The Pussycat Dolls

The Pussycat Dolls biography

The Pussycat Dolls are an American pop girl group and dance ensemble, founded in Los Angeles by choreographer Robin Antin in 1995 as a burlesque troupe. After attracting national attention, Antin negotiated a record deal with Interscope Records in 2003 turning the group into a music franchise, which developed a global image and commercial brand overseen by Antin, Interscope and various partners. The first recording group (Nicole Scherzinger, Melody Thornton, Ashley Roberts, Jessica Sutta, Kimberly Wyatt and Carmit Bachar) produced two albums and numerous singles between 2004 and 2009 including the world-wide hits "Don't Cha", "Stickwitu", "Beep", "Buttons", "When I Grow Up", "I Hate This Part", and "Jai Ho! (You Are My Destiny)". "Stickwitu" earned a 2005 Grammy Award nomination, and the Dolls brand diversified into merchandise, reality television programs, a Las Vegas act, product endorsements, spin-off recording groups (Girlicious, Paradiso Girls) and other ventures. By early 2010, the first Dolls recording group had disbanded. In 2009, Billboard ranked the Pussycat Dolls as the 80th most successful musical act of the 2000s.

As of 2011, The Dolls first album sold 9 millions copies worldwide, and their second sold 5 million, making them one of the best selling girl groups of all time. In 2012, Antin announced a new line-up of the "sexy brand" would debut in February in a Go Daddy advertisement at the Super Bowl. A video posted showed Lauren Bennett, Vanessa Curry, Chrystina Sayers, Erica Jenkins and Paula van Oppen as the current line-up.

History

1995-2002: Beginnings as a dance troupe

Antin began exploring the idea of a modern burlesque troupe during 1990 with Christina Applegate and Carla Kama. The dance troupe's first performance was in 1995. From 1995 to 2003 many dance members came and went; the troupe performed with numerous guest vocalists, with a repertoire of 1950s and 1960s popular music standards while dressed in lingerie or old-fashioned pin-up costumes. They secured a Thursday night residency at a Los Angeles nightclub, The Viper Room, where they stayed from 1995 to 2001. They appeared briefly in the 1998 films Matters of Consequence (dancing to Mancini's "Hub Caps and Tail Lights", and Keely Smith's "When Your Lover has Gone"), and The Treat (directed by Jonathan Gems).

The troupe received wider press coverage during June 1999, when Playboy featured a Pussycat Dolls pictorial, featuring at least seven contemporary members posing semi-nude (Kasey Campbell, Kiva Dawson, Antonietta Macri, Erica Breckels, Katie Bergold, Erica Gudis and Lindsley Allen). Three years later, the Pussycat Dolls moved to The Roxy. They were featured in magazines, television specials for MTV and VH1, ad campaigns, and movies. Some of the Pussycat Dolls appeared in the 2003 film Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, dancing to Mancini's "The Pink Panther Theme". They were also featured in Pink's "Trouble" music video. Along with Christina Applegate, Christina Aguilera and Carmen Electra (who was the group's lead performer for many of their shows) the troupe was featured in a Maxim magazine shoot in 2002, which increased public interest in them (Aguilera later appeared in the similarly themed 2010 movie Burlesque directed by Robin Antin's brother Steve).

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