Mariska Hargitay’s famous actor parents: Meet Mickey Hargitay & Jayne Mansfield, who died when she was 3
Mansfield joined a Miss California competition after taking a summer course at UCLA in Los Angeles, though she eventually withdrew. The family made the choice to attend the University of Texas in Austin, where Jayne appeared in a number of plays.
It in and of itself turned out to be a lot of fun, but Hollywood remained her goal. The family felt it was time since, of course, you had to be there to succeed in Hollywood. In 1954, Mansfield moved to Los Angeles with her family.
Naturally, breaking into the profession isn’t simple, as is the case for every aspiring actor or actress. When Jayne started her modeling career, her figure quickly became not just a major problem but also the focal point of her life.
Because casting directors believed that the future pinup icon’s voluptuous, attractive form was far too seductive for a commercial or advertisement, she had difficulty finding work.. It actually came to a point where she was cut out of her very first ad, was a print ad for General Electric.
Start of Hollywood career
Jayne wanted to be on screen, and soon got her big chance. She went to audition for both Paramount and Warner Brothers studios, though neither of them wanted her.
Yet while she was reading at Paramount, the head of casting, Milton Lewis, did something that would change Jayne’s perception of herself.
”I had been to three different universities and two or three dramatic schools before I went to Hollywood, preparing myself for my hoped career as an actress. I did a soliloquy for Joan of Arc for Milton Lewis who was head of casting at Paramount Studios in order to audition. And he seemed to think I was wasting my ”obvious talents”. He lightened my hair and tightened my dresses, and this is the result.”
Jayne Mansfield wanted to compete with Marilyn Monroe, the biggest and brightest Hollywood star at the time. But at the same time as her career in Hollywood was beginning, her husband Paul had simply had enough. The couple divorced in 1955, and their daughter stayed with Jayne in Los Angeles.
Jayne’s career eventually took off when she landed a role in the low-budget film Female Jungle (1955), which gave her plenty of exposure. The same year she’d been named “Playmate of the Month” and also been on the cover of Playboy Magazine.
“Marilyn Monroe King-Size”
Her new style – the pinup, provocative blonde bombshell – was supposed to cement her status as the new Marilyn Monroe, and in a way, she definitely succeeded. Pink proved to be her color, with Jayne even buying a pink Cadillac to drive.
Studios wanted more of her and soon she was signed. Fox began to market her as the “Marilyn Monroe King-Size,” and her success grew. By that point she wasn’t just an actress; she was a sex symbol of the 1950s.
One journalist even claimed: “She suffered so many on-stage strap and zipper mishaps that nudity was, for her, a professional hazard.”
Jayne gained even more attention following her appearance in Fox’s 1957 comedy blockbuster Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?. That same year, she received a Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer – Female. The following year, she starred alongside Kenneth More in the Western The Sheriff of Fractured Jaw (1958).
Jayne scored several other – for the time being – provocative roles, including The Burglar (1957) and Too Hot to Handle (1960). Sadly, however, she was labelled “The Poor Man’s Marilyn Monroe”.
Jayne Mansfield – censorship battles
At that time, Mansfield had gotten married to second-husband, actor and bodybuilder Mickey Hargitay. They tied the knot in 1958, at a press-filled ceremony in Rancho Palos Verdes, California. Before long, the family was growing. In 1959, they welcomed son Mickey Hargitay, and two more children followed. Son Zoltan Hargitay was born in 1960, and daughter Mariska Magdolna Hargitay was welcomed in 1964.
