-In the glamorous world of fashion,
supermodels in the '90s seemed to have it all.
-The more that I saw them in the magazines,
the more I felt the powerful pull of wanting to be like them.
-But young girls, lured by the glitz and glamour,
discover a seedy underbelly.
-I blacked out; I don't remember anything after that.
-I definitely remember hearing whispers of things
that were not cool.
-Where powerful predators hunt with impunity.
-You are being watched all the time.
-He was the hot shot of the modeling world, you know,
and I was a nobody.
- What happens if you say no? - You don't work.
-People only knew the tip of the iceberg.
-It's kind of like the wolves running the chicken house.
♪♪
-For decades, models have influenced fashion and culture,
but in the '90s, they become so celebrated
that their names are bigger than the designers they work for.
In January of 1990,
Vogue magazine puts Naomi Campbell,
Christy Turlington, Linda Evangelista,
Cindy Crawford and Tatjana Patitz
Petites on the cover,
inspiring George Michael to cast them in his
chart-topping music video "Freedom."
-And it's exactly at that moment
that the '90s supermodel phenomenon is born.
Fashion shows went from being little events,
with, you know, two editors from Vogue,
two editors from Harper's Bazaar,
maybe there was one television camera.
Suddenly there were a hundred TV cameras
in what were still little tiny rooms.
You know, you... you sat there,
from my privileged front row perch,
going, "What the... is going on?!"
My name is Michael Gross and I'm a journalist
and an author of books about rich people,
real estate and fashion.
A supermodel is a model whose name is known by people
who are not in the fashion world...
That if a jock drinking beer at the University of Indiana
has a poster of that girl on his wall,
she's a supermodel
because he doesn't know what a dolman sleeve is.
He, you know, he just knows, "Oh, look, that's a hot girl."
-I had the pleasure of working
with almost all of the '90s supermodels,
so I lived with Christy Turlington
and worked with Cindy and Naomi,
and I worked with all of those women.
They were coworkers.
My name is Monika Schnarre and I am a model from the '90s
as well as an actor and entrepreneur.
I look on that time fondly.
-It was an awesome time to be in the modeling business.
My name is Marie P. Anderson
and I was a former agent inside of Elite Chicago.
We were making money, I was scouting amazing models,
we were managing their careers worldwide.
-All of the top models, they kind of defined
this glamorous, successful world of not just being a model,
but like a supermodel, like a superhero.
The supermodels or the top models would be the ones
that would be in a more powerful position
to demand better treatment, lower commissions, better jobs.
But they're so rare, right?
Like, that's not the typical experience of most models.
I'm Ashley Mears.
I am a sociology professor at Boston University.
I used to be a model as well
with Elite.
-Aspiring models begin lining up,
hoping to mirror the success of the newly crowned supermodels,
but the '90 stars of the runway obscures some dark realities
about modeling exposed just years before.
-How many teenage models who start out have you slept with?
-Uh... What you mean by teenage?
-In 1988, "60 Minutes" accuses some top agents
of sleeping with their young models,
but the agents shift the blame back onto the girls.
-When French girls start to play with her body,
she knows that she can have problem,
she can have, start to have problem with men.
-In this hand, they have your career,
and in his hand they have what they want,
and your career can go up if they get what they want.
If they don't get it, your career goes down.
-But with a handful of models now reaching superstar status,
agents become even more powerful.
In the early '90s, two agencies rule the modeling world:
Elite model management in Paris,
started by John Casablancas in 1972;
and Ford Models in New York,
founded by Eileen Ford and her husband in 1946.
The two agencies approach the business very differently.
-Eileen Ford was considered more conservative,
more traditional, a little more tame.
She wasn't the party animal.
And here comes this literal Casanova,
John Casablancas...
Handsome, young, well dressed,
coming in with money, creating a splash.
-If you thought about what a Ford model was,
it was a demure blonde who didn't speak,
wearing a twin set and pearls.
