The Organist
Angelyne
For decades, Angelyne pouted down from Hollywood billboards, looking like a New-Wave Jayne Mansfield: a dense cloud of bleached blonde hair and abundant cleavage barely contained by furry pink bikini tops.
By Andrew Leland • • 25m ListenIf you’ve lived in L.A. anytime in the last thirty years, you know Angelyne. She’s the blonde bombshell on the billboards that used to be studded like rhinestones all over the city. Angelyne rose to prominence in the ‘80s, and she was a mashup of elements from the pantheon of Hollywood starlets: platinum hair, an hourglass figure, and a breathy, cooing voice. But Instead of a movie or a TV show or an album, Angelyne’s billboards just advertised herself.
A ninth-grader named Kate Wolf interviewed Angelyne at the height of her popularity by pretending she was a reporter for her school newspaper. Twenty-five years later, Kate wins a raffle for a ride in Angelyne’s hot-pink Corvette and asks Angelyne the tough questions about truth, image, aging, and her career as a looming pink archetype of gender.
Written and produced by Kate Wolf. Edited and produced by Jonna McKone.Feature image by Thomas Hawk.