In 1983, Vanessa Williams made history as the first ever Black woman to be crowned Miss America, but her achievement was cruelly overshadowed when nude photos of her were published without her consent. Now the story of the scandal is being adapted for TV - and most importantly, Williams will be working closely with the producers, ensuring that it will be told from her perspective.

At 20 years old, Williams entered the Miss America pageant in the hope that she might earn some money to cover her college tuition at Syracuse University, where she was studying musical theatre. Her ground-breaking victory, however, was initially marred by discrimination and death threats.

Then, 10 months into Williams’ Miss America tenure, nude photos of her that had been taken before her involvement in the competition were published in Penthouse magazine without her permission.

She and the photographer “had made an agreement they would never be published,” Williams said at the time, and she had assumed that they had been destroyed. “I feel as if I were a sacrificial lamb,” she said. “The past just came up and kicked me. I felt betrayed and violated.”

The blame, however, was placed at Williams’ feet. The Miss America organisation said that she had broken a morality clause, and gave her 72 hours to resign, which she eventually did at a press conference in July 1984.

Looking back, the incident seems like a prime example of victim-blaming and slut-shaming. Williams missed out on a Broadway acting gig in the aftermath of the scandal, due to the damage to her public image, and was the target of “relentless” jokes on late-night chat shows. “It seemed like an eternity in which I was the punch line to every late-night monologue,” she later said.

She didn’t let the scandal define her career, though. Williams would go on to win an Oscar and a Golden Globe for her rendition of “Colours of the Wind” from Disney’s Pocahontas, and would earn multiple Emmy nominations for her brilliant turn as icy boss Wilhelmina Slater in Ugly Betty. 

Then, 32 years after she was forced to resign her crown, Miss America formally apologised to the star. “You have lived your life in grace and dignity, and never was it more evident than during the events of 1984 when you resigned,” Miss America CEO Sam Haskell said in 2015.

The TV series, which is in the works at Sony Pictures Television, will be part of the new wave of projects re-examining the stories of women who were shamed in the media. It joins titles like last year’s Impeachment, which explored the fallout from Bill Clinton’s affair with intern Monica Lewinsky, and Pam & Tommy, which documented the theft and subsequent distribution of Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee’s sex tape (in one episode from the Disney+ show, the couple try to sue the publisher of Penthouse, when they realise he is planning to feature stills from the tape in the magazine).

The latter show hit the headlines for the wrong reasons earlier this year, however, when it emerged that the drama had been made without Anderson’s permission: was this just another form of exploitation, re-hashing a traumatic episode for entertainment dressed up as empowerment? 

In contrast, this series is being made with Williams’ approval and involvement, giving the star the chance to reframe the narrative from her own perspective. “This project is incredibly personal to me,” she told Deadline. “There are so many inaccurate and untrue accounts of the events surrounding this period in my life, and as a mother, and as a Black woman, it is important to me that my truth be told and be documented from my perspective.

“This is not just a story about racy photos, it is about misogyny and racism, and I want to shine a light on that for future generations. I was not only able to survive what could have been a career-ending scandal but rose above it and have achieved a body of work I am extremely proud of.”

With the project currently in its early stages, casting details are yet to be confirmed, so watch this space for more news on what promises to be an unmissable series… 

Images: Getty