Dataloungers Please give me the dish on Hollywood sex symbol Raquel Welch

I saw her on Broadway when she did "Woman of the Year". The audience was with her all the way. She was originally only filling in for a couple of weeks but when Lauren Bacall went on the road with the show, Raquel took over for at least 6 months. She never missed a performance and she brought star quality. Vocally, she was okay. She moved very well during the dance numbers and she helped the audience to overlook any of the deficiencies in the score or libretto. She got multiple standing ovations the night I was there and comments overheard in the lobby were mostly of the "I came to laugh but she's really good..." to "You gotta hand it to her. She's got guts going out there and working so hard...." She won a Golden Globe for "The Three Musketeers" and did some good screen work in "The Last of Sheila". I met her after "Woman of the Year" and she was much more gracious than I'd ever expected. In fact she remained until every person who wanted a picture or autograph got one....and there were hundreds waiting. I've heard she could be difficult but I've also heard from as many who said she worked very hard and didn't pull rank.

I think she's mellowed out and become nicer in her old age. She was a huge star in the early 1970s and there were stories that she was difficult and hard to get along with. I'm surprised she didn't have a lot of love affairs but Burt Reynolds--who was also hot and a huge star in those days-- couldn't stand her. She was married to a really ugly guy back then.

Raquel Welch was like the female Burt Reynolds, popular for their looks, celebrity, and sex symbol status than for having illustrious film careers. She was notoriously difficult during her heyday, which probably hastened her career decline.

Thanks for sharing [R1] it does sound like Raquel is not simply just the horrible diva that the rumour mill indicates.

She never had the hits, She's more interesting now that she's older.

Raquel at the Oscars in 1967 with Dean Jones. You know "Company". Had to tie it together. At any rate, with the exception of the pajama bottoms, she looks stunning with her hourglass figure and very contemporary even today. Starts about 15:00.

She won a 10 million dollar plus judgment against the producers of "Cannery Row" who fired her from their film, several weeks into filming. They claimed she'd been unprofessional and was difficult. Burt Reynolds even testified on her behalf that she'd always been on-time and fully prepared when they worked together.

She has always looked like a star.

I saw her in that same play, R1. Yes, she was very good, and VERY beautiful in person.

I saw her on Broadway in 1997 in "Victor Victoria". The stage production didn't ever have the magic the film had even when Julie Andrews or Liza Minnelli were playing the part on stage. Raquel was not believable as a man but stopped the show and had the audience on their feet in numbers like "Le Jazz Hot". Like (R1) said, I too felt the audience truly liked her and were rooting for her. It was an almost impossible task and the show closed but as previously noted, Raquel was at the stage door for hours, signing programs, posing for pictures and at 56, looking like a million bucks. When I complimented her performance as she signed my program, she laughed and said, "I probably should have had these fellas (grabbing her bosoms) reduced to make it more believable!".

The Daily Mail really knows how to give the subtle digs:

[quote] Meanwhile, despite her stunning good looks and sparkling charisma, Raquel currently remains single.

She doesn't move her arms when she walks.

I remember an old rumour that her face, before becoming a star, was completely rebuild by a plastic surgeon in Brazil. Have no idea if it s true.

R12 has apparently seen Raquel's star turn, the Tony winning play "Scarsdale Surprise."

R12, she does in the Oscar clip.

She was AMAZING on Central Park West....Diana Brock, the Alexis type Ex-Wife from hell....

[R13] Raquel Welch denies ever having had any cosmetic surgery In her life. I do think she's pushing her luck a little with that claim!

In OP's pic, she appears to have a huge potamus.

She had huge ta-ta's

I had always heard that Raquel had her lower ribs removed to get that hourglass figure.

in the faye dunaway category

no one wants to work with her

major bitch and diva and fug

She was the perpetual starlet and pinup- and very mediocre actress. She was no ET! She was also difficult to work with apparently.

