Actress makes beauty pageant return
LOS ANGELES: For years, she was known as “Vanessa the Undressa”, but now this star will get a chance to return triumphantly to the pageant stage.
It was announced yesterday via People Magazine that Vanessa Williams would be returning to Miss America.
The 52-year-old will serve as a judge on Sunday for the 95th Miss America competition.
The last to be announced from the celebrity judging panel might certainly be a shock to some who still remember when the now successful actress was forced to resign as Miss America 1984.
Williams was the first ever black Miss America, having being crowned the year earlier, but then nude pictures of her emerged and were published in Penthouse magazine.
Taken before she was crowned, the pictures were sold to the racy publication without the star’s knowledge and published under the headline “Miss America, Oh, God, She’s Nude!”, and were then republished by the magazine in later editions over the next decade.
With sponsors threatening to pull out of the 1985 pageant, Williams was forced to resign in July 1984.
The scandal would haunt her for years, the Save The Best For Last singer told People in 2012.
“For years, I’d walk into an audition and feel the judgment. I was a scandalous Miss America. I was ‘Vanessa the Undressa’.”
But the Ugly Betty star said she always planned to use the pain she felt to do better.
“I thought: ‘One day you’ll see what I’m made of ’.”
And it appears her chance to at least prove those pageant critics wrong has come, with Williams set to be the jewel in the celebrity judging crown at the competition, which is being held in New Jersey and aired live on Sunday.
No doubt it is hoped, with the scandal being revisited, more viewers will tune in to the show, which has suffered from a declining viewership.
Fellow judges include singer Zendaya, country singer Brett Eldredge, snow- boarding star Amy Purdy, and Taya Kyle, the wife of the late US Navy Seal Chris Kyle, who was the subject of the hit film American Sniper. – Daily Mail