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Christie Brinkley is opening up about how Pamela Anderson’s and her careers have taken a similar path over the years — beginning with their typecasting in the 1980s to today, as each of them has become writers sharing their side of the story.
Speaking with Social Life for a cover shoot filmed at her Tower Hill estate in the Hamptons, N.Y., the model, 71, reflected on how she and Anderson, 58, were “confined” to their roles as bleach-blonde supermodels in the early days of their careers, as writer Matthew Berritt puts it.
“[The] two weren’t exactly cast alike—Christie, the all-American goddess; Pam, the untamable sex symbol—but because they’ve arrived at a surprisingly similar place. Once flattened into archetypes, both women have stepped forward as authors of their own stories,” Berritt writes in the cover story, which PEOPLE has an exclusive preview of.
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According to Brinkley — who is set to host the Polo Hamptons event on July 19 and July 26 — she and Anderson were often misunderstood.
“I admire Pamela. I think we were both misread,” she told the magazine. “Different myths were built around each of us, and now we’ve found the freedom to say what was always ours.”
“We’re not salon blondes. We’re hands-in-the-dirt women. We bloom in the garden,” Brinkley added, posing in her lush, green Hamptons backyard.
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For her cover story — which was creative directed by Social Life editor-in-chief Devorah Rose — Brinkley also reflected on the release and major success of her brand-new memoir, Uptown Girl.
According to the model, both she and Anderson are benefitting from the tides turning, particularly when it comes to women in media.
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“There was a time when no one wanted to hear women like us talk—really talk,” Brinkley shared, referring to moments like when Joan Rivers joked to Johnny Carson that Christie was ‘living proof peroxide causes brain damage.'”
“For a long time, it was all punchlines and probably some projections. Now people are listening,” Brinkley added. “That’s new. That’s powerful.”
Brinkley’s Uptown Girl delves into the star’s life and work, spanning from her childhood to being discovered as a model outside a phone booth in Paris and her marriage to stars such as Billy Joel — similar to Anderson’s 2023 memoir, Love, Pamela.
The book traces Brinkley’s life and career in her own words, beginning with her childhood and her rough relationship with her biological father to at the start of her famed modeling career, after being discovered outside a phone booth in Paris in 1974.
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Later, she goes on to her work in the industry and on screen, in films like 1983’s National Lampoon’s Vacation — and her relationship with Joel, whose 1983 music video for his hit song “Uptown Girl” famously stars a young Brinkley.
Speaking with Social Life, Brinkley shared that she questioned if her book would even be successful, much less acclaimed.
“I had thought this book might just sit on shelves. I worried it would embarrass my kids. But people bought it. They loved it,” she told the outlet, before revealing her simple reaction to the book’s reception: “I cried.”
Read the full Social Life cover story with Christie Brinkley when it lands on July 18.
