Lynda Carter, Wonder Woman
SHE HAD SUPER-HUMAN strength, wielded a lasso of truth and could deflect flying bullets with her magic bracelets. And her bust defied gravity. When Wonder Womanexploded on to our TV screens in 1975, millions of teenage boys stood up and took notice of this voluptuous heroine in her red, white and blue bustier, hotpants and boots. Wonder Woman was played by Lynda Carter, a 24-year-old actress, singer and former Miss World contestant from Phoenix, Arizona. She had begun her acting career with roles in episodes of Starsky & Hutch, but when she debuted as bespectacled Diana Prince in The New Adventures of Wonder Woman, doing her little twirl to turn into the titular heroine, her immortality was sealed.
Wonder Womanran for four years from 1975 to 1979, turning Carter into one of the biggest sex symbols of the decade. Her father was of Irish and her mother of Mexican descent, but to her fans – and TV station executives – Lynda Jean Cordoba Carter might as well have descended from heaven.
Ironically, Carter claimed to have been uncomfortable with her sex-goddess image, and was also said to be unhappy about the massive merchandising industry that grew around her character, because she saw little remuneration from the action figures and other toys that used her image.
Before the series ended, however, Carter was already planning her next transformation – into a singer of jazzy, poppy, country-flavoured tunes. She had already made her singing debut at age five, in a talent contest, and had performed in various bands as a teenager, including Just Usand The Relatives. "I grew up in a house filled with music," she says on her website. "I was encouraged to sing since I spoke my first word, and I've sung every day of my life since then. And not just in the shower, either."
She released her solo album, Portrait, in 1978 and headlined at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas. She even sang a couple of songs from the album on an episode of Wonder Woman. The next few years saw Carter performing on TV specials with the likes of Kenny Rogers, Merle Haggard, Tom Jones, Ray Charles and Bob Hope, guesting on The Muppet Showand headlining the London Palladium.
Showbiz took a back seat while she and her second husband, attorney Robert A Altman, brought up their two children in Washington DC. She was coaxed out of semi-retirement in 2005 by the offer of a part in a London production of Chicago. More than 30 years after her debut album, she followed it up with At Last, which featured covers of You Send Me, Cry Me A Riverand Summertime. It reached number six on the Billboard Jazz charts.
This month, Carter releases her third album, Crazy Little Things, and here's a crazy little thing: a brand new series of Wonder Womanis about to hit the small screen, starring Adrianne Palicki as the pneumatic heroine, resplendent in an updated version of the iconic costume. What does Carter think of this rebooted series? "You really want to know? I like my costume the best," she says.
