marieclaire.com.au 185GETTY IMAGES; SPLASH NEWS
of her modelling work, Anna Nicole
tried to move into acting, but
spectacularly failed in a number of
roles – her incoherent performance in
1994’s Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final
Insult earned her a Razzie Award for
Worst New Star. At an Oscars night
party in LA in March 1995, she flashed
celebrities then threw up in the toilet.
With Marshall gone, so was
everything else. The houses he’d lavished
on her were sold, the $50,000 a month
allowance was severed and his family
vowed she’d never
get a penny of his
$1.6 billion fortune,
half of which she
claimed Marshall
had promised her.
“As soon as
Howard died, my
story wasn’t so
pretty,” said Anna Nicole, who comfort
ate her way to 101kg. She popped
antidepressants along with painkillers
to relieve the discomfort of faulty
breast implants and after almost dying
from an accidental overdose in
November 1995, she checked into the
Betty Ford Clinic. “I was f ******
bloopers,” she admitted at the time. “I
was having wild, crazy dreams about
butterflies and Pepsi machines.”
An often disorientated and
incoherent Anna Nicole was back on
the radar on August 4, 2002, when The
Anna Nicole Show debuted on cable
TV. Also starring her lawyer/agentoffer of lunch the following day because
she had to work, he gave her an
envelope stuffed with dollars “and it
was the last time I ever danced”.
Marshall showered her with gifts – on
one shopping trip she racked up
$2 million worth of jewellery on his
credit card – but never committed to
move into his Bel Air pad.
She continued to reinvent herself,
adding platinum hair and a well-
practised Marilyn Monroe pose to her
arsenal. When Playboy received her
test shots, they flew her out to LA for a
shoot and in March 1992 she landed
the cover, followed by the centrefold in
May 1993. The shots were spotted by
Paul Marciano, then CEO of Guess,
and, impressed with her bombshell
looks, he handed her a million-dollar
contract, replacing supermodel Claudia
Schiffer. “I didn’t know what Guess
Jeans were,” admitted Anna Nicole. “I
just shopped at Wal-Mart and Kmart.”
On June 27, 1994, 26-year-old
Anna Nicole wed 89-year-old Marshall
at a private ceremony at Houston’s
White Dove Wedding Chapel. Barely
more than a year later, on August 4,
1995, her husband died of pneumonia.
It was then, said Anna Nicole, that
“my whole world collapsed”.
But even before Marshall’s death,
her mental state was fragile. Four
months before her wedding, she’d
collapsed in a hotel after downing a
bottle of tequila and a cocktail of
prescription drugs. Then, on the backHoward K Stern and son, Daniel, the
reality show was pure car-crash
television, with 1.4 million viewers
tuning in to watch Anna Nicole feeding
Prozac to her poodle, Sugar Pie,
and wandering around her rented
Hollywood apartment clutching the
urn of her dead husband’s ashes.
For a brief moment, there seemed
the possibility of normality for Anna
Nicole when she gave birth to daughter
Dannielynn (the father was unknown)
in the Bahamas on September 7, 2006.
But heartbreakingly, three days later
20-year-old Daniel died in her hospital
room. Following an autopsy report that
showed methadone and antidepressants
in his system, Daniel’s death was
recorded as an accidental overdose.
It was the beginning of the end for
Anna Nicole. Nearly a year on and still
grieving, she was set to be evicted from
her Bahamian mansion after failing to
make loan payments. Her fight for
Marshall’s money – which had been in
and out of the courts for years – was
wearing her down (the case finally
ended in August 2014, when a Supreme
Court judge ruled against Anna Nicole,
thus leaving daughter Dannielynn
without an inheritance).
She also had another court case
pending, this one concerning Trim-Spa
Inc, the company
for which she had
been advertising
weight-loss pills
and was now, along
with Anna Nicole
herself, the subject
of a class-action
lawsuit alleging
false or misleading marketing.
With pressure mounting, Anna
Nicole succumbed to a series of health
problems. Two months after the birth
of her daughter, she’d been hospitalised
with pneumonia and a collapsed lung
and she was now suffering flu-like
symptoms after recent surgery to
repair one of her breast implants.
After Daniel’s death she’d also tried to
take her life twice.
Anna Nicole’s life finally ended on
February 8, 2007, in a hotel room in
Florida, where she was staying with
Stern, who she’d “married” in a
commitment ceremony the previous“My whole life revolves
around my breasts.
Everything I have is
because of them”- Anna Nicole Smith
Anna Nicole was named
Playboy Playmate of the
Year in 1993. Right and
below: she wed oil tycoon,
J Howard Marshall in 1994
amid much controversy.
He died a year later of
pneumonia. It was then
that Anna Nicole’s “whole
world collapsed”.Life stories