American model and actress (1932?2003)
This article is about the American model and actress. For the song by British band The Beatles with the same title, see
Suzy Parker (Beatles song)
.
Suzy Parker
|
---|
Suzy Parker in 1963
|
Born
| Cecilia Ann Renee Parker
(
1932-10-28
)
October 28, 1932
|
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Died
| May 3, 2003
(2003-05-03)
(aged 70)
|
---|
Other names
| Suzy Parker Dillman
|
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Occupation(s)
| Model, actress
|
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Years active
| 1947?1970
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Spouses
|
Charles Staton
(
m.
1950;
div.
1953)
Pierre de la Salle
(
m.
1958;
div.
1961)
|
---|
Children
| 4
|
---|
Relatives
| Dorian Leigh
(sister)
|
---|
Suzy Parker
(born
Cecilia Ann Renee Parker
; October 28, 1932 ? May 3, 2003) was an American model and actress active from 1947 until 1970. Her modeling career reached its zenith during the 1950s, when she appeared on the covers of dozens of magazines and in advertisements and movie and television roles.
She appeared in advertisements for
Revlon
and many other cosmetic companies, including Solo Products, the largest hair care product company in the country at the time. (Models did not have exclusive cosmetic company contracts until
Lauren Hutton
and
Karen Graham
in the early 1970s). In 1956, at the height of her modelling career, she became the first model to earn $100,000 per year (equivalent to $1,121,000 in 2023). A
song
that
The Beatles
wrote for her, though not released on record, appeared in their 1970 documentary film
Let It Be
, which won the
Academy Award for Best Original Score
.
Early life
[
edit
]
Suzy Parker was born Cecilia Ann Renee Parker in
Long Island City
, New York, to George and Elizabeth Parker, who married in 1916. The family later moved to
Highland Park, New Jersey
,
[1]
and then to Florida.
She had three older sisters:
Dorian
, Florian, and Georgiabell.
[2]
Elizabeth believed she was undergoing menopause, but then discovered she was several months pregnant with her youngest child, Cecilia ("Suzy").
[3]
Suzy's original names came from three of her mother's best friends. A then-teenaged Dorian advised her mother to arrange the names in the order, Cecilia Renee Ann Parker, so the initials of the names would spell the word "crap". Dorian claimed her mother had no idea what it meant.
[3]
Parker's father George disliked the name Cecilia and called her Susie, a name which Parker would retain throughout her life. A French
Vogue
photographer later changed the spelling to "Suzy".
Career
[
edit
]
Parker and two of her sisters were tall, all measuring between 5 ft 10 in (178 cm) and 6 ft 1 in (185 cm). Sister Dorian was the sole exception, standing 5 ft 5 in (165 cm).
In 1944, Dorian worked as an advertising copy writer when a coworker encouraged her to go to the Conover Modeling Agency. Dorian became one of the top models in the world,
[
citation needed
]
among the first small group of
supermodels
, which included
Lisa Fonssagrives
,
Dovima
,
Barbara Goalen
and
Bettina Graziani
. When Suzy was about age 15, Dorian telephoned
Ford Modeling Agency
and told
Eileen
and
Jerry Ford
that she would sign on with them if they also took her younger sister, sight unseen. Eager to represent Dorian, they agreed. Expecting to meet a similarly petite, extremely thin, flawless, pale-faced, electric blue-eyed, raven-haired younger version of Dorian, they were shocked to meet Suzy for the first time.
[4]
Parker was already 5'10", big-boned, and had carrot red hair, pale-green eyes, and freckles. She would become more famous than Dorian.
Suzy's photo appeared in
Life
magazine when she was 15. That same year, one of her first magazine advertisements was for DeRosa Jewelry. Although she still lived with her parents in Florida, she stayed in New York City with Dorian when she had modeling assignments there. Dorian introduced Parker to her fashion-photographer friends,
Irving Penn
,
Horst P. Horst
,
John Rawlings
, and a young
Richard Avedon
. Parker became Avedon's muse, she said years later that "The only joy I ever got out of modeling was working with Dick Avedon."
[5]
She became the so-called signature face of the
Coco Chanel
brand. Chanel herself became a close confidante, giving Parker advice on men and money as well as creating numerous Chanel outfits for her.
[
citation needed
]
Parker was a model with the Walter Thornton agency.
