Rose McGowan Looks Back at Iconic VMAs Dress, Explains Why She Wore It
Rose McGowan is looking back at her iconic moment at the 1998 MTV Video Music Awards, where she wore a completely see-through dress while walking the red carpet with then-boyfriend Marilyn Manson.
In a new interview, the 46-year-old actress says it was her “first big public appearance” after allegedly being raped by Harvey Weinstein in 1997. Rose decided to use the moment to take back her power.
“I just felt like, ‘Oh Hollywood, would you want a body just that you can use and throw away? Then I’ve got one for you!’” Rose told Yahoo. “It was like at the end of Gladiator when he comes out and he’s like, ‘Are you not entertained?’”
“And if you look at me, I did it with power,” Rose added. “I didn’t do it with my hand on my hip to be sexy. Most of the women that are dressed like that on the red carpet, it’s a calculated, sexy move to turn people on. Mine was like, ‘I’m gonna f–k with your brain. I’m going to blow your brain up.’ And nobody had done it.”
Rose said it was “kind of hard” to deal with the criticism for her look.
“They slut shamed me like crazy,” she said. “I hadn’t really ever dealt with global media shaming.”
Despite all of this, Rose has no regrets.
“You know, when you do stuff sometimes on instinct and in a mood, like when a mood overtakes you on, you analyze what it was that brought you to that mood or that choice,” she said. “So, I’ve certainly had a lot of time to analyze and I’m looking at the timeline. But I completely understand why I did what I did.”
Earlier this week, Rose‘s feud with a former co-star escalated on Twitter.