All The A-Listers Want To Do Is... Porn!
Before they conquered Hollywood, these five brave souls braved the world of skin-flicks and saucy photographs...
Kevin Costner
Come again? You know how it is; you’re a young acting student with your heart set on a career in Hollywood but those auditions aren’t yielding many callbacks and that fine physique of yours is going to waste. Until…
The Gig: 1974’s Sizzle Beach USA (aka Malibu Hot Summer), Richard Brander’s - frankly ridiculous - exploration of lesbianism and assorted horizontal activities on a ranch in California. Starring the director wife Leslie as Dit McCoy and a 19-year-old Kevin Costner as John Logan.
The Reviews: Earning a BOMB rating from Leonard Maltin’s movie guide, Sizzle Beach also scores a measly 2/10 on the Internet Movie Database, placing it alongside Snoop Dogg’s Urban Menace on the stie’s worst 100 movies list.
Redeeming Features: When Troma Pictures re-released the film, studio head Lloyd Kauffman claimed it was to prove that Costner’s love of all things western long predated Dances With Wolves. And the evidence? Costner rides a horse in one scene.
Post-Coitus: With turkeys like The Postman hammering a rep founded on some truly dull movies, it looked as if baby oil might be back on Costner’s shopping list come the late ‘90s. A still-ongoing career revival rendered a trip to Soho unnecessary.
Marilyn Monroe
Come Again?: Years before she became famous for letting her skirt blow up around her waist in The Seven Year Itch, the former Norma Jean Mortensen became infamous for letting her clothes fall to the floor for a certain adult publication.
The Gig: December 1953, and issue one of Playboy hits the shelves. The photos had, in fact, previously appeared in a calendar but Hugh Hefner bought the rights for the princely sum of $500.
The Reviews: Hef had so little cash he could barely afford to airbrush the nudes’ razor knicks. So next to the other models, Monroe looked positively luminous.
Redeeming Features: Loads. While you may not approve of nude modelling, Marilyn looked marvelous. And if Monroe hadn’t helped them sell no end of issues, we’d never have had the chance to read all those fascinating articles that are the real reason people buy Playboy.
Post-Coitus: Monroe turns here back on porm (although other ‘modelling’ photos came to light later in her career) and becomes the biggest star in the galaxy, is denied a happy ending. And it’s all the fault of those darn Kennedy boys? Now, whatever became of them…?
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