She's beautiful and always embodied glamour to the hilt, but she's just not very good as a dramatic actress. Mediocre at best. Several years ago I saw her in Tortilla Soup (2001). I had rented it because I love me some Elizabeth Pena (R.I.P.) and was excited to see Welch in a later role, but she was quite terrible--almost amateurish. She couldn't play the character credibly and the tone of her performance was far too broadly comic for the role and the movie. It was a real disappointment, and I thought, "WOW, 40+ years into your career and you can't even pull off this supporting role with any skill--have you learned nothing?"

That being said, in 2010 I saw a 40th screening of Myra Breckinridge at LACMA and she was on hand, looking like a million bucks and telling wonderful and honest stories about the filming of that infamous train wreck of a film. She loves being a star and does it well. But as to you original query...she simply doesn't have the goods as an actress that are necessary to have made a stronger mark, get directors insisting on her, etc. I know nothing about the prior posters' claims regarding how difficult she was/is or wasn't/isn't. Rare is the Charlize Theron, Kim Basinger, Gene Tierney, Marlene Dietrich, Lauren Bacall, Sylvia Sidney, Marilyn Monroe, Juliette Binoche, Michelle Pfeiffer, et al., who comes along with drop-dead gorgeous looks, charisma, and mad skills as an actress, all in one package.

Raquel Welch was one of those people in the late 1960s-70s we were told was a "star," but wasn't. On the screen she was vapid eye candy - no charisma, no depth as an actress. A later day pin-up. She had some later success, success that seemed like more than it actually was because she was such a lousy screen presence earlier.

She tried to do pop music as well.

There were rumors she was going to play Roxie in "Chicago" after Verdon left. That would have been interesting.

Raquel did have a nose job, not sure about breast implants. Just about all of her husbands/mates were fugs and short marriages, she sounds like a handful. Yes, one was good looking...I always felt there was a deal there.

Loved Fantastic Voyage. She was envious of the attention Farrah was receiving in “Myra Breckinridge” Great star and shes preserved her looks better than anybody.

The studios treated her terribly. She was just a bikini to them and they loaned her out to subpar Italian productions during the '60s. Amazingly, even the Bond producers took a pass on her. Most people don't know that even at her start she was a single mother of two earning a living as a starlet. She was also THE Vietnam Era pin-up with her "One Million Years B.C." poster. "Myra Breckinridge" seemed to be the death knell for her film career to a large extent, but it was evidence of her willingness to take risks and break out of the glamour girl rut.

[quote] Yes, one was good looking...I always felt there was a deal there.

The only "good looking" one was her first husband, way before she became famous and with whom she had two kids. Not sure what kind of "deal" there would have been.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

Here she is paying twofer tribute to Streisand in a mashup of Funny Girl and Nuts.

She doesn't have a terrible voice. She'd have actually been a pretty good Roxie in Chicago.

She was gorgeous in the 1960's and '70's. The camera loved her like crazy. But she couldn't act. She compensated for that with focus and determination and approached everything with discipline and professionalism. I think her best work is in MYRA BRECKINRIDGE, a film that has gotten dramatically better with the years.

She is just barely over five feet tall. She always wears high heels and always has some loft to her hair to compensate for being so short. I have been told that is at the root of some of the bad rep she has gotten for how she treats people. She's tiny and feels vulnerable. So don't get in her face. Don't push. Keep your distance. If everything is under control and moving as planned, she's fine. If not, she gets scared and acts accordingly.

[quote] She is just barely over five feet tall

Bull. She's not the Amazon she appears to be on film, but she's normal height, about 5 ft 6".

The problem is that she doesn't swing her arms when she walks.

I thought she was great in Myra Breckinridge also. It wasn’t Oscar worthy but she was still good.

She’s done other good work as well. And she looks fantastic.

I also think she didn't have what Miss J of ANTM calls "sissifying". She needed a larger group of gay men around her to advise her and groom her. If her designer Ron Talsky was gay, she was unlucky enough to hook up with the worst gay fashion designer in the world.

