I am just reading about Kay Francis, a Hollywood actress, very big in the 1930s, and I have lost count of the number of abortions she's had, after 8. She kept diaries throughout her life with entries like; 'Maurice Chevalier fucked me 4 times in 2 hours'... and she seems to have had countless partners.
I suppose it is more surprise & prurient interest than judging them! It's always interesting to read about how other women have led their lives. Kay Francis reminds me of Tallulah Bankhead, as both women seem to be very much into non emotional recreational sex and were bisexual. Then there are other Hollywood actresses like Joan Crawford & Bette Davis who used sex as power and would ensure that they slept with their directors so they could gain some control over the production and especially over the other actresses in it. Marlene Dietrich had sex with everyone, but especially her co-stars as she needed her leading men to be in love with her. During WWII she was on the frontline servicing the soldiers as she felt that they 'should have the chance to sleep with a beautiful movie star before going to their death....' As revealed by her daughter, Maria. Dietrich's reasons seemed to have been narcissistic, as she later claimed to her daughter that she didn't even like sex!
As a teenage ex convent schoolgirl we were all obsessed with the erotic writer Anais Nin, who was really popular in the 1980s and some sort of feminist icon. It was very, very racy at the time... Later it was revealed that she'd been a bigamist, had wrote about knowingly committing incest with her father as an adult women ('seducing' her father, she called it!). Later her second husband, Rupert, released the unedited diaries (Nin edited them extensively for publication removing all references to the fact that she'd been married and her first husband, Hugo, a wealthy banker had bankrolled her artistic lifestyle) and it painted a different picture. Reading these versions in the 2000s, I'll admit that when she writes about walking the street of NY with the semen of three different men inside her on her way to meet a 4th lover, I am revolted. It all seemed rather pathological as if she went through her life using sex as a form of validation and for narcissistic reasons or she that may have been a nymphomaniac. Then she was compelled to write it all down.
Perhaps it is not the sex itself but to speculate about the reason behind that is more interesting. A lot of these studio actresses in the 1930s were working a six day week in a factory style production churning out film after film, so you could also argue that the sex was a form of physical release. There was also a degree of narcissism, especially if your employer is promoting you as a 'love goddess' or 'femme fatale.'
Even today, it is interesting that some women need constant male attention while others are happy with Wordle.