This weekend, Super Bowl XLII went down as one of the biggest upsets in football history, and I came in for one of the biggest shocks of my own recent history: I actually cared. It might make me a bad lesbian, but I’m normally the one who goes to the parties for the Cheetos and party favors (not to mention the real competition – who can score the craziest commercial). This time I found myself obsessively checking in online. I blame being overseas: As an expat, I find myself being called upon to explain everything from sloppy joes to Mitt Romney, so I sometimes feel a little nostalgic for the things I never really understood in the first place.
But Popsugar.com has posted something in a football spirit that I can understand. I personally like the ref outfit. Yes, Brooke Shields recently posed in a pinup-style football spread for Parade magazine. The photos took me for a pleasant stroll down memory lane; I still remember her early Calvin Klein commercials. I mean, wow. In an accompanying article, Shields discusses being fortysomething in life and in Hollywood, after growing up as a child star. I’m morbidly fascinated by stars discussing aging in a business (heck, a culture) that worships youth and beauty, so this article didn’t disappoint.
As someone who landed roles before her first birthday, Shields says she finds it hard to remember sometimes that she’s no longer the youngster on the set:
“I’m just coming to terms with it. My husband [screenwriter Chris Henchy] laughs at me. Sometimes I’ll read a part and identify with the material, and I’ll say, ‘Oh, honey, I really like this.’ He’ll look at me like I’m crazy and ask, ‘What’s wrong with you? You’re not in your 20s. You seriously think you can walk in there and get this role? It’s going to a 24-year-old.'”
She also says that she’s never had Botox or plastic surgery, even though it’s not always easy to age in an industry where she was endlessly photographed in her youth.
“The other day, I was working with a photographer to recreate an image we had done years ago. When I saw my face, I kind of went, ‘What is that?’ I assumed I was going to look the same, and I didn’t. It was a shock to my system.”
She goes on to touch on the controversial roles of her early career, including Pretty Baby, a movie set in a brothel. I happened to catch part of this on TV last week, and it freaked me out a little – she’s barely 13, and playing a role far too sexy for her years. Her latest project, Lipstick Jungle, due to premeire Thursday in the U.S., hasn’t been highly anticipated on this site, and it’s a shame Shields’s talents may be wasted on a show more interested in indulging gender stereotypes than breaking them. But I’m still a fan of Shields. And of any actor who manages a 40-year career and still looks like she’s having some fun.
