Tabla de contenidos para PEOPLE 50th Anniversary Special en People

‘FOR US, THE REWARD WAS THE EXPERIENCE. AND THEN ALL THIS STUFF IS LIKE THE HAPPY EXTRAS’—ROBERT DOWNEY JR., ON OPPENHEIMER’S BIG AWARDS SEASON FEBRUARY 22, 2024 AN EXTRAORDINARY 50 YEARS! Personal Interviews • Stars at Home • Rare Photos • Princess Diana’s Debut • The Best Celebrity Stories 1974-2024…

I’m scared to death,” Cher says. “I don’t know if that’s the right word. No, it is. ‘Scared’ is the right word.” Sitting in her shower cap, a shivering 104 lbs., Cher looks as plain as Cherlynn Sarkisian, the name with which she came into the world 28 years ago. But then Cher reaches into a massive armoire whose drawers are labeled “Eyelashes,” “Blushes” and “Powder.” The face once again becomes a flawless moonstone. The tight bell-bottoms are buttoned, and a plumed vest half covers her scrawny poitrine. Off comes the shower cap, and the luxuriant black hair flows to her waist. Suddenly the metamorphosis is complete. There, in the place of a high school dropout called Pinky by her friends, stands the glamorous, insouciant Cher—tall, dark and provocative enough…

Richard Franklin Lennox Thomas Pryor may not play all that well in Peoria, but he was born there. He was brought up, he says, in his grandmother’s whorehouse, where his mother worked. “It was not an ideal childhood.” He was booted out of Catholic grammar school at 9, when the nuns discovered the nature of the family business. “I didn’t care so much for me,” he says, “but it made my mother cry.” After another stint in a Sweathog-style class and expulsion at 14, Pryor settled into menial jobs and petty thievery. “We used to go till-tapping, and I always got caught,” he says. “My father kicked [my] ass all the way up Washington Boulevard.” Still, Richard professes to be unembittered by that upbringing and claims, “The biggest moment…

She is Glitter Chic incarnate, a flash of furs and facets and long cars. She sings, dances and, at $1 million a movie, is one of the three priciest actresses in the world (the others: Streisand and Dunaway). President Carter asked her to entertain at his last birthday party, and publishing executive Jackie Onassis is pressing her to do an autobiography. But no Kansas-bred Dorothy, spun off to Oz by a whirlwind, could be as disoriented as Diana Ross today. It’s not the money or the fame that makes the lady suddenly sing the blues. She’s been used to all that since the ’60s, when her Supremes outsold every other group except the Beatles. The problem, she confesses ruefully at 34, is “growing up. I had a very difficult…

Maria Shriver & Arnold Schwarzenegger She is an inner-circle Democrat and niece of JFK who coanchors the CBS Morning News, and he is a Reaganite who made his reputation with an oiled body. Arnold Schwarzenegger says the reason for the success of their relationship is that Maria Shriver has him figured out. “I’m impatient when I want to get something done right away, and if it isn’t, I go crazy,” he says. “I’ll get in the car screaming about something, and she’ll say, ‘Oh, yeah, look good, be brutal, look like the Terminator,’ and I’ll start laughing. Or she’ll pat my shoulder like I’m a child and say, ‘Good boy, thinking about his career. Going to be a big star.’ She always makes me laugh.” And what Maria likes…

‘I WANT TO BE A STAR. BECAUSE IT MAKES YOU FEEL GOOD’—DREW BARRYMORE, 7-YEAR-OLD STAR OF E.T., JULY 19, 1982…

Radio Days In Jamaica, Queens, he’s a traffic-stopping teen sensation known as L.L. Cool J. A charmer with a dimpled grin and a 10-lb. radio, L.L. is instantly recognizable. A crowd of girls want his autograph. They want to kiss him. One says she wants to take him home. “‘L.L.’ is a statement of fact,” explains a friend. “Ladies Love Cool J.” So, it seems, do thousands of fans of rap music, which sets raw street poetry to a booming beat. At 18, Cool J—the initial comes from his name, James Todd Smith—has sold 600,000 copies of his debut album, Radio. He first rapped his way to national attention last year with a picture-stealing cameo in Krush Groove. Things are going so well, in fact, he says he has…

