The life of a teenage boy is amazing. The best. A time most men wish they could get back to again. As a 33 year-old man myself, I often think of my teenage years, the memories and fun of it all. While I didn’t have the most traditional of childhoods, I do have some great memories of experiences I’ll never forget. My first time seeing ‘Jurassic Park’ on VHS at school, my first cinema trip where I saw Jim Carrey’s ‘How The Grinch Stole Christmas’ and my Garth Brooks cassette collection. Simple times when I enjoyed movies and music even more than I do now. But when you’re a teenage boy, there is one great wonder that stands above almost all else. Women! Oh wow. The women of this world! Sandra Bullock, Jennifer Lopez, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Debbie Gibson, Carmen Electra, Kylie Minogue, Spice Girls etc… So many amazing women ruled the 1990’s and early 2000’s for me in my teens. And of course we had one of the most iconic woman of the 1980’s, Kathy Ireland. One of the most successful women on planet earth, and an absolute treasure. Which leads us nicely to this week’s Action A Go Go Woman Crush Wednesday. One of the most iconic woman of the 1990’s, another absolute treasure, the incomparable Sandra Taylor.
Wholesome movie and TV stars are acceptable to parents, maybe even the occasional sexy popstar. But on the inside, while those women ruled my years, there was a whole different layer. A different world of women for me. A world ruled by Pamela Anderson, Anna-Nicole Smith and later for me the wonderful Kerri Kendall. These women, these Playboy beauties, towered above even the stars we admitted to loving. And then, the tour-de-force of teenage fantasies, the woman a boy (or husband) could never admit adoring… Jenna Jameson. If ever there was a woman a young boy would give anything for, it was Jenna. I still remember being a boy in a schoolyard, staring at grainy pictures of all of these women that my friends had in their possession. But a woman I had a major love for in the 1990’s was the magnificent Sandra Taylor. As a boy growing up, there was nothing I loved more than action movies, rock music (Garth Brooks too, of course!) and beautiful women. So sitting with my folks on a Saturday afternoon, watching a copy of ‘Under Siege 2’ at 11 years of age, I found yet another love to add to my collection of fantasy wives (As my school friends called it. Times when young boys liked the idea of having wives!). Sandra Taylor starred in the action-packed Steven Seagal sequel as Kelly, the hijacked train’s barmaid. Complete with beautiful hair and adorable outfit, Sandra instantly caught my attention. Her beauty so stunning, her voice so perfect and how she poured a drink, just the perfect woman. While she would be elsewhere for parts of the movie, she lit up my TV screen when she’d reappear. And when her character Kelly was shot by one of the movie’s terrorists, I distinctly remember yelling out something I won’t repeat here. It’s a movie, Sandra is acting, and yet I still cared enough to rage toward the screen with fists clenched and candy flying from my mouth. That’s my first memory of Sandra.
Fast foward a few years to my days of first having total internet access. There have been women I’ve loved through the years, who the internet made ever more present for me. As an example, there’s another woman who has ruled much of my life, a glamour model from the United Kingdom, Zoe McConnell. A perfect, stunning woman. And boy did I adore the heck out of her. I still do. Google her. While the internet gave me a chance to get to know Zoe more, it also gave me a chance to discover more of Sandra Taylor too. I had known she was an iconic Playboy and Penthouse star, also being a major poster star in the early 1990’s. But as a boy slightly out of time, I didn’t have the opportunity to know any of her work outside of the movies she’d been in, and a few sexy shots in various magazines. But in 2005, we got our first computer at my home, and with much excitement and almost unlimited internet access, the very first people I went for were all of these ladies I’d loved through a large portion of my life. Jenna, Zoe, Kathy, Debbie and Kerri. I’ve had the honor of getting to know them all on social media. And although I’d always loved them, knowing their character as well as their work made me love them even more. The biggest discovery was Sandra though. As I gleefully Googled her name, I was finally seeing the great history and happiness she’d been bringing to young men’s lives. Reading all about her and her life was a joy, reading about the impact she’s had on the world of glamor modelling was enlightening, and the countless photo shoots she’d embarked on with Playboy and Penthouse were and are undescribable. A whole new world of Sandra Taylor was opened up to me.
Starting her career under her birth name, Sandra/ Sandi Korn, Sandra Taylor became a major fashion model and beauty queen in the early 1990’s, being named the number one poster woman in the United States, selling millions of posters. She then shot to greater fame when she began posing for the iconic men’s magazine, Penthouse. A massive amount of amazing photos would follow, making Sandra an icon for men through the 90’s, thanks to her sexy explosive style, perfect body and movie star face. Her shoots were so famed and adored that movie studios instantly began approaching her for major movies. With a couple of early roles completed, she would then move on to her first action movie, the brilliant ‘Under Siege 2’. Playing Kelly the barmaid, Sandra became even more popular with audiences, which then led to Playboy offering her a photo shoot to tie in with the movie. This then led to even more incredible shots to form her career as one of the world’s most spectacular erotic models. From ‘Under Siege 2’, she was then given a role in Curtis Hanson’s classic noir crime thriller ‘L.A. Confidential’. From there, she then appeared in ‘Batman And Robin’, during a key sequence, becoming a victim to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Mr. Freeze at a gala ball. With more movie parts to come, she then started to appear in classic TV shows and sitcoms, such as ‘ER’, ‘King Of Queens’ and ‘Just Shoot Me!’. A good friend of the late great Garry Marshall, Sandra would also appear in many of his movies, such as ‘Runaway Bride’, ‘Raising Helen’, ‘Mother’s Day’ and ‘The Princess Diaries 2’. She even appeared alongside him in a movie directed by his son Scott, ‘Keeping Up With The Steins’, which featured an all-star cast (and an appearance from legendary singer-songwriter Neil Diamond). Sandra has a fine list of credits to her name, with countless movie stars and classic filmmakers. So mixed with her fantastic career with Penthouse and Playboy, to appearing in many major Hollywood movies, this is a woman to be adored.
Having always loved her, since getting to know her more online and through her social media, I’ve grown to love her so much more. A truly awesome woman, inside and out, Sandra Taylor will always be one of my most important idols. Long may she reign. The perfect choice for Woman Crush Wednesday.