In her book Raquel stated that the producers were really looking for someone to play the female lead in Myra Breckinridge so she phoned them up and told them that she would be perfect for the role - and they agreed!

But once she started to make the movie she started to regret it. The script changed from day to day and she could tell that it was going to be a turkey.

She had a terrible time working with Mae West who was jealous of her, even stealing one of her outfits, and didn't want to do any personal scenes with her so they had to work around it.

And yes, the movie turned out to be a bomb so it wasn't exactly a jewel in her crown although it is seen as an interesting oddity today.

I bought her book "Beyond The Cleavage" and it was one of the strangest Hollywood memoirs that I have ever read.

Close to 3/4's of the book was about her personal upkeep - hair, eyelashes, beauty creams, food ( or lack of it) that she eats, clothes, wearing 'frownies' at night around her eyes to discourage the formation of wrinkles, and the list goes on.

It takes her hours to get made up every morning just to go out and she also has a special 'lighting' mirror that she uses everyday and sometimes carries with her. And she also talks about the tiny lunch that she carries with her when she has to go somewhere.

There were some interesting personal tidbits in the book but her appearance regiment was almost exhausting. She's a very image conscious person in the outside world. Every hair has to be in place, etc.

She is charming in this clip, singing "The Grass is Always Greener" with the fabulous Marilyn Cooper ...

Second rate and uninteresting as an actor. Could be sexy but I wouldn't know, I'm gay.

She seems like she was a pushy bitch in her prime with an inflated sense of self worth. But many male stars are just like that and people put up with it. The shitty guys who run Hollywood took it from men, but from a woman? Never.

Witness also the way Streisand is described in Hollywood.

[quote]She won a 10 million dollar plus judgment against the producers of "Cannery Row" who fired her from their film, several weeks into filming. They claimed she'd been unprofessional and was difficult. Burt Reynolds even testified on her behalf that she'd always been on-time and fully prepared when they worked together.

That was an odd situation. I just read about it in Nick Nolte's bio. From the very start the producer seemed to want to tank the film and miscast the role. He wanted either Raquel or Liza. Nolte said he thought they were both too old and that the producer was joking. Then he hired Raquel anyway. Raquel was worried she was too old and miscast so Nolte told her to just try and be very conscientious. He said she'd show up early with her full makeup done at home. Then they still fired her and tried to make it like it was her fault.

[quote] I bought her book "Beyond The Cleavage" and it was one of the strangest Hollywood memoirs that I have ever read. Close to 3/4's of the book was about her personal upkeep

Yes, it was very odd. They promoted the book as a memoir, but when I went to the book store to buy it I couldn't find it in the biography section. So I asked the clerk and he said, "Oh that book's in the 'style and beauty' section". I didn't want to buy a make-up book, I'm a guy. Lol.

"She is just barely over five feet tall. "

Yeah, 5'6". Some people's lies are so easy to see through.

Raquel husband who stayed the longest, fug Patrick Curtis:

Did she have a fling with Joe "pantyhose" Namath ?

Raquel was hired to be the female lead in Cannery Row. She reported for work in full makeup and waited for hours everyday - then she learned that she had been fired because they wanted someone younger and more current like Debra Winger (who is 15 years younger) for the role.

She sued and won a sizable amount of money. Then the studio producers countersued - and when the dust cleared she won an even bigger amount of millions of dollars.

Hollywood is not amused when an actor or especially an actress rocks the boat and Raquel was blacklisted from making anymore big screen movies.

She turned to making TV movies which were usually quite good and Broadway plays among other show biz work. She managed to keep herself in the public eye which is what really counts.

[quote] Some people's lies are so easy to see through. Raquel husband who stayed the longest, fug Patrick Curtis:

R46, if you're going to point out "lies" by others, you should watch out for your own,. Raquel was married 4 times and her Curtis marriage was the SHORTEST one, not the longest.