‘IT’S ALMOST LIKE THERE ARE CULTS. GIRLS GO TO SCHOOL THE DAY AFTER THE SHOW, AND THEY ACTUALLY BECOME THESE CHARACTERS. THEY SAY, “OKAY, TODAY I WANT TO BE DYLAN, YOU CAN BE BRENDA, YOU CAN BE BRANDON”’—BRIAN AUSTIN GREEN, BEVERLY HILLS, 90210’S DAVID SILVER, SEPT. 9, 1991 Murphy Brown With her Emmy-winning show hovering in the Nielsen Top 5, Candice Bergen is Murphy Brown to tens of millions. Yet it doesn’t take long in the cozy, casual refuge Bergen has created in L.A. to see how different she and Murphy are. Murphy is a merciless careerist; Bergen has lobbied Murphy creator Diane English to spread the storylines around to prevent burnout and give her more of the one thing having it all doesn’t have going for it—time and…

ON THE FIRST DAY OF FILMING, ‘I WAS HAVING MY MAKEUP PUT ON—WITH NOTHING ON—AND THERE WAS LEO. HE SAW ME AND WENT, “WHOOA!” AND I SAID, “WE’RE GOING TO SPEND THE WHOLE DAY LIKE THIS; WE MIGHT AS WELL GET OVER IT NOW.” THAT BROKE THE ICE’—KATE WINSLET, JAN. 26, 1998…

‘NOBODY HAS WHAT YOU HAVE TO OFFER. AS LONG AS YOU REALIZE THAT, NO ONE CAN STOP YOU’—JENNIFER LOPEZ, MAY 2000…

‘BEFORE, WHEN A MOVIE WAS FINISHING, I’D CALL MY MANAGER AND SAY, “OH MY GOD, WE’VE GOT TO GET A JOB.” NOW I HAVE TWO YEARS OF WORK’—HALLE BERRY, ON THE OSCAR EFFECT, DEC. 30, 2002…

‘“MATCH MADE IN HEAVEN” IS NOT THE TERM YOU WOULD USE TO DESCRIBE US. BUT WHEN WE MIXED OUR PERSONALITIES TOGETHER, IT CREATED A SPARK’—JOANNA GAINES, OCT. 24, 2016…

It’s just before midnight on New Year’s Eve in Nashville, and Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban are counting down the last seconds of 2018 in unison. With daughters Sunday, 10, and Faith, 8, smiling by their side, Kidman wraps her arms around Urban’s neck and the pair ring in the New Year with a kiss. That they happen to be onstage in front of 200,000 reveling music fans—gathered in Bicentennial Park for Urban’s rousing gig—is no matter. After 12 years of marriage, sparks still fly, and they aren’t squandering a single joyful moment. “My connection and my love for him is so powerful,” says Kidman, relaxed and down-to-earth over lunch earlier in the day. “The girls and I are so lucky to have the man that he is. And he…

For Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya, both 25, it was instant screen chemistry when they met about costarring in Dune. On-set they forged a close friendship. “We had a good vibe,” says Zendaya. “She was like a breath of fresh air,” says Chalamet. “She had a great energy.” As your careers skyrocket, how do you stay grounded? ZENDAYA I have a massive family, lots of brothers, sisters, nieces and nephews, pulling my ass back down to the ground, which is great. You need that grounding and that support. I’m lucky to also have great friends—this guy has become one of them. TIMOTHÉE CHALAMET I too have a great family that can yank me back to earth. My mom was an actress. My sister’s an actress. So they get it. What influenced…

George Clooney “The times I used to be able to sit back and read a book—that’s done for awhile,” says Clooney, who has 3-year-old twins, Alexander and Ella, with his wife, Amal, a human rights attorney. “Like, I was watching Game 6 of the World Series, the winning game for the Dodgers, and my son had a dream that a dinosaur with fire was coming after him. It was just when Mookie Betts hit the home run, and I’m trying to comfort him. So things have changed a little bit.” The couple’s humanitarian work covers a broad spectrum. A cause “has to be something we clearly believe in and something that a little amplification could help,” he says. “But I’m in the same situation as most fathers of 3-year-olds:…

