There is something about Brooke Shields that is genuine. She is a person who, after everything she has been through working in Hollywood, is still a kind-hearted soul who sees the best in everyone. It is hard to believe that after Pretty Baby, Brooke Shields would have maintained such a cheerful disposition.
Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields is a documentary that outlines the troubled life of Brooke Shields, now by troubled; she wasn’t someone who got into drugs or alcohol, but more that she was exploited by several influential people in her life.
People exploited Shields as she was a young person trusting the guidance of people in her life who were older and should have had her best interests at heart. But the reality is that Brooke was much wiser than her years and learned very early on how to navigate these challenging and often troubling situations to achieve the best outcomes that lead to fame and success, but most importantly, put a meal on the table and kept a roof over her head.
Directed by Lana Wilson, Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields, is a documentary that features a lot of frank and open discussions with Brooke Shields that explore various periods of her life—from her early career as an actress at a very young age to her years modeling for Calvin Kleins jeans, her friendship with Michael Jackson, her marriage to Andre Agassi, and her relationship with her mother, Terry Shields, who was also her manager.
You realize from watching the two-part documentary that Brooke Shields, like most young actors, starts out a career very early on in life. Brooke trusted the advice and judgment of her mother, as most child stars do. Often, not every time, but most times, there is a stage parent who feels they missed their calling and push their child into show business, as is the case with Brooke Shields. Shields grew up in a single-parent household, as her parents separated at a very young age. She started her career with a pushy show business mother who got her into TV to ensure they could survive.
The work continued and grew until Brooke found herself in several highly successful and exploitative films that catapulted her into superstardom in the late 1970s and early 1980s. This success ensured her family was well taken care of, but it did mean that everyone knew Brooke Shields, and she had been famous for her entire life.
As Brooke explains in the documentary, this fame, and celebrity have a downside. There were periods of her life when she had to start again. Still, there were also arduous periods when I was unsure how she had maintained such a positive outlook and raised such a fantastic family.
There is something humbling about this documentary as you realize that Brooke Shields is a natural person who has experienced ups and downs, like the rest of us. But because of her ongoing fame and notoriety, most of these life experiences have been splashed across newspapers and internet pages.
But the one takeaway is that Brooke Shields is a brilliant and humble person who doesn’t take any of this for granted. This documentary presents the life of a very wise and robust human that still manages to have a smile on her face when the world around her, very early on, exploits her innocence to its advantage.
Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields is currently available to stream on Hulu.