I remember all the brouhaha Raquel caused when she showed up at ther son's wedding wearing a body-hugging black sheath dress with plunging neckline, thereby upstaging the bride. The bride was not amused. That illustrates what kind of person Raquel is. Always the star.

R50, hey, her son ain't too bad.

She was so beautiful in her prime and could have gotten some hot guys but picked really ugly men!

Has a weird outie belly button. I think that's what held her back.

what a cunt she was at that wedding

UNFORGIVABLE

Her daughter Tahnee had that really prominent role in Cocoon............and the pretty much nothing else. Odd.

r7 explains why Raquel has always been known in Hollywood as a super A-hole and never worked after she ripped-off that productia company for million$.

Also Mae West did not like her when they worked together.

Anyone remember this cinematic masterpiece? Kansas City Bomber. I spy Kay Chancellor at the 1 minute mark.

If all her plastic surgery scars ever give way she'll just puddle up on the floor like water.

I like to watch the old Oscar clips on youtube and she is very often a presenter. She was the presenter after Satcheen Little Feather made the speech for Marlon Brando. She quips before they open the envelope..."I hope this person doesn't have a cause" (the winner was Liza so she didn't.)

She was quite the visual treat. A lot of men probably watched the Oscars to see her.

She also accepted Goldie Hawn's award when she won. I guess they were friends?

Gorgeous but very short. Limited talent and difficult to work with.

Anyone believe her claim not to have had any plastic or cosmetic surgery?

I walked past her on a crowded NY street and she stood out. Perfectly put together and looking like she’d just stepped off a movie set kind of glamour. I can believe she uses a special mirror. After I stopped gaping at her face I did actually check to see if she was swinging her arms!

At 55:44 Raquel Welch as the Hollywood Palace "Billboard Girl". 1964.

Groucho was said to be horse-hung!

I heard that she was a nightmare for Herbert Ross on The Last of Sheila but on the DVD commentary Dyan Cannon and Richard Benjamin speak fondly of her.

circa 1968 - her magazine covers.

[quote] heard that she was a nightmare for Herbert Ross on The Last of Sheila but on the DVD commentary Dyan Cannon and Richard Benjamin speak fondly of her.

Have you ever heard anyone be cunty on a DVD extra?

R29, in regard to the assertion that the Bond producers passed on her, I’d always heard that they flipped over a photo of Welch in “Life” magazine, and wanted her for the next Bond film, “Thunderball”. But Welch’s studio decided to cast her in “Fantastic Voyage” and the scheduling knocked her out of contention for “Thunderball”.

A superior Virgo, beautiful perfectionist, at her best when she is not too self conscious. Latina beauty.

R67 - yes. Darryl Hickman about Gene Tierney on Leave Here to Heaven.

.... Leave Her to Heaven.

I’m not R67, but good point regarding Daryl Hickman’s comments about Gene Tierney on the “Leaver Her to Heaven” DVD commentary, R70. It’s been a while since I’ve heard it, but I remember being shocked at how unkind he was about her.

At the time of “The Last of Sheila”, there was speculation that the publicity-hungry Hollywood couple played by Raquel Welch and Ian McShane were based on Ann-Margret and Roger Smith — or Raquel Welch and Patrick Curtis, which ended being ironic, since Welch ended up playing the role!

In R63: Groucho: "Thank you, Stack-well... I mean Raq-uel." Lol.

Personality and talent (or lack thereof) aside, I've always thought she was stunningly beautiful. Event today, she looks amazing. She's obviously had cosmetic surgery, but she chose a good surgeon, because she doesn't have that awful Beverly Hills elderly woman look; she just looks "freshened up."

R67 "Have you ever heard anyone be cunty on a DVD extra?"

Have you ever heard Raquel on the Myra Breckenridge dvd!? She and director Michael Sarne give dueling audio commentaries that take cuntiness to a whole new level.

Didn’t she claim to have gotten death threats for her steamy love scenes with Jim Brown in 100 RIFLES?

