In the film, Cook admitted he was \u201cimmature\u201d when Terria Joseph Augello, whom he dated three times, got pregnant and gave birth to Alicia – full name Alicia Augello Cook. He was not ready to take on the responsibilities of fatherhood.<\/p>\n
He recalled: \u201cShe [Terria] called a couple of times, told me she was pregnant. I was like okay. It wasn\u2019t in me, I wasn\u2019t there, I wasn\u2019t ready. I was immature.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alicia said: \u201cMy father wasn\u2019t there when I was born \u2026 on that evening, Mommy lay in bed, wondering how she would come up with the money for the hospital bill.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe story of that day is, in many ways, the story of my relationship with Craig.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe wasn\u2019t there and, once the difficult moments had come and gone, he would suddenly show up. Only to vanish again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Augello raised the Girl on Fire artist as a single mom living in Hell\u2019s Kitchen, Manhattan, New York City, working several jobs and putting her theatre aspirations on hold to afford her daughter\u2019s piano lessons.<\/p>\n
Keys remembered when Cook turned up at his mom\u2019s house, he told her, \u201cHere\u2019s your grandchild\u201d, handed the 17-time Grammy winner over, and left again.<\/p>\n
She grew close to her paternal grandparents, with his dad, an ex-police officer, being the \u201cmain father figure\u201d in her life, but Keys remained hurt by Cook\u2019s absence.<\/p>\n
The Empire State of Mind performer remembered: \u201cMom was (one year) enduring a particularly stressful financial season and would often find herself short on rent. Mom worked hours and hours. She would come home and sleep real quick and go back to work.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Keys opened up about her feelings about Cook through her songwriting.<\/p>\n
She said: \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of promises of different meetings and moments between Craig and I and those moments wouldn\u2019t come, they\u2019d be delayed or deferred.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember that happening for a long time. I was just like I don\u2019t want to feel like that, I don\u2019t want it to be halfway.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was so furious, I was so over it, I didn\u2019t care any more, and I wanted him to know it. I wanted everybody to know it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cook admitted feeling unsure \u201cif I can read it (the letter) because it is so painful\u201d.<\/p>\n
He noted there was \u201cgrowth on both our parts\u201d that made a relationship possible for the pair, adding: \u201cThat\u2019s who I was then, that\u2019s not who I am now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Keys\u2019 and Cook\u2019s conflict lasted until she penned and produced her 2023 Broadway show, Hell\u2019s Kitchen, which was loosely based on her life.<\/p>\n
She said writing the father character based on her was a \u201cbig vehicle for healing\u201d.<\/p>\n
Her grandmother\u2019s \u201cdying wish\u201d for a \u201cfamily unity\u201d made Keys think differently.<\/p>\n
She said: \u201cThat really woke me up to something. Craig didn\u2019t have to be my dad, but he was my father.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the film, Cook admitted he was \u201cimmature\u201d when Terria Joseph Augello, whom he dated three times, got…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":552952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[268],"tags":[78517,236759,236758,6461,61571,236757,434,2054,18,71516,117,32254,113148,19,2761,17,128426,66783,3255,3119,181163,1213,2058],"class_list":["post-552951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-heartbreaking","tag-abandonment","tag-absent","tag-after","tag-aged","tag-alicia","tag-celebrities","tag-documentary","tag-eire","tag-emotional","tag-entertainment","tag-father","tag-hurt","tag-ie","tag-in","tag-ireland","tag-keys","tag-letter","tag-life","tag-new","tag-shared","tag-to","tag-years"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116809197825225908","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=552951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/552952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=552951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=552951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=552951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}