You get to John Casablancas
and it's Patti Hansen on all fours
in a pair of Calvin Klein jeans
with her butt up in the air.
John also understood that these girls were stars.
-On the cover of People magazine.
Look at this right here, the sexiest...
The sexiest couple alive.
-Supermodel Naomi Campbell stars with Michael Jackson
in his latest video.
-John Casablancas brought
the entertainment business into the modeling business.
-With an ocean between Ford in America and Elite in Europe,
the companies dominate their regions,
managing the most successful models in the world.
-Both Eileen Ford and her husband, Jerry,
have been successfully convincing advertisers
to the tune of $30 million a year
that Ford model is the perfect person to sell their products.
-Then Casablancas in Paris decides to invade America.
-John Casablancas was ambitious,
and he lied to Eileen Ford,
told her he wasn't going to open in New York,
and then he not only opened in New York,
but he stole staff and models from Eileen Ford.
-Competition grows between the two agencies,
each fighting to sign the next "it girl."
-Looking for new models is happening every year.
It's incredible, the fantastic new team of girls that's coming.
-In his battle to transform Elite
into a dominating worldwide agency,
John Casablancas is joined by Gerald Marie,
the president of Elite in Paris.
-Gerald Marie was like, you know,
the... the really important shortstop on the team
that nobody talked about, who figures he can make a buck
and also date lots of fashion models.
-Which he does.
He even marries Linda Evangelista,
one of the most successful models in the world.
-Elite model management during the '90s
was seriously one of the most powerful brands in the world.
John Casablancas, Gerald Marie...
They yielded probably the most powerful positions
that an agent could hold in the industry.
-The making of a supermodel.
-Together, Casablancas and Marie
create a competition for models
already within the agency called "Look of the Year."
-The Elite "Look of the Year" contest
evolved in the early '90s.
It was very exciting.
There was a lot of press.
It was very glamorous.
-During the day, the contestants walked the runway,
but by night they are expected to stroll into dinners
and parties hosted by influential men.
-The judging is taking place all the time,
and that's true.
You are being watched all the time.
-John made it exciting,
and he made sure that everybody knew that his objective
was to create huge models out of anybody
that were going to be part of the competition.
-I'm Lisa Shropshire and I'm 15!
- And what position did you come? - I came first!
-Ford launches its own competition
designed to raise the profiles of its currently signed models:
Ford's "supermodel of the World"
launches the careers of girls as young as 14.
-It was a day that changed my life.
-Monika just turned 14 when she's selected
by Eileen Ford to represent Canada.
-There's a reason why this lady is smiling...
she just won a quarter of a million dollar
modeling contract from Ford agency.
-And wins the grand prize of a Vogue cover shoot.
-I won three months after I walked into the agency
and six months later I was on the cover of Vogue.
It was that fast.
I know.
I was going to go with Elite,
but my mom was most comfortable with Ford
because my mom wanted me to be with a woman.
-Monika finds success right away,
and her story fuels the dreams of other young girls
that it can happen to them just as quickly.
-The more that I saw all of the top models in the magazines,
the more I liked them, and, like,
really felt, you know, like the kind of powerful pull
of wanting to be like them.
-Do you dream of being a model?
Want to walk the high fashion runways?
-Before she signs with Elite,
tall, thin 15-year-old Ashley Mears
applies to Model Search America,
a contest not organized by Elite or Ford,
but still claiming to be able to help regular girls
catch their big break.
-Model Search America can help you make them come true.
-We went, like, on a school night
and you go for the first... The first screening.
Basically, if you showed up, they told you,
yes, you have what it takes.
-Events like Model Search America
are largely moneymaking opportunities,
leveraging the popularity of supermodels.
Still, the big agencies have their own reasons to attend.
-A lot of agents are very willing to come to these events
because the agents want to see one another.
So it's a networking event for the agents.
And then the... you know, what bankrolls it all
are kids like me and their parents.
