In the 1950s no American actress epitomized the archetype of the “blonde bombshell” better than Jayne Mansfield, with the exception of Marilyn Monroe. Sometimes promoted as Monroe’s rival by their film studio, Twentieth Century–Fox, Mansfield rocketed to fame as a gifted comedic actress in movies such as The Girl Can’t Help It (1956). As the decade gave way to the ’60s, however, she was cast in increasingly exploitative B-movies. Behind the scenes Mansfield was a trained violinist and pianist who boasted of having a genius-level IQ, and she was a devoted mother of five. At age 34 she was killed in a car crash in Louisiana. Like Monroe, who also died young, Mansfield is remembered as much for her tragic ending as she is for her films.

Early life as Vera Jayne Palmer

She was born Vera Jayne (or Jane) Palmer in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, the only child of Herbert and Vera Palmer, a lawyer and former schoolteacher. Her parents called her by her middle name. When she was three, her father died from a heart attack. Her mother eventually remarried, and the family moved to Dallas, where Jayne Palmer took piano, violin, and dance lessons. She also excelled at languages.

As an adult Mansfield would tell reporters that since she was three years old she had wanted to be a movie star. However, first came marriage and motherhood. In 1950, when she was 16, she married Paul Mansfield, a sophomore at the University of Texas in Austin. Several months later she graduated from high school, and in November the couple had a daughter, Jayne Marie Mansfield. The following year she took drama classes at the university, and she and her husband worked odd jobs while performing in local plays.

In 1952, when her husband was drafted into the U.S. Army, Mansfield lived with him while he was completing training in Georgia and continued acting in local productions. After several months, however, she moved to California and took drama courses at the University of Southern California for one semester before returning to her parents and daughter in Texas. There she enrolled at Southern Methodist University (near Dallas). When her husband returned from his military service in 1953, the family at last moved to Hollywood, where Mansfield pursued her long-dreamed-of movie career.

Life in Hollywood and success on Broadway

Mansfield screen-tested for Paramount and Warner Bros. before signing a contract with the latter studio in 1955. That same year she earned her first film credits in such B-films as Female Jungle, Pete Kelly’s Blues, Illegal, and Hell on Frisco Bay. By this time the natural brunette had become a blonde and separated from her husband. She made a bigger impression with her publicity stunts, including posing nude for Playboy magazine and engineering a wardrobe malfunction at a film event where she jumped into a pool and revealed that her swimsuit had split open. In their write-ups, reporters frequently included Mansfield’s hourglass measurements.

Midway through 1955 Warner Bros. dropped Mansfield. In October, however, she landed a role on stage in New York, that of vain movie star Rita Marlowe in the Broadway comedy Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? A satirical look at the advertising industry, the play was a huge success and made Mansfield a star.

Stardom as the “smartest dumb blonde”

Her career soared to new heights in 1956. Life magazine featured her on its cover, calling her “Broadway’s Smartest Dumb Blonde.” The accompanying article, however, primarily discussed her efforts to become famous and made no mention of her intellect. (Claims of Mansfield’s IQ having been 163 or 164 seem to have originated in the press, and eventually she liked to repeat the claim herself, although her biographers have not found evidence of actual IQ scores.) She won a Theatre World Award for her performance in Rock Hunter, signed a contract with Twentieth Century–Fox, and starred in the rock and roll movie musical The Girl Can’t Help It. Playing a gangster’s moll who becomes an unlikely rock star (because her character can’t sing a note), Mansfield turned in a witty and warm performance that earned her a Golden Globe Award for new star of the year in 1957.

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Meanwhile, she fell in love with Mickey Hargitay, a Hungarian bodybuilder and former Mr. Universe, whom she had met in New York City while Hargitay was performing in Mae West’s nightclub act. They married in California in 1958 at a glass chapel so that fans and reporters could get a full view of the ceremony. The couple had three children: Miklós, Zoltan, and Mariska.

Mansfield continued to act in films (sometimes with Hargitay). She starred in The Wayward Bus, The Burglar, and the film version of Rock Hunter (all 1957), as well as It Takes a Thief, The Loves of Hercules (both 1960), and The George Raft Story (1961). On The Ed Sullivan Show she showed off her violin and piano playing. She also appeared several times on The Red Skelton Hour and in an episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour. In 1960 she received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

The “Pink Palace” and publicity stunts

Mansfield’s talent for generating publicity reached new levels. With her family and a menagerie of pets (including chihuahuas and a pink poodle), Mansfield lived in a Hollywood mansion dubbed the “Pink Palace” for its color scheme. The press was often invited to visit the home, which included a heart-shaped pool built by Hargitay. Another of Mansfield’s notable publicity stunts resulted in an iconic photo with Italian actress Sophia Loren. At a party honoring Loren, Mansfield sported an especially low-cut dress and seated herself beside Loren in full view of photographers, one of whom captured an amusing shot of the Italian star glancing sideways at Mansfield’s decolletage.

In 1963 Mansfield and Hargitay divorced. That same year they both appeared in the comedy Promises! Promises!. In the film Mansfield made history as the first major star to appear nude onscreen. The movie, however, marked a decline in her acting career. Critics expressed increasing disinterest in her publicity stunts. (Journalist Dorothy Kilgallen once said, “She has been far too accessible to every lensman, scribe and high school reporter.”) Mansfield’s movie roles began to center solely on her sex appeal, sacrificing the wit that had distinguished her early performances. Nonetheless, Mansfield remained a star, and for several years she toured as a nightclub act.

Mansfield married filmmaker Matt Cimber in 1964; they had one son, Antonio, before divorcing in 1966. Her last film role was a cameo in A Guide for the Married Man (1967), a comedy directed by Gene Kelly that starred Walter Matthau and featured appearances by such comic greats as Sid Caesar, Carl Reiner, Terry-Thomas, and Lucille Ball.

Death and legacy

On June 29, 1967, Mansfield was returning by car to New Orleans after a gig in Biloxi, Mississippi. Traveling with her was her lawyer and boyfriend, Sam Brody; her children Miklós, Zoltan, and Mariska Hargitay; and their driver, Ronnie Harrison. The car crashed after rear-ending a trailer truck on a highway near Slidell, Louisiana, killing Mansfield, Brody, and Harrison. Mansfield’s children, who were in the back seat, survived with minor injuries. A false story circulated that Mansfield had been decapitated in the accident, a myth that arose from photos showing her blonde wig sprawled on the side of the road.

Mansfield is buried in Pen Argyl, Pennsylvania, with a heart-shaped tombstone marking her gravesite. In 2000 the U.S. Library of Congress inducted Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? into the National Film Registry, a film preservation program that selects films of cultural, historical, and aesthetic significance.

Mansfield’s daughter Mariska Hargitay, who was three years old when her mother died, became a successful television actress in the Law and Order franchise. In early 2025 Hargitay announced that she was directing a documentary titled My Mom Jayne to air on HBO in June.