Vanessa Williams Lost Miss America Crown, Then Conquered Hollywood

On July 23, 1984, Vanessa Williams resigned as Miss America, becoming the first black woman to win the crown and the first and only winner forced to relinquish it.

Williams suffered treatment, or rather mistreatment, from the Miss America organization as well as Penthouse and its lecherous founder Bob Guccione who published nude photos of Williams without her consent says a lot about the mores of America in the 80s.

But Williams' refusal to be defined by scandal, her unwavering drive and seemingly boundless talent say much more about her, in particular, and the endurance of black women, in general, in an entertainment industry that so often relegates them to roles as mammas or prostitutes with little distinction in between.

Miss America is an outdated and largely ignored relic today, but it was once a Really It's a big deal. Established in 1921, the pageant was one of the symbols of national greatness of the 20th century, exemplifying the superior beauty and virtue of the white American woman. Miss America was an official ambassador of the United States, and as a result, until 1950, only white women were allowed to compete in the pageant. The first black contestant, Miss Iowa Cheryl Brown, competed in 1970.

Vanessa Williams was a gifted individual from a young age. The daughter of music teachers, she planned to become the first African-American rockette, another bygone marker of female excellence, and studied ballet and jazz dance, theater arts, French horn, piano, and violin. She was one of 12 students offered the prestigious Presidential Theater Scholarship to attend Carnegie Mellon University, but she chose to enroll at Syracuse University on a separate scholarship.

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While in college, Williams met photographer Tom Chiapel, who convinced her to take nude photos with another model, on the condition that she not be identifiable in the photos and that they never see the light of day. It was the summer of 1982, after her freshman year at Syracuse, when she was 19.

In a 2012 interview with NPRWilliams explained that my mindset is the way I live my own life: I'm a feisty young woman, I can handle this, I can handle anything. And at 19, you think you run the world and you can control things. And a lot of times, you don't.

Having never competed in a beauty pageant before, Vanessa Williams was hesitant to enter the Miss Greater Syracuse pageant. But she decided to give it a try, and being Vanessa Williams, she won hands down. She then went on to win the Miss New York pageant, which earned her the title of Miss America. In 1983, 33 years after the pageant was desegregated, Vanessa Williams became the first black Miss America, which was not without controversy.

Sure, there were people who approached America's new symbol with tears in their eyes, saying, as Williams recalled, that they never thought they'd see the day it would happen. But there were also the death threats. In his memoir, You have no ideaCo-written with his mother Helen, Williams describes snipers on buildings due to “credible threats on his life and how he was told never to open the door to anyone.

Being Miss America was a big deal, but being the first black Miss America was huge. And the weight of that honour and obligation fell upon her in July 1984, just two months before the end of her reign, when Penthouse The Miss America Organization revealed that they would be releasing the nude photos Williams had taken years ago. Once the Miss America Organization learned of this, they gave Williams 72 hours to resign.

There was no sympathy from them towards Williams, instead she, and not Penthouse and Guccione, was vilified,

Vanessa Williams had become a star overnight, and just as suddenly, everything was taken away from her. She got to keep her crown and the official title of Miss America 1984, but she lost millions in endorsement deals, dropped out of college, and became persona non grata in the entertainment industry.

She auditioned with Tommy Tune to replace Twiggy in George and Ira Gershwin's musical My one and only but Ira Gershwin's wife said: Over my dead body, this whore will be in my show.

I had such a hard time being taken seriously not only because I was a beauty queen but a scandalous beauty queen at that, Williams said the The Cape Cod Times in 2016. It was by having this perception of myself that I realized to what extent I was going to be confronted with an obstacle.

Williams found it nearly impossible to launch a music or acting career after her resignation as Miss America, but she believed the best revenge was success. So she chose revenge. With the help of public relations expert and future ex-husband Ramon Hervey II, Williams landed a role in the 1987 film The Pick-up Artiststarring Molly Ringwald and someone else no stranger to scandal and redemption, Robert Downey Jr.

A year later, she released her first album, The right equipmentgenerating four hits, including the title track, and earning him three Grammy nominations. His next album, 1991s The comfort zonewent on to even greater success, going triple platinum, earning five Grammy nominations and featuring its signature track, “Save the Best for Last.” The plaintive ballad spent five weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was nominated for Song and Record of the Year.

In 1995, she ran away (and danced) with the television adaptation of Goodbye Birdiethen played in the 1997s Food for the soul. Williams was offered the role that would win Halle Berry an Oscar in 2001. Ball of the monsters but she turned it down, not because of the sexual content, as Angela Bassett had mentioned, but because she had just had a baby and had no desire to get naked in front of a group of people,” Williams said in 2014. “I saw [Berry] I was happy for her to win the Oscar, but in different circumstances I might have played that role.

Williams continued to work, leaving behind the memory of the Miss America embarrassment. In 2002, she was nominated for a Tony Award for In the woodsbut it wasn't until the beloved comedy-drama premiered in 2006 that Ugly Betty on which Williams has constantly kill It was through her role as HBIC/EIC Wilhelmina Slater that Williams was finally taken seriously as an actress. She earned three consecutive Emmy nominations for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy, all nominations she deserved.

In 2016, 32 years after she was unceremoniously ousted from Miss America, the organization invited her back to perform and apologize for her handling of the event. Penthouse It was a watershed moment that meant a lot to Williams, but perhaps even more so to her mother, who had also endured shame and criticism in the wake of the scandal.

Now, Williams is set to step into the stilettos of another iconic and dubiously evil fashionista, Miranda Priestley, in the West End production of The devil wears Prada. She also released her first studio recording in 15 years, Legs (Keep Dancin'), a celebration of her legendary legs and, more fittingly, her perseverance. Miss America is just a footnote in her career.

Like many black women before her and since, Vanessa Williams has had to prove herself time and time again, but she remains, by far, the most famous woman to ever hold the crown. In a sense, she is the quintessential Miss America.