There’s no denying that the
greatest Hollywood sex symbol of the 1960s was Raquel Welch, who pretty
much exploded in popularity at the time in movies like One Million,
B.C. (she wore a fur bikini!) and the British spy comedy Fathom (featured
in various stages of near-undress). In the process, she did away with the image
of the blonde bombshell that had dominated the 1950s — Marilyn Monroe, Jane
Mansfield, for example — and ushered in a whole new kind of sexy that had a
major impact on moviegoers, celebrity gawkers and studio heads desperate to get
her on the big screen. Well, as impossible as it seems, Raquel has just
celebrated her 80th birthday and for those who are wondering, she’s doing
great.
Role
in ‘One Million Years B.C.’
And, as she’s made clear over
the years, she for one never did buy into the whole sex symbol thing, despite
what she put out there. “Being a sex symbol was rather like being a
convict. That I was locked in this image and couldn’t get out,” she’s shared
with the media. “My family was very conservative and I had a traditional
upbringing. I was not brought up to be a sex symbol, nor is it in my nature to
be one. The whole ‘sex symbol’ thing is part of what I do as an actress. It’s the
kind of character I play. It’s part of me, but not the whole me.”
She was even more candid in a
2001 interview with Cigar Aficionado, admitting, “I think I was always
more intimidated by my image than anyone else. I mean, there’s a tremendous
loss of self, because you really are in a job where this image has been
created. You get tired, you wake up ugly, you don’t always have anything new to
say to people and you feel like a lemon that’s had all the juice squeezed out
of it.”
Tragic
Love Story
Certainly not the loveliest of
analogies, but it’s how she felt — particularly when all of it was first
happening because the fear was that she would be found out to be “a fake.”
“Like everyone is going to
think, ‘Well, why did we think she was so great?” stated Raquel.
“It’s human nature to pick people apart and you just can’t stand that you’re
under all this scrutiny. And yet at the same time, you’re saying, ‘I’m the
luckiest person in the world, because I’ve got this chance that everybody
dreams of having.’ It’s really bittersweet.”