[6]
She was the first model to earn $200 per hour and $100,000 per year.
[7]
Vogue
declared her one of the faces of the confident, post-war American woman. By 1955, she owed income taxes on her modeling income from previous years, amounting to more than $60,000 in back taxes and rapidly accumulating penalties, an enormous amount at the time.
[5]
Jerry Ford paid her tax bill and found her assignments. She worked also non-stop for
Vogue
,
Revlon
,
Hertz
,
Westinghouse
,
Max Factor
,
Bliss
,
DuPont
, Simplicity,
Smirnoff
, and
Ronson
shavers, to name a few. She also was on the covers of about 70 magazines around the world, including
Vogue
,
Elle
,
Life
,
Look
,
Redbook
,
Paris Match
and
McCall's
. After being introduced to, and taught photography by, war photographer
Robert Capa
, Parker was briefly listed as a member of
Magnum Photos
.
[8]
Her first film role was in
Kiss Them for Me
(1957), playing the main interest of
Cary Grant
's character. Soon after she accepted a
cameo
role in
Funny Face
(1957), on screen for two minutes in a musical number described as "Pink Number". Her other films include:
Ten North Frederick
(1958),
The Best of Everything
(1959),
A Circle of Deception
(1960 - during which she met future husband
Bradford Dillman
),
Flight from Ashiya
(1964) and
Chamber of Horrors
(1966). She also played dramatic roles in TV shows such as
Burke's Law
and
The Twilight Zone
plus appearances as herself on a number of quiz shows such as
I've Got a Secret
.
Parker's last role was in a 1970 episode of
Night Gallery
. She did, in a way, make one other film "appearance" in
The Beatles
' 1970 documentary film
Let It Be
, in which the band performed their song "
Suzy Parker
".
[9]
[10]
[11]
The song, one of the few credited as written by all four Beatles, was part of their
Academy Award-winning score
for the
original songs
they performed in the film.
Relationships and children
[
edit
]
Parker was married three times. In 1950, she and her high-school sweetheart, Ronald Staton (some sources cite Charles), drove to Georgia to secretly marry. Parker said that she married him in a bikini with a raincoat on top, adding, "He was very good-looking, and it [the marriage] was just a sheer disaster."
[12]
The young couple drove back to Florida where she was still living with her parents who were upset because of her age and because Ronald was part Cherokee.
[13]
They moved to
Pennsylvania
and rented a house near where Dorian was living with her husband and children. Parker was already modeling in the
United States
and
Europe
while Ronald was attending the
University of Pennsylvania
as a freshman.
Parker met journalist Pierre de la Salle (Pitou, born July 12, 1925) at a
Jacques Fath
party outside of Paris. She and Dorian were modeling together and separately on this trip. She returned to the United States and asked Ronald for a divorce, but he would only agree to a quick divorce if Parker gave him a large monetary settlement, paid for plastic surgery on his nose and paid for his acting lessons. She agreed, and their divorce was finalized in Mexico in 1953. Ronald was killed years later in an automobile accident. Parker and Pierre continued to date for years despite Pierre's numerous infidelities. She also was paying for his high cost-of-living expenses.
[14]
They married about 1957 or 1958, but the couple kept it a secret.
In 1958, Parker was a passenger in a car her father was driving when they were hit by an oncoming train. According to accident reports, neither of them heard or saw the train until it slammed into the car. Her father died of his injuries at the hospital. Parker was hospitalized, with broken bones and embedded glass (with her face untouched), under the name Mrs. Pierre de la Salle. The press jumped on this, but Pierre continued to deny that they were married.
[15]
Soon thereafter, a photo spread of the couple appeared in the August 19, 1958,
Look
magazine cover story about her. Parker began psychotherapy to cope with her rocky second marriage and the death of her beloved father.
After recovering from her injuries, Parker became pregnant and de la Salle left. She said, "He didn't want to be a father. I already hired a nanny... he was gone, history."
[16]
She gave birth to their daughter Georgia Belle Florian Coco Chanel de la Salle in December 1959, whose godmother was close friend
Coco Chanel
. Parker named her daughter after her older sisters Georgiabell and Florian and purposely left Dorian’s name off. Dorian and Parker feuded for many years, as Parker was fed up with Dorian’s promiscuous lifestyle and her not taking care of her children. A March 14, 1977,
People
magazine article featured Parker trying to launch her then 17-year-old daughter Georgia as a model.
