laugh, referencing his cheesy performance in the “horrible” video for the group’s 1984 single, “Runaway.”

In the nearly 40 years since Jon strutted his stuff in skintight spandex and teased hair, the lead singer has sold more than 100 million records and performed for 50 million fans worldwide. In 2018, Bon Jovi was inducted into the U.S. Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. The celebrated philanthropist and family man — he and his wife of 34 years, Dorothea, 60, share kids Stephanie, 29, Jesse, 28, Jake, 21, and Romeo, 19 — is currently worth an estimated $500 million. Yet somehow the 61-year-old New Jersey native has remained remarkably grounded. “There’s nothing flashy about Jon,” an insider tells Star. “He credits his working-class Jersey upbringing for keeping him down-to-earth. Family means more to him than anything else.”