-Fifteen year old Ashley is approached by a scout
with Elite model management.
-I told them, like, how excited I was
about all of the models that worked at Elite.
I was really enamored with the idea that,
like, "It's happening," like, "this...
This... i-it's all coming together for me," right?
-Elite and Ford have the power to change a young girl's life.
They say with great power comes great responsibility,
but not always.
-I definitely remember hearing whispers of things
that were not cool.
-As rumors of this uncool behavior
begin circulating in the modeling world,
some very familiar names get mentioned.
-I knew about John Casablancas, Gerald Marie.
I knew about the big names.
But suddenly I was hearing about people like John-Luc Brunel.
-As president of Karin Models in Paris,
Jean-Luc Brunel has a reputation for launching models' careers
and for starting trouble.
-There were rumors about Jean-Luc
and... and John Casablancas,
but I wasn't alone with them ever.
People knew that, you know, they were playboys.
-While today the term "playboy" is loaded and problematic,
in the '90s, many wealthy men
were only too willing to celebrate
both their financial success and their sexual conquests.
-Where the trouble started was agencies in Europe
that were run by guys who had more than money on their mind.
-I'm Thysia Huisman, I'm an author,
I wrote a book called Close-Up,
and it's a memoir about what happened to me as a model.
-At 18, Thysia is scouted in Brussels.
Modest, she is surprised, then excited about the possibilities
when Jean-Luc Brunel notices her.
-He was the king of the modeling industry at that time.
He met me, he was like, "Oh, you should come to Paris,
and I see a lot of potential in you,
and you can stay also in my apartment
and I will make sure nothing bad happens to you."
-But Thysia says very bad things did happen.
-Just as grunge music finds its way onto the runway,
'90s supermodels find their way into music videos.
Helena Christensen gets steamy with Chris Isaak
in the "Wicked Game" video.
George Michael gets "Too Funky"
with Linda Evangelista and Tyra.
And while Naomi Campbell is captivating
and Michael Jackson's "In the Closet,"
RuPaul pulls it all together
with the beloved anthem "Supermodel."
-♪ Sashay, shantay ♪
-All of this attention is music to the ears
of young modeling hopefuls,
especially those looking for a better life.
-I had a kind of lonely childhood.
I was raised by my father
and my mother died when I was really young.
So I thought that being a model,
you know, being in front of a camera
would give me kind of attention and being in the limelight,
and that that really sounded appealing to me.
-But when Dutch model Thysia Huisman
wins a local modeling contest,
it's not life changing in the way she imagined.
-They said to me, "Oh, well, congratulations, you won,
but you're still really young, but that's good, you know,
because you have to lose the puppy fat."
So, um, yeah, I lost a lot of weight
and it left me with an eating disorder.
-There is a lot of agents that are messed up in the head
and they're in control of these young girls.
You've got agents grabbing girls' butts
and saying "you're fat";
agents telling girls
to eat cotton balls?!
It's kind of like the wolves
really running the chicken house.
-Even though... Or perhaps because...
Thysia drops to a dangerously low weight,
she catches the eye of top modeling agent Jean-Luc Brunel.
-You know, he promised me like a pot of gold
and... and he said that he could, like,
make me a supermodel.
He also said to me, like,
"Oh, you should come to Paris right away."
I told my agent in Belgium that I was, like, kind of concerned
that... if this was the right thing to do, and she said,
"No, you know, this is really only for the special girls
that he sees a lot of potential in that...
And only they can stay in his apartment."
Paris is... is the place to be as a model.
So I was like, "Okay, if she says so, then I'll go there."
-When Thysia arrives in Paris, she quickly learns
that her success may be tied
to more than her modeling skills.
-There was this party that started in Brunel's place.
This guy started talking to me,
and I remember that he said to me, like,
"Oh, well, you should be really honored that Brunel,
he sees a lot of potential in you.
And it's important to...
