International Superstar on Overcoming Professional Hurdles, Rise to Fame

This is a partial transcript from "On the Record," October 30, 2006, that has been edited for clarity.

VAN SUSTEREN: Celine Dion is an international superstar and the signs were always there. Celine started singing at just five years old with her 13, that's right 13, older brothers and sisters. It was a song Celine composed with her mother and one of her brothers when she was just 12 that changed the course of her life.

And her soon-to-be manager and eventually her husband, Rene, used it to rocket her to international stardom. Flash forward, a slew of number one hits, Grammy awards, and now a Caesar's Palace concert hall built just for Celine. We got the chance to see Celine perform.

But first, we sat down with her before she went on stage to talk about her amazing rise to fame.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VAN SUSTEREN: You're an international star. How much is natural talent and how much is training?

CELINE DION: Interesting. When I was singing at the kitchen table for my brothers and sisters I was five. I was on stage at five-and-a-half years of age. And then I started to sing we call it "professionally" doing a record I was at the end of my 12 years.

I was just turning 13 and I didn't have a technique. I didn't have a coach at all. I really thought in my heart that in the way it was I was given the opportunity and the talent of being a singer.

And, I didn't know for so many years I didn't have to train it. I didn't have to work on it up until the day that I had lost my voice on stage. I was, I don't know, maybe 17, 18 years old and in the middle of a concert I lost my voice and it was very difficult for me to hear the people sing for me. It's hard to do a show, believe you me. It is harder to cancel one.

And I went home and I felt really like it was the end of my life. And we went to see a doctor in Montreal. To make a really long story short, he was professional enough to say that he could see inflammation but he wanted to make sure that it was nothing else than inflammation and he was not well equipped to be able to tell me that, to diagnose me well.

He sent me to New York to Dr. Gold (ph) who unfortunately passed away. And he looked at my throat, the whole thing, and he said, "You're very lucky. It's only inflammation. If you do exactly what I'll tell you to do, you will be singing for the rest of your life. If not, it's up to you. You won't be able to make it."

VAN SUSTEREN: You sing also in French besides English. You've sold a gazillion albums in French as well as English. Which is easier to sing in or is there a difference?

DION: There is a difference. French will always remain the blood that's floating in my veins. I am originally from the province of Quebec, Canada. I grew up in a French environement family. We only spoke French at home. I was singing in English a little bit because my brothers and sisters, I'm the baby of the family and I...

VAN SUSTEREN: Of 14.

DION: Of 14, correct. My both parents are musicians. My brothers and sisters all sing, all play different instruments. Then when I started to sing it was only in French. And, Rene said, "If you want to have an international career, you have to go to school to learn the language. You'll be singing the language and people, if you want to make people believe what you're singing, first you have to feel it your own self.

You have to convince yourself. You have to believe in what you do and what you say and what you're talking about. Then they will feel you and then we'll see. But you have to go to school to learn English."

VAN SUSTEREN: Well, Rene, your husband who I spoke to for a long time before we sat down together, he told me that you're so disciplined.

DION: Pretty much.

VAN SUSTEREN: He said you're extremely disciplined. You've got to be extremely physically fit to do this. I mean it's not just to have a beautiful voice and to be disciplined about your voice but even you're physically fit. This is hard work to sing every night.

DION: It is hard work. It is probably very hard work for you as well in what you do. I have decided that it was going to be part of my life. I have decided that if I wanted to make it, I have to put all the chances on my side and that means focus, hard work, training, discipline.

VAN SUSTEREN: But now this new world has us at Caesar's Palace. You've been selling out forever. We saw the lines outside lining up to get in. Is it exciting to go out there every night and see all these people and just make them all happy?

DION: It's pretty unbelievable.

VAN SUSTEREN: A specially built place just for you.

DION: It's not what I think about every night. What I think about every night is that we're still doing it. I was...

VAN SUSTEREN: You still think that way?

DION: I do. I do.

VAN SUSTEREN: With all the records you've sold all over the world you think that.

DION: I don't think of that.

VAN SUSTEREN: Not at all?

DION: I don't think of the awards, the nominations, the awards, the money. I'm very appreciative and thankful for that. It's given me an amazing life.

VAN SUSTEREN: It surprises you?

