Kate Moss Felt "Objectified" in Iconic Shoot With This Star
"I think they played on my vulnerability," the supermodel said of one of her most famous ads.
Kate Moss was one of the most in-demand supermodels of the '90s, so of course, she has many stories from her time on set. And they aren't all positive ones. In fact, one famous 1992 photoshoot left the model with "not very good memories," as she explained in a new interview with BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs. In 1992, Moss starred alongside Mark Wahlberg in a photoshoot for Calvin Klein. They both posed topless, mostly in jeans and exposed underwear, while Moss alone only wears underwear in some of the shots. The campaign made a splash in the fashion and pop culture worlds, but the star now says that modeling for it left her feeling "vulnerable and scared."
Read on to see what else Moss had to say about the modeling job, including about her impression of Wahlberg and the anxiety she felt leading up to the gig.
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Moss found Wahlberg "macho" and egotistical.
In her interview with Desert Island Discs, host Lauren Laverne asked Moss what she recalls about the 1992 underwear shoot with Wahlberg. "Not very good memories," she responded.
Moss continued of Wahlberg specifically, "He was very macho, and it was all about him. He had a big entourage … I was just this kind of model." At the time, Wahlberg had not appeared in any movies yet and was known for the rap music he released as part of the group Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch.
In addition to posing for stills together, Moss and Wahlberg also filmed a commercial in which Moss walks around Wahlberg covering her breasts with her arms, as he says lines including, "Now that could definitely come between me and my Calvins."
She felt that she had been taken advantage of.
Laverne asked Moss if she felt "objectified," and the model answered, "Yeah, completely. And vulnerable and scared … I think they played on my vulnerability. And I was, like, quite young and innocent, so Calvin loved that."
Best Life has reached out to representatives for Calvin Klein and Wahlberg for comment on Moss' interview but has not yet received a response.
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She was taking medication for anxiety leading up to the shoot.
Moss revealed in the interview that she was very anxious in the lead-up to the photoshoot.
"For like a week or two I couldn't get out of bed, and I had severe anxiety and the doctor gave me valium," she explained. Moss said that she was living with her boyfriend Mario Sorrenti's mother, Francesca Sorrenti, at the time, and that she helped her and attended the shoot with her. The supermodel noted that Sorrenti also made sure Moss only took small amounts of valium when her anxiety was debilitating and "never gave [her] the actual bottle."
Moss also opened up about her anxiety and the uncomfortable shoot in an interview with Vanity Fair 10 years ago.
"I had a nervous breakdown when I was 17 or 18, when I had to go and work with Marky Mark and [photographer] Herb Ritts," she said in 2012. "It didn't feel like me at all. I felt really bad about straddling this buff guy. I didn't like it. I couldn't get out of bed for two weeks. I thought I was going to die."
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Moss and Wahlberg haven't had nice things to say about each other in the press.
Also in 2012, Moss said to Interview of working with Wahlberg, "At the time he was such a [expletive]. He wasn't very nice."
Around the same time, Wahlberg gave an interview to Nuts magazine in which commented on the photoshoot.
"It was OK. I wasn't into the waif thing," he said of Moss (via Cosmopolitan UK). "She kind of looked like my nephew. I mean she's beautiful—she's a very pretty nephew—but I'm more into curvy women."
Wahlberg was less critical speaking to The Guardian in 2020.
"I never really had a problem with Kate, did I?" he said when asked about her impression of him. "I think I was probably a little rough around the edges. Kind of doing my thing," he continued. "I wasn't very… worldly, let's say that. But I've seen her and said hello. I think we saw each other at a concert here and there, we said hi and exchanged pleasantries."
