Everyone is familiar with the blonde stereotype: Blonde girls are sexy, but not very smart. They like to sleep their way to the top, because they don't have the brains to get there the normal way. The amazing thing is that this stereotype has been promoted on the big and small screen by blonde stars during many decades.
In case someone would be in doubt about this: although the stereotype does have some real life examples, it's certainly not applicable to all blondes, nor to a majority of blondes. And you will also find brunettes or redheads corresponding to the same stereotype.
The most famous blonde stereotype on the big screen was Marilyn Monroe. In the movie Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, she plays the dumb blonde, with the smart brunette Jane Russell on her side. The title of the movie explains all: The dumb blonde is considered much more desirable.
My own personal favorite was decades later on the TV screen, when Christina Applegate played Kelly Bundy in the popular sitcom Married With Children. Men were always attracted to her, but she was incredibly dumb.
Again much later, the stereotype came back in a more subtle way in Friends, where Jennifer Aniston played Rachel, and Lisa Kudrow played Phoebe. Phoebe was simply a little bit weird. However the subtlety was in the Rachel character, which was not so much a parody as was Kelly Bundy, but simply not such a smart girl, first working as a waitress in a bar, and later getting better jobs mostly because of her looks. Although she did get high level jobs in the end, she never made a very bright impression. The danger was in making this look like reality.
However, it was not much later when blondes were beginning to be more smart on the screen. Sarah Jessica Parker played a smart blonde writer in Sex and the City. She did have some of the typical blonde characteristics, such as her obsession for shoes and fashion in general. But being a writer made her an intellectual and thus far from stupid.
In the beginning of the 21st century, there was also the movie Legally Blonde, where Reese Witherspoon plays the blonde Elle. She starts out as the totel blonde stereotype, but by the end of the movie she turns out to be smarter than anyone else. She does however still wear pink all the time, and keeps showing many other stereotypical blonde characteristics.