If you want to succeed as a model in Paris,
that you are willing to do anything, you know,
like you are really like to... To take the extra steps."
-Ashley is also about to experience
the modeling world in Europe.
-I had what is probably the more typical experience
of somebody...
somebody's encounter with the modeling industry
in the '90s, it was, you know,
consuming the dream from afar
in this little commercial market of Atlanta.
-After years of modeling in shopping mall fashion shows,
when Ashley's agent at Elite
asked her to go to Milan for six weeks of auditions,
she's excited what her future holds.
-Coming from the suburbs, I was like ready to experience
all of this stuff that I fantasized
was going to be super cool and glamorous.
-Thysia and Ashley show up ready to do the hard work
necessary to land jobs
in the fashion capitals of Paris and Milan.
-I remember that I was with my backpack
and my portfolio under my arm, and I was really like,
"Wow," you know, "this is everything I ever dreamed of."
-I've had fantasies that I would make a lot of money
or I could be, you know, seen by the right client.
You know, what if Prada saw me
and I could be the face of Prada?
-Booking jobs in Europe can make or break a modeling career.
But for many young models, being a teenager far from home
and trying to begin a grown-up career
can be both overwhelming and disorienting.
-To look 30 and to be, you know, 14,
'cause my height and when I'm made up,
I was always treated like a woman.
But emotionally and intellectually,
my emotional intelligence wasn't there yet.
-I showed up in very hot Milan.
Some, you know, nice young man met me at the airport,
introduced himself as intended,
got me a cappuccino and drove me around for my castings.
And then when dropping me home, was like,
"Oh, we're going for a dinner tonight with the agents
and all of the other girls.
And then we're going to go to a party."
And I was like, "Amazing!
This is like... This guy is so cool," right?
And then I understood after a couple of weeks
that it was like that every night in Milan
and that he didn't work for the agency,
he actually worked for a nightclub.
He's one of the promoters that the clubs hire
to bring the girls.
-Ashley's experience in Milan is not unique.
-You are in these incredible clubs,
and there you see also people I only knew from movies
and... and, like, pop stars.
So of course, I felt starstruck and also,
you don't have to pay anything because everything is paid for.
-Of course, there's no such thing as a free anything,
there's always an expectation of reciprocity.
So the models are paying back with their presence
in these places to beautify them,
to make them look fashionable so that the cafe or the club
can also capitalize on the beauty.
-Some women were very... Or young women
were very, um, you know,
focused on the work.
And then there were others that, um, just had the best time.
I was in awe of these girls just partying all night
and showing up the next day, and they could work.
-But isolated and alone,
the nightlife can become a lifeline.
-Think about the population of models coming through cities
like New York or Milan...
It's also highly transient, it's young people,
it's people who don't have their networks
already established in these places.
I wasn't connected to anybody else in Milan,
and here was this cool guy
who was offering me access to,
you know, cool places that I wouldn't otherwise know
even where to look for,
couldn't afford to eat in them,
even if I knew where they were.
And then he was introducing me to everybody.
So it was like this instant network that I could connect to.
-On one hand, it was like everything I ever wanted,
you know, to become a model,
but was also really lonely because you weren't...
You were always on your own, you know?
You don't have, like, colleagues you work in an office with.
-And while the nightlife helps ease Thysia's loneliness,
when the sun goes down,
things also become more dangerous.
-Brunel, he had two sides, because during the day
he was really charismatic and really charming,
but he had also another side.
And that was especially in the evenings
and the night... He became sexual harassing.
His behavior, that was not okay, you know,
and I didn't feel safe.
And... but on the other hand, I thought, yeah,
I can handle this guy, you know?
-Please meet the exquisite Naomi Campbell!
Naomi! - By the start of the '90s,
the girls of the decade are popping up everywhere,
even on "Oprah," and they're endorsing countless products.
Cindy Crawford stars in this Super Bowl commercial for Pepsi.
♪♪
Kate Moss becomes the face of Calvin Klein...
