Fay Wray died in 2004, a little more than a month before her ninety-seventh birthday. She was such a memorable and beloved Ann Darrow in 1933’s King Kong–the first actress to earn the label “scream queen”–that two days after she died, the lights of the Empire State Building were turned off for fifteen minutes in her honor.
When Kong came back to life in 1976, he dumped Ann for another beauty named Dwan.
The big ape nearly ended Jessica Lange’s career before it began, but thanks to The Postman Always Rings Twice and Frances in 1981 and 1982, it was revived. So was Kong, who’d forgotten all about Dwan and traveled back in time for Naomi Watts’s version of Ann Darrow in Peter Jackson’s 2005 remake.
My own particular favorite Ann Darrow is the one on the desk in front of me. That face, that beautiful face.
Mattel, 2002
I have loved every version of King Kong and all his ladies… I never knew there was a Barbie version!
Me, either–saw her by accident when researching something–and now she’s MINE.
Mattel’s doll’s expressiopn reminds me of my mom in this picture!
I need to show this to her so she can get her daily chuckle from my direction. : )
WOW, Mark, she does look like your mom here!! Uncanny!
Your mother could totally be one of Hitchcock’s blondes, Mark.
I like this barbie doll but I’m afraid that I meit not be able to get one she’s very beautiful barbie doll
I didn’t know there was a KK Barbie! Pretty cool!
I love the big King Kong hand that’s holding her, too.
I remember seeing the ’76 version in a movie theater. I can still see the seven year old me leaning over my tub of lightly buttered popcorn and whispering two words to my baby sitter, “Camp classic!”
That’s what SHE said. About you.
“That beautiful satin-draped frame…”
Any “Rocky Horror Picture Show” reference catches
my immediate attention!
“King Kong” Barbie = Awesome!
Do you know I’ve only seen it once, and never in the theater with audience participation. Kinda funny, because my husband and some of his siblings used to go.