Celebrity Dolls Part 1: Singers and Musicians

Andy Gibb, 7 inch doll by Ideal, 1979

Here is the Andy Gibb doll shown next to Mego's 8 inch Spider-Man for size comparison. The Andy Gibb doll has a dancing action when the legs are moved. The top torso of the doll twists as the head of the doll stays looking forward. The joints at the waist and neck are diagonal rather than horizontal. This doll originally came with a doll stand that could be used to operate the dancing action. The outfit and shoes are removable. I love that Disco jumpsuit and the bell bottoms! Below is a close up of his face.

As Andy Gibb had long shoulder-length hair (as was the style in the 70's) Ideal gave their Andy doll rooted hair to match the long hair look! His name is also printed on the vest. Ideal also made a series of dolls based on the Abba rock group which are similar in style to the Andy Gibb doll.

For those who may have no idea who Andy Gibb is, he is the younger brother to the members of the Bee Gees. He became famous in the late 1970s. Perhaps his biggest hit song was "Shadow Dancing" from the album of the same name. Sadly he passed away at a very young age.

This is a picture from Teen Beat magazine, May 1979 (the same year that the doll was introduced), showing Andy wearing an outfit that is similar to what the doll is wearing, a pink vest and white shirt. Makes me wonder if this photo had anything to do with influencing the design of the doll.

I used to have a shirt with stripes on the shoulders just like this one! Mine was light blue. (The two Andy Gibb pictures above were found in 2011 on a really well done Andy Gibb website which unfortunately is no longer online.)

This is Andy Gibb's famous album Shadow Dancing, which is available on DVD. The photo is from the Wikipedia page about the album.

Wayne Gretzky, 12 inch doll by Mattel, 1983

Michael Jackson, 12 inch doll by LJN, 1984

You may have heard of Michael Jackson. I don't know why they made a doll of him as he's a bit of an unknown and hardly ever talked about. He's the singer from a quaint little record album called Thriller that was made in the 1980s but it didn't have much success. (Kidding!)

Here is the original Michael Jackson doll from 1984, made by the LJN toy company. I've also shown a collector card with a photo of Michael Jackson in the same outfit for comparison. The Michael Jackson doll came boxed in one of four different outfits: Thriller, Beat it, Grammy Awards (blue jacket), and American Music Awards (red sparkle jacket). All four of these can be found with or without the sunglasses. These outfits were also sold individually on cards, without the sunglasses or microphone, along with three additional outfits that were only available on cards: Human Nature (yellow vest), Motown (silver jacket), and Billy Jean (black jacket and pants).

Michael Jackson's Thriller album, shown above, was a huge hit in the 1980s (to put it mildly) and this doll series was part of the merchandising mayhem that followed. The Michael Jackson doll in his Thriller outfit was the must have item on my Christmas list the year it was produced (I was about 10 or 11 years old), and I was quite happy to actually get one! It was a present from my Aunt. I played with this doll quite a bit when I was a kid and recall having trouble keeping track of all the pieces, especially his glove and microphone. I lost the microphone once and then found it, but by then I had also lost the glove. When I found the glove again, I had also lost his microphone again. This went on for a while. As you can see, in the end I found the microphone but lost the glove!

Michael Jackson was actually quite attractive before he started getting plastic surgery. It's sad that he didn't realize he was okay just the way he was. I believe he had already had his nose operated on before this doll was made, so the doll's face is based on his post-surgery look with a thinner nose.

The LJN toy company used the same 12 inch doll body (in pink plastic instead of light brown) to make a doll of Boy George. The same microphone was also used for the Boy George doll but in blue plastic instead of black. The Boy George doll is far less common than the Michael Jackson dolls.

Here is a small tip for doll collectors: The black shirt from the Thriller outfit is made out of a thin nylon fabric and held closed at the back of the neck with Velcro. If the rough side of the Velcro touches the nylon fabric it can snag and cause a run in the fabric. Therefore, to avoid damaging the shirt on a loose doll don't ever undo the Velcro!

New Kids on the Block, 12 inch doll by Hasbro, 1990

Here is the complete collection of New Kids on the Block "In Concert" 12 inch dolls.  Even though these New Kids dolls were sold as a fashion doll series for girls, these dolls played a critical role in the development of other 12 inch "dolls for boys" collections such as Star Wars, G.I Joe, Action Man, and others.

By the mid 1980s doll type action figures for boys had fallen out of style to be replaced with standard action figures (DC Comics "Super Powers" series, He-Man, Transformers, Ghostbusters, etc.). When Hasbro produced these New Kids on the Block dolls in 1990 it sparked the return of the 12 inch doll format. The company started to focus on developing other 12 inch doll collections, and began by re-introducing the 12 inch G.I Joe doll. The torso of the new G.I Joe doll was sculpted to be more muscular than the New Kids doll torso, however the type of doll body and the joints are identical (shown below). (See the Hasbro page for more info about G.I Joe dolls)

Following the New Kids and G.I Joe series came other 12 inch dolls from Hasbro, such as the Elvis doll shown below, the Street Fighter series, Action Man, Starting Lineup (a series based on sports celebrities), and an astronaut based on the Apollo 13 movie. After Hasbro bought out Kenner in the mid 1990s a collection of over 100 Star Wars 12 inch dolls followed. (I've shown some of these on the Star Wars pages of this blog.) Oddly enough, all of this is a result of these New Kids on the Block dolls! Strange but true!!! In 2000 Hasbro would once again use the New Kids doll body to make dolls based on the "S Club 7" TV show (see the TV dolls page).

