Cynthia Myers Bio
Cynthia Myers was an American actress, glamour and nude model. Born Cynthia Jeanette Myers on September 12, 1950, in Toledo, Ohio, she has also been credited as Cynthia Sarah Myerson. Playboy named her its December 1968 Playmate at 18. Her appearance came during the 1960s, as Playboy grew into a major force in American magazine publishing.
Myers had natural breasts, brown eyes and brown hair. Her measurements are 39-24-36.
Cynthia Myers had already been attracting modeling offers for several years before Playboy came calling. Raised in Ohio, she began working auto shows in Detroit in 1967 and graduated from Woodward High School the following year. The centerfold session with photographer Pompeo Posar was made while she was still 17, with publication held until after her eighteenth birthday. The pictorial, cheekily titled “Wholly Toledo!,” was photographed in part around the Toledo Museum of Art and quickly became one of the magazine’s more recognizable late-1960s spreads.
Playboy soon became more than a single appearance. Myers spent time at the Chicago Playboy Mansion, worked at the Playboy Club and became a familiar face on Playboy After Dark. During the Vietnam War, she received large quantities of mail from American servicemen and tried to answer as much of it as she could. Her centerfold later acquired an even stranger afterlife when a copy of her photograph was secretly inserted into Apollo 12 mission material alongside images of Angela Dorian, Reagan Wilson and Leslie Bianchini.
Hollywood followed. Burt Lancaster introduced Myers to director Sydney Pollack, which helped lead to an uncredited appearance in They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? She studied acting at the Actors and Directors Lab in Beverly Hills with Bruce Dern and then landed the role that would define her film career: Casey Anderson in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. Russ Meyer’s extravagant 1970 cult film gave Myers a far more substantial screen presence than her earlier bit parts and ensured that her reputation would extend well beyond Playboy collectors.
A supporting role in Molly and Lawless John followed in 1972, but Myers eventually stepped away from filmmaking, in part because of repeated requests that she appear nude on screen. Modeling remained part of her life, including the memorable “Miss Earthquake” advertising campaign for Cerwin-Vega stereo equipment and appearances in several Playboy calendars. Decades later, Playboy readers still remembered her strongly enough to place her tenth in the magazine’s 2000 Playmate of the Century poll.
Myers remained connected to fans through autograph conventions and later promotional work, including a 2009 Schlitz campaign that deliberately revived 1960s imagery. She died of lung cancer in 2011 at the age of 61. Her public record is unusually rich for a Playmate of the period: Playboy, television, cult cinema, advertising and even an improbable trip to the Moon all became part of the same story.
