# 'but, miss X – you're beautiful without your glasses' - or, Ugly Ducklings on film **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 15, 2004, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854 "2004-11-15T14:15:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Saltire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saltire/32/553_2.png) [@Saltire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saltire)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2004, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/41 "2004-11-15T23:29:26Z")
To add to the hijack: In Grease 2, the nice-guy lead has to transform himself into a dangerous biker punk to win Michelle Pfeiffer. Not that I wouldn’t do the same thing, given the chance, but the message seemed wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Eureka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/74df32/32.png) [@Eureka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eureka)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/42 "2004-11-16T00:32:27Z")
Not a transformation but another “pretty girls don’t wear glasses” role is Marilyn Monroe in \* How to Marry a Millionaire\*. Marilyn’s character is blind as a bat without her glasses(as in walking into walls rather than through doors). She refuses to wear her glasses when around potentially rich men on the grounds that “You know what they say about girls who wear glasses”. Eventually, though, she ends up falling in love with a guy who knows she needs glasses and tells her she’s pretty with her glasses on so she starts wearing them in public. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/43 "2004-11-16T00:34:12Z")
> [@blowero](#): > > They did a pretty good job of making Ally Sheedy look gross in the first half of Breakfast Club. C’mon, she was lots cuter before being turned into Miss Prom Night. ---
**Author:** ![capacitor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e47774/32.png) [@capacitor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capacitor)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/44 "2004-11-16T00:41:55Z")
That what makes Charlize Theron’s performance in _Monster_ all the more extrordiary, a total reverse of the norm. She was still chosen to be Babe of the Year in many publications. ---
**Author:** ![TheOnlySaneOne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/67e7ee/32.png) [@TheOnlySaneOne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheOnlySaneOne)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/45 "2004-11-16T00:43:22Z")
Not sure if this counts, but the Lindsey Lohan character in **Mean Girls** at least kind of fits into this. I thought she looked much, much better in her geek chic style than the ‘napkin-disguised-as-a-skirt’ look later. Anyway, I almost always think these girls/women look better in their first style than later on. To take the genre-killing movie **She’s All That** for example, I would much rather have dated Rachel Lee Cook in her original style, opposed to her later style. But then, I’m attracted to geeks, so YMMV. ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/46 "2004-11-16T04:40:52Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Not actually on topic for this thread, but I have to give a shout out to Michelle Meyrink as Jordan Cochran in _Real Genius_. She’s the nerdy, “unpopular” girl _with bad hair_ who dresses funny. She’s totally hot, of course, but her personality is so hyper-active and generally wierd that you absolutely buy the character. And the best part? The main character falls in love with her _because_ she’s wierd and hyper-active, and at the end of the movie, she’s _still_ wierd and hyper-active, and she _still_ dresses funny and _has bad hair_, because _that’s what the main character fell in love with!_ > > Dammit, where can I find a sexy super-genius physics major who can knit me a sweater during a study break? (_Emphasis added_.) Jordan (Michelle Meyrink) did not have bad hair in that movie. In fact, her “Louise Brooks-bob” looked a lot a better than some of the 80’s hairstyles worn by the other girls in the cast. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/47 "2004-11-16T04:55:58Z")
> [@NDP](#): > > Jordan (Michelle Meyrink) did not have bad hair in that movie. In fact, her “Louise Brooks-bob” looked a lot a better than some of the 80’s hairstyles worn by the other girls in the cast. Well, I can’t argue with that, but I think it was _meant_ to be bad hair. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/48 "2004-11-16T06:06:11Z")
I can’t remember which Cary Grant movie this was, but he asks his frumpy stenographer to take off her glasses. She does that, but he shakes his head in disillusionment because now she’s just a frumpy stenographer who’s squinting. ---
**Author:** ![Kaitlyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/73ab20/32.png) [@Kaitlyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaitlyn)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/49 "2004-11-16T08:00:04Z")
> [@Little Nemo](#): > > There was a teen comedy where a guy was trying to choose between two girlfriends. One was his best friend; intelligent, funny, good personality, etc. The other was beautiful. But the kicker was that the actress playing the “unattractive” girlfriend was **Helen Hunt**. Me, I’d be willing to “settle” for a woman whose worst flaw is she’s only as attractive as Helen Hunt. This plot is a sub-genre of the teen romance genre. In _Some Kind of Wonderful_ the “unattractive” best friend is Mary Stuart Masterson. In _Secret Admirer_ (one of the best, and most underrated, teen comedies ever made) she’s Lori Lochlin. In _Only You_ she’s, again, Helen Hunt. _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_ introduced this as a plot thread in season one, but then had the guy actually get the gorgeous, shallow girl and never end up with the nearly as attractive, nerdy girl. ---
