Beyond the Gaze: Jule Campbell's Swimsuit Issue

I always worked with the same components.

Sky, sun, sand, girl, swimsuit.

Those five things happened every year.

The magazine reaches 70 million adults each year.

Jule Campbell is the Swimsuit's founding editor.

She oversaw every issue between 1965 and 1996.

Let's get her jacket off.

-Walter. Wait. -What?

-You wait till she works it. -Okay.

Because this is kind of a dock jacket.

It's really important.

How tight are you shooting?

-I'm getting full body. -Good.

That's not the way you wear one of those jackets, though.

You're looking at one of the most profitable ventures in publishing.

No, not a picture of her bum,

but a picture where you see her bum.

-No. -You don't want that?

No. I think the way she's doing it,

three quarters, a little cover. The rest will-- I got all the

-NOW feminist women after me. -Okay.

And I'm already going straight to hell.

But amidst the setting of serene water,

there's been a storm of protest

from anti-pornography groups.

I'm taking the brunt for the others

whose magazines expose a great deal more than we do.

The woman who lives in this historic farmhouse

in rural New Jersey

is a cook, a gardener, a grandmother,

and the creator of one of the most controversial icons

of American pop culture,

the annual Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.

I am happy that I never had a boring life.

A lot of struggles, but struggles are good.

If you survive them, you're a stronger.

Fight for what you really want.

It wasn't easy working as a woman in Time Inc.

The 1986, '87 and '88 cover model, Elle MacPherson.

She was such a powerhouse with these guys.

Just to go into the all-boys club at Sports Illustrated,

especially at that time.

It was run by men for men.

She came in with a voice and an opinion,

and she stood her ground

and she never really got the credit that she deserved.

Footballs were flying through the air,

and she was being sexually harassed

and making a lot less money.

And then, meanwhile, guess who creates

the billion-dollar franchise.

Beauty is in the beholder's eye.

So, if someone finds this terribly sexy, that's okay.

But I haven't exploited her.

People are like, oh, it's gratuitous.

That's because they didn't know the whole picture.

Women who support women?

Women who see the beauty in women?

Why would you not want to support them?

She changed my life.

That issue is seen by an estimated

50 million people every year,

one third of them women.

That might not be what you'd expect.

But then again, Jule Campbell

is not what you'd expect either.

If you respect beauty, you've nourished your soul.

Oh, my God.

This is how I feel. Like an editor again.

That's Cheryl.

This is a good one.

There are just so many things

you can do on a beach and so many poses.

And there's something a little special to it.

Yes. Yes.

I wasn't into the obviously sexy,

which made it even sexier that you weren't.

There's so much smut out there

that to see a really kind of...

semi-naked but clean,

you really wanna keep it.

I love this one.

It's so modern.

The hard thing for me working for a sports magazine

is all the editors were guys.

And when I showed the pictures,

I would have the managing editor there,

and he could salivate while he looked at them.

Sometimes I'd wanna do this.

And they wanted the sexiest pictures.

And I would take them out so they'd never even see them,

because I thought it would cheapen the woman.

This is not usable.

Go in the bad pile.

And they didn't care if they cheapened the woman at all.

But I did.

These are grown men with children, little boys.

You have to tell me about this documentary.

It's gonna be about you and your life.

- That's very ambitious. - Do you like the idea?

Yeah, I'm astounded.

I wouldn't even be here to say,

"No. That didn't really happen that way."

I'd love to hear what you would like to do,

because I'm a pretty good visionary.

I've kind of helped a lot of people

that said, "I never thought of that."

That's kind of why I'm doing what I do.

It's kind of unveiling tragedy...

- Yeah. - ...and unveiling happiness.

You need to look at other people's lives to learn.

What is the true meaning of documentary?

Ooh, that's a good question.

"Documentary: dealing freely with historical events,

especially of a recent and controversial nature."

Nobody uses a dictionary anymore.

No.

Yes.

Wow. Okay.

Is that a Tyra one?

Oh, my God. It is.

Christie.

I wonder if this is Africa.

So, her career, I don't think she ever thought of it

as a business.

She wasn't trying to create

the most successful magazine in publishing history.

I really wanted to be an artist.

My parents dissuaded me.

They said I could be an art teacher.

And that did not appeal to me.

So, I went to journalism school.

But I majored in advertising so I could use my art.

She never talked about money.

She didn't like talking about money.

But she was driven by her aesthetics,

the beauty she perceived in people,

nature,

clothes,

objects.

Sea glass, for example.

She would collect things of no value.

These are just doodles.

I'm in the garden room looking out.

"What does the heart see that the eye doesn't or can't?"

Can you move that water thing? It's in the shot.

Would Jule Campbell from SI want the Pyrex in the shot?

No. The cleaner the better.

So you know what your subject is.

Everyone thinks differently, I think, when they're filming

because they're seeing

and then they're trying to get it down

so other people can see it.

But I think filming is very personal,

and it doesn't have to mean anything

as long as you enjoy doing it.

You were sort of in the first wave

of independent women after the war

who were making their own way out in the workplace.

What was your first job after school?

Marketing consultants called Amos Parrish.

I said, "I want to be in your fashion office. "

And he said, "Most of the women in our fashion office haven't been to college.

He said, "Do you think they're gonna take you by the hand to teach you?"

So, I said, "Well, you know, how can I get ahead?"

And he said, "Go and work in a store and learn retailing."

And that's why I got the job at Glamour.

They said, "Well, we see you have your retailing experience.

This is your first course

in preparing for an office job.

You're starting a new career.

The big job was filing. I've never filed in my life.

The woman I was working for said,

"If you read everything that goes into this file,

you'll know more about this magazine than anyone else."

So, I started going into the office on Saturdays.

From that point, it seems like every six months,

I had a nice promotion.

There was a long corridor, and I was in an office here.

But over here was the fashion office

that I always wanted to get into

because they were the ones

who worked with the famous photographers

and the models and so forth.

Betty Downey was the fashion editor of Glamour.

And I guess she'd been watching me, and she said,

"I want that girl in my department."

I eventually became accessories editor.

You told me once that you worked with Andy Warhol at Glamour.

Yeah. When I knew him, he was just coming up.

Do you like to talk about it?

Yeah, I'm comfortable with it.

How did you get started at Sports Illustrated?

How did I get started at Sports Illustrated?

Oh, my God.

That seems like a thousand years ago.

It's like, "When did you have your first buggy ride?"

Well, I remember when I was at Conde Nast,

we were in a bar one night, and everyone was talking about

this new sports magazine that was coming out.