Bio
Pamela Anderson is a Canadian-born actress, glamour model, producer, TV personality and author best known for her role as Casey Jean 'C.J.' Parker in the television drama series Baywatch, from 1992-1997.
Anderson was born in Ladysmith, British Columbia, 90km northwest of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, the daughter of Carol, a waitress, and Barry Anderson, a furnace repairman.
Her great-grandfather, Juho Hyytiäinen, was Finnish, a native of Saarijärvi, and left Finland in 1908, changing his name to Anderson when he arrived as an immigrant. Anderson has Dutch ancestry on her mother's side.
The newborn Anderson won fame as Canada's "Centennial Baby", because she was thought to have been the first baby born on Canada's Centennial Day (she was born at 4:08 in the morning).
However, the Campbell River Upper Islander of July 5, 1967 reported a baby born two hours earlier on the same Canada Day.
The Anderson family later moved to the town of Comox.
After graduating from Highland Secondary School in 1985, Anderson moved to Vancouver and worked as a fitness instructor.
During the summer of 1989, Anderson went with her friends to a BC Lions game at BC Place; at some point during the game she was shown on the stadium screen wearing a Labatt's t-shirt, causing the crowd to cheer for the 21-year-old Anderson. She was taken down to the field to get an ovation from the crowd.
Labatt's immediately offered Anderson a modeling contract and she accepted.
In late 1989, Anderson decided to model for Playboy magazine. She first appeared as their October 1989 cover girl (credited as Pamela Anderson Ilicic). At this stage in her modeling career she had decided to live in Los Angeles to further pursue her career ambitions.
She became a centrefold for Playboy when the magazine chose her to be their Playmate of the Month for their February 1990 issue. Anderson has since appeared in Playboy several times in the 1990s and the following decade.
After her move to Los Angeles, Anderson bleached her brunette hair blonde and underwent breast augmentation. In 1991, she landed a minor role on the hit television sitcom, Home Improvement (1991-1999).
Having gained viewer attention, she landed the role of C.J. Parker (1992-1997) on Baywatch, and left Home Improvement after its second season. Anderson was still modeling for Outdoor Life and appearing on the cover of the magazine each year.
Her role as C.J. Parker gave her more popularity and gained her attention from international viewers. She returned to Baywatch for the 2003 reunion movie, Baywatch: Hawaiian Wedding. She also made appearances on The Nanny as Fran's rival, Heather Biblow.
In 1996, she appeared in a feature film, Barb Wire, as a character known as Barbara Rose Kopetski, which was mistakenly thought by some to have been her real name. The movie, a thinly-veiled futuristic remake of Casablanca, failed to achieve commercial success.
During the filming of Barb Wire, Anderson suffered a miscarriage.
In April 1997, she guest-hosted Saturday Night Live. During the beginning of the show, Anderson said, "You know, if you're nervous on stage, you actually should be naked!" She then began a striptease.
Her breasts, however, were covered by a small flesh-coloured bra and she also wore a crotch patch that was also flesh coloured (though they were still blurred out for the sake of the joke). The segment became fodder for late-night comedians for the following weeks.
She also appeared on one of two covers for the September issue of Playboy; the other cover pictured Jenny McCarthy.
In September 1998, Anderson starred in her produced series V.I.P. It was very poorly received and a critical bomb. However, with many people tuning in just to see her, the show lasted four seasons before being canceled in 2002.
Anderson stated that she needed to dedicate her time to raising her children, but many believed that she was retiring.
In March 2001, Christine Evelyn Roth was arrested while sleeping in a guest room of Anderson's home. She was only charged with the misdemeanour of trespassing and not the more serious crime of stalking. Roth pleaded guilty to the charge of trespassing and was deported home to France.
In 2004, Anderson returned to the spotlight. In May, she appeared naked on the cover of Playboy magazine. It was the first time she had appeared naked on any magazine cover.
Later, she posed naked for Stuff and GQ magazines. Many noticed that her breast size was larger than her pictorials from 2003.
Anderson became a naturalized citizen of the United States on May 12, 2004, while retaining her Canadian citizenship. She has lived in Southern California since 1989.
In 2004, Anderson released the book Star, co-written by Eric Shaw Quinn, in which she describes a young teenager doing different things in order to reach fame. After this, she began touring the United States, signing autographs for fans at Wal-Mart stores nationwide.
Her second book, the sequel Star Struck, released in 2005, is a thinly veiled look at her life with Tommy Lee and the travails of celebrity life.
In January 2005, Anderson confessed that she had new bigger breast implants, claiming not to feel like herself without them.
In April 2005, Anderson starred in a new FOX sitcom Stacked as Skyler Dayton, a party girl (with implants), who goes to work at a bookstore. It was canceled on May 18, 2006, after two seasons, although some episodes had not been aired on the network.
On August 14, 2005, Comedy Central created the Roast of Pamela Anderson to honour the sex symbol for the past decade. During her final speech at the Roast, Anderson referred to her breasts as "Pancho and Lefty".
In December 2005, NBC cut off a video of Anderson pole dancing topless on Elton John's "The Red Piano." NBC said that the footage was inappropriate for primetime. The video was shown on huge screens during the event, while John was playing a song. Anderson was topless, but stars were painted on her breasts.
In March 2006, it was announced that Anderson would receive a star on Canada's Walk of Fame thanks to her many years as a model and actress. She is only the second model to receive a star.
In April 2006, Anderson hosted Canada's Juno Awards, becoming the first non-singer and model to do so.
