Foxy: My LIfe in Three Acts - Pam Grier

 

Pam Grier is, of course, the stunningly beautiful actress of many of the best Blaxploitation films of the 70's, including Foxy Brown and Coffy, before Tarentino brought her back for the highly successful Jackie Brown, where she got to actually show off her acting skills as an older femme fatale.

Pam grew up in a military family and while she, of course, faced segregation and prejudice in the general population, there was some equality on the military bases and the family was well off enough that the grandparents owned a farm which the kids would stay at when necessary. So, between it all, despite the cruel outside world, it sounds like she had a pretty good childhood, overall. Funnily enough, Godzilla was her first movie theater experience and it made her want to be part of the system, as she was fascinated with the movie magic.

Well, her childhood was good up until the time she was 6 years old and raped by two of her cousins! Of course, she was told not to tell and this caused her to retreat into herself and to stutter. Truly horrible... Life went on, naturally, and she kept this a secret, but spending two years in England (as a result of her dad being stationed over there) helped in many ways and when she came home and her parents split up, she had to keep busy helping with the household finances as well as going to school.

As she got to college - working her way through with multiple jobs - she was actually cajoled into a couple of beauty pageants, although still shy and not comfortable in her own skin. But she actually came to the attention of a Hollywood agent and eventually decided to move to LA to go to film school. Ironically, at this point she still wanted to be behind and not in front of the camera! LA was crazy expensive (compared to Colorado) and she didn't know how she was going to ever afford film school, but she enjoyed the freedom - and less prejudice - that the city offered.

A job as receptionist for an agent led to her auditioning for - and getting - a Roger Corman film shot in the Philippines and she was asked to immediately shoot another before she left. Things moved fast from then on as she was cast in other films and traveled the world shooting and promoting. Her love life equaled her movie career as she dated superstars of the era even as she became more and more famous herself.

While I primarily know her work done in the 70’s, she says that her career really took off in the 80’s - I suppose it was just projects that were not on my radar. But she had substantial roles in TV, film and theatre and received far more recognition than I realized, as well. Unfortunately, her love life never clicked - seemingly from her not recognizing red flags - and while she wished that things could have worked better, she seems content with the way her life evolved.

Turns out that Ms. Grier is a fine writer as well as actress and the book is entertaining, compelling and even gripping, with plenty of background info on her work and her love life. A fine read!