The Playboy Portfolio of Sex Stars

A pictorial revisit with 14 fabulous cinematic sirens first uncovered in these pages

Starring

In Alphabetical Order:

Ursula Andress • Carroll Baker • Brigitte Bardot Arlene Dahl • Sophia Loren Tina Louise • Carol Lynley Jayne Mansfield • Elsa Martinelli • Kim Novak Stella Stevens • Susan Strasberg • Elizabeth Taylor & Mamie Van Doren

Back in the days when the movies first learned to talk, faithful fans were occasionally granted a flickering glimpse of a bare bosomed flapper in return for their box-office devotion. Cinemaphiles rarely caught sight of screen sirens in less than sheer chemises during the Depression, however; and glamour starved GIs won World War II on a cheesecake diet of sweaters and one-piece bathing suits. It took a sencuous starlet named Marilyn Monroe to reverse this trend by posing au naturel for the famous pinup picture that was to become Playboy's premier Playmate in December 1953. An impressive list of famous film fatales has made similarly provocative appearances in our publication in the intervening dozen years. This special portfolio offers--in an unprecedented package--14 of the most memorable of the contemporary sex stars who have brightened our pages with their beauty.

Elizabeth Taylor

Since Playboy's premier unveiling of the Taylor torso (January 1963) in an uncensored preview of her role as the latest celluloid Cleopatra, Liz has retained her title as queen of America's box-office beauties despite many a hopeful contender. A cause célèbre among gossip columnists who haven't forgotten how she fiddled in Rome while ex-hubby Eddie Fisher burned, majestically endowed Miss Taylor now spends all of her personal and professional (The VIPs, The Sandpiper) hours in partnership with actor-spouse Richard Burton. Their multimillion-dollar talents will soon be rematched as the star sparring mates of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Carroll Baker

Come-lately cinema sexpot Carroll Baker capped off her well-publicized box-office success last year in The Carpetbaggers with an exclusive exposure of her physical assets for our 1964 yuletide issue. After subsequent filmic forays in the title roles of Sylvia and Harlow, the 33-year-old screen star has temporarily abandoned the cameras for the courtroom and a million-dollar suit against movie mogul Joe Levine for using another leading lady in his forthcoming Tropic of Cancer.

Carol Lynley

This onetime teenage fashion model and Broadway ingénue achieved full filmic maturity as a Preminger protégée in The Cardinal, then announced her entry in Hollywood's sex-symbol sweepstakes by displaying her appealing all in Playboy (March 1965) and beating Carroll Baker to the box office as Electronovision's Harlow. A starring stint in Bunny Lake Is Missing was next.

Tina Louise

Titian-tressed Tina Louise is currently devoting all of her time and talent to the weekly video role of a stranded film star on CBS-TV's successful series Gilligan's Island. The toast of an early Playboy pictorial (April 1959), Tina played many a see-worthy part for Broadway and Hollywood before last year's TV ship came in.

Jayne Mansfield

With seven Playboy pictorials to her credit--ranging from her introduction as our Playmate of the Month in February 1955 to her most recent presentation in these pages as the sex-starved screenmate of Tommy Noonan in Promises, Promises!--the formidably constructed (40-21-32) Miss Mansfield has received the lioness' share of our photographic attentions among fellow femmes fatales. Her post-Playmate triumph as the towel-clad beauty of Broadway's Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? paved the way to Jayne's subsequent exposure for film buffs.

Susan Strasberg

The talented daughter of world-famous Lee Strasberg, whose Actors Studio has provided the American theater and screen with many of its most accomplished Thespians, made her award-winning Broadway acting bow at 15 in the title role of The Diary of Anne Frank. Since her recent debut before our cameras (December 1963), Susan has made the move to European movies, and will soon star opposite Dirk Bogarde in The High Bright Ones.

Elsa Martinelli

American moviegoers were treated to an uninhibited viewing of one of the more epic clinches from a European-made movie when Playboy preserved some footage of willowy Elsa Martinelli and Robert Mitchurn bussing in the buff (October 1963) in a steamy scene from the film Rampage. Our bare contessa's next coming attraction is The Tenth Victim.

Stella Stevens

Stella's rise to the ranks of current Hollywood leading ladies began in 1960, when she helped us bring in the new year as our January Playmate. Her stellar return to these pages last May was coupled with the comment that those who condemn nudity are "probably the least psychologically fit to judge anything." In The Silencers, she'll be spying with costar Dean Martin.

Mamie Van Doren

Eschewing her early publicity as another of Hollywood's bosomy blonde starlets, Mamie opted to further her fortunes a few years back by attaining footlight fame from coast to coast as a night-club performer. Following her original appearance in Playboy (February 1964), the multitalented miss returned to the screen with a splash, baring her charms for a beer-bath scene in a Tommy Noonan flesh-filled farce and winning additional honors in these pages (June 1964). She'll soon be starring in The Nightcrawlers, a boon for both beauty and beastie buffs alike.

Arlene Dahl

The versatile Miss Dahl had already made her glamorous mark as a fashion model, cover girl, film star, legitimate actress, night-club vocalist, dress designer, syndicated columnist and author by the time she first posed for our photographer in her Beverly Hills boudoir (December 1962). Today, Arlene remains a reigning beauty, with a new best-selling guide to glamor (Always Ask a Man) to back up her expertise in such matters.

Sophia Loren

Italy's first lady of the screen began the current decade with a well-deserved reputation as one of filmdom's most successful combinations of beauty and talent and subsequently earned 1961 Academy Award honors for her performance in Two Women. Despite her current conflict with the Italian Government--which has charged Sophia and producer Carlo Ponti with bigamy--the magnificent Miss Loren, a twotime recipient of Playboy pictorial plaudits, is still the busiest bella ragazza on the contemporary cinema scene. In addition to three new films for Ponti, including her controversial role as Mother Cabrini, she'll do a pair of farces (Once Upon a Time and Mademoiselle Docteur) with Latin Lothario Marcello Mastroianni.

Kim Novak

This year, the green-eyed glamor queen finally relinquished her title as Hollywood's most eligible bachelorette when she eloped with her British costar Richard Johnson following their screen alliance in The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders. As this third Playboy study of the sensual Novak appeal goes to press, she's back on location in England for the filming of 13, a J. Arthur Rank mystery-thriller in which Kim shares top billing with recent video Rogue David Niven.

Brigitte Bardot

France's foremost sex symbol for nearly a decade now, petite, pouting BB has reigned supreme among Gallic love goddesses ever since film fans first caught sight of Brigitte en buff in And God Created Woman. Five times the featured attraction of Playboy pictorials, BB recently stole the French video limelight with an hourlong solo spectacular. Bardolators will get their next peek at her puckish pulchritude in Viva Maria.

Ursula Andress

Sensuous Swiss miss Ursula Andress was the recent subject of the largest Playboy pictorial (June 1965) ever devoted to a single member of the fair sex, wherein she proclaimed herself an advocate of nudity when "it is used for a purpose and is done with a maximum of taste, style and class." Starred since in the film version of Rider Haggard's She, the Alpine wonder plans to conduct an NBC TV tour of Switzerland between shootings for The Blue Max and The Tenth Victim.