“I never loved aerobics,” says Cher, right before she launches into a step class involving swoops, kicks, jumps and a heart-rate check-in. The year is 1991. Cher is resplendent in sheer black tights, a black leotard with what looks like a painfully narrow crotch and a black tutu. On her feet are sneakers topped by scrunched-down black leg warmers. Cher’s exercise video constitutes just one in a wave of celebrity fitness videos, kick-started by Jane Fonda’s iconic 1982 VHS, Jane Fonda’s Workout. These videos are the banner product to emerge from a peculiar but perfect storm that hit in the final few decades of the last millennium: new interest in the details of celebrities’ lives and bodies, a surge of interest in cardiovascular activity and—that old chestnut—social pressure for women to look a certain way. In the videos, This story is from Kinfolk Issue Thirty-six Buy Now Related Stories Arts & Culture Issue 43 The Alt-Right Wellness Loop Where alt-health meets the alt-right. Arts & Culture Issue 39 Learn Lenience We were all young once. Arts & Culture Issue 39 Pay it Forward How to be a mentor. Arts & Culture Issue 39 Be Accountable On youth and responsibility. Arts & Culture Issue 39 Think Back A reexamination of nostalgia. Arts & Culture Issue 39 Grow Up In praise of aging.
