Was she wearing a corset in this movie? Because her waist looks tiny. Not particularly unattractive, just distracting and out of proportion with her baggy clothes and the size of her head.
Did she have an eating disorder? I'm not degrading her, i'm just curious.
Your future is all used up...
Very not uncommon for women in the 40s and 50s, and some in the 30s to have slim waistlines. Audrey Hepburn wasnt the only one. From books and trusted sources, No she didn't have an eating disorder of any sorts.
shareYeah but when I think 'slim waist,' I think Joan Crawford or young Elizabeth Taylor. They looked natural Audrey didn't as much. That's why I wondered about eating disorders.
Your future is all used up...
Audrey also smoked a fair bit back then. I guess a lot of the stars did back then, but back when she did ballet it was common for them to smoke to keep their weight down.
Don't know what you mean by natural and unatural, sometimes the costumes they wore worked in their favour. Maybe thats why sometimes it looks natural and unnatural. In other movies thin waistlines are not usually exposed with different costuming. In the scenes where she was wearing her pyjamas and Princess' dress it probably looked like she was less slim because they werent as tight.
She smoked more than a bit. She smoked like a chimney and it aged her a little fast, unfortunately.
shareWhen I think slim waist, I think of Audrey. Honestly, Liz didn't look very natural, at all. She probably wore a corset just like Sophia Loren and Bettie Page. Audrey never needed one; her waist was a natural 20''. It's funny who obviously healthy women like her get accusations of eating disorders, but women with actually unnatural-looking waists like Christina Hendricks, Sophia, Bettie, Marilyn, etc. you would never ever dream of calling anorexic or bullimic.
And eating disorders don't give you an eviable waistline. They make you look like a skeleton.
Well-behaved women DO make history.
Actually, I read a biography years ago that claimed she was bulimic (specifically, laxatives). It was said that she gained quite a bit of weight on the boat coming over to star in Gigi and the director flipped because he'd "paid for bones." She was put on a diet of just steak until the weight came off. It apparently left her morbidly preoccupied with her weight for the rest of her life. I have to wonder if her colon cancer could've resulted from this.
share>I have to wonder if her colon cancer could've resulted from this.
Well, it certainly could have aggravated matters, anyway.
You don't happen to recall where you read about her having bulimia, do you? Reason I ask is because some things are written about famous people that are speculative at best - or even flat out wrong... as opposed to a legitimate source. It would be interesting to know if there were real substance to it.
Anorexia - no. Her slender appearance was not the unhealthful, skeletal type.
And of course, simply gaining a lot of weight and then losing it thru laxatives abuse is not necessarily bulimia. That is the case only if it is an ongoing "binge - purge" pattern of behavior. (That is not to say such a pattern did not begin over the Gigi incident that you describe. But just that One incident, by itself, would not make it bulimia. Nor would simply being preoccupied about her weight from then on... unless that Also meant the binge - purge behavior.)
I don't remember who authored it but it was a legitimate, well-researched and well-written biography published by a reputable house, not one of the sensationalist jokes that are released today. I doubt there are that many AH biographies, so it's undoubtedly available on Amazon. And the use of laxatives was lifelong. That's not to say that she wasn't a wonderful person (and there was no hint that she was anything other than that in the biography - it managed to convey how genuinely sweet she was without getting hagiographic about it), just that she was very preoccupied with staying thin and that laxatives helped her stay that way.
shareOK Ellis, thanks; I appreciate knowing that. Almost said I was *glad* to know it... but of course, I am not glad - because that meant that the lovely Audrey Did have a problem with laxatives.
You are right that it does not mean she was not a wonderful person. There are plenty of folks out there who are nice people, who make decisions that are not in their own best interest.
Her preoccupation with thinness was no doubt Underscored by the profession she was in. What a shame!
Audrey was also a smoker, since before the original Surgeon General's Warning of the harm that it does.
My mom-in-law said she was once part of a "man on the street" cigarette commercial (on the radio), in which they ask you to take a puff and "try one of yours... now try one of ours." This was to convince you Their brand was smoother. (Well of Course it was smoother! Cigarettes are irritating; the first puff of Any brand is not going to be as smooth as the next one of any Other brand.)
The other thing they (the entire cigarette industry) was to convince you that smoking was actually Good for you!!!
After all, when you smoke, it makes you less anxious, right?
Well, Sure! - You are already addicted - so you "need" the next cigarette to calm your nerves - meaning, you are getting another "fix."
Sorry for climbing on a ciggie soap box - original reason I brought it up was that no doubt Audrey Hepburn was Also caught up in the "smoking is good for you" era. And some people, even today, smoke to help keep their weight down. She may have been one of those as well.