[17]
However, Georgia modeled only a few times during and after college.
In 1960, Parker met actor
Bradford Dillman
on the set of their 1960 movie,
A Circle of Deception
. She was still married to de la Salle but no longer living with him. Dillman was ending his first marriage and dating
Juliette Greco
at the time. Parker obtained a divorce and married Bradford in 1963 on board a boat at sea. She changed her name to Suzy Parker Dillman following the marriage.
[18]
After marrying Dillman in 1963, then receiving injuries in a car accident in 1964, Parker mostly retired from modeling and acted as a stepmother to Jeffrey and Pamela, Dillman's children from his first marriage. Parker enjoyed being a stay-at-home mother and, like her sister Dorian, who was a
Cordon Bleu
-level chef, Parker was an excellent cook.
Parker had three children with Dillman: daughter Dinah and sons Charlie and Christopher. The family lived in
Bel Air, Los Angeles
, until Dinah was bitten by a rattlesnake in the yard and almost died.
[7]
They then moved to
Montecito
in the
Santa Barbara
area, where Suzy remained until her death in 2003.
Later years and death
[
edit
]
A self-described tomboy in her teens, Parker broke several bones as a result. Parker also broke bones in the 1958 car accident that killed her father. In 1964, she was nervously rehearsing for her famous appearance in the well-known
The Twilight Zone
episode "
Number 12 Looks Just Like You
" when she was in another car accident.
Parker long suffered from allergies, and in the 1990s, developed ulcers. During surgery for an ulcer, her vital signs disappeared on the operating table, but she was resuscitated. She never fully recovered and developed more ulcers and diabetes. She had multiple hip surgeries, and then her kidneys began to fail. She spent the last five years of her life in and out of the hospital.
[7]
Parker decided to end dialysis treatments. She returned home and died at age 70 surrounded by family at her orchard in Montecito, California, on May 3, 2003. Her husband Bradford Dillman died in 2018 at age 87.
[18]
[19]
Filmography
[
edit
]
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
""Round About Town"
,
The Daily Home News
, May 4, 1960. Accessed January 26, 2023, via
Newspapers.com
- ^
www.parkerheritage.com
[retrieved 02 September 2015].
- ^
a
b
"Model", by Michael Gross, 1995, page 114.
- ^
"Model", by Michael Gross, 1980, pg. 117.
- ^
a
b
"Model", by Michael Gross, 1980, p. 118
- ^
Gross, Michael (1995).
Model
(1st ed.). W. Morrow. p. 105.
- ^
a
b
c
Jacobs, Laura (2006-11-20).
"Everyone Fell For: Suzy"
.
Vanity Fair
. Retrieved
2017-11-16
.
- ^
"Photography (Art and design), Art and design, Henri Cartier-Bresson, John F Kennedy (News) JFK, Jackie Onassis"
.
The Guardian
. London. April 19, 2011.
- ^
Lewisohn, Mark
(2000).
The Complete Beatles Chronicle
. London: Hamlyn. p. 309.
ISBN
0-600-60033-5
.
- ^
"Suzy Parker" (Lennon/McCartney/Harrison/Starkey)
- ^
Sulpy, Doug; Schweighardt, Ray (1999). Get Back: The Unauthorized Chronicle of the Beatles' Let it Be Disaster, p. 148. Macmillan.
ISBN
0-312-19981-3
- ^
"Model", by Michael Gross, 1995, p. 117
- ^
"The Girl Who Had Everything" by
Dorian Leigh Parker
and Laura Hobe, 1980, p. 72
- ^
"Model," by Michael Gross, 1995, p. 118
- ^
"The Lives of Suzy Parker", by Richard Gehman, Cosmopolitan, November 1959, p. 91
- ^
"Model," by Michael Gross, 1995, page 120.
- ^
"The Old Order Changeth: Suzy Parker Launches Her Daughter With a New Sassoon Look," People, March 14, 1977, pages 34-35.
- ^
a
b
Martin, Douglas (2003-05-06).
"Suzy Parker, Willowy Model And Actress of 50's, Dies at 69"
.
New York Times
. Retrieved
2008-04-08
.
- ^
"Chanel Girl Suzy Parker Dead at 69"
.
CBS
. February 11, 2009.
External links
[
edit
]
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International
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National
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Other
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