Unguarded Moments

Follow the careers of two actresses and you learn about the changing roles of sex and prudery in Hollywood. In 1941 Carmen Miranda had just finished shooting Weekend in Havana when she did a publicity photo session with her co-star Cesar Romero. As a photographer clicked away, Romero hoisted his dance partner into the air and gave the camera an unexpected peek into stardom. The widely circulated underground photo stirred up a scandal that, according to Twentieth Century Fox mogul Darryl F. Zanuck, "was the finish of her." In 1991 Sharon Stone was filming an interrogation scene for a thriller called Basic Instinct, when director Paul Verhoeven instructed her to uncross, then recross her legs. Moviegoers around the world saw Stone had nothing on beneath her tight white dress. Stone insists she had no idea her brief flash would even be noticed. She was wrong, and the notoriety propelled her to stardom. What a difference half a century makes.