The Face That Changed It All

by Beverly Johnson

  But nothing is ever that simple.

  At the time, I was totally unaware that there were prominent black models, such as Helen Williams, Donyale Luna, and Naomi Sims. All were beautiful models with vastly different profiles, and all had risen to a certain level of success in the fashion world during a wave of political correctness in the mid-sixties. The background stories of their work and struggles in the industry were rarely, if ever, told, so I had no idea who they were or that they even existed in the first place. These women were not showcased prominently in Ebony magazine because the magazine didn’t cover high fashion at that time. Maybe, just maybe, if I had known a bit more about those women’s stories in the modeling game beforehand, I would have been able to navigate my own course through the world of fashion a little smarter. Too late now.

  But then there was also the issue of my parents to navigate.

  Tim and Gloria Johnson would need to OK my plan of moving to New York that summer to model high fashion. In hindsight, I realize that the phone call home that day to share my newly minted idea was one of the funniest conversations I ever had with my parents. Modeling, in my father’s mind, was pretty much on par with being a streetwalker. Where Tim Johnson got some of his ideas I do not know.

  “So you’re going to New York to be a prostitute?” my father yelled through the phone the day I announced my new plans.

  My heart sank.

  While my father ranted, my mother stayed cool and just calmly listened as I explained how the idea came about.

  None of this convinced my father. He continued to say no, and 99 percent of the time, when my father said no, that ended the conversation. But something had piqued my mother’s interest. I’m not sure if it was the idea of modeling per se, my modeling, or her daughter having the opportunity to explore uncharted territory. Whatever her motivation, she never explained, as was her way. She just allowed my father to believe the subject was closed and then maneuvered behind his back by calling the woman Mimi had suggested and arranging for us to meet her in New York the following week.

  I was really blown away by my mother’s efforts to help me enter a world that neither of us knew a thing about. She obviously thought modeling could make my life a lot better, and she was right, but I’m not sure she ever understood the ripple effect she began in my life with that single phone call. I was so accustomed to seeing her as a one-dimensional person that I never stood still long enough to see the many layers and contradictions hidden beneath the surface. I guess I was too young to understand that there was more than met the eye when it came to my mother’s personality. It was a lesson I would learn the hard way many, many times, and about a lot of people.

  A week later, on a June day in 1971, my mother and I rode Amtrak to New York City and took a room at a small hotel near Times Square. Our appointment the next day was to meet Korby Pleasant, Mimi’s friend, who also managed what we came to know was a legendary store, Jax’s Fifth Avenue, a small boutique that sold one-of-a-kind designs and exotic imported fabrics. (My mother and I had never heard of the store.)

  Rumor had it that Korby knew just about everyone in the industry. She was of mixed heritage, but she could pass for white at first glance, and she appeared to be in her mid- to late forties. She was probably one of the most effortlessly chic women in all of New York City, and her entire presentation from head to toe had to be impeccable every day if she wanted to stay at the helm of one of the hippest stores along the entire eastern coast. Jax’s usual class of customers was a fascinating mix of New York’s society, such as C. Z. Guest and Leona Helmsley, as well as internationally recognized style icons like Lena Horne and Jackie Kennedy.

  Jax’s kept them coming, in part because it was the first luxury store to introduce one-of-a-kind fashion items such as women’s pants featuring a very stylish side zipper. I know that doesn’t sound exciting today, but in the sixties it was a very big deal. Jax’s also famously sold luxurious Egyptian cotton T-shirts in various pastel hues for a mere $125 each—again, this was in the 1960s. Jackie Kennedy favored this particular trend and was often photographed wearing one while out in the streets of New York.

