Marilyn Chambers

Chambers's early life seemed wholesome. Procter & Gamble chose a photograph of her as a young mother holding a baby for their Ivory Snow laundry detergent boxes. That image, tied to the product's purity, turned into a scandal when the company learned that the same woman had moved to San Francisco and started making adult films. The Mitchell brothers, Jim and Artie, promoted Behind the Green Door as starring the "Ivory Snow Girl," and Procter & Gamble pulled the ads. The controversy propelled Chambers to stardom, cementing her image as the wholesome girl next door who also did dirty movies. She also featured in what was considered the first interracial scene in porn, which occurred in Behind the Green Door.

Chambers never intended to do hardcore work. She moved to San Francisco in 1970, hoping to break into the film industry there. She took jobs as a topless and bottomless dancer before responding to an ad that turned out to be for a porn movie. She balked at first, fearing it would hurt her mainstream prospects, but the Mitchells convinced her. She asked for 10% of the gross, which Jim rejected, but Artie saw her resemblance to Cybill Shepherd as a selling point, and they agreed. After finishing the movie, she told them about the Ivory Snow ad. They used it to promote the film, and the scandal made her a star.

Chambers later starred in Resurrection of Eve (1973) and Inside Marilyn Chambers (1975), but she could not sustain a mainstream career after Rabid. She returned to adult films, rejoining the Mitchells for Beyond DeSade (1979) and Never a Tender Moment (1979). In 1980, she agreed to star in Insatiable for 15% of the gross and a flat fee of $250,000, which would be about $1 million in 2025. The film became one of the highest-grossing porn movies of all time. She also signed with Caballero Home Video for a series called Marilyn Chambers Private Fantasies, which included 16 videos released until 1987. She called her movies in the 1980s and 1990s a low point in her life, as she was addicted to cocaine and did them for the money.

Chambers married three times: to Doug Chapin (1972–1974), Chuck Traynor (1974–1985, the former husband of Linda Lovelace), and William Taylor Jr. (1991–1994). She had a daughter, McKenna Taylor, with Taylor in 1991. She died on April 12, 2009, at age 56 in Santa Clarita, California, from a cerebral hemorrhage and aneurysm related to heart disease, due to long-term abuse of cocaine and alcohol. Her net worth at death was estimated at $1.5 million, though some sources said she died mostly penniless. Her legacy as a porno chic pioneer endures, with Behind the Green Door considered a landmark film.