Ellen Michaels Bio
Ellen Michaels is an American actress, photographer, glamour and nude model. She was born on February 12, 1953, in New York City, New York. Playboy named her its March 1972 Playmate at 19. Her appearance came during Playboy's 1970s print era, when the magazine reached the height of its mass-market influence.
Michaels has natural breasts, green eyes and brown hair. Her measurements are 37-24-35.
Photographed for her Playboy pictorial by Dwight Hooker, Michaels was pursuing a degree in elementary education when the images were made — a detail that complicates the usual story of a 1970s glamour model and hints at a life lived between publicity and purpose. The Hooker session sits within a larger commercial career: by the mid‑1970s she was one of New York’s working faces for national advertising, lending her look to campaigns for Diet Pepsi, Schaefer Beer, Runrico Rum, Sugar Free Dr. Pepper and Kodak.
Her image moved easily across media. She appeared on album covers for The Salsoul Orchestra, Eric Clapton and Barrabas, posed for mass‑market romance covers — including a Harold Robbins tie‑in — and became a recognizable presence in the city’s nightlife, a frequent guest at Studio 54 during the disco years. Those assignments show how 1970s magazine glamour translated into mainstream commercial visibility without surrendering the era’s theatricality.
Michaels also tried her hand at acting, taking small roles in the low‑budget pictures Checkmate and Death Mask, and her centerfold found an odd afterlife in a brief clip on The Benny Hill Show in 1972. Abroad, she was tapped as a Playmate in Germany later that year, a reminder that American magazine work often generated overseas editions and alternate publication paths for models of the period.
Outside the spotlight she devoted long stretches to charity: running a volunteer program for the blind and working with senior citizens and disabled people. In later years her attention shifted from staged sets to the natural world; she turned to wildlife and nature photography, concentrating on the birds, butterflies and landscapes of New York’s Central Park. The sequence — from commercial gloss to quiet observation — makes for a career that balanced public visibility with sustained, hands‑on engagement.