  The day I met Korby, I decided to keep my look clean and simple. I put my slightly curly black hair up in a topknot and kept my face free of heavy makeup. For years, my daily look usually involved a dab of rouge for my cheeks, a hint of black eyeliner, and a bit of cherry-colored gloss for my lips, nothing more. I rarely wore foundation in those days because I really didn’t need it, and finding the right color as a brown girl wasn’t the easiest thing to do. Companies such as MAC and Fashion Fair didn’t exist at this point, so there weren’t many options for a girl like me. I put the health of my skin down to my mother force-feeding me a daily dose of cod liver oil during my entire childhood. I hated the taste of that stuff going down, but I believe to this day that’s why I have such clear, wrinkle-free skin.

  As for my outfit, I chose a white jumper that was actually shorts, which matched perfectly with a pair of flattering black flats to complement my five-foot-nine-inch height. Not exactly the everyday New York uniform, but quite eye-catching.

  I had never stepped into a boutique like Jax’s before in my life. There was nothing close to this back home. On the inside, Jax’s featured gorgeous mahogany walls, but there were no shelves. Instead, designer apparel was brought to the client from the rear of the store. I was intimidated, but my mother and I found Korby to be just as fabulous and gracious as we had hoped she would be. Her genuinely warm greeting immediately soothed my rattled nerves, and I was grateful for that.

  For a few minutes the three of us chatted, and Korby asked why I wanted to be a model. Eventually, a few customers arrived, and she excused herself to attend to them. As we waited for Korby to become free, the most beautiful man I could imagine waltzed into the store. He looked like the prince out of a Disney fairy tale, and I was spellbound.

  Harry Belafonte. The most successful Caribbean-American pop star in history, the man dubbed the “King of Calypso” for popularizing the Caribbean musical style with the international audience in the 1950s, a man who was a popular movie star as well as a respected civil rights activist. And to Korby, he was a man who could help her decide on my model-worthiness. That’s right—the woman who knew everyone also knew Harry Belafonte, and she asked him if I should become a model.

  Harry nodded his head as he looked me up and down. You would have thought he was in the middle of a car showroom, selecting the best-looking style and color for that year. He said very few words to me while all this was going on. As for me, I was in a daze. All I could think was, How did the beautiful Harry Belafonte become so perfect and, more to the point, how had he just become a part of my team?

  Eventually, Belafonte’s wife arrived at the store looking for her husband. She just stood there with a blank stare on her face, which was really more than my eighteen-year-old mind could process. I knew nothing of their domestic situation, and all I was trying to do was to get into modeling. I couldn’t tell if Harry’s wife was standing there like that because she routinely checked up on ol’ Harry or because she was particularly worried that Korby was introducing us. Whatever the issue, it wasn’t my problem.

  I just needed Harry’s seal of approval to kick my career off right. And that day, I got it.

  Thanks to my mother’s excellent ironing technique, my outfit was wrinkle-free for my big meeting at Glamour magazine the next morning.

  I had chosen to pair a white flared skirt with a matching white blouse this time, along with white knee-high socks and black-and-white saddle Oxford shoes. I carried a pair of white gloves and kept my hair in the same sleek topknot I had worn the day before.

  The Condé Nast offices at that time were located in the landmark Graybar Building next to Grand Central Terminal in Manhattan. After being escorted into the waiting room, we watched editors, writers, and designers running around, trying to put together one of the many magazines that were published under Condé Nast’s large um
brella. Through the years the company has owned Vogue, Vanity Fair, Glamour, House & Garden, W, Allure, and Self magazines.

  While we sat waiting, and as I grew more nervous about what was to come, someone asked if I would mind taking a typing test. Now I was really confused, not to mention angry. Why in the world, when I had come there to be a model, would I need to take a typing test? I was told that I needed something to fall back on just in case modeling didn’t pan out, and my dear mother saw nothing at all wrong with this and urged me to take the test. But I had my own backup plan, thank you very much. It was called a college degree. And why was it any stranger’s job to worry about my “fallback” plan? I hadn’t fallen into anything yet! Still, to please my mother, I took the test. I remember exactly what I typed: “The brown cow.” And that was the end of that! No one asked me about typing again that day. If I needed something that badly to fall back on, I would go to work at the local Dairy Queen.

