at least had pale skin. “No one could imagine una negra as a standard of beauty back then,” said a former dancer who asked not to be named. It was unfortunate, for then, as now, the country teemed with stunning women of all skin colors. Tropicana was not alone in this policy of only picking white, or white-looking models and dancers. The pages of Show reveal hardly any black women at all, the exception being the singers. On the other hand, there are many, many light-skinned women of mixed race, for the problem was not race itself, but appearance. “There was a standard,” said dancer Eddy Serra.
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