Jayne Mansfield was an actress, singer, Playboy playmate and stage show performer who had an enormous impact on popular culture of the late 1950s despite her limited success in Hollywood. She has remained a well-known subject in popular culture ever since. During a period between 1956 and 1957, there were about 122,000 lines of copy and 2,500 photographs that appeared in newspapers.[1] In an article on her in the St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture (1999), Dennis Russel said that "Although many people have never seen her movies, Jayne Mansfield remains, long after her death, one of the most recognizable icons of 1950s celebrity culture."[1] In the novel Child of My Heart (2004) by Alice McDermott, a National Book Award winning writer, the 1950s is referred to as "in those Marilyn Monroe/Jayne Mansfield days". R. L. Rutsky[2] and Bill Osgerby[3] has claimed that it was Mansfield along with Marilyn Monroe and Brigitte Bardot who made the bikini popular.
M. Thomas Inge described Mansfield, Monroe and Jane Russell as personification of the bad girl in popular culture, as opposed to Doris Day, Debbie Reynolds and Natalie Wood personifying the good girl.[4] Mansfield, Monroe and Barbara Windsor have been described as representations of a historical juncture of sexuality in comedy and popular culture.[5] Evangelist Billy Graham once said, "This country knows more about Jayne Mansfield's statistics than the Second Commandment."[1] As late as the mid-1980s, she remained one of the biggest television draws.[6] As an indication of her impact on popular culture today, there are numerous cultural references to the Hollywood sex symbol and Playboy Playmate in recent films, books, television and music. Numerous show business people were dubbed "Jayne Mansfield" over the time, including Italian actress Marisa Allasio and professional wrestler Missy Hyatt.[7][8][9]
- ^ a b c Russell, Dennis (1999). Jayne Mansfield - St. James Encyclopedia of Pop Culture. Gale. Archived from the original on 2011-08-10. Retrieved 2007-11-28.
- ^ R. L. Rutsky; High Techne: Art and Technology from the Machine Aesthetic to the Posthuman; page 19; University of Minnesota Press; 1999
- ^ Bill Osgerby; Playboys in Paradise: Masculinity, Youth and Leisure-Style in Modern America; page 109; Berg Publishers; 2001
- ^ M. Thomas Inge; Handbook of American Popular Culture; page 1432; Greenwood Pub Group; 1989
- ^ Stephen Wagg; Because I Tell a Joke Or Two: Comedy, Politics, and Social Difference; page 73; Routledge; 1998
- ^ Todd Gitlin; Inside Prime Time; page 196; Routledge; 1994
- ^ Luis Canales, Imperial Gina: The Strictly Unauthorized Biography of Gina Lollobrigida, page 91, Branden Booksef, 1990, ISBN 0-8283-1932-4
- ^ Mira Liehm, Passion and Defiance: Film in Italy from 1942 to the Present, page 143, University of California Press, 1984
- ^ Hyatt, Missy, Salzberg, Charles, Goldblatt, Mark; Missy Hyatt: First Lady of Wrestling; page 78