The 19-year-old Dublin beauty queen caused quite a stir last week when she ripped into her father’s one-time paramour in an interview with London’s Daily Mail.
Rosanna, the daughter of ’80s pop star Chris DeBurgh, was scheduled to do a photo shoot with the paper. Depending on whom you ask, she was either approached or ambushed by a reporter requesting an interview. Unaccompanied by pageant officials or handlers, Rosanna agreed to a chat.
Eventually, the subject turned to her father’s notoious 1994 affair with his children’s teenaged nanny, Maresa Morgan. The scandal, which broke when Rosanna was just 9 years old, left a deep impression on her. During the interview, she ripped into Morgan, saying that she has no sympathy for her former nanny, and that the thought of the other woman disgusts her. Her father, said Rosanna, doesn’t know what he ever saw in the Maresa.
When the paper hit the stands, all hell broke loose, and the whole sordid DeBurgh scandal was exhumed and reexamined. Public sympathy was largely on the side of the former nanny, who was only 19 years old — the same age as Rosanna — when the story broke. Spinmeisters for the Miss World organization — headed by former Miss Ireland, Andrea Roche — tried to control the damage. They insisted that their girl had been misquoted, tricked, manipulated — everything short of mind-melded by an evil Mr. Spock.
Unfortunately for them, Rosanna bravely admitted that she had been quoted correctly, and insisted that, indeed, she stood by her remarks. Appearing on the popular “Lateline” radio call-in show last Friday evening, the defiant beauty queen listened frostily as a caller opined that DeBurgh had been at least as much to blame as his teenaged paramour. Rosanna, her tiara obviously in a twist, snapped back that the caller should mind her own beeswax.
Snarky comments aside, Rosanna has been one of the Miss World organization’s most high-profile titleholders. Her next few months are already booked solid with modeling assignments and public appearances, plus her music industry connection connections guarantee her access all areas. Hey, scandals, shmandals: who cares about a few family skeletons when you’re young, rich, gorgeous and successful? Although a glance into my crystal ball shows some very plain, middle-aged nannies supervising Rosanna’s future kiddies . . .