Cicely Tyson One afternoon in the mid-1950s, when she was an 18-year-old secretary in New York, Cicely Tyson got up and “announced to a vast roomful of my coworkers: ‘I’m just sure God didn’t put me on the face of this earth to bang on a typewriter the rest of my life.’ I got up and sashayed out. … Then I had to decide what to do instead.” Acting was hardly an obvious alternative for the Emmy winner honored this week for her CBS special The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, since at that point Cicely had never been to a play or a movie. Her religious mother forbade it when she was growing up. Entertainment for Cicely was singing in church “where we seemed to spend all our…

Kiss What other act includes four fire extinguishers manned by “roadies” at the ready? It took Kiss’s Prometheus, Gene Simmons, 25, a month to master his flame-spitting shtick, but he still occasionally flubs and sets his hair ablaze (mercifully so far not out of control). Before founding the group (with rhythm guitarist Paul Stanley, 23), Simmons was an apprentice schoolteacher and man Friday at Vogue (“a very fast typist,” remembers a top editor). Now, Gene is on a success jag, due less to the group’s elemental rock ’n’ roll than to its thick makeup. Simmons’s Hungarian immigrant mother—he still lives with her in Queens when between girlfriends—visited one recent performance and then wandered backstage and inquired: “Which one were you?” —JULY 21, 1975 David Bowie “I wanted my freedom…

When it premiered two seasons back, Dynasty seemed little more than a gene-spliced ABC replicant of CBS’s Dallas, with plots centered on feuding oil tycoons in Denver, Blake Carrington (John Forsythe) and Cecil Colby (Lloyd Bochner). There were gorgeous ladies, handsome dudes, plenty of bed-hopping and back-stabbing—and mediocre ratings. Despite its shameless melodramatic excesses, the show lacked something. There was no wickedly charismatic scourge, no character to love to hate. In short, no J.R., despite Forsythe’s machinations. A year later the producers fixed that by adding a female sexual predator—elegant, articulate Alexis Carrington. Cast as Forsythe’s vindictive ex, she became Colby’s mistress and the nemesis of Forsythe’s current wife, Krystle (Linda Evans). It would have been a tall order for most actresses, but what the show really then had…

An American flag flies outside Luther and Lela Scherer’s isolated farmhouse near Olney, III. Inside, the TV has been bringing them images of a gaunt, ravaged figure whom they, like most Americans, barely recognize. Sadly, they do recognize him, not just as Rock Hudson, perhaps the last of the classic square-jawed leading men, but as their own nephew, whom they still call by his boyhood name, Roy. “When Luther saw him on television the way he looks now, he wouldn’t have known him as Roy, he looks so bad,” Lela says. “How could he go down so much in a year’s time?” The answer to that plaintive question—acquired immune deficiency syndrome—was equally almost beyond their comprehension. “I hadn’t heard of AIDS really,” Lela admits. Like the millions of Hudson’s fans…

Luke & Laura & Liz “I’m wild about that show. Someone from General Hospital came to see me when I was doing The Little Foxes in New York, and I agreed to do the soap when I got to L.A.,” says Elizabeth Taylor, who donated her $2,000 paycheck to two Virginia hospitals that once treated her. GH producer Gloria Monty insisted that Liz could not play herself, but only a specially created character—Helena Cassadine, the rich widow of a mad scientist who had schemed in a typically implausible recent plot to freeze GH’s Port Charles hometown. Says Liz of her two-day spree on the soap opera set: “I had a ball.” She apologetically dubbed herself “Madame Flub” after repeatedly mispronouncing her character’s name and, except for noting that things…

Mariah Carey “When I look back, it’s so unbelievable! It really is like Cinderella.” After just 10 months of struggling as a waitress, coat checker and part-time backup singer for rhythm-and-blues diva Brenda K. Starr, Carey met [Sony Music president] Tommy Mottola at a party. Anxious to sign a female singer, Mottola snatched Carey’s demo tape as she was about to hand it to another music scout. Driving home he played the demo in his tape deck. “It didn’t have my name on it,” says Carey. “He couldn’t match up the voice with this Long Island kid in a football cheerleading jacket. So he drove back to the party to find me, and I was gone.” And so, using the plastic cassette tape as his glass slipper, Mottola launched…