  Finally, I was brought in to meet Alexander Liberman. He was the art and editorial director for all of Condé Nast’s publications—translation: He was one powerful man.

  Liberman wore a well-fitted navy blue suit, crisp light-blue shirt, and paisley-print ascot, which nicely highlighted his strong English accent and impeccable manners. He showed me around the gigantic room where he had been studying some stunning photographs of gorgeous models smiling up from brightly lit boxes. As we walked, he asked me a few rudimentary questions about myself, then abruptly bid me farewell. I had been there no more than ten minutes and had no indication of his thoughts about me at all. Had I passed or failed?

  I didn’t have to wait long for an answer. Mr. Liberman’s assistant contacted me the same day and told me to head to a Vogue photo shoot at Bert Stern’s studio.

  At the shoot I was placed with a group of models already famous for posing for Vogue magazine. There was Veronica Hamel, Karen Graham, and Lauren Hutton, three legends in the modeling game. (There would be little evidence on that day of the pivotal role Lauren Hutton would play in my life much later on. She would prove to be an invaluable aid in my fledgling career. But that was to come.)

  After that initial shoot I was told I had been chosen to join a ten-day photo shoot with Glamour magazine that would be held on Fire Island in two weeks. I was—officially—on cloud nine!

  My mom and I returned to Buffalo buzzing with the news that I had landed my first assignment to model professionally. I couldn’t wait to share the news with the entire neighborhood, which really meant my only friend in the whole wide world, Dada. My father was less than pleased and chose to ignore the topic altogether. Though thrilled with my good news, my older brother, Leon, asked if I had told the magazine publishers in New York about my better-looking brothers and sisters.

  I tried to relax over the next few weeks, since there really wasn’t much preparation for me, as an eighteen-year-old, rail-thin teenager, to do for the photo shoot. Still, that didn’t stop my brain from wondering if I should be doing more. Somehow, the thought popped into my head that it couldn’t hurt to lose a few more pounds before I stood before the cameras again. Dada’s mother, who always carried a little extra weight due in part to her excellent cooking skills, floated the idea that I could take laxatives to get slimmer. That wouldn’t be the last time I would hear about extreme remedies for weight loss. The thought of going to the bathroom nonstop didn’t seem like the way I wanted to spend my summer. I figured it would be safer if I stuck to riding my bike around the block a few times a day.

  July finally came around, and I headed to Fire Island for my Glamour magazine shoot.

  I hadn’t traveled to Fire Island before, even though it was the largest island on the outer barrier parallel to Long Island, New York. Fire Island attracts a large gay population year-round. I wasn’t aware of that fact in 1971, but I was given a quick introduction to that world the moment I stepped off the ferry from the mainland.

  A group of men, who I assumed were gay, were waiting at the dock and began dancing. Naturally I felt the need to join in, and we danced to the beat of the pounding drums through the streets all the way to the rented house.

  If only the entire ten days of that shoot could have been as jovial as that festive dance on the dock. Glamour magazine had hired a well-known European photographer to photograph the fashion spread, but he was no friend of mine from the start. I was there to do a ten-page spread by myself, which was a huge deal for me. This was my first real modeling job, so I wanted to be on the set early every morning to prove I was up for the challenge. The photo shoot was to take place outside the house the magazine had rented for us all to live in. By all of us, I mean the photographer, his assistants, the magazine’s editors, and me. With the hope of helping things along, I rose extra early to apply my standard makeup plus a little extra since I would be in front of the camera. My rah-rah attitude didn’t help, unfortunately. The photographer criticized my look the moment he saw me and instructed me to go back to my room and scrub my face, not once but twice, to remove every speck of the makeup I’d applied. He then mocked every pose I tried to strike, and yelled at me to just stand still as he snapped shot after shot. I’m glad I didn’t break or bend easily, even at eighteen years old.

