Marianne Gaba

Marianne was Playmate of the Month for September 1959. Her pictorial was titled A Cover Girl Uncovers.

Marianne was born Mary Ann Gaba on Nov. 13, 1939, in Chicago. Her father Frank Gaba was a mailman while her mother Marie was a factory worker. She was fluent in three languages (Bohemian, Polish and Spanish) in addition to English.

Marianne was crowned Miss Illinois in a local beauty pageant in 1957 and was one of 15 finalists in the Miss Universe contest in Long Beach, CA, that same year. After moving to California, she dated actor Ricky Nelson. She attended USC for two years and wrote a gossip column for “TV and Movie Screen” magazine.

Marianne made her movie debut in 1958 in “Missile to the Moon,” cast as a sexy Moon Maiden. She acted in a number of movies and television shows in the late 1950s and early 1960s. She is perhaps best known for “How to Stuff a Wild Bikini” (1965) in which she played surfer chick Animal.

Marianne married Michael Eugene Starkman on June 11, 1960, in Las Vegas. She had a son, Gregory, in 1962, and a daughter, Wendy, in 1966.

Marianne died May 3, 2016, in Los Angeles from brain cancer. She was 76.

All posts about Marianne

Digital | Video | Later in life

Playboy appearances:

• Playmate of the Month pictorial, A Cover Girl Uncovers, September 1959
• Playboy’s Playmate Review, January 1960
• Playmates Revisited 1959, July 1964
• Playboy’s Playmate Reunion, April 1980
• Playmate News, December 1999

Cover:

• November 1958
• January 1960

NSS:

• Book of Lingerie, September-October 1995
• Celebrating Centerfolds Vol. 1, 1998
• Playmates – The First Fifteen Years, 1983
• Pocket Playmates 6, 1997

Foreign:

• Japanese NSS Playmates 312, 1980
• Japanese NSS Playmates Collection 4, 1983
• Japanese edition pictorial, All the Playmates Go Marching On!, February 1987

Other publications:

• Glamorgirl Photography magazine, December 1959
• Modern Screen magazine, date unknown
• The Playmate Book: Five Decades of Centerfolds, 1996

Movies:

• Missile to the Moon (1958) as a Moon Girl
• Li’l Abner (1959) in an uncredited role as a chorus dancer
• Please Don’t Eat the Daisies (1960) in an uncredited role as a young girl
• Raymie (1960) as “second girl”
• G.I. Blues (1960) in an uncredited role as a bargirl
• The Ladies Man (1961) as a working girl
• The Choppers (1961) as Liz
• Island of Love (1963) in an uncredited role
• Honeymoon Hotel (1964) in an uncredited role as a wife
• The Patsy (1964) in an uncredited role as a waitress
• Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965) as a robot
• How to Stuff a Wild Bikini (1965) as Animal

Television:

• The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (1957) as Miss Illinois in the episode “Too Much Pot Roast”
• You Bet Your Life (1958) as herself
• Mike Hammer (1958) as Gloria in the episode “Slay Upon Delivery”
• The Steve Allen Plymouth Show (1959) as herself
• The George Burns Show (1959) in the episode “The 18 Year Old Novelist”
• Johnny Staccato (1959) as “third girl” in the episode “A Piece of Paradise”
• 77 Sunset Strip as Polly in the episode “Designing Eye” (1961), as Peaches Schultz in the episode “The Affairs of Adam Gallante” (1960), and as Lita Ladoux in the episode “Sing Something Simple” (1959)
• Checkmate (1961) as Lucille in the episode “The Button Down Break”
• The Roaring 20’s (1962) as Dixie in the episode “Footlights”
• Wendy and Me (1964) as a girl in the episode “Wendy, the Woman in the Gray Flannel Suit”
• The Beverly Hillbillies (1965) as Squirrel in the episodes “Cool School in Out” and “Big Daddy, Jed”
• Burke’s Law (1965) as a beautiful blonde in the episode “Who Killed the Fat Cat?”
• Showtime special Playboy’s Playmate Reunion (1982)
• E! True Hollywood Story (2006) as herself

Playboy Videos:

• Playboy Video Centerfold Lynne Austin (1987) – Playmate Update segment
• Playboy’s Playmates: The Early Years (1992)