And Christy Turlington gets paid six figures
for 12 days of work on a Maybelline campaign.
-Is it true that... That supermodels get paid
that enormous amount of money, £10,000 a day?
-I never discuss money, ever.
-One supermodel will:
Linda Evangelista famously let it slip
in an interview that she doesn't get out of bed
for less than $10,000.
-And suddenly the models were like,
"Wait, 10,000?
Hmm. How about 25,000?
Maybe 50,000?"
So then it just took on a life of its own.
-The era of a few high paid supermodels means agents
like Jean-Luc Brunel
are bombarded with many beautiful young girls
looking for that same kind of success.
But that bright light focused on the few
continues to blind the many to the warnings about men like
Jean-Luc delivered in the not-too-distant past.
- He gave you a drink? - Yes.
- You drank it and then what? - I blacked out.
I don't remember anything after that.
-The next thing you remember was?
-Was being in this man's bed.
-Who was he?
-Do I have to say the name?
It was Jean-Luc.
- You were raped. - Yes, I do know that.
-The 1988 Diane Sawyer exposé on "60 Minutes"
accused top modeling agent Jean-Luc Brunel
of sexual assault,
but no legal action is pursued,
attention recedes, and Brunel continues to flourish.
-I remember when that came out, it was... it was a big deal.
It's... it's all anyone talked about.
And I understood now why my mom wouldn't let me go stay
at Jean-Luc's house in Paris,
and why my mom didn't want me to be with John Casablancas
and she wanted me to be with a woman.
-Despite the accusations, the fashion industry chooses
to treat them like last season's collection and moves on.
-Everybody in the industry knew,
all the agents, they knew, you know, and they couldn't...
they didn't care because they made money.
So they looked the other way.
-Unfazed, Jean-Luc Brunel learned to adapt
and continues business as usual.
-Eventually, Jean-Luc Brunel leaves Karin's.
And what does he do?
He starts a whole 'nother group of modeling agencies.
-When you put very powerful men into a room
with literally hundreds of teenage girls
that are desperate,
I mean desperate, to become successful
and be on the cover of Vogue,
and they don't have any parental supervision,
knowing that those men can make the difference in their careers,
the girls will just kind of morph
to whatever is happening in that environment at the time,
thinking, "This is the way it happens.
This is what you have to do to become successful."
-During her week-long stay at Jean-Luc Brunel's in '91,
Thysia is starting to recognize a pattern.
-Every night there were like dinners;
as a guest, you had to attend,
and the seating was always like this...
Was a man and then a model,
man, model, man, model, man, model, you know?
So you were like...
And I... I realized already back then
that, you know, you were entourage.
You know, you were like the arm candy.
-While researching a book about the fashion world,
writer Michael Gross is hearing rumors
about this type of predatory behavior
where unknown models are exploited.
He also notices supermodels are not at these parties...
And he understands why.
-They look at someone and they see money,
huge, vast sums of money.
Do not mess with that girl,
mess with that one who's never going to be anybody.
And that's the way that they work.
I took a second trip to Europe to do follow-up interviews,
and I fell into this nest of vipers
and all of these creatures and gremlins
and insects are pouring out.
And I realized that people were beginning to understand
that I might stir some shit up.
-In the early '90s, stars of the fashion world
start to blend with other celebrities.
Supermodels are now known for both the clothes on their backs
and the men on their arms.
But before a model can make it to the A-list,
she must make it through the hands of powerful
and sometimes predatory gatekeepers,
something fashion writer Michael Gross understood.
-There were patterns of behavior that had been acceptable.
-And he wants to expose it,
but Gross will soon discover his plan to shine a light
on this shadowy part of the modeling industry
will be met with a dangerous kind of darkness.
-I was actually threatened by Johnny Casablancas,
who made a lunch date with me.
He looked at me, he said, "Hello," you know,
and then he said, "If you harm Elite,
Elite will harm you."