  What was with this guy?

  I had no idea what I was doing—this was, to repeat, my first solitary modeling gig—and I was sure someone from the magazine had told him as much. But I was learning as fast as I could and I was trying as hard as I could. He seemed like such a jackass, but I had no idea just how much of a jackass he would turn out to be.

  Late that first night, as we were all heading to bed, the photographer tapped me on the shoulder and asked me to come to his room to talk about that day’s work. Again, being eighteen years old and very naive, I welcomed the chance to set things straight. Silly me. I walked to his room ready to apologize for all my missteps and to ask for a fresh start. Well, that old jackass had something else on his mind. He was lying in bed with his shirt off and a smirk on his face. For half a second I was confused. Why did he invite me upstairs if he was already in bed? He motioned for me to come sit next to him and his big fat stomach. Ugh!

  Then, I realized talking was not to be on the menu that night. My photographer clearly wasn’t interested in discussing the day’s work, so I got out of there as quickly as I could. I sprinted back to my room and locked the door behind me. But he followed me, and tapped on my door lightly, so as to not wake up the others in the house, I guess. My head and heart were pounding as his knocks on my door grew louder by the minute. Surely everyone else in the house heard something! But no one said or did a thing. That’s the business for you.

  What was I going to do? I couldn’t call my parents, because that would have been the end of my modeling career. Eventually he gave up, and I finally fell asleep in my bed, quietly praying that he wouldn’t return.

  As I was falling asleep, it struck me that this photographer had underestimated me. He didn’t know that I was the black girl who’d been bullied and booed all the way through elementary and high school. I was the black girl whose roommate had refused to acknowledge her presence for most of her freshman year at college. But he soon would find out that I was the black girl who certainly was not about to be run out of her first big-time fashion shoot by some rude, horny, fat, hairy, white photographer. Not Beverly Johnson.

  The next day at the photo shoot, he acted as if nothing had happened. Good choice, since that’s exactly the way I acted as well. Even better, he treated me with the respect I had deserved in the first place. First major shoot done.

  My sophomore year of college began without a hitch, and a few of the magazine layouts with my editorial spreads featured in them began to hit the newsstands. The Vogue issue came out, then Glamour, as well as an Essence fashion layout I’d done that summer. I was particularly proud of that one. Students I’d barely ever spoken to began to recognize me. Even my racist roommate from the previous year had the nerve to open her mouth long enough to say hello. I couldn�
�t believe it and almost ignored her, but then figured I would be the bigger person.

  Part of my curriculum at Northeastern University was their co-op program, which stipulated that I had to work one semester and study the next. I was supposed to spend my winter semester that year employed by companies that were connected to my majors, law and political science. But this now posed a major problem, as the modeling assignments were starting to trickle in and turning them down felt foolish, given how well they paid. I really needed the cash if I wanted to keep going to school. My sister Joanne was about to enter Fordham University, and the financial strain on my parents having three kids in college was beginning to take its toll. I wanted to help them out in any way I could.

  None of this mattered to my school. They must have heard this kind of sob story from other students a thousand times, but that didn’t stop me from making the case that modeling was the perfect job for my major. I gathered all my recent magazine layouts and presented them to the dean of political science, explaining to him that offers for modeling jobs were coming in and that they would be a fine substitute for my legal and political science work. The dean pointed out that the law and modeling were polar opposites, but eventually he agreed to let me use my modeling gigs to fulfill my work credits. Everything was falling into place exactly the way I had hoped.

  CHAPTER 5

  The Goal

  Who doesn’t dream of making it in New York at some point in their life? If I can make it there, I’d make it anywhere, right? I took a calculated risk heading to the Big Apple during the winter of 1971–72, but it was one I ultimately felt I couldn’t let pass. At barely nineteen years old, what did I have to lose? I couldn’t tell if there was a future in modeling awaiting me, but there was a still, small, and very deep voice that seemed to keep whispering, This is your destiny.