The Most Awesome Celebrity Fitness Videos From the ’80s and ’90s
Jane Fonda kicked up more than her leg warmers when she released her first workout video in 1982. Suddenly, celebrity fitness vids were all the rage, and everyone from Alyssa Milano to Cher lined up behind her to offer their own sweat sessions. So grab a towel and a water bottle and get ready to take a look back at some of the most memorable retro workouts, complete with cheesy hairstyles, bad fashion, and awkward moments. And one and two and three…
Jane Fonda’s Workout: 1982
Fitness is now forever linked with Fonda, who released the first of her more than 20 videos in 1982, helping to fuel the country’s interest in aerobics. But she originally rejected the idea of making a fitness tape. The founder of a line of home videos approached Fonda — already a two-time Oscar winner — about starring in one, since she had written Jane Fonda’s Workout Book. Part of her problem with the idea was that she didn’t know anyone who owned a VHS (video home system). The video she eventually made became the best-selling home video of all time and was the first of 22 in a series. More important, it gave us that amazing image of Fonda wearing leg warmers!
Richard Simmons’s Sweatin’ to the Oldies: 1988
Can you even remember the ’80s without Simmons hopping around in his (usually striped) Dolphin short shorts and a tank top? Neither can we! Though Simmons already owned an L.A. gym and hosted a TV show about fitness, it was his release of this cheesy Sweatin’ to the Oldies video and an entire series just like it that made him a household name. Great balls of fire!
Alyssa Milano’s Teen Steam: 1988
The aerobics craze was strong in the 1980s — so much so that teens wanted in on the action too. The Who’s the Boss actress, just 16 at the time, offered a version of it that included her singing the theme song, some of-the-moment dance moves, and neon clothing. And, it being the ’80s, of course there was a photo of teen heartthrob (and Milano’s then-boyfriend) Corey Haim in the background!
CherFitness: A New Attitude: 1991
Ever the original, the singer and actress was hot off her Oscar-winning role in Moonstruck and her hit song “If I Could Turn Back Time” when she made a step workout video that stood out from the others that celebrities were filming. Of course, she wore lingerie! Only Cher…
Suzanne Somers’s ThighMaster Infomercials: 1990
In between roles on Three’s Company and Step by Step, Somers began looking for a product she could brand. What she found was an exercise apparatus that eventually landed her in the Hall of Fame for infomercials. Millions of ThighMasters have been sold, and they’re still available on her website. Somers never even had to break a sweat!
Heather Locklear Presents: Your Personal Workout: 1990
After her Dynasty gig but before she moved into Melrose Place, Locklear was feeling the burn. Well, she was supposed to be, but who knows? The actress revealed in a 2013 interview on Conan that she had never taken an aerobics class before filming this gem!
Step Up With La Toya Jackson: 1993
The sister of Michael and Janet Jackson, who once had her own music career, cashed in on one of the biggest ’90s trends in fitness with her step aerobics vid. And she did it in a way that only a Jackson could do — with sexualized dance moves that would make her siblings proud, and wearing a neon spandex leotard.
Mark Wahlberg’s The Marky Mark Workout: 1993
Forget Justin Bieber — Mark Wahlberg was the original Calvin Klein underwear guy! He was already showing off his amazing abs in his popular “Good Vibrations” video with Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch when he was picked for that. Naturally, a workout tape that could help you achieve his chiseled body was the natural next step.
A few years later, MTV star Eric Nies appeared in a series of videos based on the show he hosted for the network, The Grind, which was pretty similar to Marky Mark’s but worth a mention. There was hip-hop music in the background and a shirtless, ab-tastic host leading the workout. (In case you aren’t familiar with Nies, just ask your mom!)
Estelle Getty’s Young at Heart: 1993
As the late Golden Girls star says in the intro to her workout video for seniors, “As people grow older, they get smaller. If I got any smaller, then you’d mistake me for a peanut!” Getty was fresh off a hit sitcom and the Sylvester Stallone movie Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot — who can forget that classic?! — when she branched out into the fitness market. As you’d expect, it features the septuagenarian actress cracking jokes. For instance, she has a “full-time French hunk” nearby to help her with the exercises. What it doesn’t feature is any sort of movement that will make you sweat.
Fabio Fitness: 1993
Kids, once a man named Fabio ruled the land, covering a slew of pre-Fifty Shades of Grey romance novels, advertising a butter substitute and, of course, flexing his muscles for all to see. In 1999, the muscle man famously collided with a goose while on a roller coaster at a Virginia amusement park, but his 1993 fitness video captures him at the peak of his fame, tossing his long hair around and busting out of a skimpy tank top that’s no match for his force. It was the ridiculousness that was the Fabio phenomenon in all its glory.
Now does anyone still have a VCR?