I am not a character on TV. My life is not a sitcom. When my family allowed our every waking moment (or sleeping ones, in my dad’s case) to be filmed by MTV for six months and turned into a half-hour reality show, I thought it was just another one of my parents’ crazy ideas, so I went along with it. I’ve realized my family is different from other people’s since I was a baby. … My dad has always been Ozzy Osbourne, a heavy metal singer with long hair and tattoos. My mom [Sharon] is a powerful person in the music business and loves to decorate with skulls and crosses and devils. She also has just as much girlie stuff and wishes I was more clean-cut and ladylike.…

Charlie’s Angels During their lunchtime interview, the actresses are as chummy as three teenage girls at a slumber party. All three look and act younger than their ages (Lucy Liu’s 31; Cameron Diaz’s 28; and Drew Barrymore’s 25). Lucy picks on Drew for absentmindedly picking her nose; Cameron talks with her mouth full; and each one gleefully utters dirty words now and again. And they all get up more than once to refill their plates with food. Lucy applauds Drew’s executive decision to include scenes in the movie of the trio pigging out. “We’re not going out there being stick figures. We’re not dieting,” she says. “We’re intelligent, we’re sexy, we’re setting fashion trends, and we’re also accepting ourselves as women.” They trained prior to filming with a martial-arts…

ON GOING TO A GIRLS’ SCHOOL WITH NICKY HILTON: We didn’t chat back then. I was the nerdball in theater and chorus—the girl other girls would call “slut.” I don’t want to relive high school! WHY SHE’S BLONDE: Once an interviewer thought I was Amy Winehouse for the first five minutes. Amy is badass, but I want to be known for my own look. ON CHICAGO COPS CITING HER FOR INDECENT EXPOSURE: I was on my way to perform, and I had on hot pants. The cop said, “You look totally inappropriate. There are children here.” I was like, “It’s fashion.” I was full-out drama. I love getting reprimanded for my fashion. It means I’m stopping traffic.”—JUNE 22, 2009…

Chris Hemsworth How did you react when you found out you were Sexiest Man Alive? “I found it pretty funny. My wife did too. … I can just say to her, ‘Now remember, this is what the people think, so I don’t need to do the dishes anymore—I’m above that. I’ve made it now.’” [Laughs] What will your brothers Liam and Luke think? “They’ll give me some stick over it, I reckon. But that’s all right; that’s what brothers do.” —DEC. 1, 2014 David Beckham Any fashion regrets? “Me and Victoria always laugh about when we went to this Gucci show, and we had on matching leather outfits, and now we’re like, ‘What were we thinking?’ We were living at her mum’s house at the time, and she was…

Why do you love working together? DAVIS To me Denzel is familiar; he’s easy. And at the same time, I’m a fan. I don’t like telling him that! But I think he always makes interesting choices, always rooted in truth and humanity. He’s not a wimp, and I like that. WASHINGTON And thank you, good night. And scene. What do you like most about Viola? WASHINGTON Viola is a great actor. I love working with her, and I love watching her. What did you enjoy about returning to these characters? DAVIS You can never be tired of that [August Wilson] dialogue. The power of those words—that’s what you miss. But you also miss the actors. I usually hate being the only girl because I feel like I’m so shy…

In 1998, when Lily Gladstone was 12, she used her allowance to buy the double VHS tape of Titanic, starring Leonardo DiCaprio as rakish stowaway Jack Dawson. “I preordered it from Toys ‘R’ Us,” says Gladstone. “I loved that movie. Whenever I had crushes in sixth grade, I would project them into Jack.” Fast-forward 25 years. The self-described “energetic” former theater kid is not only starring opposite DiCaprio in Martin Scorsese’s acclaimed true-crime drama Killers of the Flower Moon, but she’s getting Oscar buzz herself. It’s a heady moment: If she does score an Academy Award nomination in January, Gladstone, who has Blackfeet and Nez Perce ancestry, will become the first Native American up for Best Actress honors. Gladstone, 37, had faith that success would be possible. “My dad always…

