Sure, modern day women are amazing, but there’s something to be said about retro-style ladies. Their vintage clothing, forgotten hair-dos and sultry behavior is the stuff of fantasies. Let’s go back in time for five hardcore celebrity crushes set in the 1960s or 1970s.
Some of these actresses appeared in TV shows or films set during the high-flying 60s and tumultuous 70s. And in one instance, this singer-songwriter was the real thing who actually lived the rock-star lifestyle in the 1970s.
image via thezoereport.com
Sharon Stone | Casino
Perhaps the greatest role in Sharon Stone’s career is Ginger from Casino. Martin Scorsese’s 1996 mobster film is an intriguing story about the rise and fall of a casino manager named Ace Rothstein (Deniro). Ace falls madly in love with a part-time hustler Ginger (Sharon Stone) and the two embark on a hot and heated collision course, and all the while Ace’s gambling empire comes crumbling down around him.
When we’re first introduced to Ginger in Casino, we discover that she is a sexy, sassy, street-smart hustler who is stealing chips from high rollers at the craps table. When she’s confronted by one of her victims, she causes a huge ruckus inside the casino. During an iconic scene, she throws several racks of chips up in the air while dozens of casino patrons dive onto the floor to snatch up the free chips.
In fact, Casino is loosely based on real-life story of men like Anthony Spilotro, nicknamed “the ant,” who was heavily involved with the Las Vegas gambling industry in the 1970s, and one of many interesting films inspired by casinos.
Casino’s art department nailed the late 1960s and early 1970s look, especially with Sharon Stone’s wardrobe. Back in the 1960s, it was fashionable to dress up in casinos, because it was part of the culture at the time. Her character, Ginger, dressed classy yet proactive. She was never in the same outfit twice.
SHARON STONE STATS: For her role as Ginger, Sharon Stone won a Golden Globe in 1995 for Best Actress. She was also nominated for an Oscar (but lost to Susan Sarandon, who then starred in Dead Man Walking.)
image via FanPop.com
Kate Hudson | Almost Famous
For this retro crush, it’s time to flashback to 1973, although this movie comes from 2000. We’re talking a few years past flower power, but right at the time when rock and roll and touring bands are a booming business.
In Cameron Crowe’s coming-of-age story Almost Famous, Penny Lane is the romantic interest of the lead guitar player (Billy Crudup) of the fictitious band Stillwater. The main character, William Miller (Patrick Fugit), is an aspiring journalist who meets Penny Lane (Kate Hudson) backstage at a Stillwater concert. Miller is hired by Rolling Stone magazine to go on the road with Stillwater in order to write a feature article. Along the journey, William joins the nonstop, whirlwind party but encounters heartache too. He learns the band’s dirty secrets and has to betray their trust in order to deliver his story before the deadline.
The guys practice playing guitar in their bedrooms for endless hours to become famous so they can meet beautiful, free-spirited muses like Penny Lane. The real-life inspiration behind Penny Lane and Almost Famous was a groupie that Cameron Crowe encountered when he was covering the Allman Brothers back in the 1970s.
KATE HUDSON STATS: Kate Hudson won a Golden Globe in 2000 for Best Actress for her role of Penny Lane. She was also nominated for an Oscar that year. Her mother, actress Goldie Hawn, won an Oscar in 1969 for Best Supporting Actress in Cactus Flower.
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January Jones | Mad Men
In Mad Men, creator Matt Weiner takes us on a journey throughout the entire decade of the 1960s, but through the lens of the advertising world. The main character in Mad Men, Don Draper, is appears to have the perfect life – an award-winning career at a top advertising firm in New York City complimented by a lovely suburban home and a picturesque wife and kids. However, he’s also a womanizing alcoholic who is harboring a soul-crushing secret.
Betty Draper (January Jones) looks like the perfect 1950s housewife: she’s young, pretty, and smart. The former model also has a college degree, which was rare for women in the 1950s, and she spoke multiple languages. Betty ended her modeling career after she met Don Draper and fell in love. During that era, women quit their jobs and started having children immediately after they got married. Betty was no different.
While Betty conformed like all the other housewives in the 1950s, by the end of the 1960s she started to wonder if she was missing out on the wave of feminism that is sweeping America.
JANUARY JONES STATS: For the role of Betty Draper, January Jones was nominated for a Golden Globe twice and an Emmy once for Best Actress Television Drama Series. Jones also won the Screen Actor Guild’s Award for best ensemble cast, which she shared with her castmates in Mad Men, who won in 2009 and 2010 for best drama series.
image via LAtimes.com
Jennifer Lawrence | American Hustle
Time for another flashback to the 1970s. The David O. Russell film American Hustle starred an ensemble cast that pulled off the heist job of the decade. Russell cast Jennifer Lawrence in a supporting role, but she delivered a sizzling performance. She really made crazy feel sexy. She was perhaps have been too young in real life to play a twisted, distraught housewife, but Jennifer Lawrence stole the show in every scene she appeared in.
Rosalyn (Jennifer Lawrence) is a pill-popping, white-wine chugging housewife who grows increasingly bitter about her unfulfilled and neglected relationship with her wealthy, but very distracted husband (Christian Bale). Rosalyn gets into deep trouble when she begins a torrid affair with a member of the mafia.
The microwave scene and the scene when she loses it while cleaning the house as Paul McCartney’s Live or Let Die plays is a perfect example of why she was nominated for an Oscar.
JENNIFER LAWRENCE STATS: She’s the $2 billion dollar woman. If you count up the entire total gross of all of Jennifer Lawrence’s films including the Hunger Games series, that total is in excess of $2.2 billion. Her highest-grossing film to date is the second Hunger Games film Catching Fire with $420 million in global earnings.
image via madelizabeth.co.uk
Stevie Nicks | Fleetwood Mac
Stevie Nicks, the lead singer of Fleetwood Mac, is the only real-life person on this list, but she just couldn’t be left out. She’s also the only one who actually lived through the 1970s. Somewhat of a whirling dervish on stage, Stevie Nicks would wear ornate dresses that were both timeless and ahead of their time. Nicks was not just a pretty singer but she was also one of the principal songwriters during Fleetwood Mac’s peak years in the mid-1970s. Nicks’ iconic songs were massive hits. Despite an ugly breakup with guitarist Lindsey Buckingham that nearly torn the band apart, Nicks channeled her anger and frustration into some of the best songs of all time on the Rumours album.
Stevie Nicks played the role of the witch and the role of the angel with equal force. Her voice has melted the minds and hearts of millions of listeners over the last forty years and will continue to do so for another forty.
STEVIE NICKS STATS: Fleetwood Mac had several hit albums, but they actually only had one #1 song in 1977… Dreams, which was written by Stevie Nicks.
BONUS: TOP 5 CRUSHES FROM THE 1960s AND 1960s
There’s something about the freedom and excitement of the 1960s and 1970s that makes these particular retro celebrity crushes a little deeper than usual. They’re all equally sexy but they also embody the spirit of the era whether its Sharon Stone as the Vegas mobster trophy wife, or Kate Hudson as the rock-n-roll muse, or January Jones trying to keep up the perfect image of an ideal 1960s housewife, or Jennifer Lawrence as an erratic pill-popping housewife, or the original witch herself… Stevie Nicks.
You missed the obvious one: Jennifer Grey from every movie she has been in.