And he stood up and he walked out.
Wow! You know?
It was clear to me this was an amazing story
and people only knew the tip of the iceberg.
And when John Casablancas delivered the threat,
I got a little paranoid at a certain point.
I took all my interview tapes
and I put them into a airline carry on bag
and I hid it under the bed of a friend of ours in Paris.
I'm not writing about the Mafia,
I'm writing about the fashion world,
for God's sakes.
You know, Jean-Luc Brunel had a horrible habit
of using the merchandise
for reasons that were not above board.
The same thing happens with every one of these guys.
Look at Gerald Marie.
It just so happened that in his off hours,
he was treating models like garbage.
-By the mid-'90s, Gerald Marie is at the center of rumors
about bad behavior with models.
While on an agency retreat in Ibiza,
American agent Marie Anderson overhears a conversation
she can't ignore.
-It was Gerald Marie,
John Casablancas,
Lisa Herzog from New York Elite,
and Trudi Tapscott from New York Elite,
and both of these young women were begging the men
to stop sleeping with the young teenage girls.
And Gerald said, "We are men, we have our needs."
And John's response was,
"Lisa, Trudi, it's not that big of a deal,"
like, "stop being so puritanical about your ideas of sex,
this is fine," and the men refused to listen.
-Disgusted by the blatant abuses of power,
Marie Anderson quits her job as an agent at Elite.
-I kept trying to have this conversation,
and people were like, "Marie, shut up.
Nobody wants to hear this crap.
Don't be a Debbie Downer.
This is part of the business. Just accept it."
-Accepting it seems to be the key to understanding why
nothing changed even after the "60 Minutes" report
of abuse in the industry.
-He's got the agency, he's got the girls,
his friends say, "Oh, Jean-Luc, I'd like to have," you know,
"I'd like to meet some girls and we're having a party tonight,
can you bring some girls?" - And what happens
if you say no? - You don't work.
-One model in particular,
who I thought was tough as nails,
I warned her what was going to happen and she's like,
"Marie, I'll deck the guy.
You know, that'll never happen."
A little time passes and she calls me crying
and she said, "Marie, Gerald Marie is a pig
and he's been hitting on me all the time,
and he said that if I don't sleep with him,
I'm not going to work and I haven't been working.
I think I'm going to sleep with him."
I'm like, "Don't do it, please, girl, don't do it.
You'll sell your soul."
She said, "Okay, okay, okay,
thank you for talking me off the ledge, I won't do it."
So months go by and she comes home
and she's showing me her portfolio full of covers.
And I'm like, "Look at you!
Look at all these beautiful covers!
Aren't you proud of yourself?
You didn't sleep with him,
and look what you accomplished!"
And she sat there silent, she goes,
"No, Marie,
I did start sleeping with him.
And as soon as I did, I started booking those covers."
♪♪
-He knew! He knew.
He knew he could control that situation.
-But in Paris, 18 year old model Thysia
thinks she will be able to control the situation.
She books two jobs, and on her last night,
she says she accepts an offer to celebrate her success
with Jean-Luc Brunel.
-Brunel, he was really excited and he was saying like,
"Oh, you know, you did so well and I'm so proud of you."
So I said, yeah, we should celebrate.
And...
Of course, I didn't forget about him being a creep,
but on the other hand, I was also like,
okay, you know, this is, you know,
I'm moving in the right direction, you know,
for my career.
I remember that he gave me a drink and he said,
"I made this drink, especially for you."
It was kind of mixed drink.
And, um...
Yeah, he... he said, "Cheers to your career,"
and... and I remember that I drank it,
and 20 minutes later I started...
to become dizzy.
I told him, "I don't feel so well,
so I want to lie down."
And he said, "Yeah, but you can lie down in my room."
I remember that he... He pushed me on his bed
and I remember that then I blacked out.
And the next moment that I realized
that he was on top of me,
and I remember that I was fighting him,
but I... I remember also that I didn't have the power,
you know, to really fight him.
