Speaking of Aliens …

July 9, 2012 at 11:53 am (Whatever happened to ...?) (Aliens, Jenette Goldstein)

… which I can assure you, we were doing, because what else would we be talking about?, what became of Jenette Goldstein, the kickass chick who played Pvt. Vasquez?

But, because her name wasn’t “Ellen Ripley,” she still died.

I remember, as a child, waiting for my mother to get her hair done (she gets regular perms, because her hair just has no body!), and reading an article about Jenette Goldstein and her role in Aliens (apparently, the magazine couldn’t get a hold of Sigourney Weaver), and then I never heard of her again, and, in fact, didn’t remember her name until I googled Aliens and found her in the cast list. I’m not sure that counts as “remembering,” but whatever.

Anyway, what’s Ms. Goldstein been up to? Could she still bench press a Chevy?

Well, to begin with, Wikipedia tells us that Jenette Goldstein is Jewish, which maybe Pvt. Vasquez was supposed to be, I guess, and also that she owns a store that specializes in large-size bras. I assume this is because she has large-size breasts herself, because I can tell you the last kind of store I would bother to open would be one that specializes in products I could never use.

What I’m saying here is they would laugh me right out of that store, and send me to Sigourney Weaver’s lingerie store across the street.

So those are two things that now we know about Jenette Goldstein.

Also, a thing we know now is that Pvt. Vasquez was her first role, the character’s name was also Jenette, probably so James Cameron wouldn’t have to remember two whole names, and that she earned a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress for the role. That seemed odd to me, but it looks like the Saturns like movies that probably shouldn’t be getting any awards at all, so let’s just go with it.

And then, Jenette Goldstein didn’t disappear off the face of the earth like I kind of thought she did (like maybe Aliens was actually a documentary, and she totally died in that explosion), she just grew her hair out.

Since her stint in Aliens, she’s kept busy, appearing in episodes of Max Headroom (really!) and MacGyver in 1991 (really?), as well as Terminator 2 (now that I’ve seen her with long hair, I totally realize that she’s the foster mom! Guh!) and Titanic as Irish Mommy. It seriously credits her as Irish Mommy. Seriously.

But she just looks so different with long hair, you know?

She’s also had roles on Six Feet Under (which, no, I’ve never watched, despite working in obituaries and at a funeral home. For some reason, I just really don’t want to watch a show about funeral services), ER and Alias, and also Strong Medicine as “Unnamed Friend.” Her characters really have the best names. Or non-names. Or whatever.

Oh, and she was on one of the Star Treks, too, but it’s hard to keep track of them all.

In 2010, she was last seen on Medium, and probably sold her costar Jennifer Love-Hewitt a bra.

Possibly this one!

Her most recent project is something called Living the Dream, which is slated for a 2013 release, and which I don’t care enough about to find out what it is.

Also, she’s been doing a lot of theater work, including a one-woman show that she is writing herself and … I’ve got nothing else here. Really.

Ummmm …
She seems nice?