“It was a hoot, a real hoot!” repeated the girls, still a bit awed by the experience. After all, it isn’t every day that a group in their 70s, 80s and 90s gets treated to an overnight stay at a New York City hotel, followed by an appearance on “The Kelly Clarkson Show.”
The “girls” are women who grace the pages of a 2025 calendar titled “Spectacular Seniors,” created as a fundraising project for the Tenants Association at the Jack Satter House in Revere, Mass., one of seven Hebrew SeniorLife residences in the state. Not only do they show some of the activities of the facility—gardening, grilling, exercising, computer work, card games—but they do it minus most of their clothing.
It caused a little stir north of Boston and drew the attention of articles, interviews and a spot on national television. They were even honored by the mayor of Revere, Patrick M. Keefe Jr., and the city council on May 12, when each woman received an individual commendation celebrating their “artistic expression and bold presence,” which proved that “creativity and confidence know no age.”
The full commendation, which was presented by Revere Ward 5 Councillor Angela Guarino-Sawaya, reads: “In recognition of your outstanding partnership in the ‘Calendar Girls Project’ at the Jack Satter House and in acknowledgment of your spirited involvement, artistic expression and bold presence by bringing joy and inspiration to our local community as well as capturing viral national attention culminating in a well-deserved feature on ‘The Kelly Clarkson Show’ in New York City, wherein proving that creativity and confidence know no age, special recognition is hereby accorded.”
But it was their April 24 appearance (on Clarkson’s 43rd birthday, of all things) that proved the highlight of the past six weeks of recognition. Three women went on stage with the show’s namesake: Loretta Paquet, Phyllis Snyder and Roxanne Aiello. The rest sat as VIPs in the audience.
For Paquet, 90, it was a celebrity other than Clarkson that she kept mentioning. While waiting in one of the prep rooms before being called to the stage, actor Ben Affleck, an earlier guest on the show, walked over to her, and gave her a hug and a kiss.
“In my old age, I never would have thought I was going to get kissed by Ben Affleck,” gushed Paquet. As the camera was rolling, she declared to Clarkson in a heavy Boston accent that she was “never gonna wash these ahms. And never gonna wash this part of my face,” she gestured.
She said, “It was an experience you couldn’t believe!” More than that, she told JNS: “I’ve never been popular in my life, and now I’m a star. We never realized it would become as popular as it did. Whoever thought at 90, I’d be a pin-up girl?”
Paquet, a mother and grandmother who posed for the month of February surrounded by a bunch of oversized Bingo cards, was born and raised in Cambridge, Mass., the same town where Affleck grew up. She has lived at the Satter House for six years, and while not Jewish, takes advantage of the activities there, even Jewish ones. She said that there’s no place she’d rather be and that she wanted to participate in the calendar because “everything is so negative in this world, and I thought, ‘Let’s do something nice.’”
She noted that she never expected all the attention—or the fact that she keeps seeing the calendar in different places, like her doctor’s office.
About 700 calendars have been sold since beginning this project, said Jerusalem-born Rabbi Lior Nivo, 42, who serves as a chaplain for the independent-living facility, with more orders still coming in. Originally, 300 were printed at a cost of $15, the amount residents pay annually and on an optional basis to the Tenants Association, which provides social and cultural activities beyond the programming provided by the Satter House. That includes theater outings, sightseeing tours, harbor cruises, parties and more to keep residents engaged.
Nivo, who spearheaded the project, said: “I think the message of loving and being proud of the bodies we have—these bodies that have carried us through the ups and downs of life—has been very meaningful. And more broadly, the idea that these women in their 70s, 80s and 90s still have meaningful lessons to teach the younger generations has been important and inspiring for many people. For me, as a rabbi, I see the spiritual aspects that this calendar touched—creating meaning, feeling empowered and finding purpose.”
‘It’s like my last hurrah’
Phyllis Snyder, born in Swampscott, Mass., who turned 92 on June 1, also appeared on stage “The Kelly Clarkson Show.” She said it was an “awesome trip,” though the bus ride was long. To make it easier, she brought along little bottles of champagne and orange juice to mix and share mini-mimosas along the way.
In all, 16 people rode a bus from Revere to New York for the overnight stay, including three staff members.
“It was like I had my Broadway debut—but on TV,” said Snyder, who has two daughters, two granddaughters and two great-granddaughters. “It’s like my last hurrah.”
While she wasn’t embraced by Affleck, she remembers a kiss of another kind when she got off the plane at Ben-Gurion International Airport to visit Israel in the 1970s with her husband, Al Snyder, who passed away 13 years ago. She disembarked the plane onto the tarmac and pressed her lips to the earth.
“Being Jewish is in my gut,” she said. She didn’t forget that trip and said she won’t soon forget the New York one, where she had her hair and makeup done “just like a celebrity.”
Snyder modeled for the month of November on a workout machine in the Satter House gym.
As for being an active nonagenarian, Snyder insisted that “every day, I try to learn something new. I love being alone and also being in the middle of the action.” (They’re the attributes of a typical Gemini, she notes). In fact, she added, “sometimes, I feel like I should be a motivational speaker.”
Roxanne Aiello, 80, chimed in that “you have to be involved.” As president of the Tenants Association, she is an advocate for moving around, joining in and keeping busy. She posed discreetly with two other women for the month of June behind an association banner.
She said the calendar has brought a lot of attention to Hebrew SeniorLife and the Satter House, in particular. Aiello, Jewish and Boston-born, said that’s one of the reasons the women look so good: Bordering Revere Beach, the building is “like a resort—a beautiful place to live.” Some older people from the area are even paying the fee to join the extracurricular activities.
She works to make it better for the residents, saying “it’s never too old to go out and have fun. Studies show that you live longer by being social.”
As for the TV appearance, Aiello said, “I had butterflies in my stomach all morning. But it’s something I will never forget—not in a million years. And I am only 80; it’s not that old. To me, age is only a number.”