Part 1: The Age of Innocence
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Michelle Pfeiffer was born on 29 April 1958 in Santa Anna, California to Richard (Dick) Pfeiffer, and his wife Donna. The couple had moved to California after becoming tired with general post-war depression that had struck North Dakota. After settling in Midway City in Orange County, their first child, Michelle's older brother Richard (Rick) was born. Michelle followed suite soon after. And then over a gap of about 8 years, Michelle's sisters, Dedee and Lori arrived as well. The Pfeiffers were your average blue-collar family, with Richard Senior working as an air-conditioning and heating contractor and Donna playing the role of housewife while their children were growing up. |
When once asked if she was Swedish of heritage Michelle said, 'I'm kind of a mutt, part Swedish, German, Dutch, Irish and Swiss, but sometimes I am a little mad, like the Swedes. They always seem to have a secret, like they're hiding something, I've been accused of that, like I'm holding in some secret.'
| About growing up in the
Pfeiffer household, Dedee, Michelle's sister had this to
say: 'I don't remember loving my sisters and my brother,
Rick. I remember things like Michelle getting into my
make-up; when she broke my record albumn; when Mom was
away one time and we got into a fight and she ripped my
hair out. It wasn't until we all got older that we
bonded. But that's normal family stuff.' So was Michelle always the elegant beauty, even during her early years? Actually no. Aggressively defensive as a little girl, due to the other children making fun of her 'duck' walk, and big lips, she became a bully and was nicknamed 'Michelle Mudturtle,' a name of which she is still quite fond. A tomboy throughout her youth, Michelle was always the biggest girl in the class, with 'a pixie cut' and 'was regularly beating up the boys.' She said later, 'I was a rotten kid, just rotten.' 'If anyone needed anyone beaten up they would come and get me.' |
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Time went by, and soon Michelle was enrolled at Fountain Valley High School. Stubborn from a very early age, matching her Taurean starsign, her teens were a time when she rebelled against her parents and strict upbringing. At the same time, however, she had a strong work ethic, and would help her father by cleaning 2nd-hand fridges which he would recondition and sell later. She started working on part-time jobs when she was 14, often lying about her age to get the job. During these years she was a helper at a kindergarten, assisted at a printing press, worked as an assitant in clothes and jewellery shops, and most often of all, was a check-out girl at several Vonn's Supermarkets.
Michelle was not particularly fond of highschool. She admits she was 'not a good student,' preferring to ditch class and go to the beach with her friends. They would hang out with the surfers, and Michelle in her bikini was one of the beach-bunnies you would have seen prancing about Huntington Beach during the 70s. She says, 'I used to do drugs in high school. Iwas a beach bunny- into all kinds of drugs.' With the blue-collar area Michelle is from it's pretty safe to assume she is talking about marijuana, and hallucinogenics like LSD, but basically everything was avaliable on Huntington Beach. She also admitted later to smoking and drinking frequently. It's no surprise to hear then that she wrecked her first car, a 1965 red Mustang when she was anything but sweet-sixteen.
But as much as Michelle says she was a rebel who was hardly in the classroom she did quite well at school. Her History teacher said she got 'A's and 'B's, believing 'she didn't have to pore over the books to take her tests.' And for Drama, the only class she bothered to attend regularly, theatre teacher Carol Cooney gave her a B. With all her part-time jobs earning her extra credits, it was Michelle's desire to get out of highschool as soon as possible. She achieved that desire with her trade-mark stubbornness, finishing in only 3 years. But still she did not really know what she wanted to do. And messing around with her friends on the beach was getting boring...