He was, like, in between my legs
and he was starting to penetrate me.
And after that, also blackout again,
and, uh, yeah.
The next morning I remember
that I woke up feeling
like a train rode over me, you know?
♪♪
Um...
I got my memory back, you know,
it was kind of fragmented,
and then I realized what happened,
you know, that he raped me.
-♪ I'm too sexy for Milan, too sexy for Milan ♪
♪ New York and Japan ♪
-It's big, it's colorful,
it's theatrical, it's haute couture...
Original high fashion, custom-made for
the very few who can afford it.
-In the seemingly glamorous world of fashion,
supermodels are to young girls
what haute couture is to mass-market fashion:
aspirational and out of reach.
-♪ I'm a model, you know what I mean ♪
♪ And I do my little turn on the catwalk ♪
-The handful of women at the top sell the dream
to the majority of models who end up
owning a very different experience.
-♪ ...on the catwalk ♪
♪♪
-After a week of auditions and staying at Brunel's apartment,
18 year old Thysia alleges that he drugged and raped her.
-All I wanted to do was escape that apartment.
-According to Thysia, she returns home in shock
and keeps quiet about what happened to her.
-Paris was his city, you know, it was his country,
he was the king, he was the hot shot of the modeling world,
you know, and I was a nobody.
-During your time in Paris, Thysia books two big contracts
and her career is about to take off,
but instead she steps away.
-I quit modeling because it was full of, you know,
creeps that couldn't get their hands off you.
And... but I never told the whole story
because I was too ashamed for it.
-Speaking from experience,
I can tell you that the predator
relies on you being mute.
The predator relies on you keeping your mouth shut,
keeping things status quo, and knowing your place.
-Once again is Jean-Luc Brunel is not charged,
but in 1995, Michael Gross releases his book that,
like the "60 Minutes" episode,
exposes the ugly truth of the modeling world,
again accusing Brunel and others of abuse.
-Johnny Casablancas greets the book by threatening to sue me,
thereby selling, you know,
probably tens of thousands of copies.
-Michael Gross has ruffled a few feathers in the fashion world
with his new book,
"Model: The Ugly Business of Beautiful Women."
-I don't think the book is judgmental.
I think that the book is reported
and people who are reading it are drawing judgments.
The modeling industry basically cleaved in half.
There were the people who felt wronged,
who were generally people who I wrote about
and told tales about.
And there were people who were gleeful
because the bad guys had finally taken it in the throat.
-Gross's book kicks up a lot of dust,
but when it settles, the titans of the modeling world
are still standing.
-I had hoped that the industry would change, but again,
it was just like that "60 Minutes" episode
back in the '80s... Nothing happened.
-As the industry largely dismisses Gross's allegations,
supermodels begin getting replaced
on magazine covers with actresses.
But the marriage of film and fashion will bring
even more morally bankrupt power players into the mix,
including Harvey Weinstein,
who goes on to executive produce
the hit modeling reality show "Project Runway."
- is the chance of a lifetime.
-By '96, the complexion of the runway utterly changes.
And suddenly you had what I called
the march of the wan blondes.
It was like someone just came in
and said anything that can attract attention, no.
We have to put the attention back on the clothes.
-By 1997, the fashion world
is wrapped up in another controversy
when waif-like supermodel Kate Moss
hopes to create the next big aesthetic,
known as heroin chic.
-And so here starts a new trend.
And I don't think that,
when they started calling girls like her "heroin chic,"
she knew that she had a drug problem.
-The ultra-thin look sells clothes,
but comes with a high price when one of its photographers,
David Sorrenti, dies of a heroin overdose.
-The thing that was so interesting
about the waifs and heroin chic
was that politicians latched on to it.
-You do not need to glamorize addiction to sell clothes.
-And while '90s sexual misconduct in the fashion world
is shrugged off,
heroin's tangential relationship to modeling
is something President Bill Clinton
feels requires his attention.
