The star who really was a WONDER WOMAN
She did her own stunts, beat alcoholism and fended off sex predators long before #MeToo. As the superheroine is reborn for a new age, Femail catches up with Lynda Carter...
DURING the second season of the 1970s TV series Wonder Woman, there is a scene in which our heroine, to prevent two baddies making an airborne getaway, jumps onto their moving helicopter, her long, coiffed curls billowing behind her.
Amazingly, the feat was performed not by a stuntwoman but by the star of the show, lynda Carter, who not only managed to hang on to the helicopter without safety equipment but somehow remain contained in her famously skimpy, low-cut boob tube and shorts.
Second-generation Wonder Woman fans may scoff at YouTube clips of the original series, having sampled the new feminist film version, Wonder Woman 1984. But maybe they need reminding that lynda Carter was the real deal, in an age when women in TV action series often seemed to be there just to serve drinks and have their bottoms pinched.
‘i loved leaping on the helicopter and i loved all the fights Wonder Woman had to do,’ says lynda, now 69. ‘in what other profession could you fling guys around, hang from a helicopter, jump on trampolines and drive stunt cars?’
When the makers of the show wanted to use stuntmen for more daring action scenes, lynda was having none of it.
‘i remember looking at this one guy who was small, bow-legged and had a hairy chest and underarms,’ she recalls. ‘They said: “We’ll shoot him from far back” and i said: “it doesn’t matter how far back you go, that’s not going to look like me!” ’
Before Baywatch’s Pamela Anderson was even out of armbands, lynda, a former Miss World USA, had perfected the ‘slow-mo’ close-up, running in a corset and knickers. her 37-25-36 vital statistics were known worldwide.
The show ran for four years, turning lynda into a global star and reportedly the highestpaid woman in TV. As Wonder Woman she could repel bullets with her bracelets and
YES, overturn cars with one flick of a perfectly manicured fingernail.
it was cheesy and, in the era before CGI, some of the special effects were plain silly. But for 1970s girls she represented an awakening. When Wonder Woman merchandise was released, for the first time girls had dolls they didn’t dress up but instead dropped out of the window tied to a hankerchief parachute, like their brothers’ Action Men.
The character was recently given a reboot and is now being played by israeli actress Gal Gadot. Wonder Woman 1984 is a sequel to the 2017 blockbuster which took more than £600 million at the box office.
Gone are the slow-mo close-ups. Gadot’s Wonder Woman is an Amazonian martial arts expert who wields a whip and sword, and kicks and punches with a snarl.
Certainly, times have changed. lynda recalls one occasion during her first season of filming when she was called in to see the producers. ‘They said: “We found a cameraman drilling a hole into your dressing room,” so he was basically like a Peeping Tom. he was a really good cameraman and had seemed a nice guy.’
he was sent packing by the studio but, like most women then, lynda didn’t make a fuss.
‘i was so busy working 16 and 18-hour days that when they said they’d taken care of it, that’s how i dealt with it,’ she says. ‘But at a fairly young age i’d learnt to call guys out on their behaviour.
‘it happened one time at a friend’s party where this guy let his hand slide down my hip and i told him “no touching!” he jumped back like he’d been stung by a bee! A young woman saw that and said to me afterwards: “is that how you do it? Wow, i never thought of that”.’
But lynda didn’t always get off lightly. The #MeToo movement has uncovered a catalogue of abuse and sexual harassment of women in hollywood and beyond — and two years ago, in a u.S. TV interview, she admitted she had been the target of an abuser who at the time was being prosecuted for other offences.
She did not name him or detail what happened.
She explained: ‘There’s nothing I can add. It’s not about me. It’s about the women it’s happening to today.’
She adds now: ‘There’s more to the #MeToo movement than sexual harassment. It’s about bullying and intimidation, too, from tone of voice to demeaning women with looks and attitude.
‘But this is not all men, it is just these few. It’s important in the #MeToo conversation to include all the champion men in our lives who love and protect us just as we love and protect them.
‘I have a great husband and son [James, 32] and father, and the men in my life are all fabulous.’
Lynda is speaking from her home in Potomac, Maryland, to which she decamped from Hollywood more than 30 years ago with her husband Robert Altman, 73, a lawyer and businessman.
She turns 70 in July but still looks sensational.
‘ I’m just like everyone,’ she insists. ‘Sometimes I look fat and sometimes I don’t. I dye my hair and put creams on my skin but I’ve not had any work done — I’d be afraid of looking scary. I have a little Botox now and then.’
She has managed to keep hold of two of the original Wonder Woman costumes, which she intends to give to her children. But no, she is never tempted to slip into the starspangled corset and spin around in the room when no one’s looking. ‘The costume’s really tiny!’ she says. ‘I’d be afraid to even try.’
She continues to act and appeared in the Super Troopers films, as well as in series including Law & Order and Supergirl (in which she played the President) — and makes a cameo appearance in the final credits of Wonder Woman 1984, which arrived in cinemas before Christmas and will be available on demand next week.
HAVING She has also been focusing on her first love, singing.
grown up in Arizona, the youngest of three children, Lynda at first pursued a career in music. But after ‘accidentally’ taking part in a beauty pageant and proceeding to Miss World, she signed up for acting classes and found herself in Los Angeles in her early 20s.
She was struggling to pay the rent when the call came telling her she had won the part of TV’s Wonder Woman.
Lynda and Robert have been married for almost 37 years. ‘It works,’ she says, ‘because we have different personalities.
‘He’s very smart, very charming and very even-tempered, and while he’s a lot of fun and has a great sense of humour, around other people he’s more self-contained. I have always been. . . attention-seeking!’
She has been open about her struggles with alcoholism. ‘I’ve been in recovery for 23 years,’ she says, ‘and I didn’t even start drinking till I was in my mid-20s’. At that time she was unhappily married to her first husband, talent manager Ron Samuels.
There is a history of alcoholism in her family. ‘I would stop drinking for two or three years, then start again and it just felt terrible. That was a long time ago and now I’m very happy.’
She is incredibly proud of her daughter Jessica, 30, who recently gave up a law career to pursue music full- time. So with two children in their 30s, is she a Wonder Grandma yet? ‘No!’ she yelps. ‘Although I hope I’ll still be alive when that happens.’
In the meantime, she recently received the ultimate compliment: ‘My daughter finally saw Gal as Wonder Woman and said, “Mom, I finally get why everyone idolises you. I finally get what Wonder Woman means to everyone.’