Hey, Martha: Nice Device

When you work for a tabloid newspaper, especially one as lively as the New York Post, you never know what you’ll be asked to do each morning you walk into the office. In 2004, queen of domestic TV Martha Stewart was sentenced to five months in a federal prison and five months of house arrest for lying to SEC investigators about a stock sale. The Post was all over the story from day one—from the bombshell news that a figure best known for her baking skills was facing national disgrace, through her five-week trial, to her time in Alderson women’s prison in West Virginia. In March 2005 she was released and opted to take her house arrest in her mansion in Bedford, upstate New York—as opposed to her other multimillion-dollar pad in Greenwich, Connecticut. But just like any other felon, she was required at all times to wear a small black box strapped to her ankle which alerted authorities if she stepped outside her home. (more)

On the day her house arrest began I was summoned to test out just what a pain it would be for someone as grand as Martha to strap a clunky plastic bracelet to her ankle, which she was required to wear in bed—and even the bath! Sunday Post reporter Philip Recchia had persuaded one of the bracelet's manufacturers to send us one on the sly, giving us an exclusive, as no other paper had got hold of one. For a fun set of pictures I “road-tested” the bracelet in a range of locations, from a pedicure salon to a bar stool in my local East Village bar—to my bed and the bath. For the shot, I borrowed the bathroom of Julie Stapen, the photographer on the assignment with me, who had a small bathroom with a bath in her apartment (I only had a shower). We filled it with bubble bath and added some candles, and then I got in wearing a bikini which we covered in bubbles. We knew as soon as we saw the snap that that picture would be the one used in the Post. The story was picked up by all the TV news stations, mainly as an excuse to run a silly picture of a reporter half naked in a bath. FOX then asked me to model the bracelet on their morning news show—with my clothes on!