I don’t watch America’s Next Top Model for a reason. Well, there are a few reasons. The big one is that I like to remember Tyra Banks as an enigma. She was one of the fiercest 1990s supermodels and worked runways and editorials like crazy. Somewhere around 2005 (when her first talk show hit the airwaves), I started to realize that Tyra was a little nutty. So I selectively remember old school Tyra.
Well, Tyra has a new talk show coming out next year (god help us). She’s also promoting her new makeup line called TYRA Beauty, so she did an interview with Yahoo. The makeup actually sounds pretty cool because it’s mostly stick-based stuff. The eyeliner is called “Oops” because it includes liner on one end and makeup remover on the other. Handy. In this interview, Tyra put her stamp on the current trend of journos asking women about feminism. Compared to some of the other starlets, Tyra does okay with her answer:
She funded TYRA Beauty: “It was important for me to create a brand that wasn’t a licensing deal, but a true self-funded startup. Something that could be a legacy business, not something that would be hot for a moment and then go away. Everything is saturated today. But I’ve always been about zagging when everyone else is zigging. I hate me-too. So I became obsessed with innovation–with being unique, first, and different.”
No foundation/concealer yet: “On photo shoots, when I was a young model, they didn’t have my color. And I said, ‘That’s not going to happen with my project.'” She says she won’t do foundation unless every woman–those with ebony and alabaster skin, and every color in between–can find what they’re looking for. (She notes that if future technology and budgets allow, she’ll make it happen.)
Is she a feminist? “I do consider myself a feminist, yeah. Totally. Even when I was a model with my bra and panties on for a Victoria’s Secret fashion show. Sure, I was stompin’, and I know guys were like, ‘Woo, look at Tyra.’ But I know that my body being thicker on that runway meant something. A lot of the things I did in my modeling career as a woman of color was part of that feminism–of expanding the definition of beauty and making women feel beautiful, no matter what color their skin is.”
She’s a businesswoman/feminist: “Right now, with women in power, and not apologizing for being strong or wanting to make money or to be on top, that’s my message–and that’s all feminism. I just feel like you should be able to have a fierce face at the same time.”
[From Yahoo!]
Was Tyra ever considered “thick”? Compared to the waiflike models like Kate Moss, sure, but Tyra fit right in with the 1990s Victoria’s Secret catalogue ladies. VS models are much thinner these days. Tyra was always one of the standouts during her VS tenure. Now I can’t recognize more than one or two of them by name.
Tyra’s take on feminism is fine. She’s not super serious about it, but Tyra is rarely serious about anything except the importance of “smiling with the eyes.” I kid. Tyra’s message is that you can be sexy and feminist at the same time, and that’s true.
Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet & WENN
Haha, I think at this point, the only VS models I can tell apart are Leo’s girlfriends and Doutzen.
But… But how can you tell Leo’s girlfriends apart? They’re all the same!
Bar and Toni look alike.
Gisele looks nothing like Bar or Toni or Erin.
Erin looked 12 years old in the face.
Don’t worry, once you get past college, you’ll just look at them all and be like, “Who the eff are all of these chicks?” 😉
I didn’t watch a whole lot of her successful t.v. shows (America’s Next Top Model and The Tyra Show) but what I did watch, and what I have seen, read and heard about her makes me like her a whole lot for a celeb. I love that she promotes and values “GOODNESS” over “BEAUTY.”
Me, too. I binge watch ANTM if I’m sick. I haven’t seen it in a few years, but she was nice on it, and seemed truly concerned about the models’ health and body image and not smoking to be thin, etc.
Same here (though I did watch a lot of ANTM when it first came out).
I swear she only started ANTM to size up and banish her modeling competition! Where are any of the season winners now? They do their little stint with CoverGirl and then poof…they fade into oblivion,
My first memory of her was George Michael’s Too Funky video in 1992. It was kind of pre-internet so wasn’t overly aware of VS brand until I went to New York in 2002.
All the models then were kind of more curvy than now (not in comparison to general population), then Kate Moss hit the scene and the look changed.
I just googled the video, I had NO IDEA that the dark haired woman who gets pushed onto the stage was Julie Newmar!!!
“Tyra’s message is that you can be sexy and feminist at the same time, and that’s true.”