Some folks believe that smoking causes lung cancer Only - fact is, it can be implicated in Many illnesses, and certainly many other types of cancer. Causative or not, smoking certainly did not help Audrey's developing colon cancer.
Her long term misuse of laxatives... Plus the smoking... oh, poor Audrey! She deserved better.
Smoking can also help to keep you thin. And it was something a LOT of people did. I smoked for a long time before I gave it up. A shame it's bad for you because it was a very enjoyable pastime. And don't forget that she almost starved during the war. That could have contributed to a preoccupation with food.
I don't really think her end was a matter of deserts but rather of cause and effect. She engaged in activities that likely cause cancer and she developed cancer. That really is too bad because it seems to be unanimous that she was a sweet and very classy person.
Audrey Hepburn said in interview that the starvation she suffered during WWII seemed to have permanently affected her metabolism or something.
shareShe didn't have an eating disorder, she did monitpr her weight a lot throughout her life though.
She was previously a ballet dancer before becomming an actress, so she had always been thin prior.
But as a lot of people have already stated, people in those days had very thin waists and hips which were much more wider.
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She was malnourished during WWII and she grew up somewhat waif-like as a result. She would also lose her appetite during stressful periods and barely eat anything or nothing at all for days. This wasn't a habit though, and you can tell she had deceptively strong arms and legs, unlike anorexic women who simply are skeletic.
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Since there are responses on this thread from very recently, I will bump this and add some limited additional information (having just finished watching RH on TCM 2/13/2015 during Oscar month). Years ago I heard Paul Harvey on the radio--he of "The Rest of the Story"--telling Audrey Hepburn's tale. Apparently during WWII she carried secret messages for one of the underground resistance movements and she was about to walk into a nest of Germans with a very important message in one of her shoes. Rather than risk being caught she hid in a nearby cellar for a week or so with absolutely nothing to eat, and from then on she was never able to permanently put on any significant weight. I don't know if this is true and I'm sure I've left facts out since it may have been in the 90's when I heard it, but that's the essence of what Paul Harvey said.
And now you know the rest of the story.
She had petticoats or something under her skirt to make it flouncier, I read in a fashion blog post once.
and seriously? when will people realize you can not magically tell when someone has a mental disorder?? she doesnt look even remotely unhealthy anyway. and people act like she's the only skinny girl ever- you can clearly see Marilyn Monroe's and Bettie Page's ribs sticking out in several pics. oh, but they're healthy and natural because they have big boobs and wide butts.
"I do pretend I am a princess, so that I can try and behave like one."
She was always tiny and thin. There's a famous quote about her thinness that goes something like "that woman could single-handedly make breasts a thing of the past."
shareActually, she was 5'7 1/2, which made her pretty tall among working actresses, so she played with some of the very tallest leading men. It ended up emphasizing her thinness.
I don't know much about Hepburn personally at all, but I am Jewish, and I know a number of Holocaust survivors. After either being in a concentration camp, even if only for a few months, or being in hiding, and having severe rationing for years, most of the had some kind of food issues. I knew a man who was given milk right after his camp was liberated; it made him throw up violently, and he never drank milk again, even though he lived another 40 years. I knew a woman you could never take the ladt serving of something at dinner, no matter how much people assured hr they'd had enough.
After surviving the Dutch hongerwinter, I wouldn't be surprised if Hepburn had some kind if food, but not anorexia. Her son once said she was a good cook, who was sort of intense about preparing nutrient dense dishes. So she may have avoided dessert-type foods, because they weren't nutritious. The sort of things she ate during the hongerwinter were not dessert-type, but they were long on carbohydrates, and not much else, including texture. She probably did not dream about cake she probably dreamed about meat, bread without fillers, and colorful, fresh fruit and vegetables.
When I said "tiny", I was not referring height. A pet peeve among tall women like myself, is when we are referred to as "big". Hepburn had a very slight frame, regardless of height. Models are often a size one, but close to six feet. And short people can be very large.
shareI didn't mean to offend anyone. I just made that point, because a lot of people don't realize how tall she was, since she was often paired with very tall leading men. Compare her height to Fred Astaire in Funny Face, or Efrem Zimbalist, jr. in Wait Until Dark. They were not short men, just shorter than her usual leading men, and they are almost the same height as she is (occasionally, she's in heels, as well).
shareSupposedly, her height is the reason she went into acting. She had wanted to be a ballerina but was told she was too tall.
shareDidn't Marilyn Monroe have a 23 inch waist? & overweight people use her as a posterchild for 'Fat is Sexy.'
shareseeing the op is 3 years old I will respond with this In the biograpy of Audrey Enchantment it says she was 5'7" 120lbs. and had a 20" waist. which she kept thru pretty much her whole career.
shareIn prefame pix audrey looked a lot fuller..before and after the war..she seemed to lose weight when she became a star
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