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Born this way: Why Lady Gaga’s transformation makes her the world’s biggest star

Lady Gaga's stupendous $A650,000 reward appears to have produced results.

Lady Gaga's stupendous $A650,000 reward appears to have produced results. Photo: Getty

Snuggled under a blanket and wearing David Bowie-inspired leisure wear, Lady Gaga was starting her day in her Los Angeles hotel on February 10 when she heard she and Bradley Cooper had won the 2019 BAFTA for best original music for A Star is Born.

“This means the world to me,” shared the star on Twitter, explaining the pretty solid reason why she wasn’t gliding on stage at the Royal Albert Hall to collect her gong: She was due hours later at the Grammy Awards.

That power scheduling conflict says everything about the year Lady Gaga, 32, is having.

On the spotlit global stages of the music and acting worlds, she breathes more rarefied air than anyone, including Beyonce and Jennifer Lawrence.

On top of her Oscars nomination, and Golden Globe and Critics’ Choice wins, on Sunday the New Yorker became the first person to win a BAFTA and Grammy (three, actually) on the same day.

Her emotional, note-perfect role in the reimagining of Kris Kristofferson and Barbra Streisand’s 1976 film, has given the showbiz world a water cooler quandary.

Is she a singer who can act, or an actor who can sing?

Prince William – president of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts since 2010 – is one person who wanted to know the answer.

Cornering Cooper in London after the gongs had been handed out, the prince gushed about Gaga’s “amazing” performance in A Star is Born, according to Harper’s Bazaar.

“Did you always have her in mind when you wanted to do this?” William asked.

“Not originally,” Cooper said, who first sang with Gaga at her Santa Monica house after she made him spaghetti and meatballs. But when he saw her perform La Vie en Rose at a backyard charity benefit, “that was it”.

Nearly 11 years after her first song Just Dance, when Gaga goes anywhere these days it’s just as herself, not as the highly stylised pop star wearing meat dresses, wigs and disguising make-up.

This awards season, she’s slayed in blush silk crepe Calvin Klein for the Critics’ Choice, bridal Dior Haute Couture for the SAGs, billowing lilac Valentino for the Golden Globes and metallic Celine (worn with 100 carats of Tiffany & Co diamonds) for the Grammys.

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Wearing @tiffanyandco ✨ #GRAMMYs

A post shared by Lady Gaga (@ladygaga) on

Gradually losing her gimmicks, or her “armour” as she’s called them, was like shedding a skin.

“And every time I shed a skin, it was like taking a shower when you’re dirty. Getting rid of, washing off, shedding all of the bad, and becoming something new,” Gaga said, who has been quietly dating talent agent Christian Carino, 50, since 2017.

“It was always about just being myself.”

On the September 2018 cover of US Vogue, the woman formerly known as Stefani Germanotta wore a simple black slip, her most noteworthy feature her platinum hair which was both rock chick and old Hollywood.

“It’s an interesting time in my life. It’s a transition, for sure. There has been a galaxy of change,” she told the fashion magazine.

Lady Gaga Cardi B Grammys

Star power: Gaga hanging out with Cardi B at the Grammys. Photo: Getty

On December 28, she started a $140 million Las Vegas residency with MGM Resorts International. Over two years, she’ll perform 74 shows called Lady Gaga Enigma (standing-room tickets start at $866-plus).

But next up, there’s the Academy Awards on February 24, where she’s nominated for best actress against Melissa McCarthy, Olivia Colman, Yalitza Aparicio and Glenn Close.

“I would just say that it’s been a non-stop whirlwind,” she told Vogue of becoming the world’s most in-demand star.

“And when I am in an imaginative or creative mode, it sort of grabs me like a sleigh with a thousand horses and pulls me away and I just don’t stop working.”

Part of that work is now giving a voice to issues close to her heart.

Accepting her Grammy for A Star is Born hit Shallow, Gaga – who has spoken about being raped at 19 and suffering anxiety – said she was grateful to be part of a film that shed light on mental health.

“We’ve got to take care of each other,” she said. “So if you see somebody that’s hurting don’t look away.”

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