As others have noted, she was long on looks and very short on talent. She got pushed into the limelight with ONE MILLION YEARS B.C. but she didn't have anywhere close to the acting skills to handle stardom. As a result she was very insecure and overcompensated by being a major league squeaky-wheel on the set, but when her films stopped making money, she was easy to toss aside.

If you watch some of her post-ONE MILLION YEARS performances in stuff like FATHOM, LADY IN CEMENT, 100 RIFLES, and HANNIE CAULDER, she's just awful. She is funny in THREE MUSKETEERS, but she's also not carrying the film. She's barely in the sequel.

The only decent dramatic performance I've ever seen from her was in the Merchant-Ivory WILD PARTY, which isn't a particularly good film. For a while she second-guessed every shot that Ivory did with her, which then culminated in a famous blow-up on the set where she took major offense from something that Ivory said - I believe he said that he wanted to do a retake of a scene because the previous one was "boring" - something a seasoned actor could take in stride. She walked off the set, and refused to return until he apologized to her in front of the cast and crew. Ivory and Merchant had done indie films and weren't used to dealing with a diva like Welch, albeit a diva in decline given that she was now working on a low-budget film of this type.

However, I saw a documentary on Merchant/Ivory where they describe the incident and you then hear an audio recording of Welch coming back on set to hear the apology and she does not come off well in the end. Meow!

Anyway, Ivory apologized and having scored her point, the rest of the shoot went OK

When Groucho asks Raquel how tall she is:

Raquel: I'm 5.8 with heels

Groucho: Well, how tall would you be with a nice fellow like me?

What about the Mork and Mindy incident? Didn’t she have a blow up with Pam Dawber when she guest starred?

Some interesting Welch-related trivia on the IMDb page for The Last of Sheila:

[quote]From working on this film, actor James Mason famously once said of co-star actress Raquel Welch that she was "the most selfish, ill-mannered, inconsiderate actress that I have ever had the displeasure of working with".

[quote]Many of the actors are playing other famous people in Hollywood. For example, James Mason's character is based on an Orson Welles persona. Richard Benjamin is playing Anthony Perkins. Raquel Welch was told by the film's writers, Anthony Perkins and Stephen Sondheim that she was playing Ann-Margret - when, in fact, she was actually playing herself.

[quote]The production was marred by much on-set conflict. This has been attributed to delays, weather, sea-sickness, personality clashes, over-crowding on the boat and the alleged prima donna antics of actress Raquel Welch. Reportedly, props were thrown across the set.

[quote]From working on this movie, actor Ian McShane once said of actress Raquel Welch that "she isn't the most friendly creature. She seems to set out with the impression that no one is going to like her".

"I heard that she was a nightmare for Herbert Ross on The Last of Sheila but on the DVD commentary Dyan Cannon and Richard Benjamin speak fondly of her."

Benjamin loved her because she said the immortal line "You're the world's most attractive man" to him in the film. Dyan, as usual, was high.

One of the things that made Raquel a worse actress than she actually was (which was bad), was that she didn't know how to use her voice. She spoke in a fluffy pretty sound, like someone trying to sing "pretty" instead of interpreting the lyrics. A good acting coach could have explained what she was doing wrong.

I remember Joan Hackett also spoke well of Welch on the Merv Griffin Show when they were just finished filming TLOS. She said something like she was great but really just wanted to be left alone so she was never part of the group.

I think Kansas City Bomber showed what she could do. She's a little stiff in some of the scenes but especially in the sequence in the kids, she was very affecting, perhaps because it mirrored her own life. On the tour bus, the washed up Horrible Hank brings up an incident that happened and Welch does a very spontaneous laugh. Then, after he asks her out, she clouds over and says "we'll see", and gave it very nice subtext.

[quote]Have you ever heard anyone be cunty on a DVD extra?

Yes. Oddly enough, it was Raquel Welch.

On the DVD commentary track for Myra Breckinridge, when Mae West is seen using a phone, Raquel meows: "People say Mae was was really a man in drag. Look at those hands. I ask you: Are those the hands of a real woman?"

