Here's How Old Brooke Shields Really Was When She Got Her Big Break

During the '80s, Brooke Shields experienced a meteoric rise to fame. The then-teenager was seen everywhere from movies, to magazine covers and commercials. Being a mega-star could be daunting to a person of any age, especially a teen, but the "Wanda Nevada" star was practically born into the spotlight. Her first TV appearance was for a commercial when she was still an infant. "I never had the shock of losing all my privacy. I started in showbiz at 11 months old and it's always been my reality," she told The Guardian in 2014 while reflecting on fame.

Shields was a fixture in both movies and television throughout the '80s, but she was much more than an actor or even a model; the "Blue Lagoon" star had become a brand. "I do sort of regret having hairdryers with my name on them and a Brooke doll and all these failed endeavors that were cool to do in the 1980s," she told The Guardian in a separate interview from 2017 while discussing her early career choices.

Despite the seismic fame, Shields was able to maintain a modest level of normalcy and avoid the typical trappings of child stars. "I should have been a disaster," she told Good Housekeeping in 2009. The "Jane the Virgin" actor credited her mother, Teri Shields — who was also her manager — with keeping her grounded. Shields' mother, however, did come under fire for allowing her daughter to take a salacious role — which ended up being the actor's breakout performance.

Brooke Shields landed her first major film role in 1978 which helped propel her to fame, thanks in part to her performance and the controversial matter of the movie. The film "Pretty Baby" starred Shields as a child prostitute who lived with her mother in a brothel. She was 11 years old at the time of shooting, and was still only 12 years old once the film was released. "Brooke Shields, 12, stirs furor over child porn in films," People wrote in an incendiary headline in 1978. Even though "Pretty Baby" sparked backlash, years later Shields defended the movie. "It was the best creative project I've ever been associated with, the best group of people I've ever been blessed enough to work with," she told Vanity Fair in 2018. "I was really well taken care of emotionally," the "Tilt" star said. 

Although Shields was unaware of the public controversy surrounding "Pretty Baby," she was well aware of the attention the film garnered. "I had never seen frenzy like that," she told Vanity Fair while discussing the movie's reception at the Cannes Film Festival. "The magnitude of the attention was really scary."

Over 40 years after the film's release, Shields not only staunchly defended her breakout role, but lamented the change in the industry. "Maybe the movies I did wouldn't be made now because of such censorship, and that's a tremendous loss," she told The Times (via Yahoo!) in 2021. That was not the last controversy Shields would endure in her youth. 

A couple years after "Pretty Baby" was released, Brooke Shields starred in a Calvin Klein ad campaign in 1980 that sparked outrage. "You want to know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing," Shields said in a commercial while posing in a pair of tightfitting jeans. Even though she was practically a veteran of the entertainment industry at this point, the model was only 15-years-old when the ad campaign ran. "I was naive, I didn't think anything of it," she told Vogue in 2021 when discussing the Calvin Klein controversy. "I didn't think it was about underwear or sexual in nature," Shields added. In fact, the "A Castle for Christmas" actor believed the public had given her too much credit as a teenager. "I think the assumption is that I was much more savvy than I ever really was," Shields said.

Once she was old enough to attend college, Shields decided to take a step back from Hollywood and enrolled at Princeton. After finishing school, the "Endless Love" star decided to overhaul her image. "The old me felt creepy, and I didn't want to be it anymore," Shields told Good Housekeeping in 2009 in reference to taking "sexy" roles. This led to the actor trying her hand at Broadway as she landed the role of Rizzo in "Grease" to challenge herself, and find out "whether [she] was talented or not," she told Good Housekeeping in half jest. It ultimately paid off, as Shields' performance received rave reviews.