Pamela Anderson – who first found fame as a Playboy model, and then onscreen in TV’s Baywatch -has posed for photographer Dylan Coulter in a layout for The Guardian, inspired by Bert Stern’s 1962 Vogue shoot with Marilyn.
“The hair is instantly recognisable (‘Scandinavian Blonde $5 box’), though a little warmer than the lightning flash of Baywatch days. The voice has the soft buoyancy of Marilyn Monroe – who she references in our photoshoot – and there’s that toughness, undercut with wit and a mischievous vulnerability that reminds me somehow of Dolly Parton. The forerunners for her Baywatch look were Brigitte Bardot, Jayne Mansfield, Jean Harlow; it’s the male fantasy prototype that stretches back to Botticelli’s Venus, with her prodigious hair, pert boobs and oyster shell. Anderson took the cat’s eyes, pencil brows and the Marie Antionette hair-stack and gave it some extra fire: something ravenous, uncut and peculiarly 1990s. Her story is about love addiction, sure, but also of living on the frontline of that era.”
The photo shoot specifically references Stern’s pink scarf and black dress sittings. Like so many other sex symbols, Pamela has fought for respect throughout her career. She tells her story in a new Netflix docuseries and her forthcoming memoirs.
The Marilyn Report 