The Rich History Behind Pamela Anderson’s Tender Performance in The Last Showgirl

After the world premiere of her new movie The Last Showgirl, at the Toronto International Film Festival, Pamela Anderson was asked during an on-stage question and answer session how she prepared to play Shelley, a Vegas showgirl whose long-running gig is coming to a close. “I think I’ve been getting ready my whole life for this role,” Anderson said, wearing a black suit, which she complemented with sunglasses (though she eventually ditched those).

She also acknowledged how rare this opportunity is for her. ”It’s the first time I ever read a good script, first of all,” she said to laughs. Other material, she joked, hasn’t been quite so "coherent." 

Indeed, The Last Showgirl, directed by Gia Coppola, marks Anderson’s most substantial work in film to date, one for which she is receiving strong reviews. The BBC called the 57-year-old actor a "revelation."  The film arrives at a moment of cultural reassessment of the former Baywatch star’s career, which had more frequently than not been used as a punchline or a tabloid headline. While Anderson's Shelley is a new creation, the sense of history the audience brings to the actor playing her, whose rise to fame was inextricably linked to her physical appearance, is relevant to the story. Shelley demands that her passion for performing in the Vegas revue, nudity and all, be taken seriously—just as Anderson has long advocated for herself. 

Arguably Anderson's biggest film prior to this moment was the 1996 thriller Barb Wire, which ultimately became yet another punchline in the saga of her career. At the time she was in the middle of her high-profile marriage to rocker Tommy Lee, and she miscarried during production. Roger Ebert, reviewing the movie, wrote that: "Pamela Anderson Lee, while not a great actress, is a good sport." Later, Anderson would say, "I don't even know what that movie is about. I have no idea." 

The past couple of years have offered a chance for the public to reconsider Anderson and the media's treatment of her. First came the 2022 Hulu miniseries Pam & Tommy, which explored the fallout of Anderson and Lee's infamous sex tape and featured Lily James in the role of Pam. While the show was sympathetic toward Anderson, she herself did not approve of it and in an interview called it "salt on the wound."

The following year Anderson told her own story in the Netflix documentary Pamela, a love story, directed by Ryan White. There, she frankly talked about her life, including her experiences with sexual abuse, and shared diary entries. The film also documented her rehearsals to play Roxie Hart in Chicago on Broadway during an eight-week run in 2022. The Guardian assessed her performance with: "Anderson may not demonstrate great talent for singing (her voice is feathery and soft, at times difficult to hear even in the orchestra) or dancing (good enough), but she has what she needs: an unserious self-awareness and an excellent grasp on winking camp." 

The Last Showgirl, however, is not camp. Instead, it's a tender look at the corners of Vegas many might write off as crass or cheesy. The screenplay from Kate Gersten was inspired by her time observing the showgirls of Jubilee!, the "last standing tits and feathers show, as they call them," as she described it during the Q&A. Gersten had a job writing patter for the show that would be taking over some of Jubilee's performances.

From there Gersten imagined Shelley, a woman who has been with the production Le Razzle Dazzle for upwards of 30 years, prancing onstage nightly in wings and rhinestones. Shelley loves her job, acting as a den mother to some of the younger dancers (including Kiernan Shipka and Brenda Strong). But Shelley is also stuck in the past and holds onto the idea of what Le Razzle Dazzle once was: a phenomenon where the showgirls were celebrated and flown around the world. Now, it's closing to be replaced by a "dirty circus," and, in the last weeks of its run, Shelley finds herself adrift. 

Anderson plays Shelley with a consummate sweetness that sometimes registers as naivete. Le Razzle Dazzle has been Shelley's life for so long that she doesn't understand how others perceive it—including her estranged daughter (Billie Lourd), who is on the verge of graduating from college. However, Shelley is not a tragic figure. During one key scene she tells off a dismissive casting director, telling him, "I'm 57 and I'm beautiful you son of a bitch." The TIFF audience applauded. 

During the Q&A following the film, the rest of the cast was visibly emotional for Anderson. Jamie Lee Curtis, who plays Shelley's spray-tanned cocktail-waitressing friend, was crying as she addressed her co-star. "I can't," she said. 

Lourd, the daughter of the late actor Carrie Fisher and granddaughter of Golden Age of Hollywood star Debbie Reynolds, explained that playing Shelley's child was "cathartic" for her. 

"It felt like Shelley was my grandma and I got to be my mom and I got to understand my mom on a deeper level than I ever had, and it was a beautiful experience," she said. "And to get to do that with Pamela was an absolute gift. She is a wonderful mother in real life and a wonderful mother to me on this film." 

Parenthood is a key part of the journey that Anderson speaks about in Pamela, a love story—including describing her miscarriage during Barb Wire—making The Last Showgirl another full-circle moment for her. That's just another way in which the film allows Anderson, who is the mother to adult sons Brandon and Dylan Lee, to reveal contours of herself that might have been otherwise dismissed.

On stage, Anderson remarked how reading the script she thought, "I'm the only one who can do this." Watching it, you believe her.