‘IT’S ONLY A ROLE. I’M NOT GOING TO GROW UP AND BE A PROSTITUTE. IF I WERE IN A WALT DISNEY MOVIE, PEOPLE WOULD NEVER ASK ME IF THE PART WOULD AFFECT MY LIFE. THAT’S SO DUMB’—BROOKE SHIELDS, 13-YEAR-OLD STAR OF PRETTY BABY, MAY 29, 1978…

Surprisingly, this first feature on Diana didn’t garner even a mention on the March 9, 1981, cover, but a June 22 cover (at right, top left) previewed her nuptials. Think of her as the girl next door, a blue-eyed blonde with a peaches-and-Devonshire-cream complexion and a button nose. She played as a child with his brothers at his family’s country place and grew up to be a kindergarten teacher. So it was only fitting she should marry the boy next door, even if he does happen to be HRH the Prince of Wales and heir apparent to the throne of England. The welcome news pealed through Britain last week that the world’s most eligible bachelor had, at 32, plighted his troth to 19-year-old Lady Diana Spencer. He has been…

Normally she carries a mere 122 pounds on her 5'7" frame. Now she’s “15 pounds heavier than I ever was”—but totally unconcerned. Though good nutrition is high on Jane Fonda’s list of causes, she’s been indulging her appetite since a period of forced slimness while making 9 to 5, Rollover and On Golden Pond. “I’m tired after three movies in three years,” she says. “I’m 44. No reason I have to be on a strict regimen. Most women are overconcerned about thinness.” What should be No. 1, says the proprietor of California’s Jane Fonda Workout centers and the author of the top bestseller Jane Fonda’s Workout Book, is plain good health. Her centers (in Beverly Hills, Encino and San Francisco) and book push a program to burn up excess…

‘WITH KIDS, TO BE A ROCK STAR IS THE ULTIMATE. WHEN THEIR PARENTS LEAVE, THEY TURN THE MUSIC UP. DANCING WITH YOUR PANTS OFF—IT’S TOTAL FREEDOM’—TOM CRUISE, ON HIS STAR-MAKING SCENE IN RISKY BUSINESS, SEPT. 5, 1983…

While the rest of the Jackson clan was on the Victory tour, sister Janet Jackson, then 18, eloped Sept. 7, 1984, with singer James DeBarge. The brothers were shocked; so were their parents, Katherine and Joe. But no one was more alarmed than A&M record executive John McClain, who feared the marriage would torpedo Janet’s career. “I tried to convince her that she’s a teen idol and people just wouldn’t accept it,” says McClain, who, after eight months of hounding, persuaded her to annul the pact. Asked how he justifies his actions, McClain responds, “Hey—I’m trying to make her a star!” Although some may question McClain’s methods, there is no question that he has succeeded. Janet Jackson’s third album, Control, jumped to No. 1 on Billboard’s charts and spawned…

Heading back to her $15 million mansion on Miami’s Star Island after a long day of rehearsing, Gloria Estefan begins reminiscing. “That’s la Torre de la Libertad [the Freedom Tower],” Estefan says, nodding at the landmark that was once a processing center for Cuban refugees. “We’d get Spam and welfare cheese there because as refugees we couldn’t afford anything else. My mother would cover the Spam in Coke to make it brown and sweet.” The distance between the Freedom Tower and her home is only 15 minutes, but for Estefan, 38, it represents an odyssey of Homeric dimensions. A superstar, she has won two Grammys, sold 45 million records and become the most successful crossover performer in Latin music history. “Gloria is a fighter and deserves to be where…

Michael J. Fox could not get out of the limousine. He and his wife, actress Tracy Pollan, had just pulled up to the Beverly Hilton for the Golden Globe Awards last January, and the actor realized he was in trouble. Outside, reporters and photographers stood poised to greet the star of ABC’s hit sitcom Spin City, but Fox, 37, was in no shape to greet them. Like so many times before, his left arm and leg were shaking uncontrollably. Behind the limo’s darkened windows, Pollan began squeezing Fox’s hand and massaging his foot. But for the tremors to subside, the couple would have to wait for his medication to kick in. Fox asked the driver to circle the block. “He probably thought I was nuts,” says Fox, with a…

