Blondes vs. Brunettes | |
---|---|
Genre | Variety |
Written by | Rod Warren, George Beckerman, David Scott Jones, Bus Cohan, Lisa Medway |
Directed by | Steve Binder, Sterling Johnson |
Starring | Joan Collins Morgan Fairchild Brooke Shields Rita Moreno Bruce Boxleitner Phyllis Diller |
Theme music composer | Fred Thaler |
Country of origin | United States |
Original language | English |
Production | |
Producers | Claude Ravier, Steve Binder |
Running time | 60 minutes |
Production company | ABC-TV |
Original release | |
Network | ABC |
Release | May 14, 1984 |
Blondes vs. Brunettes was an ABC TV special that was broadcast on May 14, 1984. [1] [2] The one-hour variety show, co-hosted by Joan Collins and Morgan Fairchild, was a humorous look at the personality and lifestyle differences between blonde and brunette women. Time magazine characterized the special as a "showdown" between Collins, "…TV’s brunette meanie and Morgan Fairchild, 34, a blond TV vixen." [3] At the time of the release, Collins was starring in the popular nighttime soap opera Dynasty where she played a dark haired foil to the blonde Linda Evans. [4]
Despite the imagery of a confrontation, the special gently poked fun at popular culture's blonde vs. brunette rivalry [5] and attempted to "dispel the myths about blondes and brunettes." [6] The show featured a number of skits including a "Dynasty" skit where Fairchild and Collins played the roles of the show's blonde and brunette rivals. [7] The final skit featured Collins and Fairchild in their elderly years offering a toast to each other. [6] The lengthy guest cast included Brooke Shields and Bruce Boxleitner.
The special was widely criticized and mocked for its absurd premise.
"Do blondes really have more fun? Are blonde men more gentle than dark haired men? Which do you notice first, blondes or brunettes? Does ABC have any class? You can find out the answers to these and other inane questions on this special ... "experts" on the subject include Dr. Joyce Brothers, and Father Guido Sarducci." [8]
Dame Joan Henrietta Collins is an English actress, author and columnist. With a career spanning nearly 8 decades, Collins is the recipient of several accolades, including a Golden Globe Award, a People's Choice Award, two Soap Opera Digest Awards and a Primetime Emmy Award nomination. She is one of the last surviving actresses from the Golden Age of Hollywood cinema. In 1983, Collins was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She has been recognised for her philanthropy, particularly her advocacy towards causes relating to children, which has earned her many honours. In 2015, she was made a Dame by Queen Elizabeth II for her charitable services, presented to her by the then Prince of Wales, Charles III.
Dynasty is an American prime time television soap opera that aired on ABC from January 12, 1981, to May 11, 1989. The series, created by Richard and Esther Shapiro and produced by Aaron Spelling, revolves around the Carringtons, a wealthy family residing in Denver. Dynasty stars John Forsythe as oil magnate Blake Carrington, Linda Evans as his new wife Krystle, and later Joan Collins as his former wife Alexis.
Blonde jokes are a joke cycle based on a stereotype of a dumb blonde woman.
Blond or blonde, also referred to as fair hair, is a human hair color characterized by low levels of eumelanin, the dark pigment. The resultant visible hue depends on various factors, but always has some yellowish color. The color can be from the very pale blond to reddish "strawberry" blond or golden-brownish ("sandy") blond colors. Occasionally, the state of being blond, and specifically the occurrence of blond traits in a predominantly dark or colored population are referred to as blondism.
Brown hair, also referred to as brunette or brunet, is the second-most common human hair color, after black hair. It varies from light brown to dark hair. It is characterized by higher levels of the dark pigment eumelanin and lower levels of the pale pigment pheomelanin.
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Blonde stereotypes are stereotypes of blonde-haired people. Sub-types of this stereotype include the "blonde bombshell" and the "dumb blonde". Blondes have historically been portrayed as physically attractive, though often perceived as less intelligent compared to their brunette counterparts. There are many blonde jokes made on these premises. However, research has shown that blonde women are not less intelligent than women with other hair colors.
Catfight is a term for an altercation between two females, often characterized as involving scratching, shoving, slapping, choking, punching, kicking, wrestling, biting, spitting, hair-pulling, and shirt-shredding. It can also be used to describe women insulting each other verbally or engaged in an intense competition for men, power, or occupational success. The catfight has been a staple of American news media and popular culture since the 1940s, and use of the term is often considered derogatory or belittling. Some observers argue that in its purest form, the word refers to two women, one blonde and the other a brunette, fighting each other. However, the term is not exclusively used to indicate a fight between women, and many formal definitions do not invoke gender.
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The disappearing blonde gene was a hoax claiming a scientific study had estimated that natural blonds would become extinct, repeated as fact in reputable media such as the BBC and The Sunday Times between 2002 and 2006. The hoax claimed that, because the allele for the genes for hair colour is recessive, blond hair would become less common as people with dominant non-blond hair alleles had offspring with people with the recessive alleles, even though such a pairing would retain one copy of the blond allele in the genome of the offspring. Claims that blond hair would disappear have been made since 1865.
A Thief in Paradise is a 1925 American silent drama film produced by Samuel Goldwyn, directed by George Fitzmaurice, and adapted by Frances Marion from Leonard Merrick's 1900 novel The Worldlings.
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Nicollette Sheridan is a British-born American actress. She began her career as a fashion model before landing a role in the short-lived ABC primetime soap opera Paper Dolls in 1984, as well as starring in the romantic comedy film The Sure Thing (1985). She rose to prominence as Paige Matheson on the CBS primetime soap opera Knots Landing (1986–1993), for which she received two Soap Opera Digest Awards. Thereafter, Sheridan appeared in lead roles in numerous television films and miniseries, including Lucky Chances (1990), Virus (1995), and The People Next Door (1996). She also appeared in the feature films Noises Off (1992), Spy Hard (1996), Beverly Hills Ninja (1997), and Code Name: The Cleaner (2007).
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The blonde versus brunette rivalry is a rivalry—whether real, imagined, or fictional—between women with blonde hair and those with brown (brunette) hair. In popular culture and everyday conversation, the words blonde and brunette are sometimes used as nouns to refer to women by these two hair colors. This supposed rivalry is a common fictional theme in books, magazine articles, film, and television. Some have argued that the spectacle of blonde and brunette women engaged in physical fights with each other has been a male fantasy for many years.
Les Gladiatrices: Blondes vs. Brunes is a 2004 DVD based in a French reality TV show that featured women wrestling each other. The women were divided into two teams, one blonde and the other brunette.