Gloria Gaynor is thinking about the legacy of one of her most famous songs, “I Will Survive.”
During Lifetime’s “Voices of a Lifetime” event at the Hard Rock Hotel in New York City last month, Gaynor, 81, spoke exclusively with Us Weekly about her 1978 song “I Will Survive,” which has recently had a resurgence among TikTok audiences, including young women.
“It makes me know about my foresight because when I first heard the lyrics to the song, all of this is what I imagined,” the disco icon told Us. Gaynor also shared her reaction to seeing the next generation of girls dancing to her song on the app.
“I want to see them being real women who are pleased with who they are inside and not feeling that they have to show everything they have on the outside,”she said. “Save something for your man. Save something for that special guy, something.”
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Gaynor noted that of the covers she’s seen of the song, it’s Chantay Savage’s version she’s loved the most. “It’s completely different from mine. She really made the song her own and I love her for that,” she shared.
At the same event, Robin Roberts presented Gaynor’s biopic, I Will Survive: The Gloria Gaynor Story, a TV movie detailing the singer’s life and career, which premiered February 8 on Lifetime.
“I’m celebrating by being here with you all, but I’m celebrating with my family and friends who have come to join me here, and when we see it, we are going to have a night,” Gaynor told Us of the movie. “So we’re all going to watch it together. I’ve seen it already, but we’re going to watch together, so I’ll probably be more watching them to see their reactions and responses to it.”
She added, “It’s wonderful. It’s wonderful. It’s all about women, female power. Someone said to me, they were telling their wife, ‘You’ve got to listen to me because you are the weaker sex.’ And they heard God say, ‘You have to have weak before you can get weaker.’”
“It’s all about women power and recognizing the power that we have,” Gaynor continued. “Not trying to overpower the man in your life, but recognize that you have a power that matches his and that the two of you can be very strong together.”
Over her decades-long career, Gaynor has released several hit songs that helped define the disco era, including “I Will Survive” in 1978, “Let Me Know (I Have a Right)” in 1979 and “I Am What I Am” in 1983. “I Will Survive” won Gaynor a Grammy for Best Disco Recording in 1980, but it also scored nominations for Record of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.
When she’s not having movies made about her life, Gaynor shared with Us that she is finding much of her happiness in her “faith,” as well as “going to church, studying the Bible, writing songs and seeing those songs come to fruition.” She added, “My happy place is home.”
Reporting by Nikaline Katsilometes