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 8:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/50 "2004-11-16T08:19:22Z")
In Frankie and Johnny, Michelle Pfeiffer is supposed to be playing {opposite Al Pacino, whom I gather isn’t entirely unattractive} a dowdy waitress: she coudln’t look dowdy if she was in a gorilla suit with a paper bag over her head. ---
**Author:** ![zoogirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b9bd4f/32.png) [@zoogirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoogirl)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/51 "2004-11-16T08:42:15Z")
How about “Carrie” who got to breifly shine at her prom before having the whole thing turn into a bloody mess? ---
**Author:** ![foxymoron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d26b3c/32.png) [@foxymoron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foxymoron)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/52 "2004-11-16T11:39:37Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > I can’t remember which Cary Grant movie this was, but he asks his frumpy stenographer to take off her glasses. She does that, but he shakes his head in disillusionment because now she’s just a frumpy stenographer who’s squinting. I almost posted about this one last night. The movie is _That Touch of Mink_, starring Cary Grant and Doris Day. Gig Young plays a supporting character with a pinched-faced, bun-haired secretary (“Miss Smith”). He dictates something to her, then as she’s leaving the office he says (paraphrased), “Just a minute, Miss Smith. Would you mind taking your glasses off?” She takes them off and squints at him. He says, “Now, let your hair down.” She does, and shakes it out a little, and it’s a stringy lifeless mess. Gig says, “That’s funny. It always works in the movies.” Heh. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/53 "2004-11-16T14:10:19Z")
Back in my Young and Cute Days, I was working as office manager/fitting model at one of the 7th Avenue fashion houses. One of the designers—who was famous as having been the only hetereosexual male models in the '70s—was flirting with me. Great guy, very funny. I showed him my modeling photos. He looked at the photos, looked at me, whipped his glasses off, and said, “Why Miss Golden—without my glasses on, you’re beautiful!” I promptly fell in love. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/54 "2004-11-16T14:34:42Z")
In _Loaded Weapon 1_ Allyce Beasley lets her hair down… …and promptly turns into Kathy Ireland. ---
**Author:** ![Martha\_Medea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/43a26b/32.png) [@Martha\_Medea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martha_Medea)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/55 "2004-11-16T15:23:34Z")
I’m enjoying all your posts. I had another example but it vanished from my head. I’ll be back when it comes back to me. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/56 "2004-11-16T15:40:18Z")
> [@](#): > > This plot is a sub-genre of the teen romance genre. In Some Kind of Wonderful the “unattractive” best friend is Mary Stuart Masterson. I’ve always wondered if the producers were being ironic in this movie. If you discount the different hairstyles, you’ll see that Mary Stuart Masterson and Lea Thompson look so similar they could be sisters. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/57 "2004-11-16T15:48:18Z")
> [@](#): > > In Frankie and Johnny, Michelle Pfeiffer is supposed to be playing {opposite Al Pacino, whom I gather isn’t entirely unattractive} a dowdy waitress: she coudln’t look dowdy if she was in a gorilla suit with a paper bag over her head. I totally ruined the whole point of the story. It was supposed to be about two ordinary people. IIRC Pfeiffer’s character was originally played on Broadway by Kathy Bates. Kinda changes things don’t it? That’s Hollywood for you. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/58 "2004-11-16T16:12:14Z")
I’m surprised no one mentioned Alison Hannigans band geek transformation between the second and third American Pie movies. ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/59 "2004-11-16T18:08:32Z")
The SDMB muse, Ms. Bailey Quarters, is absolutely stunning without her glasses. Of course, she looks danged good with glasses as well. ---
**Author:** ![Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Krisfer_the_Cat)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854/60 "2004-11-16T20:28:45Z")
UGH, that’s the plot of EVERY Disney live action film starring a girl! When she firsts walks on screen she’s wild, carefree, fun kid who turns into Prom Queen by the end of the movie because we all know women aren’t worth a damn thing if they aren’t perfectly dressed and coiffed with dainty little manners and no interest in running, jumping or otherwise having fun as real peaople! Hmmm sorry about the run on sentence! Maybe I need to go run around the yard or something 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-miss-x-youre-beautiful-without-your-glasses-or-ugly-ducklings-on-film/274854.md?page=4)