Anderson was repeatedly referenced in the 2006 comedy film Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan as the title character seeks to kidnap and marry her. Anderson appears in person at the end of the film confronted by Borat in a staged botched abduction.
She performed on February 13-14 2008 a Valentine's Day striptease act at the Crazy Horse cabaret in Paris.
On July 9, 2008, Anderson entered the Australian Big Brother house for a three day visit. Her appearance on this show also marked Anderson's foray into reality television with a series of her own, Pam: Girl on the Loose, which debuted on August 3, 2008 on E! in the United States.
In addition to her fame from modeling and acting, Anderson has received a great deal of press attention for her well-publicized personal life. Her relationships have made headlines in gossip magazines for years.
She married Tommy Lee, drummer of Mötley Crüe, on February 19, 1995 after knowing him for only 96 hours and the couple eventually had two sons, Brandon Thomas Lee (b. June 6, 1996) and Dylan Jagger Lee (b. December 29, 1997).
During this time, she was known professionally as Pamela Anderson Lee. Anderson filed for divorce from him twice and reconciled with him twice, before the couple finally broke up for good.
On February 25, 1998, the couple had a violent argument, and Anderson had Lee arrested on charges of spousal abuse. The next day, Anderson filed for divorce. On February 28, 1998, the divorce was official, two days after the filing of the divorce.
Tommy was sentenced to six months in jail. In May 1998, he had to go to anger management therapy and pay Anderson's legal fees. In March 2002, Anderson publicly stated that she had contracted the Hepatitis C virus from Lee (supposedly from sharing tattoo needles), and began writing a regular column for Jane magazine.
A pornographic home video of Anderson and Tommy Lee on their honeymoon was stolen from their home, and made a huge stir on the Internet. Anderson sued the Internet Entertainment Group, the company that was distributing the video.
Ultimately the courts awarded Anderson and Lee $1.5 million plus attorney fees for their share of the profits. After this, the company sold copies of the stolen honeymoon tape across the country.
A second tape, which was made before the Tommy Lee tape, involving Anderson and musician Bret Michaels from Poison was later announced, and an abridged version of less than 60 seconds appeared on the internet. Frames of the video first appeared in Penthouse magazine in March 1998.
However, the tape was successfully blocked by Michaels, and the full, unedited version has never been seen by the general public.
Since her divorce, she has become engaged to both the model Marcus Schenkenberg and the singer Kid Rock (Robert J. Ritchie). She broke up with Schenkenberg in 2001, and broke up with Kid Rock in 2003.
It was announced on July 18, 2006 that she would marry Kid Rock on July 29, 2006 on a yacht near St Tropez, France. There was extensive unconfirmed media speculation that the marriage was pregnancy-related, but the theory was based only on Anderson's representative's refusal to comment on the question.
On November 10, 2006, it was announced that Anderson miscarried while in Vancouver shooting a new film, Blonde and Blonder. Seventeen days later, on November 27, 2006 Anderson filed for divorce in Los Angeles County Superior Court from Kid Rock, citing irreconcilable differences.
Anderson told talk show host Ellen DeGeneres in September 2007 that she was engaged. On September 29, Anderson and Paris Hilton's ex-Rick Salomon applied for a marriage license in Las Vegas.
Anderson married Salomon between her two nightly appearances at the Planet Hollywood Hotel & Casino in Hans Klok's magic show in a small wedding ceremony at The Mirage on October 6, 2007.
However, on February 22, 2008, Anderson has requested through the courts that the marriage be annulled citing reasons of fraud.
Anderson is a vegetarian, an advocate for animal rights, and an active member of the animal protection organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), taking part in several campaigns for animal rights.
She became a vegetarian in her early teens when she saw her father slaughtering an animal he had hunted.
One of Anderson's campaigns as a member of PETA has been against the use of fur. In 1999, Anderson received the first Linda McCartney Memorial Award for animal rights protectors, in recognition of her campaign against fur.
In 2003, Anderson stripped down for PETA's "I'd Rather Go Naked Than Wear Fur" advertising campaign. On June 28, 2006, Anderson posed naked with other protesters on a window display of the Stella McCartney boutique in London, England. It was a PETA gala event before the PETA Humanitarian Awards. Anderson went inside the boutique and said she would take her clothes off if the event raised enough money for PETA, which it did.
She has also actively campaigned against Kentucky Fried Chicken. In 2001, Anderson released a letter in support of PETA's campaign against Kentucky Fried Chicken, stating "What KFC does to 750 million chickens each year is not civilized or acceptable." She later made a video about KFC's treatment of chickens.
In January 2006, Anderson requested that the Governor of Kentucky remove a bust of Colonel Sanders, the founder of KFC, from display but her request was refused even when she offered her own bust in exchange.
In February 2006, Anderson decided to boycott the Kentucky Derby because of its support for Kentucky Fried Chicken.
She has also campaigned against seal hunting in her native Canada. In March 2006, Anderson asked to speak to Prime Minister Stephen Harper about the annual seal hunt. Her request was refused. In May 2006, she petitioned random individuals on the street for their opinion on the Canadian Seal Hunt.
More recently she joined forces with PETA in a campaign for the boycott of fruit-juice maker POM. The "Pom Horrible Campaign" has resulted in response to the company's refusal to halt animal tests.
In March 2005, Anderson became a spokesmodel for MAC Cosmetics's MAC AIDS Fund, which helped people affected by AIDS and HIV. After becoming the official spokesmodel, Anderson raised money during events in Toronto, Tokyo, Dublin, and Athens.
Anderson became the celebrity spokesperson for the American Liver Foundation, and served as the Grand Marshal of the SOS motorcycle ride fundraiser.