-The images projected in fashion photos in the last few years
have made heroin addiction seem glamorous and sexy and cool.
-But heroin will only briefly distract from
what remains modeling's original sin.
In 1999, two BBC reporters,
Donal Maclntyre and Lisa Brinkworth,
go undercover to gain video proof
of some of fashion's biggest predators.
-I was in the company of some of the most powerful
and I would say dangerous men
in the industry.
-In 1999, the BBC produces a documentary
with undercover footage of Gerald Marie behaving badly.
-I'm not quite sure how it ended up in my hands,
but I ended up with a VHS tape
of the documentary,
and I watched it and I was like,
"Praise Jesus, finally, somebody is talking about this stuff!"
-When the documentary airs in the UK,
Casablancas is quick to react.
He lawyers up and sues the BBC,
claiming it was all a setup
and the episode is banned from airing ever again.
But enough people see the program
to keep the issue alive in the fashion world.
Both Marie and Brunel adamantly denied the claims
and continue to work under the radar
until a powerful movement emerges.
-The New York Times reported today
Weinstein is accused of sexually harassing female employees
and actors for decades.
-After years of using his power to prey on women,
Harvey Weinstein is brought down when his victims speak up
and ignite the powerful Me Too movement
founded by Tarana Burke in 2006.
Their strength encourages other women
to hold their abusers accountable,
including one of America's worst perpetrators.
-Sixty-six year old Jeffrey Epstein
was arrested Saturday in New Jersey
after returning from Paris on his private jet.
-The arrest sparks a memory of a party
hosted by the person Thysia says raped her in 1991
and the man she met who advised her
to be willing to do anything to get ahead.
-I saw the picture of Epstein and I recognized him directly...
That he was the guy, you know, that I spoke to that night
in... in the Brunel's place.
-Brunel finally attracts the attention of authorities
and in December of 2020,
they arrest him for the alleged procurement of girls
to Jeffrey Epstein.
-In his apartment,
there were a lot of young
Eastern European models,
young girls, scouted by Brunel.
They never told me in those words,
but you felt that they were...
That they didn't have the possibility
to go back to their home country
without, you know, money, without a career.
So they were kind of stuck there.
-In Milan, these clubs, they're so beautiful
and so seductive.
And then when you get to know the people
who are sitting at these tables, the models,
you see that they're poorly paid,
some of them might be students,
some of them don't have money for the taxi to get home.
What looks really glamorous, in reality
is a form of exploitative work.
-Looking sexy maybe is like part of your job as a model,
but sex is never part of the job.
-With Brunel behind bars, all eyes turned to Gerard Marie,
and in 2021,
Marie is revisited by journalist Donal Maclntyre,
this time for "60 Minutes Australia."
-Ah, Mr. Marie!
Mr. Marie, call the police. Do you realize
the French prosecutors have got 14 women charging you,
making allegations for assault and sexual assault?
-With an investigation underway
and several of Gerard Marie's victims
working with the police, those in the industry
hope for a different future.
♪♪
-I don't think that you'll ever see a return
to the Wild West atmosphere
that lasted through the supermodel era.
We're past that now.
-The Me Too movement really changed everything
as far as how we view sexual harassment,
because now these stories will come out
if you mess with a model or an actor.
Now we have a platform.
-Despite the lack of legal consequences for some,
there is hope that exposure will protect the next generation.
-Mothers, before they send their daughters to New York, Paris,
London and Milan without a chaperone,
can read "Model," which is still in print 25 years later;
can watch TV,
can watch vice documentaries,
can hear the truth,
and then make their minds up...
"Are we going to throw our daughter in the deep end
of this fetid pool or not?"
You know, at least the information is out there now.
-The moment that I decided to... to come forward
and to tell my story was the moment
that I got my power back, you know,
and it felt empowering and also, uh...
Yeah, good to get the control back.
♪♪