Of all the career-killing films I’ve ever seen, perhaps the most epic is Mahogany (1975), the cautionary tale about blind ambition that sunk the acting aspirations of diva Diana Ross. Ross was coming off the high of playing Billie Holliday in the biopic Lady Sings the Blues, for which she’d earned an Oscar nomination.

Then came this: a purported exposé of the fashion biz. Everything about Motown maestro Berry Gordy’s directorial debut was pretty disastrous, from the ludicrous dialogue to the loony plot twists. Ross was reunited with her Blues co-star Billy Dee Williams, playing a rising politician who attempts to teach her the value of setting her own career aside so that she can learn the true meaning of life, which involves being his unquestioning appendage. The mix of racial and sexual politics is pretty unnerving here, with the chick basically learning to forego her own ambitions for his.

And while this film and the surreal black version of The Wizard of Oz, The Wiz (1978), would effectively sink Ross’s thespian career, the weirdest and arguably saddest bit of casting is that of Anthony Perkins, who plays a power-mad photographer with sexual problems. Clearly dredging up another variation on Norman Bates, Perkins has a seriously uncomfortable love-making scene with Ross, as well as the most hilarious photo shoot/car crash combo sequence ever captured. But most bizarre is watching Perkins wrestle with Williams for what seems like an eternity over the big, black gun they’re both holding. Repressed homosexuality never looked so kitschy.

by MATTHEW HAYS