All the true.
I watched the first few seasons of ANTM and meh. But I did love me some Elyse on S1 and followed her Hong Kong photo blog afterward–that girl has style, and she’s a great photographer. Last I heard she was heading into pro photography but who knows. I wish her well.
I loved Elyse’s live journal. It all went terribly pear shaped with her long term BF as I remember and I never heard much about her after that. *rushes off to google*
Tyra was a part of the era that had my favs like Naomi, Cindy, Linda , Christy and more. But she also survived in the business as a VS and Sports Illustrated model along with the likes of Gisele, Heidi and Adriana Lima and yes she was much thicker than those models.
See, I don’t know if my age is showing or whatever, but I actually KNOW those women. I can tell them apart. They all had their own special thing, whether it was on/off the catwalk. Nowadays, I can’t tell whether these new girls are VS, SI or JC Penny.
Good for her. I think she’s hit the almost Mariah point of celebrity wackydom and self-centeredness, but they all do, and she still seems like she has a good heart and cares about the models on her show. I miss the ye olden days when models were a size six and had individual looks. I remember thinking Adriana Lima looked like Sophia Loren until I saw her on the today show and realized that she was three inches taller and twenty five pounds lighter than I imagined. Oh well.
Yeah, I’ve never found her thick. Even now, I don’t think oe see her as “thick.” Just me though. I do like that on her model show that she genuinely seems concerned for the models health. I only watch it when nothing else is on.
I remember a term, the “Tyra bounce” because she was so well endowed – so maybe she was a bit thicker? But, all those 90s super models were Amazon goddesses compared to the waifs that came later.
I just have to add, I have Cindy Crawford AND an Elle Macpherson exercise DVD’s, the 1990’s ones, and both appear to look about twice the size of models these days. Like, Cindy has a belly and everything (small, but still visible). It’s crazy what the mid-to-late 90’s ‘Heroin Chic’ did to the modeling industry.
“It’s crazy what the mid-to-late 90′s ‘Heroin Chic’ did to the modeling industry.”
And really, what it’s done to women’s self esteem and body images. I don’t know if being rail thin and the thigh gap and all of that would be a thing if it wasn’t for ‘heroin chic’.
I agree, back in those days the models were always slim, but healthy looking. Now it seems to be a race to see who can have the skinniest person modeling their clothes.
At the time that Cindy and Elle would have done their videos they were already very established in their careers and therefore “allowed” to be bigger.
You are so right. Healthy looking I feel is the key word here. There is not one VS model that looks like this anymore.
https://www.google.com/search?q=cindy+crawford&newwindow=1&rlz=1C1GGGE_enUS459US459&es_sm=93&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=qFJIVLAyx4bIBLuVgrAI&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAQ&biw=1517&bih=741&dpr=0.9#facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=PWaHjwWBBWS7DM%253A%3BqTELa2_O68MnVM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fimstars.aufeminin.com%252Fstars%252Ffan%252Fcindy-crawford%252Fcindy-crawford-20070413-239491.jpg%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.sofeminine.co.uk%252Fcelebrities%252Fcindy-crawford%252Falbum840172%252Fcindy-crawford-fan-club-album-20779912.html%3B337%3B500
Yesss!!! I know she’s a bit wacky, but her heart seems to be in the right place. And she’s still super fierce. Her definition on feminism is on point.
ANTM has been unwatchable for many years now for being cast for drama and not actual model potential. Although the new format is less on that but hardly any of them are better quality than what you’d see at a mall fashion show so it doesn’t have much integrity And Tyra’s antics, oh boy. But I don’t mind her answers here. I agree, better than what we’ve been seeing in interviews. She’s smart enough to understand what feminism actually means.
Tyra is a narcissist and a lunatic, and she just gets crazier with age. BUT, I always thought she really is honest with her self-acceptance speech.
Me too. I respect her talk on appreciating what makes you unique and embracing a wider version of beauty!
Sometimes she sounds crazy as hell though and she is a huge narcissist.
I love Tyra!
I don’t think tyra is a narcissist. Sorry to make this comparison, but if anyone is a narcissist, its that bitch Naomi campbell. Tyra however seems pretty down to earth to me. As for her being thicker, I think she was in comparison to the super thin and flat chested models.