You can’t throw that much attitude around if you don’t have the talent to back it up. Welch is a hugely famous person who never did a single great project. I find it’s the semi-talented insecure talents who are the most monstrous.

The joke is that working with her is like working with Barbie. Klaus Barbie.

[quote] I find it’s the semi-talented insecure talents who are the most monstrous.

Ahem.

R84, in Hollywood you CAN throw around that kind of attitude if you have the looks.

Did either of her children make her a grandma yet? If not, that’s...telling.

Fine lady. We did some landscaping for her for several years and she was the sweetest thing ever. Always making us food and wanting to talk about her garden.

[quote] For example, James Mason's character is based on an Orson Welles persona.

Mason's character in Last of Sheila was a director who was a child molester. So what is that IMDB saying about Orson Welles?

My favorite was "Scandal in a Small Town".

Rumor has it that when she slapped her daughter in the scene, she didn't do a stage slap. The poor girl was bruised from it!

I thought she was a role model for Latina women but she was born in Chicago.

When Raquel was still a relative unknown she made a cheesy movie called "One Million Years B.C." on a cold mountaintop in South America. It was a B movie that nobody had high hopes for.

Then a photographer came along, took some photos of her in her skimpy fur costume, and the photo below exploded like a super nova around the world. Raquel was on the radar bigtime, the movie was a hit - and a star was born. All because of a photographer and his photos of her. Sometimes Fate works in strange ways.

R91, a Latina can't be born in Chicago?

Not a real one.

This is still my fave Raquel Welch performance:

The one and ONLY reason for anyone to watch MYRA BRECKENRIDGE

[R87] Telling in what way I don't understand? Her children's choices in that regard are not necessarily reflective on her in any way.

R96 Myra Breckinridge was one of the worst - if not THE worst - movies ever made. And Mae West was one of the reasons it was so awful. The only reason to watch this mess was for the scene featuring Roger Herron's butt.

I saw Raqeul on Broadway in WOman of the Year in the '80's. She was dreadful. That was the beginning of the end of Broadway for me.

She's not a great actress, not by any means. But a great actress would not have pegged Rusty Godowski with such unrestrained enthusiasm.

Her Myra so thoroughly destroyed Rusty that the hot young actor playing him, Roger Herren, left the business.

The NY Times in reviewing Miss Welch in "Woman of the Year" on December 11, 1981 noted: " She is a show-stopper, as is her dress designer, Norma Kamali. For 'One of the Boys,' Miss Welch is a vanilla vision in a skin-tight slinky white jumpsuit that could halt traffic in outer space.

Later she switches to a flaming red number. When was the last time you heard wolf whistles in a Broadway theater?

It would be inaccurate to say that Miss Welch is a better actress than Miss Bacall, but certainly at this stage of her career she is a more animated musical personality. For example, in 'One of the Boys,' Miss Bacall is lifted up and moved about stage by the male chorus as if she were a fragile sculpture. In contrast, Miss Welch kicks her leg - nice leg - as high as her ear. This lady can move and she can dance - and I think she can sing, although it is not always easy to tell over the crackle of the overmiking in the Palace Theater. Her performance is in all respects marked by show-business know-how."

Isn’t there a story about Raquel faking a pregnancy to get out of Woman Of The Year?

R102 Whatever did the poor thing need to get out of Woman of the Year FOR?

UPI reported in early 1983: "NEW YORK -- Actress Raquel Welch suffered a miscarriage while vacationing in the Caribbean last month and has returned to New York City, a spokesman for the actress said today. Ms. Welch, 42, who left the hit Broadway musical 'Woman of the Year' because of her pregnancy, lost the baby three weeks ago while on vacation with her husband Andre Weinfeld on the island of Mustique, the spokesman said."

"Lost the Baby" is code for "Had a lovely poolside lunch"

She's always been as popular with her costars and crew as Miss Faye Dunaway.

