Out of the Blue

There's always something more than a little disappointing when adolescent fantasies actually come true.

I mean, I remember enduring more than a few episodes of "Who's the Boss?" just to see how the producers might dress Alyssa Milano. Don't get me wrong, there was some amusement to be gleaned from the limp hairstyles and budding homosexuality of Danny Pintauro. And certainly, the notion of Tony Danza playing another in a long line of Tonys (likely a standard contract item to avoid awkward moments while filming a scene if he were to hear a different name for his character and fail to respond) who's single comedic gift seemed to be punctuating each episode with at least one exasperated Neanderthal Goombah line reading of: "Sum-an-tuh!" Or: "An-gel-uh!" And the ocassional, but always prized: "Mo-nuh!"

But as one of Ms. Milano's contemporaries, there was always this enchanting cloud-cuckoo land daydream: What if, one day, she would pose in Playboy?

Well, several not-so-naughty "Teen Steam" videos later, Alyssa Milano came through with a bevy of booby-baring treats, not the least of which were the camp classics "Poison Ivy 2: Lily" and "Embrace of the Vampire." Both films reveled in their ability to satisfy the salatious urges of an aging male fan base to see their little girl all grown up, and debased for their viewing pleasure.

But not all childhood Hollywood crushes have been so accomodating (Thank you so much, Katie Holmes). Why, for instance, do Jennifer Love Hewitt and Sarah Michelle Gellar merely tease and tempt with their sexual allure? How come Jennifer Aniston is only caught nude by paparazzi on foreign beaches? How bad need a career actually be before they dispense with the pretensions and simply give the public what they want?

But now here is Debbie--I'm sorry--Deborah Gibson in this month's Playboy. I can't say that she was a prime focus of fantasy for me, but then that was because she was so squeaky clean and I was young and lacked imagination. She was a suburban girl who loved her Billy Joel and couldn't even really dance. She blazed the mall touring path for her contemporary Tiffany (who posed for Playboy in 2004) and then worked on Broadway and more "adult" music. No more songs about crushes and "Electric Youth," I suppose, though I, nor too many other folks apparently, bought her albums.

But as a teenager, her imperfect face and her thin, but hardly statuesque body didn't yet entice my inner deviant. Of course, as anyone in the post-Britney world can tell you, it's this untouchable innocence that provides the most intoxicating urges. Like the cliche of a Catholic school girl who rebels against her restrictive upgringing. Britney really new what she was doing even before she knew what she was doing.

So we've got these pictures--the ones I would have killed for in 1988. And I'm satisfied, though not all that titilated. There's something about youth that is electric, and something about being an adult that doesn't shock easily.