How ‘original influencer’ Angelyne hid her true Polish past and Holocaust survivor heritage

The mysterious life of Angelyne – who was branded the ‘original influencer’ after she was skyrocketed into the spotlight when pictures of her were hung up around Los Angeles in the ’80s sparking a wave of media coverage and intrigue – is about to come to light in a brand new Peacock series.

The pink-Corvette driving blonde bombshell rose to fame in 1984 after she popped up on a series of Billboards around the LA-area of California – which featured her posing seductively with the word ‘Angelyne’ written across them.

With no other explanation, the mystery and allure of the ads left many people intrigued, and propelled Angelyne, now 71, into the spotlight. 

The billboards led to a lot of attention from the media, and the rising star soon began to receive offers for movie roles and TV show appearances, as well as magazine interviews and modeling campaigns. 

But while Angelyne slowly took over the globe, her true identity remained a secret from the public.

Early on in her career, Angelyne avoided answering any questions about where she came from, and when she did shed some light on her background during interviews, she claimed to be a Midwestern orphan.

However, it was later revealed that the star wasn’t actually who she claimed to be. Despite insisting that she grew up in Idaho, it was later revealed that was born in Poland and was raised in an ‘ultra-orthodox community of Hasidic Jews’ in Israel.

Throughout the early ’80s, Angelyne’s every move was covered by outlets – and the socialite quickly became one of the most famous faces in the world.

However, it was still unclear where the starlet actually hailed from. 

Angelyne somehow managed to keep her heritage hidden, and for more than two decades, her past was a mystery to the world. 

However, in 2017, The Hollywood Reporter published an expose on the model and actress, in which it uncovered her true identity – and it turns out, she was a Jewish girl named Ronia Tamar Goldberg whose parents were Holocaust survivors.

Angelyne’s epic story – including how she rose to fame and how she hid her real self from millions of people for more than 20 years – is now being brought to life in the upcoming Peacock series entitled Angelyne.

The show, which is set to premiere on the streaming service tomorrow, stars Emmy Rossum, Hamish Linklater, Lukas Gage, Martin Freeman, and Alex Karpovsky.

So how did the Hollywood starlet go from a poor immigrant to one of the most talked about people in the industry?

As Peacock gears up for the release on their new show about Angelyne, FEMAIL has uncovered her journey from start to finish – from how she shed her Polish past to how she hid her Holocaust survivor heritage. 

Inside Angelyne’s raise to fame: How a bunch of Billboard’s launched her major career

Angelyne first rose to fame when she joined her then-boyfriend’s punk rock band Baby Blue in 1974 as a singer. The band played across numerous clubs and bars in LA, but didn’t garner much success and they quickly split up.

She then dropped a self-titled album in 1982. But it wasn’t until her billboards took over Los Angeles two years later that her career really took off.

According to Angelyne, the advertisements came to be after she met wealthy adhesive-free-tape creator Hugo Maisnik in 1982. 

Together, they came up with the idea for the billboards and had them printed and placed all around Los Angeles – at one point, posting more than 200 at one time.

She soon started to receive calls from movie producers and directors and over the years has amassed an impressive and very varied array of credits, including role in sci-fi flick Earth Girls Are Easy in 1988, crime drama Dangerous Love that same year, comedy film Homer and Eddie in 1989, horror movie The Malibu Beach Vampires, and 1999’s The Underground Comedy Movie. 

‘Success is a high better than any drug,’ she told Oyster in 2018. ‘And to be honest, I got kind of addicted to the attention. I became a billboard junkie.

‘My whole focus was to inspire. Before my billboard went up, somebody said to me, “Those billboards are going to [spread like] wildfire for you,” and they did. Like wildfire.’

After receiving attention for the billboards, she continued to pursue her music career – dropping a second album, entitled Driven to Fantasy, in 1986, and an EP in 2000, called Beauty & the Pink.

Angelyne – who became well known for often posing in her bright pink Corvette – also launched her own record label, entitled Pink Kitten, and was the face of Michael Kuluva’s clothing line Tumbler and Tipsy.

She is also a painter and has had several art shows. Over the years, she offered personalized tours around Sunset Boulevard and Hollywood through her website, and sold photo ops for $20.

When asked if she believes she helped create the current concept of a social media influencer, she explained, ‘I do, but [my career] was definitely more notorious. 

