Brooke Shields

Shields in 1986

Shields began her career as a model when she was 11 months old in 1966. Her first job was for Ivory Soap, when she was shot by Francesco Scavullo.[2] She continued as a successful child model with model agent Eileen Ford, who, in her Lifetime biography, stated that she started her children's division just for Shields. Shields worked with director Woody Allen in his 1977 film Annie Hall, but her role was cut out of the final edit of the film.[25] In 1978, when she was 12 years old, Shields played a child prostitute in the controversial film Pretty Baby. Eileen Ford, founder of the Ford Modeling Agency, said of Brooke Shields: "She is a professional child and unique. She looks like an adult and thinks like one."[26]

In 1980, 14-year-old Shields was the youngest fashion model ever to appear on the cover of Vogue. Later that same year, Shields appeared in controversial print and TV ads for Calvin Klein jeans. The TV ad included her saying the famous tagline: "You want to know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing."[2][27][28] Brooke Shields ads would help catapult Klein's career to super-designer status.[29]

From 1981 to 1983, Shields, her mother, photographer Garry Gross, and Playboy Press were involved in litigation in the New York City Courts over the rights to photographs her mother had signed away to Gross (when dealing with models who are minors, a parent or legal guardian must sign such a release form while other agreements are subject to negotiation). Gross was the photographer of a controversial set of nude images taken in 1975 of a then ten-year-old Brooke Shields with the consent of her mother, Teri Shields, for the Playboy Press publication Sugar 'n' Spice. The images portray Shields nude, standing and sitting in a bathtub, wearing makeup and covered in oil. The courts ruled in favor of the photographer due to a strange twist in New York law. It would have been otherwise had Brooke Shields been considered a child "performer" rather than a model.[30]

By the age of 16, Shields had become one of the most recognizable faces in the United States, because of her dual career as a provocative fashion model and child actress.[2] Time magazine reported in its February 9, 1981, cover story that her day rate as a model was $10,000. In 1983, Shields appeared on the cover of the September issue of Paris Vogue, the October and November issues of American Vogue and the December edition of Italian Vogue.[20] During that period Shields became a regular at New York City's nightclub Studio 54.[31] In 2009, a picture of a naked Brooke Shields taken when she was 10 and included in a work by Richard Prince, Spiritual America, created a stir. It was removed from an exhibition at the Tate Modern after a warning from the police.[32]

Shields at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival

Shields's first major film role was as a lead actress in Louis Malle's Pretty Baby (1978), a movie in which she played a child named Violet who lived in a brothel (in which there were numerous nude scenes).[2] She was only 12 years old when the film was released, and controversy regarding child pornography arose.[33][34][35] This was followed by a slightly less controversial and less notable film, Wanda Nevada (1979).

After two decades of movies, her best known films are still arguably The Blue Lagoon (1980), which included nude scenes between teenage lovers on a tropical island (Shields later testified before a U.S. Congressional inquiry that older body doubles were used in some of them), and Endless Love (1981). The MPAA initially rated Endless Love with an X rating. The film was re-edited to earn an R rating. She won the People's Choice Award in the category of Favorite Young Performer in four consecutive years from 1981 to 1984. In 1998, she played a lesbian, Lily, in The Misadventures of Margaret.[36]

In 2001, Lifetime aired the film What Makes a Family, starring Shields and Cherry Jones in a true story of a lesbian couple who fought the adoption laws of Florida.[37]

Shields began her television career at an early age. In 1980, she was the youngest guest star to ever appear on The Muppet Show, in which she and the Muppets put on their own version of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. She was also the youngest person to host ABC's Fridays, a Saturday Night Live-like sketch comedy show, in 1981. In one episode of the popular comedy sitcom Friends, Shields played Joey's stalker. This role led directly to her being cast in the NBC sitcom Suddenly Susan, in which she starred from 1996 until 2000, and which earned a People's Choice Award in the category of Favorite Female Performer in a New Television Series for her, in 1997, and two Golden Globe nominations.[2]

In the early 1980s, she starred in the USPHS PSA sponsored by the American Lung Association as an initiative that VIPs should become examples and advocates of non-smoking.[38] In the mid-1980s, Brooke began her support of the USO by touring with Bob Hope.[39]

Shields aboard the USS Midway (CV-41) during a USO tour on January 1, 1991

Shields made a couple of guest appearances on That '70s Show. She played Pam Burkhart, Jackie's (Mila Kunis) mother, who later was briefly involved with Donna's (Laura Prepon) father (played by Don Stark). Shields left That '70s Show when her character was written out. Shields recorded the narration for the Sony/BMG recording of The Runaway Bunny, a concerto for violin, orchestra, and reader, by Glen Roven. It was performed by the Royal Philharmonic and Ittai Shapira.

In 1993, she made a guest appearance in a Season 4 episode of The Simpsons, called "The Front."[40]

In the late 2000s, Shields guest-starred on shows like FX's Nip/Tuck and CBS' Two and a Half Men. In 2005, Shields appeared in a season-two episode of HBO's Entourage, entitled "Blue Balls Lagoon." In 2007, she made a guest appearance on Disney's Hannah Montana, playing Susan Stewart, Miley and Jackson's mother, who died in 2004. In 2008, she returned in the primetime drama Lipstick Jungle. The series ended a year later.[2]

Starting in 2010, she made guest appearances on The Middle as the mother of a brood of terror-inducing children and the nemesis of Frankie Heck (played by Patricia Heaton).[41][42] She also appeared as a featured celebrity in NBC's genealogy documentary reality series, Who Do You Think You Are?, where it was revealed that, through her father's ancestry, she is the distant cousin (many generations removed) of King Louis XIV of France, and thus a descendant of both Saint Louis and Henry IV of France.[43]

Starting in 2013, Shields has been an occasional guest co-host in the 9:00 hour of Today on NBC. She also recurred during Season Nineteen of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit as Sheila Porter, the grandmother of Olivia Benson's adopted son, Noah Porter.

