Caitlyn Jenner on Vanity Fair Cover: How Twitter and Family React
Meet Caitlyn Jenner. (Photo: Vanity Fair)
The July 2015 cover for Vanity Fair is our first introduction to Caitlyn Jenner, formerly known as Bruce Jenner. The issue will hit newsstands on June 9, 2015, but digital subscribers have early access to the cover story. The profile comes following a 20/20 interview with Diane Sawyer, where Jenner first spoke publicly about her transition. “I’m not doing this to be interesting,” says Jenner in the Vanity Fair profile. “I’m doing this to live.” She reiterates that contrary to naysayers, this is not all a publicity stunt. "You don’t go out and change your gender for a television show. O.K., it ain’t happening. I don’t care who you are.”
The photos were taken in Jenner’s Malibu home by famed photographer Annie Leibovitz and will accompany a profile by writer Buzz Bissinger. Jenner’s cover look comes courtesy of some beauty industry heavyweights: The hair is by Oribe, makeup by Mark Carrasquillo, and manicure by Deborah Lippmann. Jenner looks quite different since the April 24 interview with 20/20. Vanity Fair reports that Caitlyn completed her facial-feminization surgery that included hairline correction, forehead contouring, and jaw and chin contouring as well as a breast augmentation, since the TV interview aired.
Speaking about her cover story, Jenner tells Bissinger, “If I was lying on my deathbed and I had kept this secret and never ever did anything about it, I would be lying there saying, ‘You just blew your entire life.’” Indeed, Jenner kept his secret for decades, hiding his desire to be female way back when doing speeches and endorsements following his 1976 Olympic win. Of that time, Jenner told Vanity Fair, “Underneath my suit I have a bra and panty hose and this and that and thinking to myself, ‘They know nothing about me.’” Jenner says she used to wear his first wife’s bras and that she was a “good solid B cup” when he met his third wife, Kris.
Jenner took to Twitter today from her updated account, @caitlyn_jenner, to acknowledge the cover shoot and has been met largely with praise from her family and many fans — some using the hashtag #CallMeCaitlyn. Step daughter Kim Kardashian tweeted, “How beautiful! Be happy, be proud, live life YOUR way!” Khloe Kardashian took to Instagram to support the magazine cover. “We were given this life because you were strong enough to live it!” Kardashian wrote. “I couldn’t be prouder!!! Caitlyn, You are beautiful!!!” Daughter Kylie Jenner posted the cover on Instagram, writing “My angel on earth!” while Kendall Jenner also gave praise via Instagram, saying, “Be free now pretty bird,” and “Now that’s a cover!”
Caitlyn will accept the Arthur Ashe Courage Award at ESPN’s ESPY awards in LA on July 15. (Past recipients include Muhammad Ali and Nelson Mandela.) All 10 of her children and step children are expected to be on stage while Jenner accepts the award at her first major public appearance.
We congratulate Caitlyn Jenner for bravely revealing her new look to the public.
