Politics & Power Quote by Cleo Moore

Cleo Moore’s line lands like a perfectly timed pin in a balloon: the mid-century American obsession with “European” glamour. Dropping Anita Ekberg’s name is the tell. Ekberg, a Scandinavian export marketed as a continental spectacle, embodied the era’s fantasy that Europe was where sex appeal came pre-certified. Moore swats that myth aside with blunt, almost backstage pragmatism: whatever you think those girls have, American girls have it too.

The intent is partly defensive, partly promotional. In the 1950s star system, actresses were brands in competition, and “European” functioned as a shortcut for sophistication, permissiveness, and cachet. Moore reframes the competition on home turf. By insisting there’s “nothing not found” in American girls, she’s not praising American womanhood in the abstract; she’s challenging the audience’s imported hierarchy of desirability. It’s a nationalism of the neckline, delivered with a working actress’s sense of the market.

The subtext is more pointed: “exotic” is a sales tactic, not a biological advantage. Moore hints that the supposed difference is packaging - accents, publicity stills, the press’s breathless tone - rather than some mysterious continental essence. Including Ekberg “even” underscores the jab: if the most mythologized European bombshell doesn’t surpass American girls, the whole European-worship script starts to look like a con.

Contextually, it’s a snapshot of a culture negotiating postwar confidence and insecurity at once: America booming, yet still craving Old World validation. Moore’s quip is less about women’s bodies than about who gets to define glamour - and who profits from the illusion.