‘It’s this instant gratification now – I mean, who’s going to go out, get an investor, get an image of themselves, then put up a bunch of billboards? 

‘How much harder is that than just snapping a photo? So, I’m definitely owed some credit. 

‘But I think I’m different in the sense that I promote glamor, and beauty, and music, and love, not just an everyday reality kind of thing.

‘I like to think I inspire people to become fabulous – like a walking piece of art – like I am.’

A documentary about her was released in 1995 by filmmaker Robinson Devor.

In 2003, she ran for governor of California. In the end, she received 2,536 votes and came in 29th out of 135 candidates. Arnold Schwarzenegger ultimately won the race.

He slogan for her campaign was, ‘We’ve had gray, we’ve had brown, now it’s time for some blond and pink,’ and her mascot was a pink Maltese named Budda.

She ran again in 2021 and this time, she finished 18th – which was the highest candidate without a party reference. 

Since her rise to fame, Angelyne’s iconic billboards have been featured in a series of famous TV shows and movies including Moonlighting, The Simpsons, Futurama, and BoJack Horseman.

A look into Angelyne’s true identity – and how she kept it a secret from the world

Angelyne was born on October 2, 1950, in Chmielnik, Poland. Throughout her time in the spotlight, the superstar kept her identity a secret from the public, and it wasn’t until 2017 – more than 20 years after she rose to fame – that everyone finally knew her real name and age. 

Her true identity was exposed by The Hollywood Reporter after someone who allegedly worked for the federal government contacted them with information on her.

‘I have many details on her life – all well documented – from when her parents met to early adulthood,’ the man – whose own identity was kept private – wrote to them.

‘It’s very different from her public, concocted story – and more interesting.’

The unnamed man – who said he was a self-proclaimed genealogist – explained that he found everything out about her from ‘a global network of public databases,’ and insisted that he had ‘no tie to her other than curiosity.’

After conducting an investigation into his claims, THR said it ‘independently confirmed’ his findings with ‘public records and family members.’

According to the man, Agelyne’s childhood was not easy. Her parents were Polish Jews who met in Chmielnik during World War II – they were among 500 to survive out of a population of 13,000, while the rest were sent to death at Treblinka.

Her parents, Hendrik Goldberg and Bronia Zernicka, endured ‘unimaginable horrors at a series of concentration camps,’ THR reported, per documents obtained from the International Tracing Service.

After Angelyne – who went by Renee Goldberg as a kid – was born, the family relocated to Israel.

They stayed there until 1959, living in an ‘ultra-orthodox community of Hasidic Jews called Bnei Brak,’ just east of Tel Aviv.

From a young age, she dreamed of being famous, with the star telling Oyster, ‘I used to visualize myself when I was two years old up in the sky like one of the stars.’

‘Even when I was a little girl, I knew I was meant to make the world become a better place. But of course, at the time, I didn’t know through what medium.’

The family then headed to America via boat, settling in the Fairfax District of California. But after coming to the states, tragedy struck Angelyne and her family when her mother tragically passed away from cancer when she was just 14.

A year later, her dad remarried a woman named Deborah, and the family moved to Panorama City in the San Fernando Valley, where she attended Monroe Senior High School.

She then got married to the son of a Beverly Hills executive, named Michael Strauss, and moved to Hollywood with him – however, they divorced in 1969.

‘She was the most gorgeous redhead. She was unique, beautiful, smart,’ Michael later told THR.

He described her dad as ‘controlling, cruel and narrow-minded’ and said Angelyne never spoke of her mother.

‘She’d never talk about her mother – ever, ever, ever. It was a subject that couldn’t be brought up. If I brought it up, it was shut down,’ he recalled.

After the two broke up, they stayed amicable, and they reconnected years later – after she had transformed herself to Angelyne.

‘All of a sudden, big boobs, blond hair, this voice – the voice used to make me nuts. It didn’t compute with who I’d known she was,’ he said.

Michael added that when they went their separate ways, he held on to some of her personal items ‘because she didn’t want them, and he wasn’t just going to throw them away.’

‘I mean, what if she eventually wanted them back? Except she never did,’ he continued.

‘I saw her in the early 1990s, and I said, “I have these things.” She didn’t want them. She wanted nothing to do with it. She’d created another life.

‘It’s a persona that must have suited her. It made her way in life. It’s not an easy world out there.’