Nicknamed “the Tush” by bloggers, the onetime Paris Hilton party pal is set to star on the reality series Keeping Up With the Kardashians, premiering Oct. 14 on E! Kardashian, 26, who owns the L.A. boutique Dash with her sisters, spills her secrets. IS IT REAL OR PADDED? It’s all real. I do not have butt implants. Everyone in my family has these big fat butts. It definitely came from my Armenian side, and I’m proud of my heritage. HAVE YOU ALWAYS LOVED IT? When I was 11, I hated it. I would cry and pray that it would stop growing. But in high school I started to like it. Now I embrace my big butt. WHAT’S THE BEST WAY TO SHOW IT OFF? In tight-fitting dresses. Hervé Léger…

The media narrative has generally gone something like this: Eight years ago she was the princess in a fairy tale, the beautiful starlet marrying the megastar Tom Cruise in an Italian castle, their adorable baby daughter Suri by their side. Five years later she was the prisoner escaping that very marriage, fleeing Los Angeles and Scientology. Most recently she’s been the always gracious but somewhat aloof actress who steadfastly refuses to discuss anything personal. Today, however, Holmes, 35, is none of those versions that have been projected onto her and instead is playful, girlish and surprisingly funny. She laughs freely and often. Dressed in jeans and a gray cashmere sweater in a sunny, light-filled loft in Manhattan, she has her hair loose and her makeup minimal. “I’m channeling Mallory…

The “Drivers License” singer’s punk-laced pop debut album, Sour, proved Rodrigo, 18, is more than just a viral hit. Your songs are so personal. What’s it like sharing them with the world? I’d be lying if I said that putting my deepest, darkest insecurities and sadnesses out there is just slightly scary. But I’ve always been an oversharer. I literally wrote breakup songs before I ever held a boy’s hand. I just love writing music. When I watch interviews of my favorite songwriters, they say songwriting is about helping people feel less alone. That’s true for me too. Sour was your heartbreak era. How are you now? I’m in a completely different headspace and a lot happier than I was when I wrote that record. I’m more confident, which I…

It’s a sun-kissed afternoon in late September, and Britney Spears pirouettes in powdery white sands on a beach in Tahiti. Tousled blonde hair falls over her shoulders as she goes barefoot at the surf’s edge. The 41-year-old pop icon, capturing photos for the cover of People while on a tropical getaway, moves into the shallows in search of a good shot. Working the camera as only she can, Spears looks up and smiles. Until Nov. 12, 2021—the day a Los Angeles County judge terminated the conservatorship that had governed Spears’s life for nearly 14 years—she had few respites like this. The legal victory, following fervent testimony in which Spears accused her father, Jamie, 71, and others of exploitation and abuse, set the stage for a second act that is…

FRONT COVER clockwise from top right: MPTV; Aliah Anderson/Getty Images; Amy Sussman/Getty Images; Ron Galella/Ron Galella Collection/Getty Images; Alamy; Kevin Mazur/WireImage; Andrew Eccles/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal/Getty Images; Kevin Mazur/Getty Images; Daniele Venturelli/WireImage; Tim Graham Photo Library/Getty Images; John Shearer/WireImage; Harry Langdon/Getty Images TITLE PAGE Gotham/GC Images TABLE OF CONTENTS 2-3 Brian Bowen Smith 1970s: IN THE BEGINNING 6-7 ABC/Getty Images 8-9 Douglas Kirkland/Getty Images 10-11 Dennis Stone/Mirrorpix/Getty Images 13 from top: ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images(2) 14-15 Slick Lawson 16 Steve Larson/The Denver Post/Getty Images 18-19 from left: Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images; Robert Stigwood Prods/Hemdale/Kobal/Shutterstock 20-21 from left: Ron Galella/Ron Galella Collection/Getty Images; Douglas Kirkland/Getty Images 1980s: THE VIDEO AGE 22-23 Alamy 24-25 Jack Mitchell/Getty Images 26 Anwar Hussein/Getty Images 28-29 from left: Globe Photos/Zuma; Vinny Zuffante/Getty Images 30-31…