Sharon Rachel Osbourne (born 9 October 1952) is an English music promoter and TV personality. She is the daughter of rock and roll entrepreneur Don Arden (n� Harry Levy) and his late wife Hope; the sister of David Levy; the wife and manager of Black Sabbath vocalist Ozzy Osbourne, and the mother of Aimee, Jack, and Kelly.

Sharon and Ozzy

She was born Sharon Rachel Levy in London to an Ashkenazi Jewish father and an Irish Catholic mother. She met Ozzy Osbourne at age 17 while working as a receptionist for her father, who was the manager of Ozzy's band Black Sabbath. When Ozzy was fired from Black Sabbath in 1979, Sharon took over his management and guided him through a successful solo career. In 1996 she created the Ozzfest summer touring festival.

Although she cheated on Ozzy with his guitarist, Randy Rhoads right before the wedding, Sharon and Ozzy were married in Maui, Hawaii on July 4, 1982. They bought out Ozzy's contract from her father in that year for GBP 1,500,000, a move that tarnished her relationship with her father for nearly 20 years. Sharon was so estranged from her parents that when her mother, Hope, died in 1998, she had not met her grandchildren, and Sharon did not attend the funeral. However, Sharon and her father were reconciled in 2001, after Sharon glimpsed him on a Los Angeles Street.

Other Management Roles

Sharon has also managed The Smashing Pumpkins and Coal Chamber. In 2000 she made news by severing her relationship with The Smashing Pumpkins and then announcing in a statement: "...I must resign due to medical reasons... Billy Corgan was making me sick!"

Sharon gained celebrity as one of the stars of MTV's reality show, The Osbournes, about her family's daily life. As the person who negotiated with MTV to tape the show, she is often credited with her husband's resurgence in pop culture. The show began airing in early 2002, and when, in July 2002, Osbourne was diagnosed with cancer, she insisted filming continue. The final episode of the show aired in the US on March 21, 2005. MTV's British affiliate, has been airing the show since 2003.

In 2003 Sharon became the host of her own television talk show, The Sharon Osbourne Show. The show was meant to be a reflection of her personality and her home life � similar to her reality show but with the inclusion of guest interviews and performances. However, it was never very successful in the ratings and critics panned her inability to perform the basic tasks required of a talk show host such as reading cue cards and conducting interviews. Eventually the show's format became extremely standardised � not at all what Osbourne had wanted. A sequence on her reality show found her struggling to book any noteworthy celebrity guests because their agents did not feel an appearance would be beneficial. The show was cancelled in early 2004.

At a charity auction, Sharon bid for and won the opportunity to guest star in an episode of the NBC comedy Will & Grace. She played a bartender in a spring 2004 episode.

In October 2004, Sharon announced that she and husband Ozzy would be teaming up for yet another MTV show entitled "Battle for Ozzfest", in which a group of unsigned bands battle it out for a spot on the 2005 Ozzfest tour.

In January 2005 she was selected to feature in advertising for the United Kingdom supermarket chain ASDA.

She is also one of the judges on the British TV talent show The X Factor.

Health

In 1999 Sharon lost 100 pounds (45 kg) thanks to a weight loss surgery called Adjustable gastric band.

In July 2002 Osbourne was diagnosed with colon cancer. Later, she announced her cancer had spread to her lymph nodes and was more serious than originally thought. She overcame her battle with the disease against a 33% survival prognosis, and in August 2004 founded the Sharon Osbourne Colon Cancer Program at Cedars Sinai Hospital. In addition, she was the honored guest at the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation's 2003 Fall Gala, where she spoke of her stuggle against cancer.

In December 2004, Osbourne made the public announcement that she is still battling bulimia.

Extreme: The Autobiography

Sharon Osbourne has also written an autobiography, called Extreme, which was published in October 2005, and tells of her difficult childhood growing up with her father, Don Arden, and also tells of her troubles with husband Ozzy Osbourne, and sheds light on topics that previously, she had not commented on. It was also number one on the UK Bestseller List for 6 weeks, and is published by Time Warner Books. It is very interesting.

Sharon and The Insane Clown Posse

In 1999 the band Coal Chamber, managed by Sharon at the time, were touring with The Insane Clown Posse. The Insane Clown Posse dropped Coal Chamber because they weren't pulling in enough money and Coal Chamber's sound wasn't Juggalo material. In November of that year Sharon appeared on The Howard Stern Show, and, after several minutes of brutal arguing, she bet the Insane Clown Posse $50,000 that their next album would not sell more than 200,000 units and that they would be dropped from their label. Insane Clown Posse upped the ante to 500,000 records (or, according to [1], 400,000 records). In the event, the next album, which was a dual release, Bizzar and Bizaar, sold over 200,000 copies each (or 250,000 each, according to [2]). Sharon has so far failed to pay the money allegedly owed, which Insane Clown Posse had planned to donate to charity.

The Conflict with Iron Maiden at Ozzfest 2005

On August 20th 2005, the band Iron Maiden played their last Ozzfest show of 2005 in San Bernardino, California. A series of premeditated negative events occurred during that performance, beginning with attendees in the V.I.P. being handed eggs by festival security, in which they then pelted the band with eggs, garbage, and other debris. Festival Crew and people who attended the event also described that someone sabotaged the sound system and played a tape of somebody chanting 'Ozzy! Ozzy! Ozzy!' as people at the event chanted 'Maiden! Maiden! Maiden!' to counter the attack. It was also reported that the sound system was intentionally turned off about 5 times in the middle of the band's performance. Sharon Osbourne admits to planning these attacks on Iron Maiden in retaliation against Bruce Dickinson's statements about the Osbourne family's reality show on MTV.

As Iron Maiden began to play the song "The Trooper" a man believed to be Big Dave, a famous Black Label Society road crew assistant and guest on Sharon's reality T.V. show "Battle for Ozzfest" came upon the stage and waved a disproportionate American flag, mocking Bruce Dickinson's usual activity of waving the Union Jack during this song. Despite all of the happenings, Iron Maiden played out the entire show with an additional encore. Despite Bruce's leading the band to finish the performance with the band, Sharon did command the stage to make a few statements. She complimented the band, however she reportedly dubbed Dickinson as a prick and claimed that he ruined the entire Ozzfest tour.

Most people regard Sharon Osbourne to have come off worst in this conflict, as Iron Maiden played a storming set and many people left the show in disgust afterward, booing and bottling Sharon off the stage when she came to insult Dickinson.