When asked about her childhood by the outlet years earlier, Angelyne claimed that she was an orphan who hailed from Idaho.

‘I lost my parents at a young age, and because of that, I sought the attention of the world through my tricks,’ she explained. ‘I said, “Well, I’m going to get the love of the world.”

When pressed further about her childhood, she added: ‘It’s just a long story, I don’t want to get into it. I made my way here.’

During the interview, she wouldn’t talk about which town she grew up in, and didn’t specify her religion, explaining, ‘I’ve tried them all – Jewish, Catholic, Hindu: too many dogmas.’

When THR reached out to Angelyne’s assistant, Scott Hennig, in 2017 about its findings, he responded, ‘This stuff comes up every few years – it seems to get more and more ridiculous.

‘My favorite one of all was this 300-pound black woman who claimed to be her mother.

‘”I’m your long-lost brother,” “your twin sister.” Chalk it up to life in Hollywood. I’ve never heard of “Renee Goldberg.”

‘It’s laughable, it’s outrageous,’ he continued, adding that the genealogist ‘needed to get a life.’

‘It’s almost like stalker stuff, it really is. It’s kind of creepy. It’s weird.’

THR also uncovered a 2016 document in which Angelyne petitioned to have her name legally changed to Angelyne Llyne at Ventura Superior Court.

‘This is my stage name that I use and have used since 1978,’ she listed as the reason for the change.

When asked about the document and the other paperwork that the genealogist had provided, Scott told the outlet, ‘I’m not saying the paperwork isn’t legitimate. I’m saying it ain’t her.

‘Look, I get emails from another Scott Hennig, a karate expert in Texas. People think that’s me. There are a lot of girls out there named Angelyne. 

‘I don’t know what to tell you. And who knows how legitimate this old stuff is, going back to World War II? And who’s this guy? He’s poking into Angelyne’s business.’ 

THR then asked Angelyne directly about the allegations regarding her identity, and she called the genealogist a ‘stalker.’

‘Angelyne also stated that it’s her inalienable right alone to share her story as she sees fit – or not,’ the outlet reported.

Now, the star – who lives in the Ventura County area of Thousand Oaks – is focused on bringing her face to the digital world.

‘I want to make Angelyne queen of the internet and the world and the universe and cyberspace so that I can spread positive energy everywhere,’ she gushed to Oyster.

A glimpse at the upcoming Peacock series: How Emmy Rossum transformed herself into the Billboard queen

The new Peacock series is set to take a deeper dive into Angelyne’s mysterious life.

At first, Angelyne appeared to be on board with the show, with Rossum writing in an Instagram post in 2020, ‘So excited to be able to share that the embodiment of LA itself, the original Queen of the Universe, is the executive producer of our show.’

However, she eventually stepped back from the project, and is no longer the executive producer, according to THR. 

She has still never publicly confirmed THR’s findings on her childhood, and after the 2017 article originally came out, she shared an ambiguous response.

‘When I became famous, a lot of people just wanted to be part of it, so they’ll say anything,’ she said.

She also spoke out about the article while chatting with Oyster. She told them, ‘Everybody has a take on who Angelyne is from their own perspective. However they see me, is who I am. I let my fans decide.’ 

The creators of the show, which is being executive produced by Rossum’s husband and Mr. Robot creator Sam Esmail, are excited to showcase Angelyne’s allure.

‘We don’t really think of it as a biopic. We almost feel like it’s a show about the failure of biopics and how there’s no way we could get it right,’ showrunner Allison Miller told Variety.

Rossum was ‘utterly transformed’ for the role, according to NBCUniversal drama executive Alex Sepiol, who called her ‘fearless and bold and just a trouper.’ 

Rossum added, ‘As my acting coach likes to tell me, intensity is not something I struggle with. I wanted to give them the experience.

‘I found it to be completely liberating to look in the mirror and not see myself at all. At first, it’s unnerving. But feeling lost gives way to this real liberation – from myself and the hang-ups that can impede a performance.’

Karpovsky is set to play Jeff Glasner in the upcoming show – a journalist based on THR’s Baum, who originally wrote the 2017 expose on Angelyne. 

Linklater, on the other hand, is going to star as Rick Krause, the president of the Angelyne fan club, while Freeman will play a character named Harold Wallach, who is based on Maisnik.