DION: What surprises me is that — I'm not surprised that we have an amazing show. We've worked with Franco. We are in an amazing place, an amazing stage. I work with the best people. The cast is unbelievable. We give more than we can every night. We give 100 percent and beyond that every night that I'm not surprised about. What I'm surprised is that there are so many shows.

I know, I can tell you that we have the best show out there because I believe it.

VAN SUSTEREN: So do the people out there think that too.

DION: Well that's what I'm amazed about. It's like they really think like us that they still come and we were supposed to be here I don't know two years, three years. We're going to be doing this for five years. If I'm not amazed, I'm not normal.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAN SUSTEREN: Coming up, she's an international superstar. People might just dress up like her for Halloween. So, what is Celine doing this year for Halloween? Find out next.

And later, want to go bowling? No need to leave your hotel room in Las Vegas. We take you on a tour of the Palms Casino Resort that I guarantee will make your head spin.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VAN SUSTEREN: Every day is a new day for Celine Dion, who performs her entertainment extravaganza, "A New Day," at Caesar's Palace. But even with the lines of fans and the sold out concerts, Celine keeps life in perspective.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VAN SUSTEREN: Do you think of yourself as an international, I mean a star, I mean is it...

DION: No.

VAN SUSTEREN: Not at all?

DION: Not at all.

VAN SUSTEREN: Do you have any sort of sense of that?

DION: First of all, I don't want you to think that I'm totally detached from what's going on to me.

VAN SUSTEREN: No, and I understand that.

DION: I know exactly.

VAN SUSTEREN: I understand that.

DION: I know exactly what I've done, what I'm doing now, and I'm about to do. But what I think mostly about is waking up with my son in my arms and getting ready for Halloween tomorrow and the day after. I have two days off. Do you know how much I'm looking forward to those two days every week, sometimes three? But this week, next week we'll have two days off, Monday, Tuesday.

I have somebody from the house today to go and do the groceries for me, not because I don't want to do it because I don't have the time to do so. They're going to go and buy some white cake, orange flavored cake, and chocolate cake. And we will bake some cakes and do cupcakes and decorate the pumpkins and this is what I'm looking forward the most tonight.

VAN SUSTEREN: And I believe that. I actually do believe that.

DION: I hope you do.

VAN SUSTEREN: No, I do believe it but it's always so interesting though when you meet people though who have done enormous things in their careers and yet then they have these, you know, when you sort of peel back their career and get to know them that they have those wants.

DION: You know I think in life the most important thing, and this is the most difficult thing to achieve, is balance. People who live every day with their children who do cupcakes every single weekend, who do the dishes every night and do their own beds, don't you think they're looking forward to pack their suitcase and go away? I believe so.

Well, for people who live on the road all the time, who have people cook for them, who do the groceries for them, who are not — they are with your children most of the time, well we look for the opposite. I'm looking forward to staying home in my PJs and just play with my son and pick my own tomatoes.

VAN SUSTEREN: I know at some point you've decided that you're going to, you know, finish your contract and do something.

DION: Indeed.

VAN SUSTEREN: Indeed, I know you've said that and I know you walked away once before.

DION: Yes.

VAN SUSTEREN: Any sort of sense of oh I hate to see this winding down a little bit or are you excited that, you know, that there will be another chapter?

DION: I am definitely looking forward for another chapter. I'm not getting ready to kind of push anything because I don't want to push and rush life. But I always say and I really believe that the best is yet to come.

I think we are very lucky and fortunate that we have had this opportunity, and we're still doing it, of having to work with amazing performers like that and to have had an amazing visual show every night here.

But my son started school and it's a new thing now and I've been doing it for more than three years. We started the fourth year and at the end of that will be five and I'm looking forward to kind of like be at home with him and then we'll see.

VAN SUSTEREN: Well, I just want you to know that we're looking forward tonight to see the show.

DION: It's going to be hard, if I may say. It's going to be hard when it's going to be the last show here, even though every night sometimes we say, "You know what it's hard tonight. I don't feel like it." All of us here and there it happens. We're not totally in shape or we feel a little sick.

It happens that we say, "It's going to be a hard show tonight. I don't really feel like it." But then it starts and it's another story. But I also know that when it will be the last show it will be one of the hardest things for us because we became a family.

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