Why Pamela Anderson ‘Reminds’ Jamie Lee Curtis of Mother Janet Leigh: ‘Innocence’ and ‘Incredible Beauty’ (Exclusive)

Mar. 15, 2025

Pamela Anderson in 2023 (left) Jamie Lee Curtis on Sept. 6 (middle); Janet Leigh in 1998 (right).Photo:Ian West/PA Images via Getty; GEOFF ROBINS/AFP via Getty; SGranitz/WireImage

Ian West/PA Images via Getty; GEOFF ROBINS/AFP via Getty; SGranitz/WireImage

ForJamie Lee Curtis,Pamela Andersonbrings to mind another blonde beauty: Curtis’s mother, actressJanet Leigh.

In the new issue of PEOPLE, Curtis and Anderson — who costar in the new dramaThe Last Showgirl— discuss their new film and their friendship.

Though Curtis and Anderson had never met before filming director Gia Coppola’s movie about two Las Vegas women at a crossroads in their lives, the formerHalloweenscream queen, 66, knew of theBaywatchicon, 57.

“There was a picture of her in a bathing suit that I remember very clearly. How could you not?” Curtis says of Anderson. “Pamela is classically beautiful, my mother was classically beautiful. I have always thought I was cute at best, and felt as a child that way. And so in a way, Pamela reminds me of my mother.”

“There was an innocence about my mother and incredible beauty. I wrote a piece about her once [called] ‘Bye Bye, Beauty.’ And I think the opening line of that article was, ‘My mother was the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen in my life,’” continues Curtis about Leigh, thePsychostar who died at age 77 in 2004.

“That is what I took from Pamela, was this incredible beauty and just openness, just really very moving to me,” continues Curtis.

Janet Leigh circa 1954.Archive Photos/Getty

Archive Photos/Getty

Leigh was wed to Curtis’s father,Some Like It Hotactor Tony Curtis, from 1951 to 1962. The elder Curtis died in 2010 at age 85.

Jamie Lee Curtis in ‘The Last Showgirl.'.Roadside Attractions

Roadside Attractions

Pamela Anderson in ‘The Last Showgirl.'.Roadside Attractions

“The current conversation about nepo babies is just designed to try to diminish and denigrate and hurt,” she continued. “For the record I have navigated 44 years with the advantages my associated and reflected fame brought me, I don’t pretend there aren’t any, that try to tell me that I have no value on my own.”

The Last Showgirlis in theaters on Friday, Jan. 10.

For more on Jamie Lee Curtis and Pamela Anderson, pick up the new issue ofPEOPLE.

source: people.com