James Coco pointedly said Welch was not difficult on an interview with Joan Rivers but went on to say that there was only one woman he truly loathed working with and that was Cloris Leachman.

So she was labelled as 'difficult', but don't we now know that actresses who wouldn't put out to directors/producers/leading men were often accused of being 'difficult', as retaliation for rejection?

I saw a rerun of her hosting Saturday Night Live in the 70's and she was REALLY bad. She actually reminded me of Madonna bad. She could not let go of her image enough to be funny -- much too self conscious, like Madonna. She was beautiful, but no actress.

She wasn’t much of an actress, but a lot of the most attractive actors and actresses aren’t.

I get the sense that she is definitely among the actresses who were labeled as “difficult” for not putting up with men’s bullshit. She’s a sharp woman, and was among the first to notice that the so-called sexual liberation movement had quickly become an excuse to make women wear less clothing and put out more easily. That earned her the ire of male entertainment moguls and second wave feminists alike.

R110, nice to hear from you, Raquel.

Raquel Welch was never "sharp," and she was never a proponent of "Women's Lib" or women's behavior in the sexual revolution. Rather she was one of those "I've always been liberated" or "I don't want to lose my femininity" bullshitters.

Raquel was disliked by co-workers because she was a DIVA, a diva with very little in the way of talent. Period. Face it Raquel fans.

Rocky with Gianni, Madonna, and Tupac.

She was definitely a far more pleasant singer than Bacall was. Her acting wasn't as good, but her star power was close to the same wattage (especially then). Debbie Reynolds was probably the best out of all three of them, but by that point, the show had run its course and poor Debbie ended up closing it. Barbara Eden was surprisingly great in a regional production I saw. I wonder why no one's ever at least tried to stage Woman of the Year for Encores. It's a great vehicle for a movie star who can sing a little and be funny.

I saw Welch when she stepped in for a few weeks when Bacall took a vacation. She was tremendous in the role and made such a huge hit in a few weeks that the producers asked her back when Bacall left. The word was that after she took over, she worked hard, but she got bored with it, too. And new little pieces of business crept in. Yes, the audience laughed at the crap she added, but it cheapens the performance and always works against the performer who reduces herself to being a ham. In this case, it probably makes a big difference when you saw Raquel in the show.

I was always amused that with those big tits of hers she played both a transexual and a transvestite. At least she had some humor about who she is and about her public persona.

114 replies and no mention of the very odd 1969 movie Magic Christian where Raquel "managed" the engine room?

I know no one that wants to work with her.

Did Lauren have a comment about Raquel following her in Woman of the Year?

"Welch is a hugely famous person who never did a single great project."

I disagree, I think the early seventies versions of "The Three Musketeers" and "The Four Musketeers" are genuinely great films, by far the best version of the old story ever made.

However, she was the weakest thing about the films.

"Welch is a hugely famous person who never did a single great project."

I disagree, I think the early seventies versions of "The Three Musketeers" and "The Four Musketeers" are genuinely great films, by far the best version of the old story ever made.

However, she was the weakest thing about the films.

When she was on The Muppet Show they had a dig at her:

Kermit the Frog: For tonight, we are honored to present the one and only Miss Raquel Welch.

Miss Piggy: [clears her throat] Pity we can't book an *important* guest star once in a while.

Kermit the Frog: W-What are you saying, Piggy? Tonight, we have an internationally acclaimed actress, singer, dancer, and one of the sexiest ladies alive!

Miss Piggy: You get that every night, Frog!

THE poor man's Sophia Loren.

There was a recent interview with her where she opens about about racial bias and racism I didn't even know she was Latina and her parents were from South America.

Racial bias, yeah, that's the ticket, everyone hates Raquel because she's Latina! NOT

[quote]THE poor man's Sophia Loren.

That title always belonged to Gina Lollobrigida, not Welch.

Indeed r124 Gina Lollobrigida is in a completely different league of talent to Raquel Welch.