I'm not a fan of NKOTB and never have been, but I thought these dolls were very well done. Here are the boxes for each doll from the "In Concert" series which came with a microphone accessory, as well as real cassette tape containing an exclusive interview. Jordan also came with a plastic hat. The Donnie and Danny dolls have rooted doll hair "rat tails" which were very popular at the time.

The back of the box shows the "Hangin' Loose" series of NKOTB dolls. This series was sold in smaller boxes and did not come with a cassette tape, so it was sold at a lower price than the "In Concert" series. A closer look of the picture from the back of the box is shown below.

Here is the NKOTB stage playet that was also available.

I noticed that the "In Concert" Donnie doll has two variations as his jacket was made with an error. Notice the sleeves on the unpackaged doll above are reversed from the doll in the package. The group photo from the front of the box (below) shows Donnie in the same jacket. The American flag is supposed to be on his right arm and the British flag on his left arm, so the doll shown in the package above is the correct version. However, it looks like both dolls have the front sections of the jacket reversed from the original jacket as well! I don't think there is any difference in value between these two dolls. Some collectors (like me!) simply like to collect these kinds of variations.

Elvis, 12 inch doll by Hasbro, 1993

Hasbro made a series of three Elvis dolls. This one is wearing the "68 Special" outfit. The other two are "Jailhouse Rock" and "Teen Idol" and came with a guitar. The body for this doll is similar to Hasbro's New Kids on the Block dolls.

NSYNC, 12 inch marionette by Living Toys, 2000

Here is the NSYNC Justin Timberlake marionette. As is often the case with toy puppets this marionette is a doll with strings added to it, therefore it does not work very well. The object with marionettes (and any type of puppet) is to design them for movement rather than simply making a doll. People who know little about puppets however do not realise the complexity of marionettes.

Aside from the poor movement of this puppet I think the doll was well made, though it doesn't look a thing like Justin Timberlake. The sculpted face looks much older than the photo of Justin on the box and the way the hair was painted makes it looks like rocks instead of hair. I like that the doll body was made like an action figure instead of the typical fashion/celebrity doll type of body. This is interesting to me, but as teenage girls were the target market for these marionettes, I don't think the action figure style body was a good idea.

Although NSYNC was a very popular group at the time, these marionettes did not sell very well and had to be discounted on clearance. Even at the reduced price, they lingered in stores for quite awhile. I think standard fashion type dolls would have been more successful products than these "marionettes". Above is a closer view of the overly simplistic marionette control.

High School Musical, 10.5 inch doll by Mattel, 2006

Here is a doll of Zac Efron as Troy from the Disney TV movie High School Musical, which is the first in a trilogy of films. The movie premiered in 2006 so I assume this doll was also made in 2006. Troy dolls were sold in several different outfits for each of the three High School Musical movies, and as such there are a dozen or more Troy dolls to collect. For the third movie a new head sculpt was used on Troy dolls which shows him smiling with an open mouth. Other characters from the movies were also produced as dolls in various outfits.

I bought this Troy doll second hand at a doll show without the original box. Based on pictures that I've found online this doll was originally sold individually or in a two pack set with Gabriella (she has a red dress). A second version of the two pack set has a talking feature and the Troy doll's white gym outfit is slightly different. The jacket for the talking version is open at the front and the doll has a red shirt underneath. The red stripes on the sleeves and legs of the outfit are also slightly thicker than the stripes on the outfit shown above, which are just rows of red thread stitching. The jacket on the doll shown above does not open at the front, but rather at the back and has Velcro to hold it closed.

This is an awesome doll as it's very Mego-like with the way it's jointed, and I like the smaller 10.5 inch size. The rooted hair on the doll is also soft and loose rather than being glued down into position as is often the case for male fashion dolls with rooted hair. It's also a very cute doll too, but you'd have to try hard not to make a doll of Zac Efron cute! Below are pictures of him from the movie wearing the white gym outfit that the doll's clothes are based on. He's a Cutie Patootie!

KISS, 8 inch dolls by Toy Figures Company, 2011

In 2011 Figures Toy Company (FTC) offered reproductions of the popular 12 inch Mego Kiss dolls that were originally sold in the late 1970s. The series of four Kiss dolls were issued by FTC in both 12 inch and 8 inch doll sizes. Shown above left is the 8 inch FTC doll of Paul Stanley as "The Starchild", based on the Kiss record album "Love Gun". This first series of dolls was followed by additional sets based on other Kiss record albums. Shown above right is FTC's all-new original Mego-like doll of Gene Simmons as "The Demon" from series 3, which was released in 2012 and based on the Sonic Boom album.

Here is the Love Gun "Starchild" 8 inch doll with the packaging. Each doll comes with a "collectable album cover" card. Below is the back view of the packaging which has a re-closable plastic shell.

 

 Series 1 "Starchild" and "Spaceman" 8 inch Kiss dolls by FTC.

 Here is the "Demon" 8 inch doll with the Somic Boom packaging. Below is the back view.

Text and Photos © Mike Artelle, 2011, 2013