Shields has appeared in several Broadway musical theater productions. She played Rizzo in the 1994 revival of Grease. For four months, beginning July 2001, she played Sally Bowles in the long-running 1998 revival of Cabaret.[44] In September 2004, Shields replaced Donna Murphy in the role of Ruth Sherwood in the 2003 revival of Wonderful Town until the show closed four months later.[44] Her performance was widely praised.[45] Ben Brantley of The New York Times praised the "goofy sweetness" she brought to her interpretation of the role, but wrote that she fell short of Donna Murphy's "perfection."[46] In April 2005, Shields played Roxie Hart in a long-running production of Chicago at the Adelphi Theatre in London's West End.[45] Later the same year, she reprised the role in the Broadway revival, from September 9 to October 30.[47] This made her the first performer to have starred in Chicago, Cabaret, and Grease on Broadway, three long-running revivals noted for "stunt casting" of celebrities not known for musical theatre.[48] She took over the role of Morticia Addams in the Broadway musical The Addams Family on June 28, 2011.[49]

In 2006, Shields wrote Down Came the Rain: My Journey Through Postpartum Depression and in 2015 she published There Was a Little Girl about the relationship she had with her mother.[50][51] In 2022, she launched a podcast called Now What? focusing on how people respond to adversity.[52]

Between April and May 2005, Shields spoke to magazines (such as Guideposts) and appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show to publicize her battle with postpartum depression, an experience that included depression, thoughts of suicide, an inability to respond to her baby's needs and delayed maternal bonding.[65][66] Her book, Down Came the Rain, discusses her experience,[67] contributing to a greater public awareness of postpartum depression.[68]

In May 2005, actor Tom Cruise—a Scientologist whose beliefs frown upon psychiatry—condemned Shields, both personally and professionally, for using and speaking in favor of the antidepressant drug Paxil. As Cruise said, "Here is a woman and I care about Brooke Shields, because I think she is an incredibly talented woman, you look at [and think], where has her career gone?" Shields responded that Cruise's remarks on antidepressants were "irresponsible" and "dangerous". She also argued that he should "stick to fighting aliens" (a reference to Cruise's role in War of the Worlds as well as some of the more esoteric aspects of Scientology doctrine and teachings), "and let mothers decide the best way to treat postpartum depression." Shields responded to a further attack by Cruise with an op-ed titled "War of Words", published in The New York Times on July 1, 2005, in which she made an individual case for the medication and stated: "In a strange way, it was comforting to me when my obstetrician told me that my feelings of extreme despair and my suicidal thoughts were directly tied to a biochemical shift in my body. Once we admit that postpartum is a serious medical condition, then the treatment becomes more available and socially acceptable. With a doctor's care, I have since tapered off the medication but, without it, I wouldn't have become the loving parent I am today."[69] On August 31, 2006, according to USA Today,[70] Cruise apologized in person to Shields for the incident; she accepted the apology, saying it was "heartfelt". That November, she and her husband attended Cruise's wedding to Katie Holmes.

On July 7, 2009, Shields spoke at the memorial service for Michael Jackson.[71] She stated in that speech that she first met Jackson when she was 13 years old, and the two instantly became friends.[72] Shields said:

Thinking back to when we met and the many times that we spent together and whenever we were out together, there would be a caption of some kind, and the caption usually said something like 'an odd couple' or 'an unlikely pair,' but to us it was the most natural and easiest of friendships... Michael always knew he could count on me to support him or be his date and that we would have fun no matter where we were. We had a bond... Both of us needed to be adults very early, but when we were together, we were two little kids having fun.[73]

In her eulogy, she shared anecdotes, including an occasion in which she was his date for one of Elizabeth Taylor's weddings, and the pair sneaked into Taylor's room to get the first look at her dress, only to discover Taylor asleep in the bed. Shields gave a tearful speech, referring to the many memories she and Jackson shared and briefly joked about his famous sequin glove. She also mentioned Jackson's favorite song "Smile" by Charlie Chaplin, which was later sung in the memorial service by Jermaine Jackson.[74]

Jackson stated in his 1993 interview with Oprah Winfrey that he was dating Shields at the time.[75] Shields has stated that Jackson asked her to marry him numerous times and to adopt a child together.[76]

In a conversation with Rabbi Shmuley Boteach in 2001, Jackson said of Shields:

That was one of the loves of my life. I think she loved me as much as I loved her, you know? We dated a lot. We, we went out a lot. Her pictures were all over my wall, my mirror, everything. And I went to the Academy Awards with Diana Ross and this girl walks up to me and says 'Hi, I'm Brooke Shields.' Then she goes, 'Are you going to the after-party?' I go, 'Yeah.' 'Good, I'll see you at the party.' I'm going, 'Oh my God, does she know she's all over my room?' So we go to the after-party. She comes up to me she goes, 'Will you dance with me?' I went, 'Yes. I will dance with you.' Man, we exchanged numbers and I was up all night, singing, spinning around my room, just so happy. It was great.[77]