RAQUEL WELCH |
The career of Raquel Welch is of small
consequence to a lover of movies but
is crucial to anyone interested in how
a glamorous image can be projected.
In one sense, Raquel Welch is a
genuinely revolutionary, historical
figure. Just as Bing Crosby changed
popular singing and had a lasting
influence on all who followed, Raquel
Welch changed the accepted idea of
what constituted a movie star and of
what constituted an attractive young
woman. Many have followed her lead.
Raquel Welch was born in 1940 and was married at eighteen to James Welch by whom she had two children. She had plastic surgery to her nose and then went to Hollywood where she met and married Patrick Curtis who would mastermind her climb to fame. While keeping their marriage a secret, Curtis bombarded the media on both sides of the Atlantic with photographs of Raquel, more often than not in a bikini, together with trivia about her. At this he was remarkably successful and soon her pictures were in magazines everywhere. However Hollywood was wary and did not offer her work, and after several months people were asking why Raquel Welch was always in newspapers but never on the screen.
Connosseurs of the female form had a different question. Normally a woman with large mammary glands will also have well rounded shoulders and arms, but Raquel Welch's stomach, shoulders and arms were of a order normally found in flat-chested women. Noticing this, many people began to question whether silicon had played a part in her development. When challenged on the issue, Raquel Welch has always denied that her body has been artificially boosted. (In most of her glamour pictures, Raquel's cleavage looks quite genuine - unlike other actresses who have had their figures enhanced by surgery.)
Raquel played a few tiny roles and
after two years she secured a proper
part in "The Fantastic Voyage". She obtained some publicity from a
scene where the other members of the cast had to wipe her clean. Apparently,
her colleagues showed gentlemanly restraint until director Richard Fleischer
urged them on, whereupon they displayed lusty enthusiasm!
There were no other worthwhile offers in Hollywood, so she trod in Ursula Andress's footsteps and went to England to make a prehistoric story for Hammer, "One Million Years B.C." Welch followed this with further European movies, none of which has survived, before returning to Hollywood.
She was cast opposite James Stewart in "Bandolero" and Frank Sinatra in "Lady In Cement". Welch gave a soft, yet acceptable performance in "Bandolero", but her acting was severely inadequate in the Sinatra movie. Now, five years after her first bit part, the writing was on the wall. Raquel Welch could fill a bikini, she could fill newspaper columns, but she could not fill the screen. Beyond reach was Claudia Cardinale's formula for success (capable actress + beauty + good films + publicity = long term career) but she could follow the Ursula Andress path (beauty + rubbish films all over the globe + publicity = maintaining a career until the public catches on).
Raquel Welch's globe-trotting started at once: to England for "The Magic Christian"; to Cyprus for "The Beloved" and to Spain for "100 Rifles", a movie memorable only for a scene where she rubs her chest under an improvised shower to lure soldiers into a massacre.
There has never been any indication that
Raquel Welch has attempted to become
a better actress or has ever wanted to make memorable films. She has, however,
indisputably mastered the art of
publicity. Welch is a skilled performer
on television chat shows, presenting an
attractive combination of humour,
determination and modesty. She is also astute in choosing which other guests
she will appear with and whom she will avoid. Famously, on the Michael Parkinson
show in the U. K. she refused
to share the guest couch with Morecambe and Wise because she realised their
humour would completely obliterate her.
In press interviews she normally has something to say, (and not always charitable: in her 'Playboy' interview she made some unnecessary remarks about Kim Novak and Carroll Baker that were less than lady-like).
Welch has also mastered the publicity photograph. Unlike Ursula Andress and Daliah Lavi, she has always set time aside for photographers, and unlike Anita Ekberg, she has made sure that only flattering pictures of good quality were published.
This sustained effort at publicity kept the name and face of Raquel Welch familiar to the public, and gradually it became accepted that she was a genuine movie star even though her films were unsuccessful at the box office and immediately forgettable. Similarly, her endless torrent of photographs eventually swamped questions about silicon, and she became accepted as a physical ideal of womanhood, thin shoulders notwithstanding.
This then is Raquel Welch's contribution to
Western civilisation. A movie star is no longer
perceived as some-one who stars above the
title in major movies and who is judged by
that work. Today a movie star is any-one who
receives massive personal publicity and has a
leading role in a movie, regardless of quality.
A movie love goddess is no longer an actress with a highly individual face that
excites people's imaginations. Today, a movie pin-up is any young
woman who has a tiny waist and large
breasts, regardless of credibility.
Many will dispute that Raquel Welch brought about this change on her own. Clearly she was not alone and clearly others were happy to see this change.
What is beyond dispute is that today Hollywood is full of young actresses who believe that having their breasts enlarged is essential to any chance of success. Films and television programs feature actresses with emaciated stomachs, matchstick shoulders and limbs, and large, obviously artificial breasts. It also cannot be disputed that there are today actresses who are regarded as stars merely because they have appeared in two or three movies, even though the quality of the movies is dreadful.